The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #146244   Message #3386731
Posted By: JohnInKansas
06-Aug-12 - 03:20 AM
Thread Name: Digital photo frames for music
Subject: RE: Digital photo frames for music
My comment about 200 pages being a pretty big load for common kinds of music stands was intended as an expression of understanding of why you want to do something different. I certainly didn't intend that you should get a bigger stand.

Some of us might have a spare laptop, or one that doesn't get much use otherwise. Although it can be risky, one can get a used laptop that works long enough to carry it to the car for around $30, which is probably cheaper than most of the picture frames. It takes a little more caution, and probably a few more bucks to get one that will still work by the time you get it home and out of the car or to get an OS that's not far out of date.

We have two digital picture frames, both bottom of the line things used just for an "off computer screen saver." With the two we have, you load files onto a flash card and stick it in the frame. With the more expensive one, I think you can choose between two separate folders of pictures and have it display one or the other. The other just flips whatever pictures are on the card.

On both of them you can choose how fast it should flip the pictures, but changing the rate requires a fairly major manipulation, which would require changing settings to speed up the rate in order to go to a particular picture and then changing the whole setup again to get it to remain on that picture long enough (maybe) to play the piece.

None of the settings are particularly obvious or easy to change. There were no instructions that were particularly helpful with either frame.

Frames might be available with more versatility, but the ones we have would not be suitable for what you want to do (IMO).

I would expect a more sophisticated frame might allow you to pause on a picture, but not necessarily to easily "quick step" through the pictures or to select a picture and go directly to it.

If you already have a Kindle or Nook, it probably is possible to display what you want on either of them, possibly with some adjustment of the images and formats. I'm not sure what indexing, search, and go-to functions are available in those kinds of devices, or how well they work.

Very limited looking at what's required for Nook generally has led into discussions of several of the devices of similar kind, and while the "format specifications" don't seem to be particularly burdensome, I've found frequent discussions about "quirks" peculiar to each device that you may have to handle, or that may not be at all applicable to your use. The only way I can think of to separate the "dammits" from the "sowhats" would be for you to try to set one up to do what you want, and fix whatever pops up in your use of it.

Lin informs me that the New "color Nook" that she got recently is the "Simple Touch" and was $139, but offers her opinion that it would NOT do what you want. She suggests that you would need to step up to the "Tablet Nook" that was $199 list recently, that's "more like a smart phone." I'm not sure of how she reached her conclusion, so it's a FWIW comment, and prices may vary some depending on where you are and how hard they're pushing the merchandise when you get there.

John