[drpje]

I just received my Sony VAIO Pocket. It was ordered from newegg.com for $450 With a Sony $50 rebate the final price was $400. I am very pleased with the player so far. I was going to post this in the iPod Killer thread but it seems to have transformed into an iPod vs the rest argument. I was a Mac person at one time and owned a G4 Powerbook and iMac G5 I now own a Sony VAIO A-290 laptop and now the VAIO Pocket. During the time I had my Apple computers I seriously considered the iPod and consider it to be a good player. I have used iTunes and have the Airport Express to wirelessly stream music to my home stereo. The one thing I can say about Apple is the design and simplicity especially iTunes.
Now back to the VAIO Pocket. Having had experience with Apple I feel that I can give an unbiased view of the two players. I installed the Sonic Stage 2.3 Software and the firmware update to allow MP3 capability. I bought the VAIO Pocket with one thing in mind, to rip my CD collection and have it stored in one place to listen to on the road or connect it to my home stereo. I had no problems using the Sonic Stage software. It is not as simple as iTunes but not bad. I used ATRAC 3 Plus at 256K. All of the CD ripping was done with my A-290 laptop. The sound quality at 256K is very good with the enclosed headphones and I am sure it will be better when I receive my Sennheiser P-200 headphones. The build quality on the VAIO Pocket is excellent, it is very solid and looks better than the iPod but this is my opinion. I am not a fan of white players. The touchpad took a lot of getting used to and in this regard the iPod is simpler. All in all I am very pleased with the VAIO Pocket and would highly recommend it to anyone looking for a player. Thanks to Rumz for his comments which helped me select the VAIO Pocket over other players.

 

[wyzeguy]

Thanks for your comments. I'm looking at purchasing a Vaio Pocket myself, but finding comments from actual users is proving difficult. Until recently I was looking only at the iRiver H340 or iAudio M3 and after quite a bit of research I hadn't even heard mention of the Pocket (it doesn't get much mention, clearly, although now it does native mp3 it seems to being mentioned more).

Anyway, I'm upgrading from a Sony WM-FX77 Walkman that has worked faultlessly for 13 years (the main reason I like the idea of another Sony), which shows how behind I am on portable audio, and plan to transfer my CD collection to HD and listen at work (I don't fileshare and haven't started ripping my CDs yet, so either ATRAC or mp3 would be fine).

How have you found the Pocket in other respects? Battery life, size, mechanical noise, access times etc.? I have read elsewhere that Sony's portable devices have quite low power output; have you had any problems in this regard?

Unfortunately, because I don't live in the US, I will probably have to buy my chosen DAP sight unseen so any comments are welcome!

Adam

 

[drpje]

Wyzeguy:
Yes it is true that the VAIO Pocket has not had much press. When I was shopping for a portable player the only place I was able to listen to one was at the Sony Style Store at the Houston Galleria. They had several on display and the salespeople were able to show all the features. This as well as Rumz's comments convinced me to purchase the Sony. When I went to Comp USA, Best Buy, and Circuit City they do not sell the VAIO Pocket. This struck me as strange since they sell other Sony products such as computers. Everyone sells the iPod since it so heavily marketed. I feel that if the Sony player was shown at more places it would do well. I really feel that it is a good option to the iPod.
There has been so much negative publicity about the Sony ATRAC system and I feel that it has hurt Sony sales. It is a good system and when you rip CD's using the ATRAC 3 Plus at 256K it sounds very much like the source. Since I plan to use the player to rip my CD collection the issue of MP3 vs ATRAC was not a deciding factor and I am sure that it is not an issue for a lot of people.
As far as the build quality the VAIO Pocket is very solid. The quality of construction is first rate. There is nothing cheap on the unit. The color is a charcoal grey. The color display is bright and clear and gives good information on the music you are playing. The headphone output through the included phones is loud enough. Any louder and it would have been uncomfortable. There are 6 equalizer settings to adjust the sound. I liked the setting with bass and treble emphasis. The unit is silent in operation and the access times are very quick. All in all it is a good player. It is a shame the player is not more popular but since there is no marketing compared to the iPod it receives little attention.

 

[easypeasy]

The VAIO pocket has quite some publicity over here, (as do most Sony products). The fact that it didn't initially support MP3 format really killed it. The product is by all means attractive, and the controls looks cool (as supposed to some other non-iPod HD players). Colour screen is a great bonus, the the pricing seems to be a bit on the premium side

For quite some time only imports where available (with Japanese UI), so this didn't help much either.

Now that iPod supports formats upto 60G, shouldn't Sony offer these options also

 

[Rumz]

drpje--

I'm glad you found my comments helpful. As you mentioned, that other thread continues to be both an iPod vs. the rest argument as well as people trying to one up the other on how witty / smart they are... I somewhat regret posting those comments there instead of in it's own thread. I'm glad you started one.

I can honestly say that my iPod Mini is collecting dust. It's a great player and I will find use for it, but since I decided I needed something with more space (hence less time required to maintain my collection-- with the Mini I have to be very selective about what music I carry with me, with the Pocket I do not).

Granted the iPod does have a bit more powerful output, and it's a bit louder with certain 'phones than my Vaio Pocket, but being a former MD user (I still use it from time to time still, actually), I've found that the output is sufficient-- I have no complaints. A lot of it depends on how loud the original music itself is.

For me, gapless was a key feature and sure, other players support gapless formats such as ogg and flac-- but the fact that gapless was native to Atrac3plus which is the primary format for Sonic Stage made using gapless that much less hassle. Mp3 support is a bonus-- one I'm appreciating more every day. For me, this player has it where it counts.

Also, $400 for a 40 gig player with color screen and the ability to transfer photos without the purchase of a separate adapter seems like a fair deal to me compared to the $500 40GB iPod Photo.

 

[Rumz]

Oh one more comment, this time with regards to battery life:

I haven't let it run out of juice but once. I let it play to see how long it would play uninterupted, and it got near 24 hours of constant playback using atrac3plus files encoded at 256kbps. Granted battery life will be less in practice (since changing tracks, use of the color screen and backlight etc will increase power drain), it's still a huge step ahead of my iPod Mini. In practice you probably get 15-20 hours using Atrac3plus.

 

[Taphil]

I saw the VAIO pocket again today at Fry's. I took exactly a minute to learn how to use the touchpad, and I really like it. What's nice is that even though it's touch sensitive, touching it doesn't do anything until you press down on the pad. Real nice.

The color screen is really beautiful. I don't know the specs, but I'm guessing it's double the resolution of the iPod Photo with the same screen size, which makes it very sharp. It's also very bright and easy to read when the backlight is off. It can display tiny text very clearly, such as the clock in the bottom right corner.

The only thing I didn't like about it is the mettal thing that goes along the back side. It would have been nice if they made just the back continuous like the other side of the back.

 

[lord viper]

i returned my VP and got an ipod photo 60gb.
i tried everything with it and really didnt want to go back to the ipod.
as a unit, the vaio pocket was a FAR superior DAP to the ipod (for me). only problem with the unit itself was that navigation was very tedious and slow, compared to the ipod.
other than that i was happy with everything.
BUT as a package, its the worst DAP ever made in my opinion. a bit of a paradox i know, but if i dodnt have to use sonic stage with it it would be excellent.
i had it for two months and i would now pay money to not have to use sonic stage again.
heres a shot of my desktop. EVERYTHING IS SONY!

despite being a sony fan and employee i just could not keep it.
sonic stage wouldnt accept about 1/3rd of my music, roughly 4000 tracks were denied.
it was just so random.
the album art was a headache to attach.
after you transfered anything it needs to check the music info which can take up to 70mins!
im not going to bash it too much. i was impresed with atrac as an audio format. it sounded good for me, and gapless playback, high res screen, etc made me smile.
but sonic stage really infuriated me. id been waiting months for the ap1l and was so disappointed.
but hey, you might disagree with my opinions on it and love the thing.
either way, good luck man.

 

[Rumz]

I've noticed that the interface isn't as zippy as the iPod Mini. Not a big enough drawback for me to negate the positives i find in the Pocket.

Then again, I didn't try dropping hundreds or even thousands of mp3s onto it at a time. I've put some mp3s on it, but otherwise have been ripping CDs to Atrac. Adding album art I thought was as simple as it was on the iPod-- drag and drop. Works for me. Even better if I drag and drop before ripping.

Some people hate sonic stage and cannot get past that-- I guess my experience / needs are different than the average Sonic Stage hater

There's no question the program needs a LOT of work... but iTunes grew tiresome to me as well, I don't think I enjoy managing music on a PC period.

In any case, good to hear from another (albeit former) Pocket owner. This is what people want, reviews of the unit. Though with Sony's other portables there's already plenty of complaining about Sonic Stage

 

[wyzeguy]

Quote:

sonic stage wouldnt accept about 1/3rd of my music, roughly 4000 tracks were denied.

Wouldn't accept? Why not? Does Sonic Stage have to be connected to the Internet when loading audio files to a device? Checking the music sounds like running a database query (btw, is that an SE S700i/10i next to the Pocket?

).

If there's one thing that gives me pause at the moment it's Sonic Stage: there are no reports other than bad ones about this software as far as I can tell. If only we were allowed to drag and drop!

 

[lord viper]

yes its an s700i.
the majority of my tracks were mp3 and when i imported my music folder they would appear in my SS library, but wouldnt convert or export.
i would always get the error of
"rights management not found"
but the same tracks would all export fine the day before i decided to export the tracks.
it really was bizarre.

 

[MdRex]

The VP just underwent a price drop where I live. I so want that thing (or H320) now.

 

[Rumz]

Quote:

Originally Posted by lord viper yes its an s700i. the majority of my tracks were mp3 and when i imported my music folder they would appear in my SS library, but wouldnt convert or export. i would always get the error of "rights management not found" but the same tracks would all export fine the day before i decided to export the tracks. it really was bizarre.

So they show up in your Sonic Stage library but when you try to transfer them to the Pocket you recieve an error? Did you try the Vaio music transfer program at all?

 

[lord viper]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rumz So they show up in your Sonic Stage library but when you try to transfer them to the Pocket you recieve an error? Did you try the Vaio music transfer program at all?

yes i tried the music transfer but it didnt help.
another thing is track names are not present in certain albums ripped with itunes or wmp.
i needed to manually rename a whole load of files.
but one of the most disappointing aspects is the lack of playlists.
yes, i know it allows for grouping, but that creates one track reference per assignment.
this means that if i have a track in two 'playlists' (known as my compilations albums in ss) then i will have three copies of the same track on my VP. a real waste of space.
again, these were the issues i faced. you may feel a lot different about it.
however, if you do overcome the problems ive listed, then please report back on how you acheived the results. good luck.

 

[Rumz]

Quote:

Originally Posted by lord viper yes i tried the music transfer but it didnt help. another thing is track names are not present in certain albums ripped with itunes or wmp. i needed to manually rename a whole load of files. but one of the most disappointing aspects is the lack of playlists. yes, i know it allows for grouping, but that creates one track reference per assignment. this means that if i have a track in two 'playlists' (known as my compilations albums in ss) then i will have three copies of the same track on my VP. a real waste of space. again, these were the issues i faced. you may feel a lot different about it. however, if you do overcome the problems ive listed, then please report back on how you acheived the results. good luck.

That's interesting. I've not got a huge collection of mp3s that I'll use so it's not as big of an issue for me-- but it would be for anyone who intends to use this primarily as an mp3 player (rather than atrac)-- so it's good to hear your experience. It's unfortunate such a great player is hampered by the PC-side software.

The Pocket does do playlists, but right now you can only set them up via the Pocket itself on the fly (not unlike how "My Favorites" works on the iPod, you just have to select which list you want to add songs to before you start building it, and you're limited to 5 playlists)-- Sonic Stage won't allow you to manipulate them. Perhaps at some point in the future they'll address this issue... though I'm not holding my breath