How big should a digital poster frame be?
Ideally, a digital poster frame should be larger than 10-inches. Some of the best digital poster frames such as the Pix-Star have a 15-inch display with a 4:3 aspect ratio. The 4:3 aspect ratio is important for displaying photos without having to edit, crop, zoom, or distort. There’s also an issue whereby some digital poster frames will surround the photos with black bars to fill the screen’s unused space – making photos appear smaller.
In terms of storage space size, we recommend a digital poster frame with 4GB or more of local storage. Note that some digital poster frames offer USB/SD card support and cloud storage in addition to this internal storage, so you have more than one way to hold photos on the frame.
What features to look for in a digital poster frame?
The main feature to look for in a great digital poster frame is Wi-Fi connectivity. Wi-Fi paves the way for more advanced features such as cloud storage with automatic backups, sharing photos to your frame via mobile app and/or web interface, remote configurations and updates, and much more. Almost all of the top digital poster frames offer Wi-Fi and cloud connectivity.
Make sure the digital poster frame has a mobile app and web dashboard that support sharing photos from your phone, social media, photo-sharing sites, and even from your computer. Sharing photos from your phone is essential as it’s the most accessible and simple-to-use way to get photos to any of your frames.
Another important feature is remote configuration support. This feature lets you remotely manage your frame’s settings, start and control slideshows, manage cloud storage, and much more – from anywhere via the Pix-Star frame’s web interface. It’s an ideal feature for families and seniors as you can control most aspects of any connected frame without needing to be in the same room.
Which is the best digital poster frame?
Pix-Star is one of the best digital poster frames for the money. Pix-Star offers a broad set of features that cater to both families and seniors. Photo-sharing is simple using the Pix-Star Snap mobile app to send up to 250 photos to several Pix-Star frames at the same time. Link photo albums from social media and photo-sharing sites and have them sync automatically whenever you upload new photos to a connected album.
Pix-Star has a remote configuration feature that lets you manage and control any of your frames using the Pix-Star web interface. Here you adjust each frame’s settings, start slideshows and adjust how they play, manage the frame’s cloud storage, motion sensor, and much more. It’s a good feature for families and especially elderly users as they don’t have to do much to see slideshows or manage their frames.
Pix-Star includes a lot of useful slideshow features to control the play order and frequency at which photos show. You can set the frame to display newer photos more often, only show photos that fill more than 70% of the display, and even play slideshows from specific files or folders. Videos can play in slideshows alongside photos and you can even play music over a slideshow from a connected USB or SD card.
Unlike competing for digital poster frames like Skylight or Nixplay, Pix-Star doesn’t charge any recurring fees or subscriptions. It offers one of the most robust feature sets and offers it without charging extra. Some digital frames lock many important features (e.g., access to the mobile app) behind a paywall; whereas frames like the Pix-Star offer it freely.
P.S. Pix-Star has a 10-inch digital poster frame and a larger 15-inch digital poster frame. Both frames have the same features and both use a 4:3 aspect ratio to improve how photos display without editing.
Can digital poster frames play slideshows?
Pix-Star’s digital poster frame can play slideshows containing both photos and video clips. Once photos are saved on your Pix-Star frame’s internal storage or a connected USB or SD card, you can start slideshows. Pix-Star supports plug & play, meaning you can play slideshows directly from a connected USB or SD card without having to first copy the photos to your frame’s internal storage.
Pix-Star digital poster frames have several slideshow configurations – many of which can be remotely adjusted via the Pix-Star web interface. Slideshow settings include adjustable play order and frequency, color and brightness settings, transition speed and type, and much more. You can play slideshows from specific files and folders, from a connected USB or SD card, or even start slideshows remotely from anywhere in the world.
How to load photos onto a digital poster frame?
There are several ways to load photos onto a digital poster frame. The most common of these is with the frame’s mobile app. Note that only a handful of digital poster frames have a mobile app. You can send several photos to several frames at the same time – and sometimes even short video and audio recordings.
Another great way to share photos with a digital poster frame is as a web album. Pix-Star’s frame is one of the best frames for web albums. Web albums are photo albums linked from social media or photo-sharing sites such as Google Photos or Facebook. They’re saved automatically to your Pix-Star’s internal storage.
Finally, top frames like the Pix-Star include several other photo-sharing methods such as emailing photos, playing slideshows from a connected USB or SD card, syncing a folder from your computer as a web album, and more.
Can digital poster frames only mount on the wall?
For a digital poster to mount on the wall it needs either support for using a standard VESA mount or include hanging holes on the frame’s rear. Note that several of the top digital poster frames such as Pix-Star support using a standard VESA mount and have several dedicated hanging holes. Pix-Star’s frames can mount on the wall in both orientations, slideshows can be rotated, and individual images can rotate using the in-slideshow settings panel.
