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#1 |
Recovering Gadget Addict
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Join Date: May 2004
Location: Pittsburgh, PA
Device: iPad
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iPOD Killer? Sony's New Walkman Bean Players
![]() The device is actually available for pre-order at the Sony site. Read more here at Yahoo News from NewsFactor.com. |
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#2 |
Technology Mercenary
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Karma: 2561
Join Date: Feb 2003
Location: East Lyme, CT
Device: Direct Neural Implant
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As long as it doesn't require MemoryStick or MemoryStick Pro, or some non-mp3 "MP3" (as Sony calls it), then it'll probably be successful.
On a side-note.. has anyone noticed that manufacturers tend to inflate the number of songs that these devices play, by 3x or more? Looking at a basic group of "average length" mp3s I have here, 695 of them would require roughly 3,475,000 megabytes to store. Dividing that by 3.4 to get near their 1GiB figures means my songs would have to have 2/3 or more cut from their length to fit. I don't know anyone whose full-length mp3 songs are 1.5M in length. No thank you. |
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#3 |
Addict
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Join Date: May 2003
Location: Asia
Device: Tungsten T5
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Most probably they provide the figures using 64-bit rates and the ATRAC format instead of 128bit mp. Just as Windows people are touting that 64b WMA are near CD quality, unlike mp3 which require 128 to be near CD quality.
The bean look very nice, if a bit large compared to the shuffle. It could be a Shuffle killer but Apple would probably back away from the Shuffle by the time the bean hit the market... The Shuffle is really a bit aged by now, it small size is still cool, but with so many great mp3 player that are smaller in size, more stylish, and even have a OLED screen (the Tiny cube made in Korea comes to mind), If placed side-by-side, I choose those over the Shuffle... |
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#4 | |
Technology Mercenary
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Join Date: Feb 2003
Location: East Lyme, CT
Device: Direct Neural Implant
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Quote:
I rip all of my albums to no less than 256 VBR Ogg Vorbis format. Anything less (including 256-bit mp3 format) sounds like absolute garbage. Any quality ambient tracks will sound very different in 128-bit vs. 256-bit, if you have headphones that can reproduce 6-2300Hz or better. Comparing 64-bit WMA to 256 VBR Ogg is hilarious (if that is indeed what they're using as a baseline). Maybe people are used to low-quality headphones and crappy music that sounds the same in 64-bit as 128-bit or higher, but proper recordings sound horrible at anything under 256-bit (192-bit in some fringe cases). Maybe I'm just picky, but I prefer it to sound like the CD, not like a copy of the CD recorded from across the room using a microphone taped to the opposite wall. |
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#5 | |
Evangelist
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Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Canada
Device: Assorted older devices
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Quote:
That said, I personally think 64-bit anything is too low quality. 128-bit MP3 is even too low quality for me. I find it has to be either 128-bit+ of a good format (i.e. OGG), or 192-bit+ MP3/similar. |
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#6 |
Fully Converged
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Join Date: Oct 2002
Location: Switzerland
Device: Too many to count here.
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128kbps MP3's sound "shallow". I think 192kbps is fine for my headphones. For a 10k+ stereo system, I agree with hacker, nothing below 256kbps and if possible Ogg.
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#7 |
Detective
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Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: California
Device: Palm TX
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The mass market has been trained to enjoy the transisitor radio experience. I get the feeling we're not the mass market.
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#8 | |
Evangelist
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Karma: 281
Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Canada
Device: Assorted older devices
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Quote:
![]() ![]() (Offtopic: Wow, never noticed the ![]() |
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