Sony, Walkmans And The iPod

Atrac3 by DecadeSol · 2004-07-05 05:11 · Score: 4, Informative

Adaptive TRansform Acoustic Coding originated with the minidisc. A nice little description.

Re:Atrac3 by Anonymous Coward · 2004-07-05 05:20 · Score: 1, Informative

Can somebody mod the parent up?

Far from being offtopic, it's a very useful bit of history and insight into the ATRAC format - Sony's proprietary format for their digital music players - and how it came about.

Encoding limitations? by nayigeta · 2004-07-05 05:12 · Score: 5, Informative

From the article: "... can play songs encoded in the popular MP3 and Windows Media formats on the computer. However, the program has to convert songs to Sony's proprietary Atrac3 format, the only file type the portable players will support."

I think this is will be a challenge for this device to pick up speed.

The additional effort and time needed to convert MP3 to Atrac3 format might not be a popular.

"The problem is they are a company at war with itself. So because they want to own everything, they end up owning nothing."

--
Sunset over the lake, cool mist over the bridge; A leave upon the ripples, the snow reflects its glow.

Re:Encoding limitations? by dfghjk · 2004-07-05 08:36 · Score: 1, Informative

This is done transparently by the sync software. Users have to do nothing for this and many won't even be aware of it.
Re:Encoding limitations? by Anonymous Coward · 2004-07-05 10:45 · Score: 3, Informative

[Atrac's] sound quality is better than most -- if not all -- of the MP3s that I've heard.

Then you are listening to poorly encoded MP3s. In fact, according to the Hydrogen Audio listening tests, Atrac is probably the worst modern, lossy audio compression format.

Misses something important. by user+no.+590291 · 2004-07-05 05:13 · Score: 5, Informative

In particular, it fails to mention their efforts to hobble consumer devices, including but not limited to ATRAC and Magic Gate. And no article about Sony's interaction with technology is complete or accurate without a mention of one of their senior executive's Churchillesque rant against peer to peer networks:

"The [music] industry will take whatever steps it needs to protect itself and protect its revenue streams," Heckler said. "It will not lose that revenue stream, no matter what."

We will develop technology that transcends the individual user. We will firewall Napster at source - we will block it at your cable company, we will block it at your phone company, we will block it at your [ISP]. We will firewall it at your PC.

Remember that when you buy Sony, you support the people whose management said these things.

Re:Retail outlets? by fullmetal55 · 2004-07-05 05:16 · Score: 2, Informative

we've had ~5 Sony Stores here (edmonton) for a long time... they seem to be doing pretty well for themselves. more keep popping up

Sony didn't invent the "portable HiFi" by Lars+T. · 2004-07-05 05:16 · Score: 3, Informative

A German did, and Sony finaly admited it.

--

Lars T.

To the guy who modded me down from perfect to terrible Karma - Apple haters still suck

Re:Retail outlets? by Ced_Ex · 2004-07-05 05:17 · Score: 5, Informative

Man.. how old is this article? We've had the "Sony Store" here in Canada for years! All they sell is Sony stuff, and they even have a Sony credit card.

The unfortunate thing about the store is that the prices are way higher than another electronics store selling the same product. Then again... what other electronic store actually showcases bleeding edge products found no where else? Good and bad.

--
Live forever, or die trying.

Re:Retail outlets? by weffey · 2004-07-05 05:19 · Score: 3, Informative

Opening retail outlets isn't a new tactic for Sony. Here where I live, I can think of two Sony Stores - one of which has been open for at least two years and I think the other one even longer. In the mall I work in part-time, I'm constantly giving people directions to the Sony Store. Now, if only they taught their sales associates to help customers *before* they're at the cash ...

Re:Retail outlets? by jm92956n · 2004-07-05 05:20 · Score: 5, Informative

There's a Sony store here in Manhattan, around 50th and 5th Ave., if I remember correctly. It's a very exclusive area: Brooks Brothers, Bergdorf Goodman, Tiffany's, and several high end retailers are close by.

I walked into the Sony store and it was nowhere near as nice as the Apple store in SOHO. The store was physically split into two sections each with its own entrance; merchandise was cluttered; there weren't as many product demos as I expected; and the sales staff, I thought, might be more at home at a rural used car dealer lot.

I remember the old Gateway Stores. They weren't nearly as bad as the Sony store.

--
An effective signature identifies a particular user amongst a base of thousands.

Re:Problem is those non-Sony artists. by LostCluster · 2004-07-05 05:20 · Score: 3, Informative

ITMS does in fact allow the Indies to get involved... It's just a matter of them signing up.

Almost what you want... by BearJ · 2004-07-05 05:31 · Score: 2, Informative

Have you checked out the iRiver H series? They are slightly larger than the iPod, have about 16 hours battery life and can load songs via USB mass-storage. Songs loaded this way can only be played via filename until you update the database. I use a program called iHPtool. I leave it on my player's hard drive itself, and after I dump new files, no matter what computer I'm at, I can quickly update my database.

And, it has a built in FM tuner, comes with LCD remote, optical and analog ins and outs, records direct to MP3 or WAV, has Ogg Vorbis support. You can record via analog in, optical in, or built in microphone.

There are a few quirks with some firmware, and navigation isn't as easy as with the iPod. Also, iRiver is super busy writing firmware for a few of their upcoming units, so a firmware update hasn't been released for these units for a little while. You should check out the hilarious disgruntled 14 year olds on the iRiver community forum.

Anyway, I made my choice, and I'm happy with it.

--
Stand clear of the doors. The doors are now closing.

sony portables debunked by FlunkedFlank · 2004-07-05 05:39 · Score: 3, Informative

iPodlounge has a pretty good article about Sony's new offerings: How Sony Cemented iPod's Supremacy

a biased source? yes. but a fair analysis? yes, IMO, including full bias disclosure at the end of the article.

One can License ATRAC by DAldredge · 2004-07-05 06:05 · Score: 2, Informative

Sony to License "ATRAC 3 TM"

American and Japanese Semiconductor Chip Companies join Sony in promoting "ATRAC 3TM" Sound Compression Technology

February 26, 2000 - Sony Corporation today announced plans to license the LSI codec of the "ATRAC 3" sound compression technology developed by Sony to the following seven companies: Fujitsu Limited, Hitachi Ltd., Motorola, Inc. (Chicago, Illinois), NEC Corporation, ROHM CO., LTD., SANYO Electric Co., Ltd., Texas Instruments, Inc. (Texas, USA).

Licensing will allow these companies to develop and commercialize "ATRAC 3" compliant LSI, which will smoothen the development and commercialization of "ATRAC 3" compliant audio devices by hardware manufacturers.

"ATRAC 3" is a sound compression technology based on "ATRACTM" used for MiniDisc. Compared with "ATRAC", "ATRAC3" features a higher compression rate, while maintaining the same level of sound quality. It has been highly anticipated as a compression technology that enables music distribution with high sound quality. "ATRAC 3" has been commercialized through Memory Stick WalkmanTM and the "bitmusicTM" music distribution service by Sony Music Entertainment Japan, Inc. since December 1999.

"Today's announcement further demonstrates the capability of 'ATRAC 3' to link to a variety of electronics devices and recording media in addition to packaged media such as 'MiniDisc' and 'Memory Stick'. We believe that collaboration with a host of LSI manufacturers will play a key role for the wide acceptance of 'ATRAC 3' business especially because it is essential for us to have a variety of LSI codec specifications" said Shizuo Takashino, Corporate Senior Executive Vice President of Sony Corporation.

"Making a family of our Hi-perion DSP products compliant with 'ATRAC 3' as an audio codec will allow us to exponentially expand our DSP business in the silicon audio market in the future" said Joji Murakami, Doctor of Engineering General Manager, System Micro Division, Fujitsu Limited.

"We have already commercialized a system LSI compliant with 'Memory Stick', and we believe that today's announcement will help to further develop a wide rage of products" said Seiichi Ueda, General Manager of System LSI Marketing Division, Semiconductor & Integrated Circuits, Hitachi Ltd.

"We place a high value on digital AV business in consumer devices, and we anticipate to further expand our business through emergence of Sony's 'ATRAC 3' and our IP core/process technology" said Toshio Nakajima, General Manager of 1st System LSI Division, System LSI Operations Unit, NEC Corporation.

"We anticipate to quickly comply with a variety of data compression applications for users by incorporating Sony's 'ATRAC 3' sound compression technology in the future" said by Toshio Asai, Director of LSI Product Development Headquarters, ROHM CO., LTD.

"We have developed an ATRAC decoder featuring low-power consumption. We believe that utilizing the feature will enable to develop 'ATRAC 3' compliant devices and help to gain wide application" said Yasuhiko Okuyama, Deputy General Manager of MOS-LSI Division, Semiconductor Company, SANYO Electric Co., Ltd.

Metreon by nucal · 2004-07-05 06:53 · Score: 2, Informative

There's a Sony themed entertainment complex / retail outlet: Metreon that's been in San Francisco for at least 5 years and seems to be doing pretty well ...

Re:Sony is ignoring their real market by Dogtanian · 2004-07-05 07:07 · Score: 3, Informative

Sony (whose name comes from a combination of the words - 'Sound Nippon')

That's not where I understood it was derived from:-
Here it says that it (basically) comes from the latin Sonus and 'Sonny boy'

--
"Slashdot - News and Chat Sites Deviant". (Click "homepage" link above for details).

Re:lol by jhesse · 2004-07-05 09:11 · Score: 2, Informative

If you have a SOny device, it supports memory stick. You don't have to go around guessing.

Right.
Would that be MemoryStick, Memorystick Duo, MemoryStick Pro, MemoryStick Pro Duo, or Memorystick with memory select?
Just don't forget the Magic Gate!
cite.
Memorystick is one of the bigger clusterfarks there is.

--

--
"I have also mastered pomposity, even if I do say so myself." -Kryten

ATRAC Only by m1a1 · 2004-07-05 09:21 · Score: 2, Informative

These things are ATRAC only. No thanks Sony. Take your shitty music player back to the drawing board.

Seriously ATRAC got the worst rating for 128kbps in the Hydrogen Audio Forums competition. The worst! Does anyone want to spend $200 - $500 on a player that will only play the lowest of the low? I certainly don't. Rio karma plays ogg and mp3 and wma and flac if you want lossless. Sony is the king! They should be destroying Rio and Apple by making a player people want! They should support every possible format. Especially those that are free to support (vorbis and flac come to mind).

minidisc woes by xpulsar87x · 2004-07-05 09:29 · Score: 3, Informative

I owned a Sony NetMD walkman for a few years (I now own a 40gb iPod :). Their software to get songs on the device was absolute garbage, but there was some weird method in which it would convert your mp3s to ATRAC and put the DRM stuff on it, but you could just convert that mp3 again and then it would lose the "transfer count" on it. Seemed kinda dumb. I hated using it anyway.

In order to get MP3s on the device, I'd use a combination of things. I'd burn a cd with Nero's Image Writer, and then mount it using Nero's image mounter. Then, I'd use the NetMD SimpleBurner, which was a well designed program imho. Rip to the MD, umount and delete the image, and there you go. Still, takes a number of steps to get done.

I'll take my iPod over that any day.

20 of 269 comments (clear)