For those of you not blinded by the unsightly image above, that there is the "world's first HD Video
Walkman," or in other terms, one of the
ugliest devices we've seen in years. Beyond the fact that this thing resembles a decade-old handheld cassette recorder with a seven-inch HD display flanked on top, it enables users to watch their HDV / miniDV tapes on the go, which isn't likely to entice you unless you shoot for a living. Furthermore, the GV-HD700E can record HDV1080i/DV signals from an external source, sports i.LINK /
HDMI / component outputs, supports
x.v.Color, and includes a Memory Stick slot for tape-to-flash card conversions. No word on just how much this curious creature will set you back, but those still fascinated can look for it to land in Europe this September.
posted Jul 26th 2007 1:03PM
Of course, if it's the first... then it's also the prettiest.
Tape, we hate mini DV tapes . . .
Sony is release dead products again.
Where are the mini blue-ray discs?
Only a consumer would call tape dead...HDV is the lower end prosumer gear for those who can't afford full DVD, but know that recording to AVCHD DVD is still low grade, low quality, consumer junk.
This is pro gear, and it looks just fine for pro gear.
HDV is hardly pro
Hey CharlieX - I really do think this is intended for at least a semi-pro audience. If you're shooting HDV that you care about enough to review in the field between shoots - you're probably not just a consumer shooting home videos.
I'll be very surprised if this device actually does carry the consumer-based "Walkman" name when launched.
@ CharlieX
Charlie, HDV is a format used by professionals, there is no arguing about that. Are you saying that, for example, Sony HVR-Z1U that is widely used for field news gathering, is not a professional camera? Of course, if you work in the studio and shoot on HDCAM, or you are a cameraman working with George Lucas, then you might think of HDV as a "cheap" format.
Regarding the walkman: when you work on the field, it is very inconvenient when people ask you to watch what you've just recorded. Unfortunately, it happens often. Sometimes you want to see it by yourself too.
Pros do not rewind tapes on the camera, it puts additional "mileage" on the heads and extra dirt. Here this walkman will really helpfull, not to mention the big screen and, even more important, that you can use it as an external recorder.
And regarding the "ugliness". Guys, this is a pro equipment, and ALL PRO EQUIPMENT looks just like that. It is not meant to please your eyes with aerodynamic forms used for consumer stuff.
Spyvie, that's what I was thinking. It looks like a professional device. It would fit right in with other video equipment.
My eyes!
That's an awful looking bit of kit. Sony, what were you thinking?
Functionality over aesthetic
The 1980s just called, they want their style back
SNL just called. They want their joke back.
I called... no one answered.
they're all dead jim!
I like the way it looks. It's like 90's retro, very cool.
Exactly! Not Ugly, Just "Old School"...
I like the look too, looks sturdy and as if you get what you pay for :]
Looks like the bastard child of a VCR and a laptop.
Is there a reason it should look pretty? I don't care what my camera gear looks like as long as it does the job and this doesn't look hideous. Just looks like a piece of video equipment which it is. Therefore it is fine.
Looks like the bastard child of a VCR and a laptop.
Ugly? What?... too many buttons, Mr. Jobs?
Form above function, I guess.
Some people prefer stuff that works than stuff that looks pretty and has to be sent back to the maker for a battery replacement. Looks like a useful device for an amateur filmmaker.
Kind of off-topic but...
Do companies purposely make new players fat even if they can make them slimmer? The current blueray and hd-dvd players are as fat as the first gen dvd players. I'm sure the current circuitry size for the HD disc players don't need to be so huge.
it is common phenomenon called "1st Generation hardware"
They might do. This could be to avoid a low-end appearance. You can buy a regular DVD player for $40 that's maybe 1.5" tall. They might want to avoid association with that category, and thus make their players taller and appear more substantial, more high-end.
Or maybe these players just have chunky power supplies.
Sony needs to give up the memory stick. Proprietary formats just aren't cutting it, especially when they're twice the price of their competitors' memory.
Well, they're not in problems since their cybershot cameras use it and has a large portion of the market.
sony as much as I love them have always favored proprietary media formats.
It's for pros, people, come on. It's a waste to spend large amounts of money just to make a pretty design that will appeal to the controllable masses that won't use that.
Oh god, I feel like cyclops when Kratos ripped his eye out.
Does it have FW400/800? If so it would be very useful in the prosumer videographer area. My old miniDV deck only has a 2.5" b&w preview screen, so this would also be nice for running at large places where youre showing things printed to miniDV tape, we did this all the time working on the film crew at a camp this summer.
I'm far from a Sony fanboy, and I don't usually rag on Engadget, but after reading that this unit is the "ugliest" while calling Logitech's monstrosity "curvalicious" (earlier today), I really have to wonder if there isn't a tad of bias against Sony.
I don't see the black helicopters, but I don't think there is consistency at Engadget either.
But can it play DOOM?
I thought Sony called portable devices you watch stuff on, "Watchmans" not walkmans??
I like it. I think it looks fab. Reminds me of the professional walkman sony did years ago. Just simple no messing functionality. Sony should do more products like this
I totally understand the desire this might have for filmmakers, and I agree with function over form, however this is taking that statement waaaaay too far. This thing is inexcusably ugly. Especially coming from Sony. Even if the argument is made for saving a few bucks, this thing is a travesty and a slap in the face to industrial designers everywhere.
As an Industrial Designer I take offence at your comment. Your comments are based upon viewing a few pictures of an object and discerning the functionality of the design based solely on aesthetic appearances. While simplicity of form is often a major factor contained in many designs it should never be an overriding point. Industrial Design is more than making an object look pretty, if we wanted to create something with that discards functionality for form we would have become Interior Designers.
Well sir, you offend too easily. I made no such comment concerning the functionality of the design, nor the simplicity (or lack there of). I was simply stating that the aesthetics were certainly not taken into consideration whatsoever. Coming from such a major electronics company its a surprising mistake. If you don't think aesthetics play a major part in consumers' gadget/electronics purchasing decisions (sometimes over functionality) you may want to reconsider your choice of profession. Now here's a pre-emptive tissue for that last statement.
As someone who has been in the audio/video business as a professional for 40 years, I disagree with your statement and logic.
The design is made for rugged, simplicity in the field. Period. Get over it.
It is a pro tool....and will be used by same to efficiently record/review HD footage in the field.
Regards,
David
Looks MACHO!... black and with many button for experiment not a fancy "press the only button to play" device.
Yes, you are right. Apple products looks gay when you see this video walkman.
This is traditional Sony design, I love it.
1) stunning, usable design for its intended market and uses
2) removable batteries, as god favours getting the job done instead of docking-and-charging downtime.
All the 'ugly' comments, not to mention the headline, is very perplexing. This isn't ugly, it's classic Sony, pro-level design... I wonder how the comments would read if this thing was white.
So...that's the first one...where's the ugly ? Did Dell enter the video market and you forgot to link us a picture ?
and think the design perfectly matches my HDR-FX1...
for anyone who is puzzled - please google "sony mini dv walkman" - yes, they were actually making this before, just not HDV.
http://ec1.images-amazon.com/images/P/B00005K4LP.03._SS500_SCLZZZZZZZ_.jpg
I think it looks better than an iPod honestly.
I think Apple's designs are disgusting and ugly.
Looks are subjective.
This is pro equipment and looks like that, rugged and functional.
The real point is that engadged should be named macfangadget or sonybashergadget, because at the end is not more than a mac fan/sony hater meeting point.
And this is a pity, really.
Like they said that commenting the ifa winners was too much, but apple release a phone and we have to read zillions of irrelevant iphone posts for years, hmmmm biased maybe?
You guys really are the original "Sneery tech blog". This is a piece of professional equipment, I'd imagine the people using it won't really care what it looks like.
>> it enables users to watch their HDV / miniDV tapes on the go, which isn't likely to entice you unless you shoot for a living.
Yes... that probably is who it's aimed at.
clearly a professional piece of gear.
how many consumers need a $1200 portable dv deck? output your home videos to optical disc or your personal media player.
looks like every other product in the sony broadcast lineup.
what, were you expecting multitouch? you guys dont know jack, this isnt a gadget you get to make you look cool like your ipods. this is something you get if your a wedding videographer, doing corprate videos or filimg for news media. its not in any way supposed to look pretty.
enagadget, you should assign writes to write about things they know the market for.
if you have done any high def commercial video production you would know that seven inch is one of the standards, there are others but many of the monitors that connect to pro cameras for the purpose of directorial review or what we call video asst. are seven inch. this is made for video asst. of there prosumer and entry level pro hd cams. I have used similar screens for the purposes of HD TV commercials as well as HD music videos. As stated by others a consumer has little use for such a device while a pro needing to review the shot with a client this is a self contained god send.
This is a (lame) update to the older DV Walkmen clamshell units, which looked about the same. They were always too expensive ($800) considering what you got: the playback mechansim was no better than a DV camera, yet you could get a camera for less $$ -- and most of us did. The only place I see these a lot is on set: Many directors use these as little field monitors if they can't afford a video village, or else they use them to review dailies or other material on DV.
Now this unit would make sense if it could display HD material (720p, 1080i/p) since a lot of us are shooting HD now -- but if the screen doesn't have the pixels then it's almost useless; it least it seems to have the proper hookups to bring in HD material even if it can't show you pixel for pixel. At best, it could function as a cheap import deck for someone who can't afford one of the Sony HDV decks.
JK
what like video asst. for 35mm panavisions give you equal rez? come on who needs pixel for pixel to see if the framing and take and lighting are decent. There are vary few video asst units that have equal rez as the end product and if you need it this has an hdmi out so you can hook up to a 19" monitor which is what you have to do in final cut or AVID anyway as a computer monitor is not pixel for pixel HD. This is compact video asst with appropriate hookups so you can have the rez if you need it. all things in perspective.
This looks like a little DV monitor... It doesn't look ugly to me because as Spyvie said it looks fine for pro gear.
This looks just like every other piece of mini dv/hdv hardware out there. It's also built to be used and abused, not to be looked at. I could probably drop this and at the same time have some random PA spill his redbull from craft services on it while mashing his donut into it trying to pick it up and it would still work.
It'd be really nice to have this unit so that your director could review tapes in the field without having to steal the camera.
I like the look very much. It's cool, it's pro-looking and it'll be able to do what it's designed to do.
I'm going to admit my comment may be redundant because I haven't read the comments previous to mine.
This thing isn't for general purpose consumers who want their camcorders to spit out unedited, DVDs. It's for people who want to preview their footage in the field. That's why they call it field production. It's for electronic news gathering guys, Wedding videographers, reality tv crews, who use the great-looking HDV format (which doesn't offer the greatest audio quality btw). It can also be used to output from your non-linear editing computer to a preview monitor so you don't have to wear the heads on your HDV camera. It's for the guys who are too cheap to buy a deck but cheap enough to get one of these instead.
Its not meant for watching Simpsons episodes on the train. Although you could... but it would be a pain to get the episodes onto the tape and cumbersome. Get an ipod or iphone or any number of the other PMP's out there for that nonsense.
Based solely on looks, I think it looks great. I'd get one if I had money to burn and was doing HDV video. It looks professional and rugged. Anybody else agree?
I'd also like to add I don't think this unit is ugly at all. Looks not much different from the last gen DV Walkmans and that is not a bad thing.
Even though HDV is a highly compressed format, it is still very popular, even in the professional world for its price and size of gear.
There is no need for Firewire 800 on this as someone asked, because HDV uses the same exact bitrate as DV, which is 25 mbit/sec, something Firewire 400 is more than equipped to handle.
This is obviously geared for the prosumer video market - NOT a consumer device (why would you watch an end product on HDV).
It may look ugly to some, but it has a very good user interface. Thus it should be considered a good design with regards to accomplishing the intended function with the least hassle and confusion.
This is not a "fad" device, to be "consumed" and put aside in a matter of weeks.
"Beyond the fact that this thing resembles a decade-old handheld cassette recorder with a seven-inch HD display flanked on top..."
Maybe that's because it *is* a cassette recorder with a 7" display on top? What else should it look like?
"...it enables users to watch their HDV / miniDV tapes on the go, which isn't likely to entice you unless you shoot for a living."
It's probably a safe bet that Sony is putting out HDV products for - surprise - people who shoot on HDV. I'm not a fan of their company lately and one can discuss the merits (or lack thereof) of HDV all day long, but really, this article just comes off as uninformed (the screen isn't HD-res) and petty (honestly, do you really care what your video deck looks like?
This isn't a product aimed at a casual consumer, nor is it meant to be put on a display shelf next to the beanie babies. Let's just focus on the tech and leave the subjective whinings to yourselves, okay Engadget?
I am seriously shocked... -.- That's one of the ugliest Sony devices I've ever seen. I've always find Sony's design rather impressive, but this one... is just ugly.
You guys are a bunch of douches, this is a VTR and this is what VTR's look like, Geez hence the HDV/DV combo playback and Firewire. If you don't want to wreck your camera heads, then use this, I know I could fork out a good $800 instead of using my $7000 Xl-H1 camera to use for capturing.
If it was white, had less functionality and required a credit card number and subscription to a service, Engadget would have loved it. Let's see you build a better one, haterz...
Whiteshaft..
Of course it's a Walkman design...what did you expect? And your comment about rather than buying the deck, most of you bought the camera for less money instead tells me you used your camera for editing too! Not smart. You buy the camera to shoot...you buy the deck to edit with. Using the camera transport for editing is a foolish use of your investment.
Regards,
David
He's not complaining about the 7-inch size. He's saying that the resolution is not HD. Which it's not.
800x480 is plenty sharp enough to determine focus and framing. I shot HD recently using the Ikan V8000 monitor, and had zero issues determining focus. And that was also using a 35mm adapter system, which greatly reduces DOF and makes nailing focus even more critical. The Ikan is 800x480 as well (http://www.ikancorp.com/pages/monitors/v8000hd/index.htm). So in that regard, this new HDV "Walkman" is fine. Unfortunately, it appears to have no component inputs...probably so as not to cannibalize Sony's production monitor business.
I think the confusion is caused by the name Walkman... which is quite unfortunate.
Ah Sony...Sony...Sony This looks like a practical unit but it is not the first HDV unit of its kind. JVC released one about a year ago but i don't think it got much attention. Given the day and age that this is being released I would have liked to have seen it with some sort of flash media incorporated as well. Tape is still tape and represents a clunky non RAM format that is time consuming to work with. Random Access will always speed up your day. The push to flash drives and solid state devices is the here and now. I think Sony has goofed again!!!
Yes here it is. JVC released it well over a year ago and it was a 720P Video Walkman model number CU-VH1US-P. Almost identical to the Sony if you ask me for the exception of 1080i. If you google this you will find it on many review sites. JVC shelfed the unit and it is no longer available and has been put in their discontinued junk pile. I would suspect that this unit will end up in the same pile. If a flash media or HDD version gets released then I and many others will be all over it for sure.