Cagic 8.4-inch Digital Photo Frame (Mahogany)

Cagic is new to the digital photo frame arena and its claim to fame--or at least its marketing pitch--is that it's keeping things simple while making a frame that's more stylish and better constructed than your typical digital photo frame.

The company's first offering, an 8.4-inch diagonal model that comes in three finishes (birch, mahogany, and black), has been designed by "a European-trained interior stylist using quality materials and passionate attention to detail." Silly marketing phrases aside, the Cagic frame does live up to its billing as being well designed and stylish.

That 8.4-inch LCD (800x600 resolution) is surrounded by a rather hefty wooden frame that considerably extends the dimensions of the overall frame. The frame measures 10.1 inches high by 12 inches wide by 3.2 inches deep and weighs a little more than 4 pounds. Part of the reason it weighs that much and feels as solid as it does is that its support stand and the entire back of the frame are made of metal. That's rare.

More frames these days are using what's called touch-matting technology. Touch-responsive sensors are imbedded in the matting around the frame (which is also made of metal) and you simply touch the matting in certain spots to access and navigate the onscreen interface.

That interface is elegant and fairly simple to use, but initially some people may get a little confused about where to press on the frame and what action it will illicit. In other words, it's not entirely intuitive out of the box, but once you play around with it for a bit, you will get the hang of it. There are onscreen directions, too, telling you where to tap for what. The one problem with the touch-matting style interface is that it's halfway between a true touch interface (where you can touch the screen itself) and a nontouch, hard button-style interface. This means you'll probably find yourself wanting to tap the screen instead of the matting to control the frame. We should also mention that no remote is included with this model. Not a big deal, but some frames include a small remote control.

As for features, Cagic has made an effort to keep things basic and hasn't bogged down this model with extras like MP3 and video playback capabilities and wireless connectivity. The frame does beep when you touch the matting (you can toggle the beep off if you want to), but that's as far as sound goes. The frame includes no internal memory but Cagic includes a 1GB SD memory card, which allows you to store thousands of photos. You can then upgrade to a bigger card if you want.