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Sorry to resurrect a post that's been dormant for more than a year, but has there been any conclusive information/evidence about the compatibility between NW-Ax000 and the RM-MC55ELK? This post (and other relevant posts in this forum, including the Guide to Remotes...) suggests that the MC35ELK and MC55ELK are pretty much identical, only the 55ELK supports more languages. So I went for it and got an MC55 off eBay. Most controls work but the display doesn't show anything at all when used with a NW-A3000. Anybody had a similar experience? Is there anything equivalent to a Service Manual for Remotes? There must be a way to make that display work with the NW-Ax000 series.

Has anybody managed to work round this? I also have an RM-MC55ELK and a NW-A3000. When I checked the Guide to Remotes... I didn't notice any incompatibilities (it seemed that the MC35 and MC55 were largely identical) so I went for it and got an MC55 off eBay. Most controls seem to work with my NW-A3000 (except the folder/search buttons which I knew about) but the display doesn't doesn't show anything. Onlne information about the RM-MCx5ELK is hazy. Possibly because the unit is not sold separately. I haven't found a single page on a forum that says DISPLAY DOESN'T WORK WITH NW-Ax000. And wherever I look it seems that the MC35 is compatible to MC55 (only the 55 supports more language sets) The PDF manual available for the MC35ELK states that it's officially recommended for the NW-A3000. But it doesn't have a proper Troubleshooting section. The only thing it suggests is replugging the remote and/or resetting the device via its RESET button. Neither of those seem to make any difference.

May I also confirm that I proceeded replacing the battery with one I got from eBay for 15 quid (hey, ncl, thanks for the tip!) and my NW-A3000 is now back to normal. Battery times acceptable again. It really *is* worth it. Just be careful how you open the device (instructions on the Operation Guide & Service Guide) and get yourself a nice set of REALLY small screwdrivers! Thanasis

Is the RM-MC35ELK identical to the RM-MC55ELK? I have searched about that and it still isn't clear to me. Is it an EU/US/JAP market discrepancy thing? Has anybody used an RM-MC55ELK with a NW-A3000? I got a black RM-MC55ELK/BM ("universal remote backlight") off eBay (hasn't arrived yet) and I was wondering which features are and aren't supported in a NW-A3000. I'm not that fussed about being able to use ALL of the buttons, as long as there aren't any MAJOR compatibility issues. Thanks in advance.

I've been enjoying decent battery life for about 10 months after I got the NW-A3000, where 'decent' is 8-10 hrs at best (so still a far cry from the advertised 30+hrs). That was OK, since most of my tracks were transfered as MP3s (not ATRAC) and I couldn't possibly tolerate the Brightness set to anything other than 'Maximum' (otherwise I couldn't see the screen during daytime). Screensaver off, EQ set to default, 15 sec display, new song pop-up OFF, volume 20-28. So I had accepted that the max battery life I would get from the NW-A3000 with the above settings would be around 8hrs. Which was fine.. ..UNTIL, 10 months later, I decided to play around with the ArtistLink feature. My original thought was to make 'custom' Artist Link associations so that I could get dynamic (sort of) playlists from artists that I had grouped as 'similar'. A huge mistake, as it turned out. This never really worked as intended. ArtistLink adds a ridiculous amount of time and overhead when plugging the device to the PC and while loading the device's contents (I use SonicStage CP 4.3) it is 'processing' Artist Link information for about 10 mins and doesn't allow you to skip that step if you're in a hurry. Note that this was regardless of the amount of ArtistLink data. Nevermind whether I had just one small ArtistLink 'group' or several hundreds, it would still take ages to load. Furthermore, once I did that, it seemed to irreversibly mess up the Library database. It now took ages to navigate from one track to the next and from one artist to the other (at least 5 seconds for each 'step') and the battery LITERALLY didn't last for one whole song! If I just pressed play and never touched it again, I might've been lucky if it lasted for ~20 mins. If I used any controls or browsed within the playlist, the battery would drop down dead there and then, before I even managed to finish listening to ONE track!. It could well be a coincidence, but the only thing that I could think as a culprit was my stupid idea to mess with ArtistLink. So, I exported my ArtistLink data to a txt file and removed every trace of ArtistLink information from the device & from My (PC HDD-based) Library, in the hope that things would return to normal. Things DID NOT return to normal. My NW-A3000 has been constantly plugged to the wall socket ever since. The battery just kept playing up. Tried backing up with Acronis, formatting the device, importing OMGAUDIO again. No change. Defragged the device plenty of times (it did make some diferrence in browsing time but obviously no difference whatsoever in the battery life) Firmware has been v3.0 for quite a while (before this incident). I didn't want to try downgrading to a previous version of SonicStage, having been tortured by all different incarnations of CONNECT through to SonicStage (I was one of those users who grabbed a NW-A3000 as soon as it came out in Europe). The first two versions of CONNECT were a disgrace and I never really enjoyed the NW-A3000 until SonicStage/CONNECT came along. I think SonicStage CP 4.3 is, so far, the "best" version out there. (hard to say this about such a big, cumbersome, slow, memory-hog, CPU-hungry piece of software, but IN COMPARISON and in my opinion, it is). So I didn't want to go through all the hassle of converting the library again. I accepted that it's a battery problem. Now I finally got a new battery off eBay and I'm keen to try it out. Sorry for the long post, I just thought I'd share my experience with you. Anybody else ever had trouble with ArtistLink and browsing times/battery life?

I did the same and just got a battery from the same seller. I have yet to install it, though, as I'm concerned that it's smaller in size (its width is about 2mm narrower) than the original battery. The replacement battery type seems to be correct, although there are some minor differences in the part no details: New Battery: Model No: CS-SA3000SL Part No: LIS1356HNPA 1-756-608-21 5Y30A1697 Original NW-A3000 battery: LIS1356HNPA(SY6) 1-756-608-21 5X12A0745 You reckon I should go ahead and do the swap? I'm surprised you say there's no need to glue the new battery back. As I wrote above, mine seems quite narrower so it's hard to imagine it would stay firm. Anyway, I'm going to give it a try. Thanks for all your tips.