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Wait and see. It'd be crazy if you see new equipments from Sony every months. It takes time to come up with a new design and all.

It's great to see overwhelming positive reviews for the latest DAP from Sony. At least, it's a very nice comeback for Sony Walkman, no doubt about that. I haven't seen a negative user review from CNET either so far. While dropping SS was a good move for most people, I also believe that the bundled earphones (MDR-EX082) is a major contributor for the reason why this DAP is having such popularity now.

I also bought my EX90sl from "BuyFromJapan" on ebay as well. The package was shipped very quickly and the package is genuine as well. Everything was there. What was surprising for me was that they declared that the package is only worth $30 USD and I didn't have to pay any custom duties at all. I'm very happy about that. Speaking of knockoffs, it's not surprising though because a lot of manufacturing plants are installed in China and those people can produce extra quantities secretly then sell it under the table. If you look in ebay, you can find so many cheap EX71sl for about $20 USD. I might be interested to try one of those and replace my broken EX71sl after 2 years of service.

I think you can also format the player in the options from settings. It might help.

The point is that backward compatibility won't look as good on HDTV regardless the upscaling option. Upscaling doesn't do much, honestly. The image is interpolated by smoothing up the edges. As a result, the image may become a bit blurry depending on the game. However, upscaling is best used on DVD movies. Personally, I find that the best way to enjoy PS2 games is still on a normal TV. If you really want backward compatibility, consider buying a PS2 memory card adapter if you still have valuable game data in those cards.

Congrats on your purchase. I haven't tried connecting my mp3 players to my PS3. However, you can copy mp3/atrac files into the PS3 hard drive by using an altenative method, such as a USB flash drive or memory stick.

There is one thing that most consumers fail to realize when they speak of backward compatibility. PS2 games will rarely look good on HDTV since most of them only play on 480i natively. HDTV are best viewed on their native resolution. Plus, some HDTV has a small lag when you play games on a non-native resolution.

You might be interested looking at ebay. There are tons of auctions for earbud replacements.

Which could possibly be interpreted as CNET giving the A818 a lower score than it deserved.

I don't know but DVD Upscaling is the firmware's job. If you get the latest firmware, you will have DVD upscaling. As for the controller, the Sixaxis is the standard controller since the PS3's debut. The Dual Shock 3 is coming next year. You might want to wait until Easter mainly because it has been said that Sony will bundle Metal Gear Solid 4 with Dual Shock 3 together for European release.

Just like the A810, you can create/import the playlist from Windows Media Player 11, which is the only software included in the CD. I barely touched the playlist since I never use it.

For transfers, simply drag the file and drop into the mp3 player just like the A810. I don't think that there is a simpler solution than that. I haven't found any issue at displaying any Asian letters on the unit. The choice on which one to buy is yours while we can only help you sort out the factors based on your needs.

A816 comes with MDR-EX082. You can easily find that on ebay for about $20-30

Yeah, I would recommend an upgrade on the headphones if you're getting the S610. You don't miss much if you don't go for the A810. In fact, I believe the S610 was a better deal than A810. With CAD being on par with USD, I bought the EX90sl from ebay for less than $90 CAD (shipping included) from Japan and had no extra custom duty fees. To sum up: S618 + EX90sl + FM Tuner I think it's better than A818 + EX082 Then again, it will only depend if you are able to buy online or not.

The A810 series is only sold in the website and Sony Store only carries the new S610 series for now. Sony Canada's Press states the following: "The NWZ-A810 series will be available exclusively online at www.sonystyle.ca and at Sony stores across Canada later this Fall" Here's link if you want more info: http://sony.ca/view/press_419.htm