doclloyd

Within the past week or so, I picked up Sigur Ros's "Takk..." You have to listen to it. It's hard to describe, but I dig it, much like the rest of their music. Also picked up Coldplay's Parachutes" and "A Rush of Blood to the Head."

Last weekend (9/15-16), saw Suspect Zero, The Exorcism of Emily Rose and The Exorcist (apparently on a kick to be freaked out by movies on the last two.)

Sad that no firmware updates will come for current devices, even those like the NW-E507 which is quite new and is firmware upgradeable. I would be surprised to find out that all current ATRAC devices (HDD,Flash,MD/Hi-MD) would cease to work with the new software. At most, I would imagine that the functionality/integration you receive between hardware and software will be lacking. This of course may encourage people to go out and buy new portable devices. Personally, I'm excited to see where all this is going. As long as they keep MD support (and continue the reliability of uploading recorded content) and making the software better at actually managing the music files and being stable. All I hope is that they find a better way on the backend to store info. An Access. mdb isn't too great once the file gets big... I'm sure it's part of why SS can be slow at pulling up my library at times. But I digress....

Most interesting news! The new interface reminds me of screenshots of iTunes that I've seen, which isn't a bad thing. It will be interesting to see what the future holds with this new Connect Player and all their portable devices.

In case people were waiting for an official Sony USA firmware update, it's available online. http://esupport.sony.com/perl/swu-download...7,16&mdl=NWE507 Description matches the 2.0 version that was out outside of the US, but here it is.

Tempting, but I think my next Sony Walkman purchase should include support for the new A3+ bitrates - or at least a firmware upgrade to support them. I have a E507, HD3 and NH900 I can't use most of the new bitrates with, save 192 on the HD3 (from reports I've read.)

I saw this while perusing sonystyle.com and thought it was very fitting for them to promote MD as it's meant to be used (mostly): a recording medium. Not sure the package itself is an amazing deal or anything, but it's nice to see regardless. http://www.sonystyle.com/is-bin/INTERSHOP....isc_HiMDWalkman

Interesting. Hopefully Sony will release stuff here. Accessories are sadly important to a device's success these days.

FYI, Sony USA has released SS 3.2 to the masses. Same stuff that we already know about, but for those who wanted to wait until the US release was here... http://esupport.sony.com/perl/swu-download...,7,16&mdl=NWHD3

SS 3.2 is now officially available from connect.com. See their description of new features here http://esupport.sony.com/perl/swu-download...,7,16&mdl=NWHD3

Hi there, For anyone here who has any of the NW-E40*/E50* players, is there a decent armband style carrying case for it? The included clip with my E507 is OK and all, but additional options for wearing the device while exercising would be nice. Let me know if you've found something, even if it's not a Sony-branded case. Thanks!

The upgrade went smoothly on my desktop computer. Only downside is that it seems the copy protection that exists on all music currently on the computer, including self-recorded content, has "Copy protection: available" as a property of the file. For the self-recorded stuff, that's fine. I can still convert to WAV. At least all future CD's I import will be copy protection free.

I installed SS 3.2 from the MDCF downloader, changed the registry value and I could connect to the US Connect just fine. Even able to download a track I had downloaded before. Lookin' good. Time to upgrade my desktop with my music.

OK, I'll wait for the official upgrade from connect.com. I've purchased stuff via Connect, so I need to make sure SS is compatible. Hopefully they release later this week.

I'm assuming this includes the US version of Connect?

In 3.1, DRM is not applied to the files that are stored on your PC. Look in the folder that SonicStage uses. All the files are regular .mp3 files. Likely though that they will have the wrapper put on them when put on portable players.

Wow, this 3.2 update is quite large considering it's only a point release. It's nice to see that some of our ranting/venting is actually being heard and taken seriously. I recently emailed them sharing my struggles with moving the SS database, even to a different folder on the same computer. Then to hear they're removing the DRM on imported CD files - hopefully it will fix all the files I currently have on my computer. As far as personal recordings go, I wonder if it will allow me to re-upload recordings from the past. I will also throw my kudos to Sony for what sounds like a great upgrade, especially if it also has speed improvements. No matter how small, improvements are improvements.

Thanks for the quick reply. The upgrade went without a hitch. The screensavers are kinda cool. I wonder what format they are. It's hard to tell. It would be cool to be able to make your own.

Thanks. I just got the E507 this past weekend. I need to see if Sony USA has a firmware upgrade program yet. If not, I wonder if the European version would work? It's nice to see they're finally allowing software updates to their devices. Took them long enough to figure it out.

@Kurisu: nice to know there's another "halfie" on the board! Japanese/Irish is not a common mix to find. Then again, neither is Chinese and Czech.

Born and raised in the western suburbs of Chicago, Illinois USA (and still living here.) I am half-Chinese, half-Czechoslovakian. Best nickname to date: Chinese "Czecher". Yea, painful pun, but it's funny.

It's interesting to come back and read this list after a long time. Has anyone come back here to see what actually has been fixed? It's interesting to see a number of dex's feature requests being implemented: * Upload bug? seems a lot better. All recent uploads I've done have been good. * WAV convertor integration * Release date info is now there. Granted, it doesn't come with tracks downloaded from Connect, but anything that is ripped from CDDB has the info (along with composer now as well.) Though, no easy ability to sort by this seems to be available. * "On the fly encoding and deletion" is now available, which is nice. No need to have multiple copies of files sitting around. * Track numbers are now editable for ALL files (even those downloaded from Connect) Now, for things that still seem missing: * Better playlist support. It's improving, but the Smart Playlist concept seems like such a cool idea, esp. since others have it. An even cooler concept would be for SS to recognize a MD that is associated with a smart playlist and update it automatically when connected to the PC. * They still need a better backup/moving mechanism. It all stems from their DRM, of course. After working on computers at work which had iTunes library, in which EVERYTHING was in one folder - database files and music - and just having to copy it over to the new computer was so nice. Just deauthorize the old computer for purchased music and re-authorize the new one with a couple clicks was amazing. Ultimately (as has been discussed), not DRM'ing our OMA files and scattering keys all over our computers to protect things needs to happen to make it easier on end-users. Again, there is the need to encrypt purchased music (and I'm OK with that), but ripped OMA files need to be open to be moved between computers more easily. * Importing Album art is a challenge. Also, it seems to dither images down very heavily. It's nice having the album artwork in SS to quickly browse your collection. It would be nice to print album art from SS, even if you don't have a VAIO computer. * Overall speed improvements still need to be made. No more animations (who really cares about that anyway?) From what I know from being a programmer, the Access-based database has to go. I'm sure it's a big reason as to why it's so slow. Go XML-based DB like iTunes. From what friends say, it handles large libraries with ease. Besides, in my eyes, detaching yourself from a backend that is inherently Windows-only (MS Access), you make it very tough to even consider other platforms. Granted, a massive backend overhaul of SS would be needed, along with a nearly bulletproof upgrade path for people, but I think it can be done. Let's be hopeful! :-) Overall, SS 3.1 is a big step from the SS 2.x and even the 1.x series. I will give props where it is due, but it's still has a long way to go. Sony, if you are reading this, please continue to listen to the community that is using your products and do whatever you can to improve things. Thanks.

Interesting. Sony UK announced a recall recently for the HD3 as well, but sounds like a slightly different issue. Coincidence? Info here http://www6.head-fi.org/forums/showthread.php?t=119520 Wouldn't be nice if they just upgraded some firmware while they were at it? Maybe to match some of the new features of the HD5. I wouldn't hold my breath, of course.

Sure, if people would be interested in hearing my church's sunday sermons. This is the first week (well, second if you include the non Hi-MD recording) we've done it. I'll look into it when I get home from work.

CD turned out just fine. Sounds just as good as the recording (Hi-SP btw). I'm happy. :-)