[doomlordis]

Bradford , i have had a HD1 for 4 months now and i agree it isnt perfect but i have never got any static or hiss? I have never tried it with shures though.
I have used e888lp , ex71 (too quiet , the hd1 needs 16ohm 50mw phones) px200 and mdr-ed21lps.
It is in my opinion better sounding than an ipod though, i have had a 4g 20gb for 2 weeks and i am not that impressed , i like the UI obviously , apple has got it almost perfect but it sounds tinny to me even with ex71s.
I am hoping that Sony make available an upgrade to add mp3 to HD1, i like atrac and will keep all my existing atrac on it but any mp3s i get will get added without conversion.
I also have a nh900 Hi-md and it sounds really good, i use it for recording from vinyl and gigss mainly but i find myself using it as a music player more and more, i like removable media i guess.
From all the jukies i have owned (karma, touch, h120, hdd100, hdd60, nitrus, ipod, hd1) this was my scores:

sound - 1.iriver h120 2.touch 3.hd1 4.karma 5. nitrus 6.hdd60 7.hdd100 8.ipod

UI - 1. ipod 2. touch 3. hd1 4. hdd100/hdd60 5. karma 6.nitrus 7 . iriver h120
All players have some deal breaker that put me off and made me return them. Iriver has no proper shuffle, touch was to big, karmas hard drive died after 3 days, nitrus was good but not enough storage. hdd100/60 too quiet, ipod sounds crap.
So i have been left with my hd1 + trusty minidisc, until the next big thing comes out, its an addiction.

ps. the line out on the Sony is fine, it is not designed to be played through earphones etc only amps, otherwise any good lineout will sound awful.

 

[bradford]

Quote:

Originally Posted by doomlordis ps. the line out on the Sony is fine, it is not designed to be played through earphones etc only amps, otherwise any good lineout will sound awful.

actually, i was trying to say that i used the line out to play it thru my headunit on my car, not headphones, and it was wildly distorted no matter what i did.....once i switched to headphone setting, and lowered the volume, it settled much better......the hiss was much more noticeable when connected to my car audio system (1400 watts), as compared to my sony ms70d flash player connected to the car audio system.....

do you too find the battery gets crushed if you use the backlight a lot?.....also, what atrac have you been using?.....i find a huge difference between atrac plus 48kbps and 66kbps, but not too much difference between atrac plus 66kbps and atrac 132 kbps......how about you?

to me, 48kbps atrac plus was far too muffled sounding....

i am waiting for more input on hd3 before i purchase

B

 

[doomlordis]

I mostly use lp2, 132kbps. I dont like 64, 66 etc they sound strange. I use 256 for my favourite albums. Your head unit must not be able to deal with the HD1 line out, was your nw70s ok(does it have a line out?).
I only have the backlight on when i am pressing buttons, i get about 27 hrs use i reckon but i dont let the battery down below 50% as lithium dont like discharge(what guy does? ;])

 

[sekigahara]

the hd3 is made of Aluminium, the hd1 and 2 of Magnesium, due to this, the hd3 is 20g heavier than hd1 (and slightly bigger).
(according to Sony)

@mavis:
Sorry, may I overlooked your answer for my question, but if not so;

What is the iPod-bass like with the mdr-ex71 headphones ?
I've read these headphones'd give a enormous bass (since they're "in ear"),
do they?

@ikari:
german Windows ? so where are you from?

 

[Spex]

"let's not forget, the English version of SonicStage 2.3 is available now, indeed - but it wasn't available when I bought the unit,"

Hi Mavis,

I'm afraid you're wrong - last Friday it took me less than 15 mins of Googling and checking Sony websites to find a download of the full version of SonicStage 2.3. I believe it has been available since at least Nov 30th.

Anyway, non-Japanese versions of the NW-HD3 will have a 'proper' version of SonicStage 2.3 in the box.

Col

 

[mavis]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Spex "let's not forget, the English version of SonicStage 2.3 is available now, indeed - but it wasn't available when I bought the unit," Hi Mavis, I'm afraid you're wrong - last Friday it took me less than 15 mins of Googling and checking Sony websites to find a download of the full version of SonicStage 2.3. I believe it has been available since at least Nov 30th. Anyway, non-Japanese versions of the NW-HD3 will have a 'proper' version of SonicStage 2.3 in the box. Col

Yes, as I mentioned in the review, I too found a full English version of SonicStage 2.3, that was available on Friday evening. However, it DID NOT WORK. Believe me, I know how to search for stuff on the internet, and I DID find SS2.3, but that version DID NOT WORK. When I plugged in the HD3, I received an error message telling me that 'this atrac player is not compatible with this version of SonicStage.' I was very clear about this in the review. I'm not sure why people insist on beating a dead horse, as I've said NUMEROUS times, the SonicStage 2.3 that I was able to download last Friday DID NOT SUPPORT THE HD3.

That was my experience. If you'd like to write a review detailing YOUR experience with the HD3, by all means, do. In the meantime, what I have offered is MY experience with the HD3. What part of this is difficult to understand? I received a defective HD3 (apparently?) and the SonicStage 2.3 that I was able to download didn't support the HD3. That is exactly what I wrote in the review, because that is exactly what happened to me.

 

[Spex]

I guess you were unlucky and I was lucky in finding a working version of SS2.3.

The only reason I dropped in comments to this thread is that with the link from slashdot there are now thousands of people reading it and getting the impression that the NW-HD3 is a dud. For balance, I was saying that some of the problems you had were understandable (Japanese software in a Japanese released product) or could be down to a faulty unit (hissing noise) because I had none of these experiences.

Col

 

[mavis]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Spex I guess you were unlucky and I was lucky in finding a working version of SS2.3. The only reason I dropped in comments to this thread is that with the link from slashdot there are now thousands of people reading it and getting the impression that the NW-HD3 is a dud. For balance, I was saying that some of the problems you had were understandable (Japanese software in a Japanese released product) or could be down to a faulty unit (hissing noise) because I had none of these experiences. Col

Yeah, I understand what you're saying. But try to understand where I'm coming from.

1. Japanese software in a Japanese released product
This has never been a problem with anything else I've purchased in Japan. For example, my Intuos i-620 worked, out of the box, on my English WindowsXP PC. So did my Logicool MX-700 (that's what Logitech is called over here), as did my iPod, my LAM-Z03 (netMD), and my DSC-P9 (camera). All of these products require drivers and software to be installed, and they were all purchased at local retailers in Tokyo. AND THEY ALL WORKED. Is it asking too much for a company like Sony (you know, lots of money and manpower, etc) to have working software available for English OS's at product launch? It's not like I'm asking for out of the box support for Swahili or something, I'm talking about English, the language Sony used IN JAPAN, on its packaging.

And don't forget that I did download and install SonicStage 2.3, in English, AND IT STILL DIDN'T WORK.

2. could be down to a faulty unit (hissing noise) because I had none of these experiences
Well, you're also not using sensitive headphones like the E5c's, but overlooking that for the moment, please tell me why people shouldn't know that my unit was defective (if that was indeed the case) ... ? I reviewed the unit I purchased, if it was indeed defective (and since was not possible for me to exchange it to find out) people should know about it. If Sony wants to avoid bad publicity on the first day of a product's release, they may want to consider tightening their quality control process a bit.

 

[Shattered]

Thanks for the detailed review Mavis. I've pre-ordered one and should hopefully get it Monday (20th).

Whilst I'm waiting for it, I thought I'd download SonicStage 2.3 and start importing my MP3s. Now I've never used SS before and if it wasn't for the fact I have to use it I wouldn't be now. If there are any experienced SS users, could you answer the following please?

I have all my MP3s in the same folder (eg MP3). I've imported them into SS and everything is fine. However, if I add say 10 new albums to the MP3 folder and import from this folder it starts duplicating everything. Do I really have to individually import each album folder or am I missing something here? Can I create MP3\New and put them in there, then move them back to the original MP3 folder once imported, or will SS lose track of them because they've moved?

Also, if try to get the album info from CDDB (or whatever it uses), SS tells me that it cant as the album wasn't created from a CD. Well it was, but not in SS as that only seems to allow atrac creation not MP3. Is there any way round this or do I have to buy a Vaio to get the SS MP3 add-on?

Thanks.

 

[suresh0t29]

A few quick things about the interface. I've had a HD-1 for about two weeks now. I didn't really want it, but it was a gift so I figured I'd try it out. Anyways, to get back to the Now Playing screen from a menu, you can hold down the Mode button for a few seconds. Kind of annoying, but you don't have to wait 30 seconds. And, if you want to get back to the menu you came from, you can press up or down from the now playing screen and it takes you to where you selected your current playlist from. I think, at least, I don't have it with me right now.

And as far as the player goes, I'm pretty happy. It's tiny and works, and is Not An Ipod, which is nice. Converting everything to ATRAC blows, but you only have to do it once. As soon as my finals are done I'll get around to putting the rest of my music on it. Soundstage sucks too, but I can deal. I only use it for transfers. Although it did screw up a bunch of tags when I first imported all my music, which led to some albums being out of order.

 

[aeriyn]

*rant*

Oi, it's not even remotely good.

1) 5mW per channel--LAME! Sony should really know better than this.
2) Sonic(Useless)Stage
3) Slow track transferring.
4) Did I mention 5mW per channel? Well I'll say it again. LAAAAAME.
5) Poor SQ (at least the HD1 had it)
6) Playlists? What's a playlist? Duuuuh Sony.

Every single MP3 player I've ever seen has at least an 8 or 10mW per channel headamp, even those little tiny flash players, and usually has an 18-20mW amp (30mW in the case of the iPod and even the iPod Mini). What the hell is Sony's excuse then? What, does it give you a whole extra half hour of battery life to put a 5mW amp rather than a 15mW amp? Sheesh!

Not even gonna really go into everything else except to say SonicStage. That program by itself is reason enough to keep me from buying a DAP right there. It could be the best-sounding most featured DAP on Earth, and if it used UselessStage, you couldn't pay me to use it.

Not an iPod indeed. It's most definitely not an iPod. It's not even a Rio or even an iRiver (and I don't like iRiver at all). It's an order of magnitude below any of these units. I'd rather use an iRiver than an HDx.

*/rant*

 

[doomlordis]

Quote:

Originally Posted by aeriyn *rant* Oi, it's not even remotely good. 1) 5mW per channel--LAME! Sony should really know better than this. 2) Sonic(Useless)Stage 3) Slow track transferring. 4) Did I mention 5mW per channel? Well I'll say it again. LAAAAAME. 5) Poor SQ (at least the HD1 had it) 6) Playlists? What's a playlist? Duuuuh Sony. Every single MP3 player I've ever seen has at least an 8 or 10mW per channel headamp, even those little tiny flash players, and usually has an 18-20mW amp (30mW in the case of the iPod and even the iPod Mini). What the hell is Sony's excuse then? What, does it give you a whole extra half hour of battery life to put a 5mW amp rather than a 15mW amp? Sheesh! Not even gonna really go into everything else except to say SonicStage. That program by itself is reason enough to keep me from buying a DAP right there. It could be the best-sounding most featured DAP on Earth, and if it used UselessStage, you couldn't pay me to use it. Not an iPod indeed. It's most definitely not an iPod. It's not even a Rio or even an iRiver (and I don't like iRiver at all). It's an order of magnitude below any of these units. I'd rather use an iRiver than an HDx. */rant*

I have a HD1 but have listened to the mp3 on HD3 (friend bought in Tokyo)

Firstly where did you get the 5mw figure from exactly?
Second the volume is loud on mine (euro version) so dont get to stuck on MW it doesnt dictate output.
Third , it sounds better than an ipod (it has bass) and no hiss on mates - just my opinion.
Fourth the battery lasts for 30hrs or 22 with mp3
Fifth it looks better than a ipod and is less common.(not as nice as hd1 though)
Sixth sonicstage is not perfect but i havent had any technical problems with it at all (itunes has its fair share of issues too)
Seventh iriver sounds great but has the worst UI ever

I dont think you have ever even listened to one, i had an ipod and was not sorry to see it go.

 

[bradford]

hey Aeriyn......

i cant help but asking, who is that a picture of in your signature.....everytime i scroll thru threads, i stop at any of yours to look at that photo.....

B

 

[dura]

My experience and opinion concerning the NW-HD1 matches Doomlordis' exactly, including the last sentence.

But Aeriyn is an ipodowner, and with that machine seems to automatically come a strong negative opinion about the Sony, even if one hasn't even used it.
A psychologist might explain this strong feelings as a need to rationalize away a feeling of insecurity about one's own thingy.

 

[Shattered]

Mavis mentioned in the review that the backlight isn't very bright, making the screen difficult to read. Is the blue-lit screen on the other coloured models any brighter?