NW-A91x

[pata2001]

http://www.ecat.sony.co.jp/walkman/lineup.cfm?Series=A

Thanks to Kakashi from t-board for finding the link from Sonystyle.jp.

Flash based, up to 16GB. Supports MP3, WMA, AAC, HE-AAC, Atrac, AAL.

Looks like the 1st NW that ships with Media Manager for Walkman software.

Pluses:

-Noise cancelling

-built-in stand

-seems like it comes with a digital TV tuner? (an antenna pop-up)

Minuses:

-Only support 320x240 video. C'mon, when was the last time you find 320x240 video? Even podcasts are going at least 640x480.

Wanna bet this is going to be Japan only? FU Sony!

PS: C'mon Atraclife mods, can we at least pretend to be excited by putting this in the front page?

Oh wait, forgot to put the keywords: iPod, sound quality. There you go.

[Ascariss]

well looks like alpha III has arrived.

it plays atrac since it has no Z in the name. question is, will it make it to the rest of the world.

[pata2001]

question is, will it make it to the rest of the world.

Is that a trick question?

[dutchtrance]

that is imply perfect.

really.

if i had to design the perfect walkman i would design that.

Atrac Yep

Direct encoding yep

video Yep

sexy look Yep

Sonicstage support Yep

noise cancelling yep

its simply perfect!

though if i was nit picking, it could do without the buttons and a touch screen, but its still gourgeous!

does it really do TV tuning as well?

i really really really want this player.

its going to be hard to resist sony usual tactic of selling it at 200 quid then knocking the price down to 100 quid 2 months later.

[bob123_]

if they do release it world-wide they may release drag n drop versions.

player looks awesome and is exactly what i've been waiting for. If you are listening... Sony, please please please release this world-wide!!!!!

[rocklegend_]

That player looks fantastic.I would but in in a heartbeat.I´m sure that it will appear on ebay stores.As it is stated above bu someone or all....that is the perfect Walkman.Sony are at least headin in the correct direction.Now all they need to do is release it outside Japan.Although if I´m picky and only downside is that it´s 16GB.Wouldn´t it be amazing if Sony released this walkman with a extremely high Hard Drive 60-80GB...I suppose I can keep dreaming

Edited September 27, 2007 by rocklegend

[metal]

Sonicstage support Yep

SS may not be supported as I don't see SS being mentioned in the website

[Shinji Ikeda]

I will have to take a closer look. This player supports one-seg television, which is only used in Japan.

Apple has a lock on overpricing their products then drop it significantly two months later.

I am unsure about the current range of iPod, but they only displayed 320x240. I doubt this has changed. So supporting 640x480 means that it needs to be scaled down. So either the video needs to be scaled down on the media player, or on a computer. The former will effect battery life of the media player.

[pata2001]

SS may not be supported as I don't see SS being mentioned in the website

Sonicstage is still supported. This series ships with Sonicstage CP, Media Manager for Walkman, and "Walkman launcher" (whatever that is).

Hey, Engadget beats Atraclife (again).

[pomj]

SS may not be supported as I don't see SS being mentioned in the website

A bit down on the page it says:

同梱アプリケーションソフトウェア Media Manager for WALKMAN、SonicStage CP、WALKMAN Launcher

[pata2001]

that is imply perfect.

really.

i really really really want this player.

Presumably that you can actually buy the player, that is. What's the point of a perfect player if people cannot even buy it?

[bob123_]

pata2001. what's with all the negative attidude???? Why don't you just wait and see??

[kino170878]

I predict that this model will eventually sell outside Japan, minus atrac support of course. It makes no financial sense to restrict your market, even Sony knows that.

[aob9]

There will be punishment for forcing Sony to Drop SS in some regions. The first crack of the wip will be NO NW-A91* for the 'bold boys'. Soon we will be wishing for the 'Good Ol' Days' of ATRAC.

[dutchtrance]

There will be punishment for forcing Sony to Drop SS in some regions. The first crack of the wip will be NO NW-A91* for the 'bold boys'. Soon we will be wishing for the 'Good Ol' Days' of ATRAC.

As far as i can tell atrac is a containerless format, as in it is just a raw audio file. the reason atrac does not work in the 81* series is windows media player doe snot write a table of contents which atrac requires. therefore if sonic stage is supported then so is atrac as sonic stage will write a TOC.

i predict this unit will be released here minus the TV support and minus sonic stage support and there fore atrac.

it would be a shame to have to import from japan and get the TV bit not working as i presume it will be tied to japanise TV systems freq.

[LG1_]

Look at this pic

http://www.ecat.sony.co.jp/products/picture/NW-A910_006.jpg

There is a tv icon down the bottom, might not get the s618 after all

[wham44]

they will most prolly release it to the world minus the tv thing? why would they waste a good mp3 bcos of the tv thing anyways. the thing is i hope the sound will sound like the nw-hd5 and nwa1000 series instead of the new a808 series. the new series is so bright its abit painful to hear

[bryue]

How large is that screen?

It looks sweet!

[tonyjaa]

How large is that screen?

It looks sweet!

The screen size is 2.4" inch and has the same 320x240 resolution.

I'm sure you can import this model and use SS 4.3CP minus the TV won't work. Does anyone knows if mobile digital TV in Japan is free to air or subscription based?

Edited September 27, 2007 by tonyjaa

[Old skool D]

16GB is nice, but I'm not that impressed with the look of the player itself.

[aob9]

16GB is nice, but I'm not that impressed with the look of the player itself.

I agree, i think the A80*,A81* looks more stylish

[bryue]

It is nice to see Sony using space more efficiently on such a small unit. But I agree that it doesn't look as stylish as the previous ones, this new unit looks like more like a PDA.

According to the specs, the size is pretty close to the A810 and A610.

A910 = 47.2 x 86.0 x 12.3mm (W x H x D)

A810 = 44.5 x 88.0x 9.6mm (W x H x D)

A610 = 42.0 x 79.5 x 11.5mm (W x H x D)

I got a bad feeling that this unit will be so expensive to the point that I think I might just keep using my PSP instead haha.

EDIT: Found the price tag: 47,800円 (approx. 413.35 USD or 414.26 CAD as of today)

Edited September 27, 2007 by bryue

[LuLu]

I agree, i think the A80*,A81* looks more stylish

I think the A8XX look more stylish as well. It might be the buttons. I prefer the ones on these models.

I also agree about the space. Notice also that on both the A-8XX and the S-61X the bottom section of the DAP that contains the buttons takes up almost one-third of the device. On NW-A910 the buttons are only about one-quarter of the face. It would have been great if they used the buttons from the A-8XX on the 910.

I think the S-61X series look "cheap" because of the way they framed the front (the rounded edges).

[Shinji Ikeda]

16GB is nice, but I'm not that impressed with the look of the player itself.

Unlike the NW-A800/NWZ-A810 series this new NW-A910 series looks bulky and not as sexy. I was hoping from them to add a 16GB model to the NW-A800/NWZ-A810 series. I will wait until I have one in hand before I make my final assessment.

[GusG]

it remember-s me a Nokia N80 music lol

[Ascariss]

it is similar a bit. but the design seems to be influenced by the walkman phone and the new 600 series.

[sdfzz_]

I think if Sony should removes the one-seg and release it to North America with wifi, so that we can watch IP TV, Location Free or youtube..

[pata2001]

Well, even dapreview and gizmodo covered this. Hello Atraclife?

[Shinji Ikeda]

I think if Sony should removes the one-seg and release it to North America with wifi, so that we can watch IP TV, Location Free or youtube..

Adding WIFI would be a great feature to change one-seg for outside of Japan. It is possible for Sony to make a model that supports Location Free, but I suspect that it will be available in Japan first. One-seg is very popular in Japan and this feature is included with many cell phones. Sony has already released a portable One-Seg player in Japan.

Well, even dapreview and gizmodo covered this. Hello Atraclife?

It still has not become a big news item outside of Japan. If this was by Apple it would be huge news.

[bob123_]

[Shinji Ikeda]

It still has not become a big news item outside of Japan. If this was by Apple it would be huge news.

Sony has to be to blame for that. I can't understand why (unless it is only a Japan release) they would not do a proper world-wide press release with details as to where it will be sold and for how much etc. It would be so simple. Even if it is only a Japan release why not state as much.

Unfortunately, this device has features that are not available outside of Japan. There are key technologies that are only available in certain regions. One-Seg, which is the key feature of this new player, is not available outside of Japan. Additionally, this play still supports SonicStage and ATRAC. Remember, there were those that stated that ATRAC was dead. A world-wide press release is not needed.

One-Seg has been available in Japan for several years, and I suspect that it is the first time that many have heard of the technology.

Apple's news is spread is spread by hype from Apple fan-boys tell how innovative the product. That is the meaning of my comment about Apple. Not that they do it better than others.

[pata2001]

It still has not become a big news item outside of Japan. If this was by Apple it would be huge news.

What does this have to do with Apple? Are you suggesting that Atraclife to start reporting Apple news now? Is this news is so insignificant that other tech blogs like engadget, gizmodo, dapreview, etc already reported it? What's the point of Atraclife then?

[bob123_]

Is this news is so insignificant that other tech blogs like engadget, gizmodo, dapreview, etc already reported it? What's the point of Atraclife then?

I would have to agree. I fairly regularily check Atraclife because I thought they were ahead or at least equal with other sites at reporting Sony news. Even if it is just a Japan release it is still a major release. Atraclife's silence is surprising

[Shinji Ikeda]

What does this have to do with Apple? Are you suggesting that Atraclife to start reporting Apple news now? Is this news is so insignificant that other tech blogs like engadget, gizmodo, dapreview, etc already reported it? What's the point of Atraclife then?

If two ships pass each other in the night. How close must be to each other to notice each other?

There was no point to my comment on Apple, other than some news is spread by word of mouth.

For sites devoted to telling news about Sony products and ATRAC technology this is important news. I always viewed ATRACLife as a community that share information about Sony products and ATRAC technology. However, ATRACLife has always reported news not rumour. I would agree that it is curious as to why this is not covered by ATRACLife on the front-page.

Thanks to you we are now covering this story.

So what is your solution?

[thefanboy]

Boring Design,

Dumb User Interface,

already looks like three or four year old design.

chance of winning any market share is same as what hd5 had against ipod photo.

past few years sony had no clue against click wheel, next few years they will fight against touch interface.....I am sure those morons in walkman team will NEVER understand this.

features will only increase the price, not the market share.

I am yet to know if Howard Stringer fired people who were responsible for reducing walkman monopoly to almost last in the market.

pity is every other sony brand has nice look and feel but for walkman. please note handheld is the flag bearer for entire brand. original walkman was partly responsible for creating giant called sony. ipod revived apples fortune, now all their products stand a good chance against competition.

[thefanboy]

best thing they can do is to combine mylo and walkman into single product. lot of efforts can be saved and make ppl more happy for the money they pay.

[juli_]

past few years sony had no clue against click wheel, next few years they will fight against touch interface.....I am sure those morons in walkman team will NEVER understand this.

I wasn't aware Sony users yearned for a click wheel OR a touch interface. I for one, hate click wheels and a touch interface. Is there a majority of users who want these features then?

[thefanboy]

Hi Juli,

how are you ?

'sony users' may not be yearning, but general public is mad about it, and if you want to make money, you have to attract them. wat say ?

[dura_]

I doubt it. Imitating Apple to me seems not the way to go.

Problem is that the western customers, Americans especially seem biased to the idea that ipods are the best. It goes that far that many people here (in the Netherlands) seems to think there are cheap mp players and ipods. Cowon, Iriver and Creative are hardly known. Sony of course is known, but not for its DAPs.

in this kind of discussions everyone seems to assume Sony is wrong and the public is right, but is that true?

Robert Heinlein, a sf-writer famous for his oneliners once said: "name one occasion in history in which the majority was right".

Overdone surely, but many people are so ignorant they blindly follow each other and are sure ipods are the best and nothing other manufacturers do seems to be able to chance that.

The -often wellment- criticism on the internet on Sony DAPs doesn't better things, since the internet is the #1 source of information for many people, and they get the impression Sony products are bad.

Edited September 30, 2007 by dura

[Guest Stuge]

Boring Design,

Dumb User Interface,

already looks like three or four year old design.

chance of winning any market share is same as what hd5 had against ipod photo.

past few years sony had no clue against click wheel, next few years they will fight against touch interface.....I am sure those morons in walkman team will NEVER understand this.

.

Hmm ,but I really liked its design

Even I-pod has its old boring Design IMO

[Shinji Ikeda]

I doubt it. Imitating Apple to me seems not the way to go.

Problem is that the western customers, Americans especially seem biased to the idea that ipods are the best. It goes that far that many people here (in the Netherlands) seems to think there are cheap mp players and ipods. Cowon, Iriver and Creative are hardly known. Sony of course is known, but not for its DAPs.

in this kind of discussions everyone seems to assume Sony is wrong and the public is right, but is that true?

Robert Heinlein, a sf-writer famous for his oneliners once said: "name one occasion in history in which the majority was right".

Overdone surely, but many people are so ignorant they blindly follow each other and are sure ipods are the best and nothing other manufacturers do seems to be able to chance that.

The -often wellment- criticism on the internet on Sony DAPs doesn't better things, since the internet is the #1 source of information for many people, and they get the impression Sony products are bad.

The media has a tendency of having too much influence on stating public opinion. The media contains individuals who believe they have something important say, and believe that they are being objective. It is not our responsibility to influence others, as netizens, but to allow them to form their own opinion.