Microsoft Photo Viewer?

tom mornini

I was just watching late night T.V. and saw an

infomercial for Microsoft Photo Viewer hardware.



<a href="http://www.microsoft.com/hardware/tvphotoviewer/pro_overview.asp"; target="_blank">http://www.microsoft.com/hardware/tvphotoviewer/pro_overview.asp</a>;



I was startled, because this thing arrived under

my radar. $159 buys hardware + software to arrange

digital photos into albums and display them on a

TV.



The device can be used stand-alone for the

technically impaired to just view photo albums

created by technically capable people. :-)



This is a good product that seems like it would

fit into Apple's digital hub strategy quite nicely

except for two things:



1) Ugly as sin



2) Floppies. Yes, that's right, in 2001 Microsoft has created a product that lets your share 40 whole photos at a time!



It seems to me that this sort of product is going

to be big, however. Digital photos are great, but

printing them out and distributing them that way

is ridiculous! Something that makes sharing them

really easy to social is going to be a big deal.



I recently made a DVD (on my QS 867) and I think I

had as much fun with the still photos as I did the

video that I used. However, making a DVD takes too

long to punch out 50 for XMas and enclose in the

holiday letter... It strikes me that CD-R would be

a really good format for this...



So, might this be a future Apple hardware product?

Combined with the mythical iPhoto?



[ 12-24-2001: Message edited by: Tom Mornini ]</p>

ghost_user_name

No

waffffffle

I tried to bring this up a few times on both these boards and the MacNN boards. I think Apple should definitely avoid creating THIS product, but they should definitely consider a superior device of somekind. I can't help but speculate that Apple may try to come up with their own digital camera (again) and load it up with all sorts of features that no one had ever though of before, like a built-in slide show feature that you can use to show pictures on your tv. If it used firewire that would be sweet since I don't know of any digicam that does. However one thing that bothers me is that Apple could theoretically dig themselves a hole with all these digital devices when the time comes that Mac users can ONLY purchase Apple peripherals. I have a feeling that most mp3 player manufacturers no longer feel a need to make mac drivers for their products since the iPod is so much better for the Mac market. If Apple were to come out with a camera, pda, or camcorder then the other players would stop focusing on the mac market. That would suck for us and make the platform look bad.

david r

Iomega released a product that did the same thing quite a while back, but theirs uses zip disks.



<a href="http://www.iomega.com/fotoshow/index.html"; target="_blank">http://www.iomega.com/fotoshow/index.html</a>;

ghost_user_name

Apple could theoretically dig themselves a hole with all these digital devices when the time comes that Mac users can ONLY purchase Apple peripherals. I have a feeling that most mp3 player manufacturers no longer feel a need to make mac drivers for their products since the iPod is so much better for the Mac market. If Apple were to come out with a camera, pda, or camcorder then the other players would stop focusing on the mac market. That would suck for us and make the platform look bad.



Apple is not trying to nudge out Sony or whoever from the mac market. Apple is simply raising the bar for those companies to show them that Apple demands more from 3rd parties. Apple is pushing SONY forward along with the rest of the industry.