Desktop Component

HP includes a CD with the DreamScreen, and the software it comes with allows you to wirelessly transfer files to your DreamScreen. It's a pretty simple affair: after you install the software, you get a drag and drop zone that allows you to easily transfer files to the DreamScreen. It took one minute 12 seconds to copy 10 files (28.4 MB), and the files are resized as part of the process - they take two seconds each to load rather than the nine seconds I saw with my original resolution images. Given that my smaller photo shoots tend to be 30 to 60 photos, and my major photo shoots (such as vacations) easily top 500 pictures, you'd have to wait several hours to copy photos over.

I also transferred a music album (18 MP3s, 69.3 MB in total), which took four minutes and 23 seconds. Unfortunately it also copies over the album art JPEGs that Windows Media Player and the Zune software creates - so if you copy files over this way (on a folder basis), when you're looking at All Photos in the photo application, you'll see a bunch of low-resolution album art images. This is a poor user experience and HP should add some intelligence to skip files like this. And lastly, given the limited video support, users will see this error screen frequently:

And There's One More Thing...

One of the best features I've seen on other picture frames is the ability to subscribe to an RSS feed. I use Smugmug to share all of my photos with friends and family - one of the great features they offer is an RSS feed of all my published galleries. That means as soon as I publish a new gallery, anyone subscribed to the gallery RSS feed would get a notification. As you can imagine, a wireless picture frame that automatically updates itself with the latest photos is a killer scenario for grandparents. What could be easier than turning on your picture frame and seeing new photos downloaded from an RSS feed? Sadly, the DreamScreen can't deliver this functionality. Worse, with only a SnapFish application, HP is ignoring Flickr, Windows Live, Smugmug, ZenFolio, and other popular photo sharing services.

Wait for the Next Version

All in all, the DreamScreen is a product that screams "VERSION 1.0!". It has too many compromises to deliver a smooth, fluid experience to consumers. I don't know what CPU/GPU HP is using to drive the device, but it's simply not fast enough. Every time you start up a task (photos, videos, etc.), the screen goes black for two to five seconds, then you watch for another three to four seconds as a progress indicator tells you the task is loading. When you're standing there staring at the screen, waiting for things to happen, it feels like a long wait.

The DreamScreen 100 is underpowered and lacking both support for needed video codecs and resolutions (like, say, that whole "HD" craze going on right now), and the software is lacking both polish and smart functionality. HP should look at integrating a Tegra chip to get the power this product needs. I don't know if this product was rushed to market, but it feels like it was, and that's a shame. It needs significant work for it to be worth the $249 USD asking price, and as it stands right now, I wouldn't recommend it to anyone under any circumstances. Rarely have a seen a product from a major computer manufacturer that has missed the mark so badly. I see potential - a lot of potential - for this product, but HP needs to refine the rough edges of this product and significantly enhance the current feature set.

In reviewing this product, I was reminded of the HP iPAQ 310 Travel Companion GPS. It was a product with great potential, but one that was ultimately flawed. It held the same type of promise - it was a GPS that also boasted media playback capabilities, but they were equally limited. If HP had spent more time improving the end user experience, it would have been a superb product. Instead, HP never improved it and as far as I can tell, it's been killed off after only one version. I see a lot of potential in the DreamScreen and hope that HP will address the shortcomings in a future version.

Jason Dunn owns and operates Thoughts Media Inc., a company dedicated to creating the best in online communities. He enjoys photography, mobile devices, blogging, digital media content creation/editing, and pretty much all technology. He lives in Calgary, Alberta, Canada with his lovely wife, his son Logan, and his sometimes obedient dog. He still doesn't own a photo frame of any sort - is that weird?

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