Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #88091 in Consumer Electronics
• Brand: Sony
• Model: NWHD1
• Published on: 2004-09-20
• Released on: 2004-08-11
• Dimensions: .24 pounds

Features

• Sony's unique G-sensor technology protects the internal dard drive even if it falls from a height of 1 m! The HD-1 has an extremely long playback time of up to 30 hours with the built-in Li-ion battery

Manufacturer's Description
The epitome of elegant design, the silver NW-HD1 model weighs less than 4 ounces making it the world's smallest portable audio device built with a 1.8-inch, 20GB hard drive. Music lovers will be able to store up to 13,000 four-minute songs recorded at 48 kilobits per seconds (kbps) on this sexy little player that fits right in the palm of your hand.

The new hard-drive player lives up to the Walkman legacy for stability and endurance. It houses an internal rechargeable battery that provides up to 30 hours of continuous playback. G-Sensor" shock protection offers an advantage over traditional hard drives by safeguarding the player's internal mechanisms to protect against impact and help prevent a loss of data. Sony's skip-free G-Protection" technology is also incorporated to help eliminate skipping during active uses, as well as to provide quick recovery from both horizontal and vertical shock.

The new hard-drive device connects to a compatible computer via a USB 2.0 digital interface for high-speed music transfers. It comes bundled with SonicStage® version 2.1 software, which makes it easy to import, manage and transfer music collections. With SonicStage software, playlists or track information created in the jukebox can be automatically transferred to the device.

Additionally, SonicStage jukebox supports and seamlessly converts many Internet audio formats, including MP3, WMA and WAV files.

Accessing music on the Network Walkman player is as easy as a click of a thumb. Sony's Jog Dial® navigation lets you quickly retrieve tracks and playlists on the seven-line backlit LCD display. Four different display modes offer the flexibility to navigate through track numbers, bit rates, song titles, artist names and more.

Box Contents

Customer Reviews

great! i've found how to make it louder too!
when i first got the player i loved it, and still do so so much. one thing though was that i thought it was a bit quiet. but i've descovered a way to make it about 20% louder! follow these instructions!
1) To enter the service menu, first make sure the player is on (i e plays a track).

2) Stop playback.

3) Set the player to HOLD immediately by sliding the HOLD switch on the bottom of the player to the right.

4) While holding down the MODE button, enter the following key combination using the navigation wheel:

RIGHT RIGHT LEFT LEFT RIGHT LEFT RIGHT LEFT UP DOWN

5) Now as you disable HOLD, the display goes dark and says "POWER". Don't worry that the display is non-backlit - it is normal and you will reset it to backlit in the last step. Anyway, you are now inside the service menu.

6) Click UP so that the display says "OTHER".

7) Click RIGHT so the display says "G TEST".

8) Click UP as many times as needed until the display says "SP SET".

9) Click on the PLAY button. If the display says "OFF", than you might just as well leave the service menu (go to step 11) because you are using a non-throttled player. However if the display says "ON", it means that it the player is set to restricted output.

10) Click on the MODE button so that the display shows "OFF".

11) Press the PLAY button to store the new setting. Now the display should say "SP SET".

12) Hold down the MENU button until the unit performs a normal startup and displays the WALKMAN logo.

13) You must now enable the backlight again by using the normal Menu function.

Does what it's meant to do
Firstly I have to admit that I have not used any other digital players. I was considering the iPod but they have become something of a cliche for me.

I have to say that I am very satisfied with this player. It does what I want it to do and as a first time user of any software that converts CDs to another format - the software works very well. As I'm not intending to use MP3s but put my CDs onto the player, the lack of proper MP3 support does not matter to me. Sound quality does and coming from Minidisc (which gave me the quality and size I was looking for at that time) I knew that the ATRAC format should be just as good on this player. I have to say that I have not been disappointed.

The size of it is really great - I can't get over the fact that eventually I'll have about 5000 tracks on it (I'm using 132kbps).

As for the loudness of it - it depends upon the headphones. I did use a pair of SHURE e2c's and while they did sound loud enough it lacked the bass I had been used to. I switched back to my SONY ex70's and although not as loud - I think they are much better suited.

Battery life is also good. I've had the unit for three weeks now. On the first charge it only lasted about 8 hours but on the second charge it lasted around 20 hours - this was at playing it 2 hours a day. I expect that the time will increase once the battery is upto full capacity (it takes a couple of charges and full discharges to achieve this).

The lack of remote control on such an expensive unit is abit of a disappointment but then the new generation iPods don't have them included either.

As for that docking station - people do complain about this. Yes it is abit annoying that if you do ever travel you have to take it with you but it is very light and small and the same applies to the charger - incredibly light. What happens when you take a iPod on holiday with you ? Of course you have to take a charger for that too in order to charge it. Lastly I like to think you're less likely to get mugged for it as you do need these two items to charge it or do any transfers. From what I understand you just need a cable for the iPod to do these things.

These are just my opinions and I hope that it will allow you to make a better judgement of this player. Yes it's no iPod but that's probably what I like most about it. It's just as desireable once in your hands.

Life-enhancing
I start from somewhere different. I'm not interested in rock/pop/whatever or downloading tunes. But, over the years, I've acquired a collection of cherished CD's that my wife doesn't want to hear (even though some of them were gifts from her!) I bought the Sony machine so that I could listen privately while working or reading. So far (60 hours after purchase) I find it mind-blowing. I've loaded 46 CD's covering a wide range (Classical, Musicals - Cole Porter, Irving Berlin, etc -, Opera, World Music, Cabaret, Jazz) and the quality is phenomenal. I've still got space for another couple of hundred CD's, which I don't actually have. The earphones are no better and no worse than other similar ones; I find all of them uncomfortable, but have got round this by using (v. expensive but v. comfortable) Bang and Olufsen earphones that I bought some years ago for listening to music on long-haul flights. The only problem that I've had is that the software refuses to read some CDs, but this is not the fault of the Walkman itself. The acid test? One of my CDs is by a classical violin and viola duo who are old friends; I have heard their repertoire live in a concert hall, and also in a family living room setting. The Walkman reproduced it perfectly; I was transported back to their live performance. I'm not qualified to judge between MP3, WAV, etc., but if Atrac3plus can do that for me, that's as good as it gets.