Zizone_

As far as I know, the new Walkmans only works with Japanese SonicStage, which requires Japanese Windows.

... hmm... I don't really have songs in my player to really test if it is gapless. I would normally try concert CDs, but I don't have concert music files in my player (personally, don't really use gapless). But, from hearing normal songs, I don't think it is really gapless; though PS3 supports I believe. Anyways, I hope someone else from the forum can answer your question.

I use PS3 for AAC files (because my PS3's HDD which stores much more than my PC) but I think you can use Winamp or drag-n-drop.

SonicStage supported AAC for some time now, if I remember correctly since SS 4.0 if not earlier.

In my opinion, the difference is pretty noticeable; NWZ-A810 or NW-A800 is superior to PSP in terms of sound quality, and it also comes with pretty good headphone, which if you were to buy the headphone separately it would be USD 70 ($70). So, 810 or 800 is seriously a good deal.

Regular audio CD one would find in stores with stereo tracks are stored using 16-bit PCM coding at a 44.1 kHz sampling rate per channel. Audios stored in CDs use Red Book audio. WAV files and CDs both encode songs in PCM; anyways, WAV is considered lossless since no data is compressed as far as I know. Because data is not compressed, there is no need for uncompressing data, which would consume more power thus shortens the battery life. So, linear PCM (WAV) would deliver the same sound as CDs with using less battery. Oh, and WAV should have 1411.2 kbps. I hope this helps and anyone who finds my information is incorrect, please correct me. Thanks.

I believe new Walkman line ups from Japan are recognized by Japanese SonicStage only; also, retailers warn consumers before their purchase. So, try using Japanese SonicStage. (maybe someone mentioned this already sorry).

Hey Juli, It seems like Sony is dropping ATRAC outside of Japan. I would rather encode those music in AAC, since AAC is not going anywhere (in my opinion AAC is better than MP3 in terms of sound quality). If you want the best possible battery life out of your player, I would use Linear PCM (and best sound quality at the same time).

Oh thanks for the SS 4.4 news. I didnt' even know they released it; it must have been at most a week old, since I checked like 2 weeks ago for newer version. Anyways, I am going to download it now.

I am think the new line up of Walkman will come out before firware update It's interesting that day before CES, sony.com/ces showed NWZ-A818 on the list but after the CES started, they just took it out. I think they have something but maybe trying to avoid dividing attention from Mylo 2 (COM-2)??? I believe new line up will be available in Spring.

Considering the fact that they showed 16GB MemoryStick Duo, I am certain that they will release higher capacity Walkman.

It has improve so much compared to the original mylo. I heard that the mylo 2 (though official name was like COM-2 or something like that). But, yeah, this product looks nice (keypad, camera, better browser than mylo 1, and touch screen); I wonder what it's sound quality is like..?... I think I am going to wait for next Walkman line and then decide which one I am going to buy. I am actually looking for a smaller and thinner device than mylo 2 (NWZ-A810 or NW-A800's thickness is perfect for me.)

Band: RADIOHEAD Album: IN RAINBOWS NWZ-A818, AAC 320kbps 15 Step Bodysnatchers Nude Weird Fishes/Arpeggi All I Need Faust Arp Reckoner House of Cards Jigsaw Falling into Place Videotape

NWZ-A or NWZ-S serieses can use many different softwares. One that is working pretty well would be WMP 11. Others are: winamp, rhapsody and napster and etc. But, it does not support SonicStage. So NWZ series support AAC (non-DRM only), MP3, WMA (both non and DRM ones) and linear PCM but no ATRAC support.

Hmm, I wonder if they will add the gapless support; I certainly would like to have for my soundtracks rather than for other types of songs. I would prefer if they could release some good dedicated software for Walkman (something completely opposite from the Media Manager for Walkman) or at least release some kind of add-on on WMP11 for Walkman, if possible.

You may be right. I hope that Sony is not going to receive criticism for high price due to built-in NoiseCanceller then, since regular consumers seemed to not to care or had no knowledge why the price for when NW-S700 with NC was released last year. I was suspecting Sony would hold their possible new line up until Spring as you mentioned.

It seems like Sony USA continues to make mistakes on their product's feature and NAME... If you visit sony.com/ces under music menu, one can conveniently find Walkman, which is named as "NWZ-S818." (should it not be NWZ-A818??? or is this really a new product that I am not aware of...). If this is a mistake, there is yet another mistake under its specification on the same page. If you scroll down, it says that the player can playback video for 30 hours... So, either "NWZ-S818" has REALLY NICE battery with 30 hours of video playback, or they simply made mistake on name and confused with 33 hours of music playback with the video... If this is a mistake, when will Sony USA stop making so many mistakes on THEIR products??? If this is NOT a mistake, which I highly doubt, this thing has one nice battery. edit: it seems like I have misread the video part. What they meant was the length of video. For this, I am really sorry. But, the fact that they have wrong name still stands. Edit: Wrong name on the site is now correct.

No problem ; I am using this cradle for NW-S700/NWZ-A810 series so, yeah it does work.

Use BCR-NWU3. The supplied plastic stand looking thing fits into this cradle thus the player will fit into the BCR-NWU3 properly. The cradle supports NW-S700, NW-S710, and NWZ series (also NW-A800) and etc. In order to make the cradle for all these different shaped players, they supply plastic stand for each unique players for purpose of fitting these players into one BCR-NWU3 model. edit: Oh, and the cradle allows you to connect to PC, charges without having to turn on the PC (charges when the cradle is connected to power outlet which can be connected to PC at the same time), has line-in and line-out for recording (e.g. NW-S700 can record) and for stereo use. side note: don't trust those who work at the store for any kind of store, although there are exceptions; from my experience, most of employees are poorly trained if they are trained at all (like I said there are exceptions but... maybe I just had a bad experience... )

visit esupport.sony.com and enter your model number. There you can find drivers, updates etc...

Yes, NW-A800 series is discontinued in Japan (it's been around for about a year in Japan). But expect good news in few months. As for now, my interest lies on Mylo 2. Waiting Sony to release spec.

To be honest, I don't really pay too much attention over lossy compressed formats, since I rarely use except for some sound tracks. Mostly, I use WAV over anyother types of lossless formats since the former tends to give much better battery life. But as far as I know, correct me if I am wrong, Zune does not support WAV. To be honest, I was a bit surprised that many players today do not support WAV.

I was also looking for DAP for Christmas present. Toshiba T-series and few others like Samsung P2. But, Samsung only supports MP3 and WMA (no lossless support) so I turned that down and bought yet another NWZ-A818 for present. I think for myself, I am going to wait until probably May, and see what Sony has to offer. Anyways, what is SNR for Zunes? just out of curiosity... also, does it support Linear PCM (WAV)? I kinda like NWZ-A818 alot in a way that it supports many formats: WAV, AAC, MP3, WMA. It seems like so many players are dropping WAV lately... what is the world coming to...

Personally, I don't understand why this software is getting much attention. I agree that this software does not meet today's standard. But, no one is forcing you to use this software, unlike old day's SonicStage, which in my opinion is much better than Media Manager. Considering many other softwares to choose to manage music, video, and pictures for NWZ-810 series in addition to drag-n-drop, I have no problem, since finally the hardware is more open than ever. It is interesting to see how so many people praised the Walkman and now it is getting criticized for releasing Media Manager. Anyhow, Sony SERIOUSLY needs to work on their software and their advertisement department.

Well, Sony released MEDIA MANAGER FOR WALKMAN, and I hope I am not bringing old news. Anyways, I am installing the program at this moment. But... NOTES: Does not include a video file conversion function. To use this fuction-> In order to use this function, it is required to upgrade to MEDIA MANAGER FOR WALKMAN PRO. Anyways, I think I am sticking with WMP 11 to organize music, and just use MEDIA MANGER to video conversion.