Can one bypass the VAIO Pocket’s Photo USER_001 folder?

[sdsviet]

Hey guys, well Ishiyoshi's review made me buy the VAIO pocket awhile ago and I am fairly satisfied with the device considering that at the same price I was prone to get a 20gb ipod with monochrome display. I also ordered the PDAir case as it is better than nothin'  I like your idea of the cable, why did Sony expect us to use the player to transfer pictures from a digital camera (I have Panasonic FZ1 and FZ10) with the need to lug around a craddle? The Cowon X5 does not have a cradle and works as USB host. Hopefully some competent person will design and manufacture this cables... On a side note I found a little (but not significant) improvement on the Japanese firmware over the US/English firmware. When using the Photo viewer, the english version is restricted to the USER_001 folder while the japanese version works just as a file viewer allowing you to go to other folders.

I don't have much experience with portable players but I like good sound reproduction. When I went to my local Target store in McAllen, TX I tried the BOSE triport headphones and I was in shock from the quality of sound the VAIO delivered, compared to the pathetic stock headphones that come with it. Now, the BOSE headphones are 150+tax which is not within my budget since I already spent it on the player itself!  Can someone recommend me a high quality set of headphones/earphones to use with the player without breaking the bank? Thanks a lot for your help and sorry for the long post. 

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i have a question about the jap firmware. i have about 2.5gbs of pics and they are order by date in their respective folders. i tried every type of way to bypass the user_001 folder with the english firmware to no avail. i even tried to put another user_001 folder within a user_001 folder. but it does ntoihng. so are u saying that the jap version lets u do that where u can view folders within folders using the user_001 method or are u saying it just uses the folder names that u upload in the vaio? if the latter, i will for sure update witht eh jap version. also if i update with the jap version and use the english language, is there any difference compare to the eng version eng lang? also i hope there is a new firmware update to get rid of the album grouping issue. it worked fine with the hd3 but when i switch over to my ap1l it just group all my singles song that i group as album singles together. really annoying little bugger.

[yoshimail]

i have a question about the jap firmware. i have about 2.5gbs of pics and they are order by date in their respective folders. i tried every type of way to bypass the user_001 folder with the english firmware to no avail. i even tried to put another user_001 folder within a user_001 folder. but it does ntoihng. so are u saying that the  jap version lets u do that where u can view folders within folders using the user_001 method or are u saying it just uses the folder names that u upload in the vaio? if the latter, i will for sure update witht eh jap version. also if i update with the jap version and use the english language, is there any difference compare to the eng version eng lang? also i hope there is a new firmware update to get rid of the album grouping issue. it worked fine with the hd3 but when i switch over to my ap1l it just group all my singles song that i group as album singles together. really annoying little bugger.

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If I recall correctly (and we might have to corroborate with Ishiyoshi) is that I was able to access different folders but I don't remember watching pictures on it since I have not tried it other than just with my digital cameras but I assume you alrewady have the pics arranged but it migth be entirely possible since I remember that I was able to even acces the VAIO_skins folder from the japanese firmware, in the japanese firmware you cannot see the user interface in English (only in Japanese) which is kind of funny since most of the interface is in katakana from the English cognates I would also recommend to resize your pictures to QVGA size, that obviously reduces the size of the files and makes a huge difference in watching the pictures on the VAIO Pocket. With my 4MP files it takes like 5 seconds to show a "high res QVGA" file in the color screen compared to almost instantly with the 320X240 jpegs. I think this is important since we don not have a thumbnail feature yet that I would like to see in future firmware updates. Keep posted and let me know if it works!

Yoshi

[sdsviet]

oh i dont know any japanese at all so converting to jap firmware and and trying to read the katakana would just suck for me. i guess im out of luck. hehe. do u think i can install the jap firmware to see if the folder thing work and then put back in the eng firmware?" i dont mind being a guinea pig to see if the folder option works or not.

Edited August 2, 2005 by sdsviet

[sdsviet]

hmm i wonder if i can use like an external harddrive to transfer the already preset folders i've done. or just toss those folders in my digicam and do it that way. like i said b4 i have 2.5gbs in pics and about 75folders already dated and named. i really dont want to have to redo everything?

[sdsviet]

ok i just tested transfering my data from my digicam (casio exilim ex-m2) i just threw some folders in the dcim folder. i then transfer it over to the ap1l. when finished wat it did was just basically use the default folder that casio itself sends out when it transfer it to another media. let me explain this a bit so its easier to comprehend.

first when i first got my casio it had a program that u would have to install on the comp and whenever the casio is in its dock it'll recognizes and transfer all the pictures over. wat the casio does is that it dates and timestamps every picture and when it is being transfered it goes into its own folders respectively ie. year month and day. from there u can change it however u want.

so when i transfered over to the ap1l it sort of did that but not really. in the casio there's only one folder in teh dcim folder xxx_101 soemthing like that. so when it transferred it did create a dated folder on teh ap1l. even tho i had tons of pics that was dated and timestamp with a span of several years and months it transferred over to only one folder. the folder was "20050802_001". that is which is todays date. i guess my conclusion here is that when u transferred anyover to the ap1l it just takes the date of the digicam and uses watever the cam folder output setting is and transferred it.

my guess is to go around this situation. like if i take the digicam and change the date on teh camera itself and then insert the same dated folder in there and transferred it over to the ap1l it would have the right dated folder in there. i dont know if this will work but it seems logical enough. i know it would be a pain in the ass to do it this way but im really anal on this stuff and i can't stand just seeing the user_001 folders in there with no way of knowing wat month or day it is b4 scrolling thru the pictures themselves. with this method at least i can see the date of when the folder was created. i wish i am able to do descriptions.

well let me know if u guys can try this out with ur other digicams and wat the output folder is on the ap1l. if it gives a better description than mine i might try to find a friends camera and use it to transfer my photos.

ps. i know this might be a hassle for some people but when i buy something i make sure its worth every penny and i try to take advantage of all the features that comes with the product. that's just how i am.

Edited August 2, 2005 by sdsviet

[yoshimail]

Yes, you can flash the firmware to the Japanese version and go back to the English version. I have done it and everything works, so no risk of killing the Vaio Pocket, hehe just give it a try, I can read the katakana, but I have a hard time reading the kanji, the plus is that since everything is in Japanese your friends will not understand the interface and therefore return you the VP back to you when they want to listen to it.

[sdsviet]

ok i just tried changing the date on teh camera but the folder now gives me the same folder but now its _002. so i changed the date on the ap1l and tried it and it did in fact changed the new folder to the date on teh ap1l. so its dependent on the ap1l's date no matter wat teh camera's date says.

[Tamim]

So you guys are saying that if you transfer photos from your computer to AP1L, they all go in the same folder? And that folder is not changeable by default? And you cant organize your images by putting them in different folders?

[sdsviet]

no that's not wat i mean. when u transfer photos to the computer u have to make teh folders a specific name for the ap1l to recognize it. ie. user_001, user_002 etc. so u can only change the numbers portion in the user_xxx part. i have tons of folders by date year month and description. its my way of keeping track of the pictures that i have taken. im trying to find a way that i can get the ap1l to recognize the ways my folders are setup.

oh yea i guess if i reply enough eventually i get my own page. hehe

Edited August 3, 2005 by sdsviet

[Ishiyoshi]

Interesting initiative; here's your own thread.

*the following texts are iori's response to the topic in question

PS: I tried creating a folder in Japanese Firmware then convert it back to English one, and it did not recognize the folder anymore.  However, in English firmware, if you transfer a media using "Photo storage" menu, the folder from the media is transfered over to VP separate from the USER_001 directory.  That folder is also accessible through the VP's photo viewer.  So I'm thinking there must be some sort of hidden flag somewhere.  I'll investigate some more and get back to you guys.

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[sdsviet]

sweet thanks ishi.

[iori]

Follow up on my initial post:

I can confirm that my USB card reader does the same thing with directory name, and also the photo folder that was visible under the Japanese firmware, is no longer visible in the English firmware. I also checked for contents inside the folder to see if there were any hidden ini files of that sorts, but no luck. It seems like, as sdsviet pointed out, that the English firmware only can detect a certain group of folder names such as USER_xxx or YYYYMMDD_xxx.

[sdsviet]

i guess with teh later folder name we are able to know the date of the transfered pics. so that means that unless there's a new firmware coming to get this bypass or whenever u transferred a certain dated folder one would have to change the ap1l's date to match the folder and then change it back when transfer is done. man that is gonna take me a good awhile to do now. its like id3 tagging my 20gbs of mp3's all over again. =(

[sdsviet]

update:

so i found out that u dont need to change the date on the player or anything like that. when the player is connected to the comp u just have to transfer all the folders over and use the format YYYYMMDD_xxx and it reads it fine. im so lucky that, that was how i organize all my folders in the first place and the only difference was that i didnt have the _xxx part and had a description name there.

[mdsjack]

I am interested in this topic since I'm considering to buy one of these vaios.

I have a digital photo album with folder names that I dont want to change.

Have you eventually found a workaround? (sry not easy to read longposts in eng)

Is the trick of the english old fw over the jap one workin?

Is there a chance that they will release new fw?

[Minger]

I doubt there will be new firmware as its pretty much unsupported now (the player that is...) - its gonna be discontinued soon (or already is)

[sdsviet]

there is no other workaround unless there is new firmware (doubtfull). u just have to label it to the YYYYMMDD_xxx format. that is the only way at this point.