Sony HD3 or HD5

[Marcos]

U may need an extra battery for the ipods measily 12hrs, compared to the HD5s 40hrs (quoted)

Yeah, thats what i'm saying, Sony's hitting the ipod hard at its weakest feature. I'm still waiting to read reviews on it, 30hours MP3, 40 hours atrac

[DaftpuNk]

I see the battery latch as a great advantage on the HD5, i mean, nowadays after the iPod has happened, we see "replaceable battery" as a whole different term to what it use to be in the MD days. iPod changed the term to mean 'you're going to need to replace the battery at some point because it simply stops performing', but back in the day a replaceable battery simply meant you could carry a spare with you any time in case you ran out of charge etc. Which isnt really going to happen with the HD3.

But then again you might ask, how often do you spend 30+ hours listening to music away from a power source? Its just nice to have the option

I don't see how it could possibly be of that much benefit.

[Marcos]

I don't see how it could possibly be of that much benefit.

I come from the MiniDisc crowd so i expect huge battery life and the option to carry and easily replace a spare batt while i'm out and about. Its a different story if you didnt take that path early on.

If you come from an iPod then the standard built in 30hours will be brilliant, i've just been spoilt by MD and now waiting for MP3 players to catch up on battery life and sound quality

[nvening]

I think I may get the HD5, in black.
Sony says it can hold pictures word documents etc, anyone know how that works? Is it pug and play or what?

[Marcos]

I think a lot of the HD and flash players out on the market have the Plug & Play external HD function. It shows up as an external drive, nice and easy.

Although any music files you load onto the player this way will be stored as data, not playable. I've been told you can only transfer playable music via sonicstage, but i'm very surprised that 3 generations later someone has yet to create a smaller, cleaner, better, freeware transfer program for the Sony players, like ephpod for the iPod.

I think HD5 may get enough attention to make this happen

[nvening]

The thing is, u dont need to use sonic stage much, just put all ur music on it and u r away. Then u can use something elses to listen to music on ur pc.

If it works as a portable HDD that great!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Marcos]

Yeah, i mean, i'm not that bothered about sonicstage, just most people make a big deal of it.

And it'll be very handy having a HD function at Uni, convenient

[bledd]

Where did you get the idea ipods cant play mp3?

they can't (unless I'm horribly mistaken) -you have to convert them in iTunes first?

[Marcos]

they can't (unless I'm horribly mistaken) -you have to convert them in iTunes first?

They can play MP3, but they have to be transfered with either iTunes or Ephpod, but it still plays the same file.

Just like the Sonys, and probably a few others, you need software in order to transfer playable music files, but you can use windows to transfer data.

I'm very surprised no one has gotten around this though, they can find the smallest of security holes in an OS but cant come up with a simple by pass to drag & dropping on the world's most popular DAP

[Gunbuster]

I don't think the iPod needs a DRM tag to play MP3s though, where as the HD-1/3/5 need an OpenMG tag added to the files by Sonicstage. Neither require transcoding like Marcos says.

[Marcos]

I don't think the iPod needs a DRM tag to play MP3s though, where as the HD-1/3/5 need an OpenMG tag added to the files by Sonicstage. Neither require transcoding like Marcos says.

Thats true, i think the ipod doesnt mess or alter the files where as the sony does something to them.

I cant imagine the DRM tagging can be that slow though, must be at least 10x faster than atrac conversion.

[Aaron]

I cant imagine the DRM tagging can be that slow though, must be at least 10x faster than atrac conversion.

I think it was this DRM tagging that ruined my mp3 collection once.

I had SonicStage on my OS drive and my MP3 collection on a seperate drive. I formatted the OS drive and when I reinstalled SonicStage it refused to play my mp3s (or let me transfer them to my mp3 player) because they weren't valid.

[pickers]

I don't think that sonic stage actually alters your MP3s on your hard drive, it puts a tag on when you put it onto the player so it can only be transfered back onto your PC.

[Marcos]

I don't think that sonic stage actually alters your MP3s on your hard drive, it puts a tag on when you put it onto the player so it can only be transfered back onto your PC.

True, I think you can choose for it to tag all your MP3s on your PC too, but i think most people just let it tag when transferring, i know i would

[bledd]

iaudio acts as a hd and plays with no 'transfering' software

[Gunbuster]

I found this post in Avforums and it suggests that the Vaio util works with the HD3, allowing transfer of mp3s without Sonic Stage
http://www.avforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=189371

Cky2k: yep, but this isn't a discussion about the Iaudio players.