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How Sony's HD Audio Player Falls Short
Mr_Silver writes "Sony's new MP3 based HD player (the snappily titled NW-HD3) is reviewed over at head-fi.org. Unfortunately it can't remember where you last were located when browsing, you can't list all the songs by an artist, 1.5 hours to transfer 2100 songs (instead of the iPod's 15 minutes) and a wall of noise in the output. Final conclusion? 'If there was a way I could return this thing, I'd do it in a second.' So close, yet so far." Update: 12/14 00:35 GMT by T : Not quite so fast: As
forums.minidisc.org Administrator Christopher MacManus writes, it turns out that (as the threads below this review reveal), "The reviewer
discovers that the unit he had is defective as someone else employs one
and there is no hiss issue. Furthermore, the software woes he
experienced are related to him employing JAPANESE software on an English
operating system. Sonicstage 2.3, which he needs to use the unit, is now
available in English."
honestly - how do people turn out such a faulty product? it seems the hardware would be the hard part - why is the software so shoddy?
MP3 based HD player
Damn two letter acronyms in article summaries.... I was wondering what MP3 had to do with high definition.
HD == hard disk, in this context
I'm glad newspaper reporters don't write this poorly yet.
...A special kind of sadistic bastard to make a portable music player that doesn't play MP3 files (as most previous Sony products did). Sadistic bastards generally don't make stellar products when their main concerns are pushing file formats.
Even those who arrange and design shrubberies are under considerable economic stress at this period in history.
I often wonder how companies don't notice things like what's listed for how it falls short... I guess companies just rush it out the door instead of spending at least a week having random people use it an list complaints... shame.
Reality is nothing but a collective hunch.
The only advantage I can see to getting this is that it charges off usb. I hate the fact that my 4th gen iPod will only charge off of a firewire port (although the included wall adapter is a really cool feature). Also, does anyone know if the SONY product can be used as a harddrive? The review said that you had to use their software to transfer songs, but it said nothing about how you could transfer files and things.
Now I've done it; I've doomed the thing to be wildly successful!
The CB App. What's your 20?
ATRAC is better but not when you are converting from a lossy format like MP3 to ATRAC.
Any man who afflicts the human race with ideas must be prepared to see them misunderstood. -- H. L. Mencken
On one page I see an advert for a 40GB IPOD that can hold 15000 tracks for only $399
On the adjacent page I see that these tracks only cost me $0.99/each
My math says that's $14,850 to fill the thing up.
I've only got a hundred or so albums and it would be nice to carry them around with me, but getting them into the IPOD or SONY HD3 or whatever and indexing, is a royal PIT@. Going out and finding all that music and buying it AGAIN at the 99 cent music store is also a PITW (pain in the wallet).
Why the hell can't I just take my CD or vinyl recording and easily stuff it into the portable player? Until this is 'fast and easy' the radio or listening at home is more attractive (granted there are some good stations in my two home towns).
Now I'm the grandest Tiger in the Jungle!
this is a prime example of how a product fails because of it trying to control the consumer.
I just can't believe how this got past the door isn't market research meant to prevent really stupid products like this
sony can make awesome electronic gear its just the donuts in head office and other depts shoot them selves in the foot
Hmm. The iPod puts out fairly accurate low end when its hooked up to a stereo. Sounds to me like mavis had a problem with the headphones and decided to fix it in a rather too drastic manner. Ah, the curse of the early adopter who is influenced by the lure of the shiny new toy.
The poster does mention trying new headphones with the iPod (near the end of the "review"), but fails to say if they made a difference. The implication is that they didn't. Maybe this is because the iPod is missing a simple "bass boost" button (something which is far from lacking, between equalization and the desire for many people to listen to music without significant alterations)? Then again, this was written by a self-proclaimed bass-head non-audiophile...
Hmm. Sounds like a pretty solid vote for "not recommended" to me...
You're special forces then? That's great! I just love your olympics!
So my original story sent over a week ago about this new player wasn't good enough? Had to wait for a post that made Sony sound like it sucks, eh? Seems like the typical /. way... oh well. FWIW, someone else on that thread got the HD3 and didn't notice and hiss issues with the device. I'm still looking forward to its release here in the states.
Granted, the 2100 song transfer was all mp3's, which is likely being wrapped in some DRM on the device and not the native ATRAC3plus format. Regardless, I agree that it's still slow. But then again, how often does one swap out that many songs on and off a DAP?
In the meantime, I'll wait for the "SONY SUCKS! APPLE RULES!" posts to suck up more internet bandwidth and database server space.
If you read the comments at the bottom of the review page, you will notice that the reviewer has determined that he has a defective unit, which would account for the bad output quality.
Of course this still doesn't excuse sony's production of such an obviously crippled device. It has great potential, but will never work so long as sony is also a record company.
I wonder if the reviewer made an honest mistake and actually received a genuine Sorny product. Anyway, I would have went with a Panaphonics.
You want to know who isn't running Firefox 2.x? They spell it "definately" and "rediculous".
I originally acquired a minidisc for one main reason: Battery Life. It would last around 50 hours on a single AA and that was the only thing I cared a year ago. Eventually I discovered all the issues with the technologies involved into this portable media.
Minidiscs (Net-MD and HI-MD) do have many issues such as:
- ATRAC only.
Compress your compressed mp3s into Atrac. Noticable Quality Loss. If you want to preserve the quality, then record LIVE (SP-Mode) like a cassette but do we really have time to do that?
Compress = lose time = quality loss = why?!?
- Cheap built quality.
Sony tends to make the higher-priced models built to last longer using material like magnesium unlike plastic of the lower-end models. It makes some sense I guess since it costs more but for a company like Sony, the company who ruled in the era of Walkmans (god those things were solid), I find it sad how the tables have turned. Walkmans used to take major beatings and they'd still function.
- slow transfer.
because of conversion and because it doesn't mearly use the potential of usb 2.0. Very abysmal on NET-Md's. On HI-Md's, they try to impress you with "100X" when in fact that's 500kb/s of burning speed.
I'm glad that Sony at least understood that it will take mp3 playback capability to at least compete in the market of portable audio players but they are already behind, way behind in the western countries and have a long way. They have to improve the software these players use (SonicStage has a horrible interface and barely enough features) and built quality of these players.
I'l sum this up by saying that I just wish Sony could build their future players like they used to with the Walkmans: Built to last.
The post mortems of this and other so-called "iPod Killers" are beginning to expose the difficulty of creating:
1) a sleek, feature rich MP3 player;
2) sleek, intuitive software to run on the player; and
3) sleek, intuitive software to interface with it.
(and optionally a sleek music store to interface with it)
For those who belittle Apple's achievement or dismiss their market success as "clever marketing," the failure of Sony and others to basically get their engineering shit in order should be more than telling: apparently, creating a great MP3 player really is hard.
Stop spamming slashdot.
I had but a simple dream, to destroy all humans.
A few players such as this Sony and perhaps the Creative Muvo2 look good on paper, but specs aren't everything. A lot of it also comes down to the UI and how easy it is to use. If I have to scroll through 5G of songs with only a one line display (ala Muvo2) to find one song, you can forget that!
The friendliest digital photography forums on the net!
No, it will charge off USB, just not as fast....
Just be sure you dismount the thing or it will continue to run and suck juice.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
"Oh, here is another over priced piece of Apple crap", I thought. And that time, I might have been right. I am not an Apple fan by nature.
I bought a 20 GB player from another company, and liked it well enough.
Earlier this year, I had the chance to get $100 off one of the new 4th gneration iPods. I decided on the 20 Gb to replace the brick that was my MP3 player.
I have never looked back.
My iPod is easily the best gadget (or maybe even technology item, period) that I have ever purchased. I love it. My life is now filled with music and audio books.
What I really don't get is how a company like Sony can fall on its face over, and over, and over. Seriously, can't Sony, f@cking Sony, figure out how to make a cool gadget to compete with iPod? Seriously, nothing I have tickered with at WorstBuy (tm) or CircuitCrapy (tm) from Sony even comes close to the ease of use and pure coolness that I have with my iPod.
As a software developer, I really don't get how a company that is often on or ahead of the curve like Sony and continue to f@ck it up!
Apple is in strange territory. Many times the first to market is also to far ahead of the market that they fail. This is not the case with the iPod, and Sony needs a huge shift in engineering and attitude if they want to even attempt to catch up.
Great ideas often receive violent opposition from mediocre minds. - Albert Einstein
I personally believe that Sony's dual role of hardware manufacturer and record lable are at odds with one another. (Indeed, you have to wonder if the famed Betamax case would have ever been filed in today's world.)
Ah, the NW-HD3; so easy to remember. I can hear it now:
"Mom and Dad, I really really want a Sony NW-HD3 this holiday season!"
Never mind sending Mom and Dad to the mall with that kind of information just invites holiday disappointment. The real problem is that Sony makes ten trillion different pieces of consumer electronics, all of which are named just as idiotically. KD-36XS955, HDR-FX1, DSC-F828 -- these are all real products I pulled off the Sony website. Do you have any clue what they are?
Contrast this with the branding Apple pulled off after Jobs returned: they went from having a confusing line of Performa 5200s, Performa 6300s, PowerMac 7200s, Powermac 8500s, PowerBook 1800s (etc. etc. the list goes on) to having three easily explainable product lines: iMacs, PowerMacs and PowerBooks and now iBooks and iPods. Easy. "Mom and Dad, I want an iPod". Done.
Granted this creates another set of problems (for tech support and repair shops especially) but overall the effect dramatically reduces consumer confusion dramatically. Why can't Sony and other electronics manufacturers learn from this lesson?
~jeff
You don't always need to be an innovator. You just need to do something well.
Sony make excellent consumer and professional video gear. Their audio gear has always been low-end from the Walkman until today. As far as I can see, they were never aiming at the high-quality market, rather neato gadgets and shiny things.
On the other hand, how 'inventive' can you really be with an mp3 player? Especially when the first criticisms of a new music format or user-interface will be "but it doesn't play mp3" or "it isn't like my iPod" (when that is the whole point).
Indy Media Watch-Proctologist of the Internet
I believe they crippled the regular "consumer" version by not including a digital input. They did the same to DAT. This to appease the publishing business. If they really championed it, we would've had a very durable, reliable replacement for the floppy ten years ago. Memory sticks don't compare. They just don't hold up. CD's are a pain.
What?
Sony's hardware has fallen short of claims so much that when I see this I just think 'here they go again'
It's always the software portion. First it was the customized software drivers on their PCs which did less than the generic drivers. Then there was the net MD crap they forgot to tell you they had to convert all the files to atrac on your HD first and that up to 64X speed meant everyone got around 1.3X speed. Then their memorystick format didn't support sizes over 256mb - hence the 'pro' version. Funny NO OTHER flash format needed any upgrades from the first 8MB card to the 4GB cards.
His device was defective. There is no background hiss with this device, but unfortunately, most people will not see my comment and believe the aforementioned review. It's truly idiotic how the internet can be at times..
Use Minidisc? Join the Minidisc.org forums.
HDD, or Hard Disk Drive, tells you what kind of drive it is. It's a "Hard Disk" drive, as opposed to a "Floppy Disk" drive, or a "Tape" drive, or "CD-ROM" drive.
But the "World Wide Web" typically refers to HTTP(S) traffic, while "Internet" refers to the network on which the WWW is built. Therefore it does make some sort of sense to say "Internet Web", as opposed to "Internet2 Web" or "My Private Network Web". You'll still sound funny saying it, but it makes sense.
PC Computer is as bad as ATM Machine or NIC card, though.
It was pretty obivious a "wall of noise" would have to be a hardware defect, Sony would not send out a product like that - and lots of people seem to be picking up on this so you can renew your faith in ther internet.
However - is it accurate you cannot browse by artist? That to me would be enough to disregard it. I use all of the browsing modes on the iPod and wouldn't be happy to loose any of them - to produce a new product without this feature seems insane to me.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
- Copper wire connecting 2 tin cans, which is limited by geographic proximity to external broadcasting device (approximately 5 feet) and subject to external interference
- Flintstones-style singing miniature Pterodactyl, which is known to develop an attitude over time and make gut-busting wisecracks in place of music
- 'Space-Time Continuum' abnormality actually linking listeners with original performance, which occasionally disintegrates the listener
- Shrunken city whose sole purpose is to exactly recreate tracks on penalty of death, which is limited by lifespan and extremely sensitive to shaking and tapping on the device
- Ghosts of the band, which have a penchant for telekinetically elevating the listener during emotionally charged tracks and sometimes becoming visible to young children
- Specially trained M&M Minis forced to sing, which are hard to keep housed within the device and nearly impossible to reinsert when the device's housing is breached
MI mean come on... I HATE 'lol' as a damn abbreviation. I can't help but say it in my head when I read it and MAN it's annoying when it's used in writings...
So can I ask for a ban for any review that even thinks about containing 'lol' within it? This one does, has been shown to be a bad review of a defective product, and I think that speaks volumes of someone who would use 'lol' within a piece.
This blows my mind continually. I hate the Apple marketing, I hate the stupid white headphones, and I hate the iTunes music store.
However, as an EE, I think the iPod is a god-damn miracle. It's incredibly well-designed, tightly engineered, and not really much more expensive than any of its competitors these days. It is, simply put, a triumph of user-centered design, at least in regards to the interface.
Is it the only interface out there? No.
Is it the only great interface that's possible? No!
Is it the only great interface out there? Yes.
The only thing that's even come close, in my book, was the Archos running Rockbox -- generally speaking, when manufacturers fuck up the UI, they do it in the firmware or with those CRAP joystick input devices. Since basically no one has clued in to the fact that open firmware for an otherwise impossible-to-copy device poses no threat to sales, firmware on otherwise well-designed devices (iRiver, etc) languishes in shittiness. When someone develops a good open firmware standard for portable audio devices, we'll really be getting somewhere.
It's not even that Apple has the best hardware engineers or the best platform -- the iPod uses the PortalPlayer architecture, and so have a number of other companies' entries. They've just all sucked.
IAAPDESE(I Am A Product Design Embedded Systems Engineer), and I work for a company that does MP3 players, among other things. We worked on one of the most recent entrants in 5GB HDD space.
I watched this product be crippled by the client's overwhelming urges to satisfy their industrial design (read: aesthetics) people, who knew precisely dick about what makes a really good interface. Unsurprisingly, it has bombed in the market despite good media coverage, and has been discontinued indefinitely.
Apple, on the other hand, generally pays attention to that stuff. It's not that they're the only ones who can. It's that they're the only ones who do -- everyone else is clawing at the market with money-losing bullshit products instead of regrouping, taking a year off, and designing a *really* well-though-out device.
Personally, I use an iRiver iHP140 -- I need record capability -- but I lust after the new one with the non-joystick controls...
"The reviewer discovers that the unit he had is defective as someone else employs one and there is no hiss issue. Furthermore, the software woes he experienced are related to him employing JAPANESE software on an English operating system. Sonicstage 2.3, which he needs to use the unit, is now available in English."
The original reviewer is employing much higher quality headphones (Shure) than the person who states that he encounters no hiss at all. As well the person in the headfi thread who responds that he has no issues has a different model.
This can mean several things:
1) That the model is particularly sensitive to power line noise.
2) That the better headphones are more sensitive to noise within unit than the lower quality headphones employed within by the other individual.
3) That the model is actually defective.
It does not mean the model 'isn't defective. But the reasons presented within the thread to not 'prove' the model is defective.
This is somewhat obvious, but: iTunes is definitely better than copying files manually.
/artist/album/ folder structure. One click. I then take the new songs and drag them onto the device where they are similarly organized. One drag.
This is especially true if you stay in iTunes-land: You rip your CDs with iTunes or buy songs from the ITMS and it automatically adds all the correct ID3 name tags. iTunes doesn't deal well with missing ID3 tags - it will just plop everything in the "unknown artist" category.
Why is iTunes better? iTunes provides a database of music and keeps the files organized on the disk in the background for you. I would naturally assume that any geek would understand how a database is better than a file system, but here are some examples: Searching is easier, re-organizing is easier, you have meta-data (like rating: 1 to 5 stars). You can create smart playlists, like "all 5 star songs in my library". And so on.
And you can conveniently move albums from iTunes to your portable mp3 player. If songs are already there, it will do nothing, not annoy you with an "are you sure you want to overwrite?" dialog. You can also set it to auto-sync all music if you have a big enough player.
A real-life example: I have a Bob Marley album on both the computer and the portable device. Now i just bought another Bop Marley album. On iTunes, i click "import" and it will go to the CDDB and get track names, import all files and put them in the correct place on the HDD, naming the files like the song titles, and putting it in a
If i am HDD based, i need to first tell my importing program where to put them on the HDD, "Save As: Bob Marley/Album..". Then, i open Explorer on the HDD, navigate to the the album (many clicks), hit "copy" on the album folder, navigate to the portable player to the correct album (many clicks) and hit paste. No gain, but a whole lot more work.
As far as crappy MP3 software is concerned, i know what you mean. Back when i had a Creative Nomad with MusicMatch JB (PC), i just could not use it. Like, at all. It was total crap. I had to resort to using the Nomad only on the mac, with the iTunes plugin (there was no iTunes for windows at the time).
I received my ipod from Amazon on Friday and eversince I have been infatuated. A few years back I thought the whole IPod thing was just a lot of hype so I bought a Creative Jukebox. I wish I hadn't wasted the money on the Creative Jukebox, soon after the warenty ran up the headphone jack died and I had to listen to it through an external amplifier or if I did use headphones it was very quiet.
Apple hit gold with their design of the IPod. It shows you that a little hardwork on an intuitive design can pay off.
I can operate my ipod with one hand
It looks beatiful
Its small (I can throw it in my pocket)
A little hardwork went a long way. I wonder how much analysis they conducted on what consumers want in a portable music player / how many hours of brainstorming went into the 1st generation.
Hey you forgot the Aibo...Everyone tries to duplicate that.
With sometimes tragic consequences as I found out when attempting to insert four AAA cells up my late dog's behind.
Indy Media Watch-Proctologist of the Internet
I've owned about 10 portable CD players and a MiniDisc player and the iPod kicks all their asses for sound quality. Even the top of the line Sony Discmans over the years can't compare. Also, in terms of the output, I think it's probably higher than the average which makes it great for better headphones. I have some excellent Beyerdynamic DT531s which it drives wonderfully. In fact, a number of hi-fi reviewers have taken to using the iPod in show demos.
Egg, meet Face. Face, Egg. :)
iPod's design "is so sleek" vs. the poor device on review "doesn't come even close to iPod design"
iPod's interface "is so sleek" vs. the poor device on review "which has some interface problems when compared to iPod"
I have an IRiver myself and I like it's metallic design. Still, I read every now and then reviews like 'the design is nothing like iPod's' - and always from people who should bring in a neutral point of view. Give me a break on this!
You don't have to try to simply find a better device than iPod, but nice alternatives for people who want and need different things from their player.
-el
They had other, great, intersting (remember the electronic picture frame?) and innovative products. But that's quite some time ago.
Since Sony purchased CBS and Columbia pictures this company went apeshit.
It nowadys seems to be run by a bunch of paranoid, MBA'd marketing droids with neither a knack for innovation, nor a clue what the customer wants.*)
What a shame!
*) I mean: releasing a portable music player in the year 2004 without native MP3 support? Yeah I know, they finally provided (or promised to provide) a firmware upgrade. But how frigging dim can you actually be to even get such ideas...
ich bin der musikant
mit taschenrechner in der hand
kraftwerk
And you didn't return it to Apple to be fixed during that first year? Fuck off.
Bad analogies are like waxing a monkey with a rainbow.
I do a lot of audio production (analog and digital) so I have a lineup of various brands/models of headphones that I use during final mixdown processes. From my experience, some devices do seem to have a little bit of extra "edge eq" similar to techniques used by commercial radio stations trying to get "that signature sound" type of an effect. IMO the iPod is bright on my whole range of headphones, from my wonderful Audio-Technica M40fs' (a great deal at $69-$99US for studio headphones that also sound great on everything) to shitty panasonics and almost-brandless Sony rip-offs I spend $7 to $15 on almost weekly. My PowerBook puts out colorless sound and (with eq off in iTunes and my mixes how they played out through the board, as CD size/format uncompressed AIFFs) has beautifully distinguished bass. I've noticed similar effects on some sony players, enhanced when sony's headphones are used, but muddy through the AT monitors and dry and harsh through iPod earbuds. These are my own mixdowns of stuff I'm working on in production and were transferred in that same uncompressed AIFF format to all the devices, and on CD as CD audio to play in car stereos, etc. Just my experience, but it's been something I've had to actually thinking about when closing up a mix recently. I've never heard a hiss, though, on any non-powered headphones (noise-canceling ones are really noisy, it's a bitch) on any of the devices I use, with any of my headphones, the hiss could be result of interference, crappy modem(DAC), crappy electrical in your house, no ground, or a million other things. Oh, and if this guy is driving 'audiophile-quality' headphones to the point of hearing hiss because they are sensitive (ohmage? s/n ratio? frequency response pattern?) he may well have already blown a crossover or otherwise damaged the drivers on his phones. Also the SPLs this would be pushing are close to ear-damaging and also cause the brain's very own distortion channel of pain to kick in on the signal, so he might be hearing the his from aural compression, so to speak. Stuff sounds better when you turn it down.