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Portable CD-RW/DVD Player
BugNuker writes "If your CD/MP3 player wasn't enough, you have to check this out. Sony has released this all in one media device that can play mp3's, wma's, cd's, and DVD's... yes, DVD's. It can be hooked up to your computer, and be used as a CD-RW and then hooked up to your TV, and play your favorite DVD's. But can it play my mp3's recorded on my DVD? Ultimate media device I would say, same size as a personal cd player. Comes with a Memory Stick expansion slot, a rechargeable battery and a USB 2.0/1.1 interface." There's a picture. It's cute. And expensive.
I mean, seriously, is this such a bargain?
If you want a DVD player, you're much better off going with a dedicated unit for the same $$$. It will give you infinitely better picture quality.
If you want an MP3/etc player, head for an iPod or that new Creative device. It'll be smaller (and even the cheapest version will still have as much memory as a DVD), and the battery life will be better because it doesn't have to spin the damn dvd around all the time.
One of those cases of big wow factor because of convergence/size/cuteness, but when you look at it objectively - jack of all trades, master of none.
-- james
I've always longed for those super-ultra-tiny notebooks like you find on Dynamism, but the coolest ones don't have built-in CD or DVD drives. I hate carrying around a drive just because I might need to read a cd-rom, but this little gizmo would be the perfect companion. I could use it to watch movies on the road in hotels, plus listen to music, and still play cd-roms with the computer.
The drawback of the bundled add-on CD drives that come with the notebooks is that they don't function separately - you're just lugging around a mostly useless cd-rom reader, not a CD/DVD Walkman. This thing is going to sell like hotcakes to business travelers!
What's your damage, Heather?
How depressing must it be to be a product developer in there, busting a gut to produce neat stuff that people will love, only to have the weasels in legal forcing them to eviscerate the product with ill-considered DRM?
Large corporations typically are divided into various legal entitites in different country, to maximize on government grant, subsidies, local taxation and such. Totally apart from that there's businesses/business units/segments/whatever you call them that deal with different products, markets or technologies. Explaining different directions within such a monster by referring to its legal entities doesn't make that much sense...
*Cue Apple switch music*
I had it... it worked... but it kinda sucked in the fact that to put music on.. you HAD to do it in real-time. I bought a HI-FI deck which allowed x2 speeds, but still it did not really satisfy my needs - who wants to waste 30 minutes waiting for a CD to copy over? Oh yeah, NetMD now apparently is better, but I've never had one, nor will I ever get a MD player again. For me? 20gb iPod all my music, all my documents and 'some' of my movies in my pocket. It brings a smirk to my face everytime I see people fumbling around with CDs/MDs on the train platform.. hehehe. If you're willing to spend *THAT* much on a personal audio device, you might as well buy the best availble... I'm Michael Jin, and I'm a student....
Fight Crime - Shoot Back!
For a portable device which records and reads CDs at 24X, rewrites CDs at 10X and reads DVDs at 8X, for less than $300 I think it isn't too bad actually. IMHO of course.