Sony miniVaio

ExoduS 18.11

Anybody got one of these? Bought a 40gig one about 1/2 a year ago. Reasonabley happy, wonderin if theres any firmware or software updates? Pocket vaio rather !!! mistake in thread name

Karoma

"miniVAIO"?? VAIO Pocket perhaps?

Karoma

anyhooo... if it is a(n EU) VAIO product, all updates,etc. will be on www.vaio-link.com

ExoduS 18.11

woops ! thanks alot though! i always get it mixed ;P

Karoma

well?is it a VAIO Pocket or something else?:)

garthv

Dont touch one,
Theyve stopped making them anyway..
Ive got a thread floating about here somewhere about how bad they are...ill try and find it

/edit
Here we go :
http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=304532

Karoma

VAIO production ends quite shortly after VAIO initial sales launch.
that doesn't mean anything.

the player itself is actually quite nifty.. shame about SonicStage.

Wertz

I dunno...I love mine...barely a moments trouble (had to reset it twice in 3 months).
Sonicstage I don't even use....vaio transfer is a drag and drop application that does everything I need it to...unless I want to delete tracks/albums, in which case sonicstage is necessary.
€250 for a 40gb player is a steal IMO...sound quality is top notch and the touchpad is good once you get used to it...my only gripe is with the remote, or rather how the remote interfaces with the menu; that can be pretty annoying.
Last firmware upgrade I know of is the one that allows direct playback of mp3s...if you've not got that then get it immeadiately. Sonicstage 3.2 is sposed to be good, though I've not bothered installing it for now.
Shame about the prices of the official cases for the pocket....I mean ~£40stg is f*cking ridiculous for a piece of stitched leather...

Karoma

Aye - but the point remains: you have to keep using SonicStage for some reason or another, and it's godawful. Good luck with upgrading (or downgrading) SonicStage - there's a good chance that it simply won't work.
It's not direct mp3 playback - it facilitates 'direct' conversion of .mp3 to .oma (Skips the unneccesary ATRAC3 conversion) - it's still locked. In saying that, the firmware upgrade is essential - unless you like gaps in your music collection..

Wertz

The one thing I have to really laugh about when it comes to Sony and Sonicstage is that you can't buy any f*cking music from their Connect store unless you live in the US :rolleyes:
I mean here's a company hellbent on screwing up their players with DRM out the ass and you can't even legally fill it with purchased d/ls if you wanted to...add to that that if you could that the selection is laughable at best (I've never browsed the itunes store to compare them mind)

Karoma

uh,what about http://www.connect-europe.com ?

Wertz

I have a US model (I knwo that shouldn't make a difference) that came with 50 free d/ls (since expired) so the only cause I had to visit the connect store was to put in the promotion code....which had to be the US version...and AFAIK connect europe wasn't about back then anyhow (could be wrong on that)

I just clicked your link lol

Sony Connect wrote:

We have performed a system check and detected that you need to download and install the item highlighted in red below to use CONNECT. Please do this now and then enter the site again.

Internet Explorer 5.5

Use IE and pay for a craptastic selection of music...no thanks!

Guy:Incognito

Karoma wrote:

Aye - but the point remains: you have to keep using SonicStage for some reason or another, and it's godawful. Good luck with upgrading (or downgrading) SonicStage - there's a good chance that it simply won't work.
It's not direct mp3 playback - it facilitates 'direct' conversion of .mp3 to .oma (Skips the unneccesary ATRAC3 conversion) - it's still locked. In saying that, the firmware upgrade is essential - unless you like gaps in your music collection..

Do most other players not do the same (ipod I'm looking at you)?

Karoma

stekelly-
my post was in response to:

Wertz wrote:

Last firmware upgrade I know of is the one that allows direct playback of mp3s...if you've not got that then get it immeadiately.

And,iTunes (Also gets the status of godawful) is at least back/forward-compatible; and can be replaced if you so please with 3rd party software due to it's popularity.

Guy:Incognito

Karoma wrote:

stekelly-
my post was in response to:


And,iTunes (Also gets the status of godawful) is at least back/forward-compatible; and can be replaced if you so please with 3rd party software due to it's popularity.

Are you sure it doesnt play mp3's the HD5 does and it uses sonicstage.

Karoma

i'm sure. it's no different,as you say, from other popular personal music players (cannae call 'em "mp3 players") - it isn't mp3 that it's playing.. it only allows an mp3-encoded file to be dragged..