Digital Spectrum 15-Inch Digital Photo Frame

15" Digital PhotoFrame Gold. 15 High-Quality TFT LCD Display Changeable decorative frame 1024x768 screen resolution Play Audio Slideshow Built-in Stereo Speakers Generous Internal Memory Multiple video formats supported: MPEG1,2,4 Built-in CF/SD/MMC/MS/MS Pro Remote Control

Great Product,/Risky Purchase (Keith D. Quintrell, Reisterstown, MD, 2008-05-16)

In a nutshell...
A beautiful, versatile and powerful product... that's the only reason that I was so generous with the rating. It's a shame that the instructions are so poor and that the customer service is limited to an automated response. Given my experience, you should not expect any more customer service than that from the manufacturer.

This product did make the the perfect 50th wedding anniversary gift for my parents, and they love it. The picture is impressive and has fantastic resolution. The transitions between the high resolution pictures are smooth and reasonably fast. One pixel on the display actually stays blue, but it is barely noticable. The ability to add background music is also impressive. Storage is versatile, accepting my flashdrive as well as other conventional storage cards.

However, the cord that connects the transformer to the AC receptacle was missing from the sealed package, and I could not find any contact information within the package or the manual for customer service. Digital Spectrum failed to respond with anything other than an automated reply that stated that my "request was being processed". I was fortunate that Radioshack carried the $8 replacement cord that I needed, as otherwise I would have been without a gift for my parents when they celebrated their anniversary. It's a shame that I got so stressed out and had such a poor customer service experience over an $8 cord.

Once I did get the replacement cord (from Radio Shack) and set the frame up for my parents, we discovered that the tranformer gets rather hot after the photo frame runs for about an hour or two. This does concern me a bit, and I've suggested to my parents that they switch off after an hour or two of continuous operation.

Finally, the manual is very basic. The instructions miss a crucial step in transferring files (after highlighting what you want to transfer, you need to hit the "setup" button on the remote to get the "popup menu"... it does not pop up by itself). It took me, a technically-savy engineer, about an hour of experimenting to figure this out.

Amazon has assured me that I'll get my money back if this was not resolved in timely fashion, even though they suspect the manufacturer will not accept a return... well it's too late for a return now, and I've been waiting 4 weeks after Amazon promised me resolution to get their promised refund through their over-rated "A to Z guarantee"... despite a conversation with them last week full of empty promises. Apparently, you only get your money back if you make a lot of noise! IMO, the customer service for BOTH Digital Spectrum and Amazon is a lost cause. I'll stick with eBay from this point on.

Consider this a risky purchase, even with Amazon's A to Z guarantee.