iMo FotoFrame Printer A Mixed, Cute Printer
LCD photo frames are pretty common these days. We’ve seen our share- including the excellent Kaleido R7- but often find the idea better in theory than practice. Between battery life or annoying cords, poor resolution or distracting effects, many of them just won’t make it into regular use regardless of your digital photo collection.
Mimo monitors has produced some excellent side monitors- second screens that can be used in a variety of ways, but are meant to stay plugged into a computer. It makes sense that they’d expand into a new market with the iMo FotoFrame Printer, but it clearly isn’t their core business judging from their site design (how does it work is all about monitors, for instance). Despite that, we like the twist. Not only is the device a digital picture frame, but it also offers basic photo printing- not enough to satisfy the pros or even the semi-pros, but decent enough to satisfy most folks.
The 8-inch screen is nice, though not a touch screen unfortunately, and the 800×600 resolution is decent. The screen is unfortunately a bit overshadowed by the large bezel. We liked the included remote, for basic slideshow functions. We also appreciated the flexible memory card slot, offering support for Compact Flash, SD/MS/MMC and xD. MemoryStick and SDHC cards require an adapter (not included), but USB sticks can plug in and work just fine. There isn’t any wi-fi or internet support, so you can’t transfer your pictures to or from a computer, but you can save them from your memory cards to the built-in 1GB memory. The user interface is only OK, but controllable using the three buttons on the unit. One note: you cannot orient the device to portrait mode.
So, as a photo frame, it’s OK. But the real draw here is the printer. We have fond memories of the Game Boy printer, and have checked out Zink devices that offer fast portable printing. Here, self-contained removable cartridges are able to print up to three dozen 4×6 prints at 300×300 DPI, and are easily replaceable. However, the included print cartridge can only print a dozen before you’ll need a new one. Again, these aren’t quite up to photo-lab quality, but are glossy and look pretty slick. At $20 a cartridge though, that makes it about 55 cents a print- a bit pricey, considering that the prints weren’t quite up our standards (with slightly dulled colors). The iMo is sturdy, reasonably attractive, and super-simple to use- but at $200 available online is a bit of a hard sell.
