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Polaroid PoGo review

Verdict:

Relive the dream of instant photography. A practical mobile photo printer that's a lot of fun.

Review Date: 17 Oct 2008

Price when reviewed: £100

Buy it now for: £19
(see more store prices)

Supplier: http://www.play.com

Our Rating 4 stars out of 5

User Rating 4 stars out of 5

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Remember Polaroid's instant cameras? They were simple and fun to use, though they certainly wouldn't fit in the average pocket. The film was expensive, and Polaroid finally stopped manufacturing it earlier this year, so an era has officially ended.

Fortunately, they've come up with a successor for the digital age. Polaroid's ZINK ('zero ink technology') may find its way into a camera in the near future, but for now we have this printer, which you can use with your own digital camera to resurrect the instant gratification of getting proper photos as soon as you take them. The sturdy little unit prints glossy 2x3 inch photos from your camera phone via Bluetooth or from a PictBridge compatible camera, and it has a rechargeable battery so you can output pictures wherever you go.

The PoGo needed no setup, and a photo from our Bluetooth phone was printed within a minute of hitting the Send key. To print from a digital camera, you need to dig out the camera's USB cable, connect it to the PoGo's USB port and put the camera into PictBridge mode. Oddly, the first PictBridge camera we tried, a Fuji Finepix A500, wouldn't recognise the printer. We had more luck with a Ricoh 500SE. You'd need to get Polaroid to confirm your model, or try it before buying.

We were pleased with our PoGo prints. Although small and no match for full size photo printers, pictures from both phone and camera showed impressively accurate colour and exposure.

The best thing about the PoGo is that it doesn't need ink. Instead, it uses a thermal technique to activate special glossy paper with a claimed 100 billion dye crystals embedded in each sheet. Ten sheets cost £3, which sounds steep, but given that there's nothing else to pay for, 30p a print isn't bad for occasional use. The prints are dry the moment they emerge, are water-resistant, and can evenbe used as stickers by peeling their backing off. They're also tiny, but that's part of the fun.

Easy to use, well built, pocketable, and not excessively pricey to buy or run, the PoGo will be on our Christmas list, if we can wait that long.

Author: Andy Zarkesh

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User Reviews

Independent customer reviews from

Polaroid CZU-10011B scored:
8.2 out of 10

The 2 most helpful reviews based on 18 reviews:

Confirmed purchaser

9
Good Points
The printer does have a decent print quality. The speed at which the printer works is pretty good, and when used with my mobile phone the over all effect is impressive.
Bad Points
The battery isn't very good as it only last for a very short time. If I was to use it outside away from a charger, then I wouldn't get many photos printed. Even when the printer is switched of the battery depletes very quickly (about a day!).
Confirmed purchase on 17 Aug 2008

dean, bristol

9
Good Points
very small and will fit in your pocket to allow you to take it everywere with you plus ot easy to use. I have drop it a few times but never no damage done it seems to be strong.
Bad Points
can take a while to print sometimes.
Confirmed purchase on 15 Jul 2008

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£21
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