Polaroid PoGo is a brand new printer for mobile phones and digital cameras. It intends to be very portable, as it doesn’t need any PC connections. Its mini-size enables you to bring it anywhere and print photos instantly, so that you can share them with friends, family, co-workers…
It also claims to be easy to use, just as the Polaroid cameras were.
Let’s find out!
We received the Polaroid PoGo in its retail package with 2 additional packs of ZINK™ Photo Paper (10 sheets each):
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At first sight, the content of the box seems quite complete:
• 1 printer Polaroid PoGo;
• 1 pack (10 sheets) of Polaroid ZINK™ Photo Paper;
• 1 rechargeable battery;
• 1 Type C power plug;
• 1 Type G power plug;
• 1 AC Adapter.
All you could need is here. Here’s a global view of the content, and of the printer itself:
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The traditional warranty card is also included, as well as addresses for worldwide support contacts and a User’s manual. This manual is very simplified, and perhaps a little bit disturbing if you like being instructed with words. It’s divided into 4 panels: charge the battery, load photo paper, print from a mobile phone via Bluetooth and print from a camera via USB.
Everything is explained with images and some precision would have been welcomed, e.g. to turn on or off the printer you need to press the power button for at least 2 seconds.
Concerning Bluetooth, on some mobile phones there is a menu “Print via… / Bluetooth” but even if the PoGo printer is recognised, this is not the right way to print and it doesn’t work. You have to choose “Send by… / Bluetooth” instead. The needed code to create a link between the printer and the mobile phone is the only thing written in numbers on the User’s manual.
However, after having taken a look at the Polaroid PoGo website, we found a page with printing explanations for every compatible mobile phones:
http://www.polaroid.com/pogo/comptool/index.html
The design of the Polaroid PoGo is very simple: a rectangular shape with rounded corners and edges. Only 2 buttons (one to turn on the printer, and one to open it in order to load photo paper), 2 plugs for USB and power connector, 2 LEDs and one paper output:
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Thanks to its minimal size, it’s not really heavy, and you can hold it in your hand or even place it in your pocket, and bring it everywhere. Here’s a preview of the size compared with a BIC médium pen and a 20 pence coin:
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Obviously with such an ultraportable size, your photos will just be the size of a credit card, but nevermind, this is quite enough to share it with your friends, family…!!
Here’s a comparison with an Oyster card:
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The Polaroid PoGo tends to be a portable device, and as you can see, it successfully does it.
First, the Polaroid PoGo is a zero ink printer (hence ZINK™). This means you don’t have to buy or replace ink cartridges. It uses thermal technology: as soon as your photo is printed, it is dry and waterproof.
Then, you have two ways to print your photos:
• via Bluetooth: nowadays, most of the mobile phones have the Bluetooth connection. Once activated, you just have to send the picture via Bluetooth to the Polaroid printer. When the transfer is completed, the PoGo starts printing your photo.
• via USB: you must have a digital camera equipped with PictBridge. Then you just have to select the Print menu on your device, and choose the PictBridge option.
What you get after a 60 second print is a 2″ x 3″ borderless, fade-resistant, long-lasting, smudge-proof, water-resistant, tear-proof photo.
Finally, you can bring it with you everywhere you go, thanks to its rechargeable lithium-ion battery.
We tested the Polaroid PoGo printer with 2 Bluetooth equipped mobile phones (Samsung SGH-U900, Sony Ericsson K800i) and a PictBridge equipped digital camera (Sony Cyber-shot DSC-P93).
We didn’t face any problems, and everything happened as expected. We sent the pictures via Bluetooth or PictBridge and the printer worked perfectly.
Here are 3 samples of printed photos, and with the original picture when available:
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The quality of the pictures is pretty good with a nice printing of details. The colors are sometimes not accurate, but anyway it offers a beautiful rendering. By the way, the quality is not the main argument of this printer, which is its portability.
Concerning how long it takes to print a picture, it really makes it in 1 minute, we tried it. It took about 20 seconds to transfer the 5Mpixels photo from the camera to the printer via PictBridge, and the printing lasted 59.95 seconds!
Mobile printer specifications:
| Size | 120mm (4.7″) H X 72mm (2.8″) W X 23.5mm (0.9″) D |
| Weight | 8 oz (without paper) includes battery |
| Battery | 7.2V rechargeable lithium-ion 15 Prints per charge at 25 C Battery is replaceable |
| User Interface | 2 Tri-Colour LED indicators |
| AC Adapter | 9V output Universal Input 100V to 240 VAC Printer will print when plug into the AC adapter |
| Connectivity | Bluetooth (Class 2) OPP USB 2.0 USB A connector |
| Print Speed | 60 seconds per print, from send to share |
ZINK™ paper specifications:
| Size | 50mm (2″) X 76.2mm (3″) |
| Features | Full-bleed, borderless image ZINK™ inkless printing embeds colour into the paper Prints dry-to-touch, water-resistant, tear-proof, smudge-proof Peel-off, sticky-backed Automatic image quality optimization |
Here is the Polaroid PoGo in action:
The Polaroid PoGo printer is definitely a must-have not only for Polaroid camera fans, but also for every person who wants to share its photos in a different way. The quality isn’t worth a 10Mpixels photo displayed on a plasma screen, but it’s fine enough to have a nice souvenir and to share it with fellows.
Nowadays, everybody has a mobile phone in its pocket. The size of this printer enables you to have it in your other pocket, thereby getting a complete modern Polaroid camera in your hands.
Once you own this printer, the only charge you’ll have is the ZINK™ paper thanks to a thermal technology which uses zero ink. This special photo paper is sold by pack of 10 sheets, is water-resistant, and comes with a sticky side, so that you can place your printed photos everywhere you want!