lacobo

Hi Stephen. I'm sorry to tell you that the NAC-HD1E doesn't read ATRAC CD's. I've installed SonicStage CP 4.3 on my laptop and created an ATRAC CD. The NAC won't read it. Comes with the error No MP3? So it can read MP3 CD's. And there's more bad news: You can't export ATRAC files at all (exept when you connect an A808 walkman), only MP3 up to 256 bps. Bert.

Was experiencing the same issue when I used the software delivered with the walkman. I wrote to Sony about the problem and they had no solution (the software seems to be made for the A8X8 walkman, which had a smaller screen and a lower resolution). Then I started using Windows media player and that went Ok, but a bit complicated. A few day's later I started browsing for answers and found a recommendation to "Mediamonkey". This is an ideal piece of software. Covers can be added manually (I use 200 x 200 pixels for the NWZ-X1060) or downloaded automatically. Synchronizing the songs to the 1060 is very easy and it's possible to convert songs to a less space-consuming quality. I found the program so easy to use that I bought the gold version (life time updates for 30 dollar or something like that). Now the pictures look sharp on the 1060 and it's very easy to fill it with my favorite songs. Bert.

The NAC is a great device. I have stored +300 CD's uncompressed on the harddisk and still there's room for more. If it happens that I'm out of space I can convert my non-music albums (50% of the collection are shows from Dutch comedians) to Atrac 256 and get room again for more. When I bought the device it costed around 650 Euro's, but a few days later the price went down to 350 Euro's. I asked if I could get back the difference and... the shop agreed and I got 300 Euro's back! So I bought a nice LCD screen in a matching color. I have now a 20 inch view of the display. Nice! Only I can't stop pointing the remote to the monitor instead of the NAC The fact that the NAC can export songs via it's USB port on the front is a very big plus (It can convert tracks from Atrack to MP3 and put them on a USB stick for instance), but probably killed Sony's warm feelings for the Gigajuke. I can imagine that Sony music wasn't very happy with this possibility. The NAC is firmware upgradable via the internet link, but no firmware update has ever come up. It has it's quirks: Adding album sleeves to it must be done by hand and takes forever. Adding a picture to an album with 8 songs takes a few minutes! Adding the content of a CD on the other hand is easy, but the sequence of the albums can't be changed afterwards. So things get messy if you don't pay attention. I have only a few different artists on the NAC (around 25) and can easily switch between them, but if you have hundreds of different artists it can take quite a while to go from the first to the last. Recording is easy and programmable when to start and finish. I use it sometimes to record the audio from the TV or other sources. Then extract it to a USB stick and it's ready for use or editing. All in all I'm very happy with the NAC and I use it often. If it's everyone's cup of tea I don't know, but for me it's the ideal replacement of my minidisc deck. Bert. P.S. What is an ATRAC CD? I thought ATRAC was only used on walkmans and minidisc.