Sony's Memory Stick Micro to debut in March
By Marc Perton 
posted February 6th 2006 2:20PM
posted February 6th 2006 2:20PM
We were hoping it was just
a bad dream when we heard last year that Sony was launching yet another version of
the Memory Stick. But it looks like the company was serious about it, and you can soon begin adding Memory Stick Micro
(aka M2) cards to your collection of Sony-specific media. Like MicroSD, MiniSD and TransFlash, M2 is designed to be
used in cellphones, and chances are good that if you pick up any Sony Ericsson phone announced from now on (including
today's newcomer, the M600) you'll have no
choice but to go with M2 if you want to add storage. And chances are even better that you'll never see it used in any
other manufacturer's products.
I am so sick of Sony creating their own media. I am done! No more sony for me, including any Sony labeled music.
which means it'll remain expensive as hell, even after they release the mega mini micro M3 nano.
I should bash Sony for creating yet another memory card format (I'll avoid using the word "standard"), but I've come to realise that I'll have to buy a new memory card whatever new gadget I buy.
I've had about 6 cell phones and various other gadgets over the past two years. The only two that have used the same memory card format have been my Sony Ericsson P910i and Sony PSP. Kinda ironic that the most propreitary format is the only one that's been useable in multiple devices, don't you think?
its hard to imagine with so many different formats being made each year that there would be enough support to keep any of them alive long enough to catch on. Obviously tech needs to change when more advanced ways come along, but it would be wonderful to see the industry help in standardizing these waves of advancement instead of individualizing, alienating, and aggravating
Since when did the market for gratuitous memory card formats become so ripe anyway?
Not that it matters with Sony, since they treat this whole portable media thing as if it were some sort of hobby.
http://www.engadget.com/2006/02/06/sony-ericssons-m600-3g-tri-band-gsm-cellphone/
quoting shalalala:
"..Please tell me that they are not coming out with a new form of the memory stick and that i will need to buy a new memory stick for all of new sony products. This sucks balls.
Posted at 7:11AM on Feb 6th 2006 by shalalala "
yes, this sucks major balls.
Really small
Oh, same for me Re 1st comment if it wasn't for the PSP
Yet another Memorystick standard? Ouch.
I'm assuming that someone will eventually create an all-in-one adapter for all Sony media, including this new standard. Or at least I hope so....
Let's hope that the addition of a Sony micro card format means that Sony Ericsson can make even smaller phones!!!!
I'm looking forward to insert the card in the micro-to-duo adapter which I'll then put in the the duo-to-memorystick adapter to view the pics I took with my future phone on my PC card reader.
@sdwells.
Wholey agree with the comments on aggravating the consumer.
It makes a whole lot more sense from a consumers point of view to standardise the formats across the board. Personally I make my choices of digital camera or MP3 player based on if it can use my existing collection of SD cards.
Can you imagine how well a DVD would have sold if each company had its own media type (and with that only certain studios films with affiliation)? Not at all most likely, no-one wanted another Betamax/VHS/Video 2000 debacle and the consumers went mad for it.
How about if the same was true of USB type devices, each one with its own connector at the PC end and a different card to buy to plug in your camera or MP3 player?
I dont think Sony ever seem to compromise despite the fact that near enough every format they have developed has always been widely under supported in the industry by anyone but themselves, examples being - Minidisc, Betamax, ATRAC and so on...
I think we may be able to add Blueray to that pile soon enough based on track record.
I thought MicroSD and TransFlash were the same thing...?
I agree with xbit, I was going to be annoyed with Sony, but everything seems to use a different format these days.
At least the M2 is pin compatible with Memory Stick PRO Duo and thus regular Memory Stick PRO too, so adapters to use them in other devices/readers will be nice and cheap.
Goodbye Sony. No one likes a company that does not play well with others (without a handful of adapters). Proprietary formats suck. Memory Stick, then MagicGate Memory Stick, then MagicGate Memory Stick Duo, then Memory Stick Pro and Memory Stick Pro Duo and now
M2 (did I miss any?).
RS-MMC, best.
Geez thanks Sony, for putting consumers last again, you selfish pricks.
Hi
I will only use Sony MemoryStick products as they are reliable, cheap (when you know where to buy them from). I dont know why everyone hates them for using their own memory format, when other companies like Panasonic have SD and MiniSD, now Sony will have MS, MS Duo, MS Duo Pro, MS Micro. MemoryStick products have a higher transfer rate and from my experience more reliable.
Why copy everyone elses media format which means Sony have to pay royalties for technology which is not theirs and is inferior. So Sony is better of using their own format in their own devices. This way if you have multiple Sony products, they all share the same media format.
Cripes. I just wasted an hour of my life trying to figure out for SURE if the DSC P200 would accept (1GB) MS Pro Duo.
I ended up buying the MS Pro because that was the only MS "guaranteed" to work (besides the regular MS) per Sony's site.
Point is, I would much rather have bought the MS Pro Duo because I could have used that in more devices (phones, etc).
This, in my mind, is part of the reason Sony's going to the dogs.
Is it really possible? That is, to completely phase Sony out of your lives?
This constant Sony-specific memory media module bullcrap is as good a reason as any.
Data is data damnit! Damn you Sony! I will NOT be purchasing a PS3, I will Illegaly download ALL SONY distributed movies and music!
Im going to have a huge family, with many many children, who are all going to never give Sony a cent of their money. And as my seed populates the Earth and eventually the Universe, Sony will slowly and surely die away.
G sus H Crimony.
I too, am done putting money into Sony media. Although their current generations of cameras and digital camcorders are great (perhaps even at the pinnacle of current technology) they will fall in favor inevitably with the market trends and quality levels (i.e., Nikon/Fuji/Canon of yesteryear), and I will be stuck with these later GIANT MemoryStick Duos.
F'n SIGH.
It looks like they took a pro duo 1GB and cut off the extra plastic that is empty.
look:
http://images.tigerdirect.com/SKUimages/medium/S153-2120.jpg
Just a new excuse to jack the prices on thier memory sticks.
I thought MicroSD and TransFlash were the same thing...?
You all get pissed off because of a new Memory Card? I don't care. The product is more relevant, not this tiny little storage. So calm down! What about the hundreds of other Memorys available?
Sony, go on, you're products are awesome.
yeah this is a pain in the butt. I have a sony camera and a PSP, the camers takes a regular memory stick and the PSP a memory stick duo. the PSP's stick can be used in the camera with an adapter, but of course not the other way around!
how nice it would be if all my sony memory sticks worked in all my sony products, its not a lot to ask is it. Hardly as if the duo was a huge beast anyway...
Yeesh, you'd think Stringer and his cohorts ate your first and second born from all this rancor.
Chances are, unless you're going to get a Sony Ericcson Walkman phone within the next XX month, you won't need this memory.
Now, try getting a decent sized MMC that's not Palm branded these days, and for cheap (retail brick and mortar). No one's giving too much fuzz over Nokia and their stance on MMC cards...
Can't you just see the proud product management group after they show the revenue projections for the new phone (M600) to the division president then they say, whipping out the old revenue growth chart: "And LOOK at what happens to the revenue if we create a NEW MEMORY FORMAT!"
From #15: "MemoryStick products have a higher transfer rate and from my experience more reliable."
I agree with everything you say. EXCEPT NOT.
Clearly you haven't offloaded a gigabyte worth of photography from a Sandisk Extreme II compactflash card using a firewire or cardbus reader, or used the same card in piss poor environmental conditions.
There are a wide variety of CF cards, and the Ultra/Extreme versions from Sandisk(and comparable versions from Lexar) are built to withstand the worst of photographic and other situations, in addition to having the fastest speed of any flash media
At what point do things like this become too small for practical use?
what a waste of R&D money by SONY. This is one of the many reasons i will never by a sony product (except the ps2 and 3)
"17. Cripes. I just wasted an hour of my life trying to figure out for SURE if the DSC P200 would accept (1GB) MS Pro Duo."
Yes, the pro duo will work with the p200 because the pro duo comes with an adapter that allows you to fit it into the camera (as a memory stick).
You should have just called support and solved this in 5 minutes.
I can't believe Sony. They are releasing these mem stick formats and selling them for unbelieveable prices. I could uderstand why they made the Duo, since they had the mem stick out for so long. But in less than two years anonther format that will only be used in Sony products. Like someone up there said Sony is treating portable media like it is a hobby. I hate Sony now.
The only good thing about this is that the Duo prices will drop. However, Sony is a collection of idiots.
Want to know the real reason why Sony created the Memory Stick Micro? Basically for money. Sony's proprietary memory sticks are a big cash cow for them since they charge and make more by selling their own format. However since MiniSD came out (T-Flash) they are small enough for someone to produce an adapter that converts MiniSD cards into Memory Stick format. People will soon be able to buy MiniSD cards, plug them into a Memory Stick adapter and voila, use them for cheaper Memory Sticks and Sony makes no money. Sony to protect their cash cow, developed their own mini memory card that is too small and the wrong shape for anyone to produce a T-Flash to Memory Stick adapter. Pretty smart for Sony sucks for the consumer.
look,these cards are not hard to get your head around..
just think of those little russian dolls..small card inside larger card,and so forth.
The example of the P200 camera given earlier?
This camera will accept EVERY memory stick ever made by Sony(original purple,white-magicgate,black,red,navy blue,psp branded,pro etc etc..)with no loss of performance between variants.Yes,a (often free)adaptor may be needed if you choose a duo-but this is no problem.The M2 card is the next step towards smaller devices-that I as one will not bitch about.
The Sony bashing by uninformed teens on this site is getting really tedious-if you dont like sony dont buy the products-simple.Your hollow threats of a 'boycott'are always forgotten when something that might get you liked(or laid)by your ever diminishing group of friends-is launched by Sony.think about it.
This is getting out of hand. I have a post about this at my site:
http://trilancer.blogspot.com
At this point in size...couldn't Sony just make it an onboard chip in all of their products? I.E., instead of making it removable for their next SE phone...just give it the GB of memory? Does every memory format need to be removable in the first place? I mean, yeah, its nice to pull out the 1gb Pro Duo from my
DSC-M1 and stick it into the front of my Vaio laptop, but I could just as easily plug it in through a cable...
Anyways, I'd personally just rather have a lot of onboard memory and an expansion slot for the buttload of extra memory I'll probably never pay for... If a camera came with 1gb of onboard memory and was still a great camera, I wouldn't mind an extra $100 price tag... same with a cell phone. One Thing I wish was that the sizes of proprietary media were different enough that they could be adapted into other types, i.e., a pro duo being small enough to give it an SD adapter like RS-MMC or TransFlash... That'd be cool, but oh well, I have an SD for my cell phone and a Pro Duo for my camera, I deal with it.
Remember their slogan?
"Only Sony"
Well, we need adapters!
will it have memory stick and memory stick duo adaptors?
(theyre gonna be extremely expensive too, i mean look at the ms duo!)
Who is forcing you to buy? The quality? I have tried different electronic brands and I can fairly say that sony products are generally of better build quality and "techno-quality", but a lot more pricier than its competition. this is not to say a canon camera or panasonic tv is not a match to sony's. they are and often outperform sony. but for me, sony holds a certain charm. for 20 or 30 % higher price id go for a sony.
It makes me laugh how much people jump on the anti-Sony bandwagon over something which may not even effect them. "I'm never going to buy anything by Sony again" "Sony are idiots" "Sony don't think of the consumer". Get a life you bunch of weavels.
I'm going to do my best not to defend Sony here, as they're just another company, but you have to admire their efforts. Granted they've had some bloopers in the past, (Betamax et. al.) but Memory Stick is a legitimately decent format, and I own more Memory Stick products than any other format, so they must have anticipated at least me in their business model.
They have recently introduced native mp3 into the product lines which didn't already have it - as that's what the consumer wanted, wasn't it? They are only one of many major brands associated with the BluRay format, and they can't all be evil, can they? They have slapped the wrist of their BMG division over the DRM debacle (and the public continued to show a strange degree of selective memory over other companies that do unwanted things to your computer.... Mi.....). They have recently taken a British-born CEO on board who is re-dressing a lot of the bloat that had afflicted the company. They have recently picked themselves up off the floor of flat panel TVs and are now producing an award-winning line. They have just shut down their robot and ultra-high-end CE line as they weren't contributing to the business. They are in-bed with IBM and Toshiba over the Cell BE processor and they are set to make big losses on Playstation3 consoles to the benefit of consumers so that the BluRay standard can get established.
There are a lot of good things going on at camp Sony, and those who would see to knock them in this day and age, are very bitter individuals who are most-likely blindingly loyal to other companies. The company is far from perfect, and their history is a cloudy one, but times change, people change, companies change. Opinions should change with them.
Sony continue to produce the best (IMHO)
players, phones, cameras etc.
Yesterday I've put my antiq
4Mb Memory Stick in my new DSC-R1
and it's working!
Keep up the good job, Sony
and screw all other media standards!
What's wrong with good old SD cards? Does every device need to be so freaking tiny?
This is a non-issue and small is good, as long as there are adapters.
Put the Micro in the Pro Duo, which fits in the Memory stick....
The memory-cards stand in my local electronics shop spans the entire length of the shop nowadays. There's always one or two dehydrated shoppers somewhere halfway, reading all the fine print. The clerks draw straws when somone needs help.
Fuck Stringer. It should have been Kutaragi.
The "spirit of innovation" is indeed "diluted".
Root Kit
Why continue to trust Sony ... ??
The Sony root-kit issue belongs to a seperate diversion - the music publisher Sony-BMG. If they had their own way, Sony would not have created MP3 players - fortunately for everyone else, there are other departments who prefer to cater to what the public wants.
I agree with the general sentiments of dismay - the only glimmer of hope is that the new devices (such as the M600) will have USB host capabilities that will support multi-card readers - at least you should be able to use your excisting investment in 'old' media formats....
Cowabunghole!
Listen.... Sony makes good products and the SonyEricsson cell phones are, without a doubt, the best on the market, but there is only so much any one person can tolerate. This is one that will be caught by the shit filter. My opinion is that if they can come out with a card that is 1/4 the size of a "regular" memory stick, then they should just make a better f**king memory stick that will hold 4gb!!! Or better yet double that and build it right into the cell phone so you can put 8gb of storage onto your mobile. These ideas for new formats of media storage are getting to be beyond redundant. I say go SD and thats all we need.
If these things get any smaller they will have to be sold with tweezers so you get it in and out of the sockets.
I mean look at the picture - its the size of a thumbnail!
Surely the Duo memory sticks are small enough even for cellphones?