Hello Sony Walkman B100 -- bye bye ATRAC and SonicStage

An interesting bit of news from the kids over at ATRACLife this morning. According to "trustworthy insiders," Sony is set to introduce another Walkman stick -- the B100 series -- which supports drag 'n drop music transfer... no SonicStage required. Perhaps oxymoronic considering the source, the player will not support Sony's MiniDisc era codec, ATRAC; a milestone in and of itself. Instead, the player touts MP3, non-DRM'd WMA, and presumably AAC like we've seen in the recent lineup of dedicated Walkman players and phones. The latter necessary to get your DRM-free EMI on (at least initially). The B100 series will ship sometime before May has sprung in 1, 2, and 4GB capacities with or without FM radios. Nice, now where's that nano killer?

[DiablQ @ Apr 18th 2009 4:44PM]

Where can I find the firmware for this ITEM!!!!!!

[Marcio @ Apr 26th 2007 6:24AM]

"Nice, now where's that nano killer?"


Here:
http://www.engadget.com/2007/03/01/sonys-nw-a800-launches/

Bunch of Sony-haters!

[benjamin @ Apr 26th 2007 6:29AM]

woohoo,, finally sony are getting with the programme,, i hope theyve put one of those long lasting batteries in it

[Atanas Boev @ Apr 26th 2007 7:10AM]

Oh, FINALLY Sony gets it. SonicStage was really killing it for me. Only if they did that, like, 5 years ago... NW-E3 was really nice walkman then. I had it and threw it away, because the SonicBullSh... er, Stage.

[daniel @ Apr 27th 2007 1:41AM]

how many small flash players do sony want to be selling at once theres already at least 3 all with only slight differences

[JDT @ Apr 26th 2007 7:06AM]

how about a Sony walkman with a 'selector wheel' that clicks around, like on their stereos (mines from 96).

[cf18 @ Apr 26th 2007 7:45AM]

So Sony finally gave up making/ordering customized ASIC to support ATRAC. It will be much cheaper to just use standard ASIC that everyone uses.

[Philip @ Apr 26th 2007 12:28PM]

hooray for drag and drop... hopefully we will see this in more, larger cappacity sony players then i might get one, the only thing putting me off before was sonic stage (fist hand use with sisters mp3 player).

[Kichigai Mentat @ Apr 26th 2007 12:58PM]

Back in the day, I had a NetMD player. I really kind of liked it, and still kind of wish it still worked (though it's hard to compare it to, oh, say, a 60 GB iPod). Anyway, since it was NetMD, it also supported LPMD, which meant ATRAC3 and variable bitrates.

Quite honestly: ATRAC3 was a nice codec, except for it being proprietary and no one else being able to use it. If Sony attempted to open up ATRAC3, so other people could use it, I probably would have had, years ago, of course, a small collection of ATRAC3 songs.

Anyway, having used OpenMG and SonicStage, I can say that there's no love lost there. Sony can make hardware, but not software. They should have learned that by now. Most unstable, convoluted, inflexible, inefficient, slowest media application I've ever used, and I've used WMP6, IE3 and Win95.

[Chuckles McGee @ Apr 26th 2007 10:43AM]

Oh! The death toll of another Sony proprietary format! Take a drink! -Engadget Drinking Game

[alex @ Apr 26th 2007 10:50AM]

Baby steps that ain't going to make all that much of a difference and I agree, this should have been done 5-7 years ago. If they're going to go all out like this they should design something a little more revolutionary.

[Dan @ Apr 26th 2007 11:09AM]

Maybe now stores like Best Buy and Wal-Mart will start carrying their full line of MP3 players. I always liked some of the players, just could not stand SonicStage at all.

[Peter @ Apr 26th 2007 3:54PM]

Surely this is just a late April Fools hoax, right?

Since when does Sony show any regard for what the knowledgeable user wants? It's too easy to coast on their 1990s era good name, and keep raking in the cash.

[Mark @ Apr 26th 2007 8:53PM]

This is good news, Sony finally dumping ShittyStage and Atrac. This should have been done years ago. Sony came in too late into the game.

Who wants to buy a Sony product when their company resume has 'Rootkit' and 'Broken DVD's' on it? I sure don't. Who knows what other anti-consumer evils they have planned.

[chris @ Apr 27th 2007 9:10AM]

hm.. this seems to me like something that sony is testing the waters with.. they're trying to answer the questions, what if we got rid of our propietary format? do people really hate sonicstage that much (YES)? with a no-frills mp3 player. the problem with this is, without the frills it's not a sony. i predict that customer reaction to this will be lukewarm at best, and sony will just think, hey this means people WANT sonicstage, look we removed it and this player didn't sell! which is too bad because i have the nw-a800 and it is the most amazing piece of hardware i have owned in quite a while, but the software is (to quote kichikai mentat above), "Most unstable, convoluted, inflexible, inefficient, slowest media application I've ever used."

[PenaltyKillah @ Apr 27th 2007 8:25PM]

*YAWN*... Sony tries not to be labelled as an "iPod competitor" by creating DAPs for the alternate lifestyle. One looks like a bean, the monochromic screen "blends" with the frame in the earlier models, one's the shape of a Mentos tube, and then this. *YAWN* And what's in between the NW-A800 and the PSP? Sony's would-be iPod (video) killer! Can't you make that, you rootkit-smuggling goons?

[tekdroid @ Apr 30th 2007 6:30PM]

Hi Sony
http://www.vorbis.com
http://flac.sourceforge.net

If you ever feel like making something unique again. Tho the Koreans and Chinese already support FLAC and Ogg Vorbis and have for years, you can try, too. Might as well admit defeat and join them.

Tip: these are superior and patent-free codecs with no licensing problems. Make it gapless and you'll have something for people to get excited about again - maybe.

Or you can continue making things other companies have done for years and expect a surge in sales.

Despite being years late, congratulations on your SonicStage-free device. I never thought I'd live to see the day. People know how to use USB sticks, and now they'll know how to use this Walkman - and on any operating system they choose. Congratulations!