Dinko

Sorry! I wasn't referring to you. I just didn't want to post two entries so I quickly replied to you about iPod EQ features then moved on to the other topic. With "ipod bashing" I was referring to the comments on this and other threads around the board where a variety of posters parade the "Apple sucks, Sony rules" mentality. Which is just as annoying as the Apple fanboy mentality which proclaims that "Apple rules, the rest of the world sucks".

Not really. iPods aren't drag and drop, but you can sync with a number of (freely) available software (RealOne, MediaMonkey...).

If you mean the physical build (chip and processor), I have no idea. If you mean the enhancements available through the menu: virtually none. The iPod has pre-programmed EQ settings covering the major genres (acoustic, classical, pop, dance, jazz...) and some generic variants (increase trebble, increase bass...). These are hardly worth writing about. I rarely find they make any difference. As for all the iPod bashing going on around here: iPods are not so popular just because they're fashion accessories. They're that popular in large part because through their lacks and problems, they actually work. You don't have to deal with SonicStage or Connect. iTunes handles large libraries relatively well. Playlists are pretty basic and easy to use. You can call people simpletons and what not, but sometimes, you just want to transfer some music and get on with your life. The iPod is the only product currently on the market which offers that. Consider this: SONY - SonicStage is buggy for a large number of users - SonicStage can't handle libraries exceeding 5000 tracks (well it can, but you need a PC with a couple of Cell processors to handle the load) - ATRAC-only at the beginning (yes, ATRAC sounds fantastic, but it's also proprietary and no-one else used it) LG FM30 - in MTP mode: will recognize ID3 tags and play albums in order, but will not recognize random tracks; will refuse to play them - in MSC/UMS mode: will not play tracks in album order; but will play and recognize all tracks - tracks transferred in UMS mode cannot be accessed in MTP mode and vice-versa (on the plus side: best sounding device after Sony products. best Preset EQs, custom EQ also available, perfect highs: crisp and clear but never shrill or acid; deep & warm bass, doesn't miss the mids; and a freakin' 60 hour battery life!!! also supports OGG). CREATIVE Zen V+ - painfully slow transfer rates - buggy interface, constant freezing - painfully slow transfer rates (bis) (on the plus side: standard plug, better than average sound, many extras) SAMSUNG YP-T8 - will not recognize ID3 tags - plays tracks in the order they were transferred; plays albums in the order it decides - Samsung Media Studio is easy to use, but crashes the moment you rush it (on the plus side: incredible transfer speeds, many extras) SAMSUNG YP-Z5 - menus won't scroll - gapless option isn't gapless - sound devoid of any bass whatsoever (on the plus side: metal casing) ...and the horror stories pile on and on. Pretty much every single device I've encountered has serious user-friendliness issues in the most basic departments. Like it or not, and iPod works out of the box. Charge, transfer, play. You don't have to plan the music you'll be listening to the next morning so it can transfer overnight (Zen). You don't have to worry that some tracks won't play (LG). You don't have to worry about not being able to find the music you want (Samsung and ID tag issues). You don't have to worry about your software crashing on you or demanding you "initialize your atrac device". True, the sound isn't all that good (though it's perfectly acceptable and superior to many available devices). True, the clickwheel is hit and miss. Good for some functions (rapid scrolling), not good for others (volume should have it's own button). True, you have no extras (Samsung, LG and Creative had line-in, radio reception and video playback when Apple was still wondering what a video was, and still hasn't figured the concept of line-in recording). True, iTunes is butt-ugly and often unintuitive (menus which are clearly labelled on SonicStage or Windows Media Player are lost and buried in iTunes). But it still works. Sorry! But it's not always about style. iPods perform decently in their main functions, and they outclass the competition in many of the key user-friendliness criteria.

Wise move. Better player than, but at the same price as the iFatty. Now we're talking.

They better fix the pricing though. With the Fatty selling at 220$ for the 8 gigger (not to mention the 199$ Creative Zen V and the occasional Sandisk rebate which can decrease the Sansa's price below 200$), a Sony product can clean the house and do your homework and it's sales numbers still won't register on anyone's radar if they price it above the competition. Sound quality and higher-end earbuds only matter to a very small minority of people. Not to mention the 4GB NWZ-A8** Sony gadgets selling for 30$ above the 4GB Fatty and an even greater price discrepancy between Sony and Creative/Samsung/Sandisk/RCA 4GB players, all in the 130$ range. Hope they fixed the transfer speeds too. Given their lame transfer speeds, Creative probably uses the same cheap second rate flash memory, but at least they sell their players at a discount relative to iPoos.

Sadly, I think they're doing a pretty good job already. All they need to do is just keep churning out those half baked Walkmans once every quarter in the hope that the next one will be "it", when each is crippled by one of it's key aspects (lack of features, buggy features, size (NW-A3000!!!), transfer speeds, design (pucks, beans and dildoes)) while maintaining a software/jukebox which can't handle a library greater than 1000 tracks, and crashes on you once a week with a new excuse, proprietary cables with no or few added accessories, high prices and you've pretty much boosted Apple sales by a few hundred units per week. Put it this way, design, sound quality and battery life may be very important, but at some point, Sony should realize that time is as precious if not more important than those. Spending hours waiting for SonicStage to get its act together everytime you want to transfer some music in the fear that you'll encounter yet another unexplained crash can take it's toll even on the most die hard Sony fan. iPod: connect, select cues, transfer, disconnect. Catch bus. Arrive on time. Happy. Low on battery? Forgot your charger? Drop by the first department store, pharmacy or electronics store and pick-up a stand alone charger or computer cable. Want better sound quality? Use better ear buds. You can't reach Sony sound quality, but it's quite acceptable. Sony: connect. "You must authorize this ATRAC device to work with this computer." wait. wait. select cues. wait. select more cues. wait. transfer. wait. Crash: error 11002111. Retry. Wait. Miss bus. Arrive late. Unhappy. Go to electronics store, buy iPod. See iPod procedure five lines above. I'm sure there are thousands of people out there who buy iPods as fashion accessories. Then there's true music lovers who buy iPods to spend more time listening to music, and less time trying to transfer it to their device. I think the crucial question goes the other way: What would it take to abandon an iPod for a Sony? Is sound quality sufficient? Battery life of the new Nanos is on par with the NW-A800, so there goes that advantage. I'd really like to know how well those noise-cancelling players are doing in terms of sales. They were marketed as high-quality sound products. Was it sufficient? So many of us Sony freaks have made the move to the dark side, that the answer to the thread's question seems almost obvious. And the reasons are pretty different. Some made the move because of mp3 support (some years ago when Sony = Atrac only). Others switched because of accessories. Others switched because of iTunes (iTunes has been very stable for me so far, but I still find it a painfully unintuitive). Because of the iTunes Music Store. Because of sound output (Sony = 5mW + 5mW: try powering large headphones or sending a clear signal to your home stereo with that). Oh well... live and hope. Maybe next time...

I tend to change the music fairly often. On a 4GB Nano, I used to change the music once every three days. It was pretty fast, so I didn't mind. Later I tried a Zen V, and changing the music on it was a massive pain. What took less than half an hour with the Nano would take in excess of two or three hours with the Zen V. In other words, if, sometime in the morning, you got an urge to listen to something that is not on the player, you could forget about being able to transfer it before hopping on the train to work.

Cool. Thanks folks! That answers the question. Guess I'll be waiting for the next Sony guizmo.

I'm considering an NW-A800 model as a potential purchase in the next couple of months. But past Sony flash players have tended to be a little slow on transfer rates. CNET UK says in its review that the transfer speeds are comparable to the Zen V Plus. From personal experience, the transfer speeds on the Zen V Plus are absolutely pathetic. From that review, the NWA800 is closer to the Zen V than Samsung players or iPods. Transfer speed is my #2 criterion for flash based players. If it's as slow as CNET says it is, I'll be avoiding this thing. If it's comparable to a Nano, a Samsung Z5 or Sony HDD players then I'm sold on it. Any comments on transfer speeds would be much appreciated. Thanks in advance!

oooh!!! I love idiotic studies and lame news reports with scary titles. So Halloween! 80% of [undefined something] suddenly equals [undefined level of hearing loss]. Oh yeah, and that part about "day after day, month after month, for years". Uhm... exactly how many years would that be? The plural implies more than two. Infinity limits it on the upper end. So uhm... how many? Doesn't Reuters ever read the garbade they publish? This study says nothing about some thing. 80% of a Sony player is hardly an 80% on an iPod. And what about earphones? I've had earphones that required the player to be at max, when another set of earphones would only require it to be at half volume for the same loudness. That's almost like a UN report. Full of vague numbers someone pulled out of nowhere, extrapolated from a microscopic sample and applied to the general population. At least it's appropriate for this time of year.

Battery life according to SonyStyle.ca is based on ATRAC3 at 132 kbps: "50 hours playback with built-in lithium-ion rechargeable battery in ATRAC 132kbps at power save mode “Super”, Noise Cancelling/Clear Stereo/Equalizer/VPT/are not in use"

Depending on whether you need access to the CONNECT music store, you may wish to download the Asian version of SonicStage 4.0 I used to get the same error message as you got until I finally installed the Asian version. I no longer need to reformat my device whenever I have a PC bug or reinstall the software. That's what I used to do before: (1) create a new folder on my hard drive (2) via Windows Explorer copy everything from the device (HD1) into the new folder (3) delete the SonicStage library (4) import the folder to SonicStage (5) transfer to device I did it three times. It worked with the HD1 using ATRAC files. But... it was all on the same computer. I have no idea if it will work on a different PC.

Or a cable thing. If the line-in cable or cradle is not conneted, record function might be disabled in the menu, but becomes available upon cable connection.

Indeed, the price tag is the thing that just scared me away from the Canadian version. At that price, I'd probably get an 8GB Nano, or a 30GB regular iPod. The noise cancellation feature is a very good introduction, as is (optional) line in, but except for ultra-Sony fanpersons, I'm not convinced that thing is price-competitive. On the other hand, this has been Sony's pricing policy for quite a while in Canada. Every time they introduce a new DAP, they push up the price, then gradually bring it down. These will probably shed 25%-30% off their price tag by February if not earlier.

I'd disagree with that (which you probably already know ) Same mp3 file (192kbps) be it orchestral or rock, same ear phones (typically JVC ear canal phones), no EQ: NWHD1, NWE407, NWE99... outsound iPod Nano by a 10:1 margin. The difference between the Sony devices and the Nano is just huge. Instrumental separation, 3-dimensionality & width of sound stage, upper end clarity, depth of bass line, presence of mid range... in terms of sound, the Sony thingies just take the Nano and mop the floor with its scrawny carcass. The Nano lacks the depth of sound the Sony provides, upper ends sound metallic and edgy, bass is a joke: if you push up the volume on the Nano, you'll get a decent amount of bass, but it's just a shallow bass line - the Sony gives you that reverberating "boom" that good home speakers do - it's a blooming sound. The Nano sounds more like a portable boom box you bring to the beach.