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| Product: Ceiva Digital Picture Frame |
Company: Ceiva Logic |
| Web: www.ceiva.com |
Phone: 310-887-6799 |
| Platform: Your desk |
SRP: US$250
plus $3/mo. fee)
Street Price: same |
Cred Rating: | Special Award: Object Value |
When Bill Gates was building his multi-gazillion dollar high-tech dream home (for a guy that allegedly doesn't know how to program his VCR), one feature that got a lot of media attention was the digital picture frames. Giant LCD screens in various rooms throughout the house display art that can change to suit the mood of the rooms' occupants. You can have a more modest slice of this same technology with the Ceiva digital picture frame ($249, .
The device is basically a traditional-looking 5" x 7" matted, wooden picture frame. Looks are deceiving. This frame has a built-in microprocessor, a power supply, a modem and a 640 x 480 LCD display. Once on a desk or a wall (one you figured out a way to mount it -- it comes with only desk-display capability), you plug in a power and phone cable and your frame logs onto the Internet. A single button is used to access a special image account on Ceiva's Web site. Access can be automated or manual. Different features (slide mode, Web access, etc.) are selected by holding the single button down for various lengths of time in different modes. There is also a brightness button that steps you through the brightness settings.
To load pictures into the frame, you can place them there via your own computer (by placing them into your personal "album" directory at the Ceiva site, or you can give your password to family and friends so they can load images and surprise you. The frame stores up to ten images and your online albums can contain up to 250 images.
With full-blown PCs available for under five hundred dollars and Internet appliances for under a hundred, the Ceiva will seem pricey to many. It's definitely not for everyone. It's the kind of thing you might get granny for a Christmas present 'cause she wants to get in on some of that Internet action (but not too much). Executives might like it as a prestige item, and I can imagine a long-distance romance being enlivened by a little...ah...inspirational photography delivered to the bedroom on a regular basis. Part of the fun of the Ceiva is not knowing what family and friends might load into it. You can get creative too, sending your own artwork, digital greeting cards, and even messages saved as jpegs ("Hey mom, dad. How are you? College is kinda cool. Please send money.")
- Gareth Branwyn [11/22/00]
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