Sony enters the low-end portable music player market with its latest E-series Walkman-branded players.
With a starting price at approximately US$ 180, the new E-series will sport a one-liner OLED screen, 512MB, 1GB or 2GB storage sizes, and will come in five colors (none of them white). Don’t count on this new Walkman eating up a significant chunk of the iPod Shuffle’s market, though, for the fundamental reason that it’s not an iPod!
Don’t count on this new Walkman eating up a significant chunk of the iPod Shuffle’s market, though, for the fundamental reason that it’s not an iPod!
And because it costs $180. Might as well by a 1GB iPod nano for $149 or the 2GB model for $199.
Argh, that’s supposed to be: “…buy a 1GB…”
At least it comes in colors, but that’s about all it has going for it.
I found this funny on the ATRACLife site:
“Pricing will be below the rival iPod Nano”
I bought Sony’s NW walkman from last that competed with the Shuffle at the time and won with a fairly good advantage.
Apple upgraded their flash-based iPod to the Nano and what Sony brings out in order to compete with them is a downgrade compared to their previous flash player?
Maybe the OLED’s going to feature a full display. Perhaps then, they can say they’re competing with the Nano.
No, the OLEDs are exactly the same as my old MP3, actually I think that this is exactly the same as my old MP3 player (NW-E407) except that is has less buttons (which is always a plus for Sony anyway) and perhaps a simpler software (which is also a big plus) and much uglier than their older flash player (which is exactly the opposite direction Apple took from the Shuffle to the Nano).
Basically it’s like those one of those Nokias in which they fit the same hardware in a dozen different shells and sell the cheaper models with more “blocked” features in the software than the expensive ones.
It all depends on what they do with the OLED. If it’s cool and displays song titles and allow s for some kind of navigation then I think it’ll rock.
If it’s just the plastic casing, then it’s kind of meh. But since everyone has an ipod it makes for a nice change.
Hmmm it displays song titles and artist name I guess. But Sony has had a player out like that for quite a while and no one bothered with them.
“But Sony has had a player out like that for quite a while and no one bothered with them.”
Again, because they weren’t iPods, methinks!
In the portable media player market, brand is everything.
Cd players all the way
You don’t understand j angelo, this player is a downgrade from Sony’s previous player which failed to meet success against the controversial iPod Shuffle.
How does Sony expect to win more market share with a worse player than before against a device much superior to the Shuffle? (Nano)
My apologies for the misunderstanding. Perhaps it’s a marketing ploy. You know how these tech companies are. They come out with a new product, which could be inferior to an old model, but a bit smaller and better marketed, hoping more people would buy it. It’s the same with some digital camera models I’ve encountered. They know most people aren’t out for the features, but for the coolness factor.
darn, i prefer those with FM radios