Digweed97

Hi All, First time post in this forum, and a new Sony Walkman NW-A808 owner. I've had the player for about a week now and in general I'm impressed with the player, styling, design, functionality, menus, ease of use, sound quality all excellent, but my god what an almighty pain in the arse it is trying to get video transfered onto the player. I have been trying off and on for several days now. reading the instruction manual that came with the player (very skinny!) and also the PDF manual, which I have to say are not a lot of help. After doing a bit of googleing I now realise that I'm not alone in this observation. The player came with Sonic Stage and included Image converter version 3.0. If you hover the mouse over the video icon on the walkman launcher you get the message 'Start software to convert videos on the computer to a format that is compatable with your ''Walkman'' and transfer them your ''Walkman.'' After opening the software you are greated with the user interface of image converter 3. Clicking on the add to list opens another box which allows you to select the video source/destination. At the bottom of this box is a drop down menue that displays; All Video AVI (*.avi.) Recorded TV by Media Center (*.dvr-ms) MPEG (*.mpg,*.mpeg,*.mp4) Quicktime Windows Media File (*.wmv) After messing about for some time I discoverd that I was not able to transfer DVD movies MPEG-2 with the software (obviously not coverd by the all video option) This was also confirmed after again tralling the internet untill I found the web site for Sony Europe Customer Support. MPEG-2 can not be converted. OK no problem I will use Nero recode to convert it to a format it will recognise MPEG-4. I have done this and also put the files in Memory Stick video format (which I am told are the only files guaranteed to be compatable) and resized it to 320x240 pixels. I now have an MP4 file with supposedly all of the right atributies. I click on the add to list button and I get the message 'This file format is not supported.' Bollocks! What have I done wrong..well nothing that seems obvious to me. Scrach head, try again..same message, This should work, I have done the lions share of the work and this little pice of shit software can't be arsed to get of it's lazy arse and do the bare minimum of converting said video file. After quite a few attempts I decided that Nero Recode for what ever reason simply wasn't going to work with the Image Converter software, so i tried a different video converter, this time Prism, which I downloaded of the net. It was recomended by someone who was having similar problems of getting video on to there player. I tried converting first to MPEG-4 with the appropriate settings, no luck..'This file format is not supported' I then tried using a different file type, this time AVI. again the same message keeps popping up when I try and convert the file and transfer it to the player. To Say that I am now a little pissed of with the whole business would be a little understated. Why Have Sony done this. I have seen many frustrated comments on the internet from people that are relatively computer savvy and are really strurgling with this. If you were a realitve novice with computers you wouldn't have a cat in hells chance. The Sony Image Converter software is supposed to convert videos on your computer to a format that is compatable with your walkman. That's what it says on the tin, ladies and gentlemen...quite frankly I don't believe them. Finaly does anyone know of a diffinative way of guaranting succesful video transfer to the Walkman..I'm starting to lose the will to live.