Sony D-NE300 ATRAC Walkman Portable CD Player (Blue)

Sony D-NE300 ATRAC Walkman Portable CD Player (Blue)
by Sony

List Price: ~~$94.99~~
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Category: Network Media Player
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Customers in the UK, buy this product at amazon.co.uk for British Pounds

Digital Photo Product Details

Manufacturer: Sony
Brand: Sony
Edition: Electronics
Release Date: 2004-03-15
Model: DNE300BLUE
Color: Blue
Publisher: Sony
Studio: Sony
Music Label: Sony
Product features:

Portable CD player compatible with MP3 files and Sony's ATRAC3plus compression technology; 2-line display with ID3 tag recognition
Includes SonicStage CD Simple Burner software to facilitate ATRAC3plus CD burning from MP3 files and from other CDs
Skip-free G-Protection technology eliminates or reduces skipping during many active uses
Bookmark playback function for easy programming, auto-ranking playback programs your favorites based on listening frequency
More than 85 hours extended playback with 2 AA batteries (not included)

Accessories:

Digital Cameras Photo Reviews of Sony D-NE300 ATRAC Walkman Portable CD Player (Blue)

Customer Review: My First MP3/CD Player
Summary: 5 Stars

This is my first mp3 player, but I'm no stranger to electronics and standard CD players. I bought this player last night at Target so there are probably features and annoyances I have yet to discover. I just thought I'd share my first impression.

The D-NE300 comes with software for compressing audio files (Atrac3) but the software required updates and made my computer crash. I gave up on that for now, mp3s work just fine for me.

PROS:
**This little player is very customizable!
**LCD screen shows ID3 information, which has a customizable display - you can cycle through title, artist, and album with the push of a button. ID3 tags can be created and edited using the free program Winamp. If you don't have winamp yet and you're buying an MP3 player, something is probably wrong with you.
**There are 3 equalizer presets and a custom style that can be set in one of 21 different combinations.
**The large center button has the play button and menu buttons. The small buttons on either side of the large button are for moving through directories. I have a CD with 8 different albums, with one click I can move from one album to the next. The other two buttons on the face of the player are stop and menu.
**There are several different listening options.. you can listen to one song repeated, all the music on the disc, all shuffled, one directory, one directory shuffled, playlists, playlists shuffled, your most-played songs, your most-played songs shuffled. So many options!
**Battery life is 85 hours! This is in part because the LCD powers down when you push stop. When you push any button, the LCD pops back on and displays the last song you were playing. There's no power button! There's also a timer option, so you can go to sleep listening to music and not worry about the batteries.
**The sound is very nice, plenty of volume, and the bass is sufficient. I'm using my own Sony MDR-Q22LP headphones. The sound quality was a big improvement over my Philips Magnavox CD player using the same headphones. I've tried both music and audio books, the sound is crisp and loud. (see CONS below).
**I've heard complaints with mp3 players about a delay between songs. I have not experienced this. The jump from one song to the next is instant. I use NTI CD Maker for burning.
**The case is sleek and stylish. If appearance is important to you, this player is not lacking. The blue color does have a questionably purple tint to it. If you're a guy or buying it for a guy who would be offended, you may want to consider the grey case.

CONS:
**There is no backlight on the display. That doesnt bother me, I usually know what I'm listening to or I don't care to look at every song title as it's playing.
**The player has a loading time of about 15 seconds. MP3 players are not instant like standard CD players... at least this one isn't. Also, the loading sounds can be a little noisy. Probably not louder than the sound of a phone on vibrate, but louder than I expected.
**The headphones that come with the player are crappy and very quiet. Suprise suprise. I'm using my Sony MDR-Q22LP headphones ($15).
**The volume control consists of two buttons on the side, up and down. A bar appears on the LCD when adjusting the volume. I would've liked some sort of numerical indication of the volume. This is just me being nit-picky.

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Description of Sony D-NE300 ATRAC Walkman Portable CD Player (Blue)

SONY D-NE300 -- Whether you're commuting, working at a desk, or working out at the gym, the D-NE300 CD Walkman(R) Portable CD Player will keep you entertained and informed right up to the moment. Customizable Equalizer Up To 80 Hours Continuous Playback with 2 AA Batteries (Not Included) for ATRAC3plus Playback -- Up To 50 Hours CD Audio Playback Off Timer Auto Shut Off Feature to Conserve Battery Life Skip-Free G-Protection(TM) Technology CD-R/RW Playback 18 Playback Modes Auto Ranking Playback Function Bookmark Playback Function for Easy Programming Digital Mega Bass(R) Sound System Digital Volume Control Heat Resistant Lid 2 Position Automatic Volume Limiter System ( AVLS ) Color - Blue

The Sony D-NE300 is a stylish, compact portable CD player with a robust set of features. If you're in the market for a durable companion that will let you enjoy CD, MP3 and ATRAC3plus tracks on the go, The D-NE300 is the ticket. We found much to like and little to complain about in this capable unit.

Features
The D-NE300's simple controls allowed us to find our way around the unit's features with little fuss. The two-line dot matrix display was especially handy for viewing the names of our MP3 and ATRAC3plus tracks. Sony's G-Protection feature can be programmed to offer two levels of protection from stutters and skips when the unit is jarred or shaken. Even on the lowest level of protection, we found that only the hardest knocks could make our music miss a stride. We also liked the intelligently designed equalization features of the D-NE300. Equalizer presets called "soft," "active" and "heavy" are built in, or you can set your own levels in the low, mid and high ranges via a nifty graphical interface.

Sound Quality
In short, we were impressed. We popped in an MP3 CD and within 10 seconds the unit recognized the playlists and song titles we'd burned onto the disc. The unit delivered rich bass and clear highs, especially when we used the "heavy" equalization setting. We noticed some degradation in sound quality when listening via the included headphones at high volumes. We found the Sennheiser PX 100 Headphones to be a worthwhile upgrade.

Battery Life
It would be nice if the D-NE300 shipped with rechargeable batteries, but Sony claims that the D-NE300 can squeeze up to 85 hours of battery life out of two standard AA batteries (not included). If accurate, this is an amazing feat, and although we didn't test the unit for 85 hours, we did note that battery strength was still full after a full day of testing. According to Sony, the D-NE300 is equipped with advanced digital signal processing that helps it pull a lot less juice than its predecessors. The unit's display has no backlight and it sleeps after a period of inactivity, further contributing to battery life.

ATRAC3plus, MP3 and SonicStage
The D-NE300 ships with Sony's own SonicStage software, which is designed to convert your MP3s and audio CDs to Sony's proprietary ATRAC3plus music format. There are advantages and disadvantages to using SonicStage and ATRAC3plus encoding. On the plus side, ATRAC3plus offers a very good compression ratio of approximately 1/20, meaning it can compress CD-quality audio to a twentieth of its original size. This allows you to encode up to 490 songs, burn them to CD and then play them in your D-NE300. MP3 encoding, on the other hand offers about half as much compression, which means your CDs won't be able to hold as many songs when encoded in this format.

The downside to ATRAC3plus is that once your music is encoded in this format, your CDs must be played on an ATRAC3plus-compatible device, which means you are stuck with Sony branded CD players with ATRAC3plus support. MP3 formats, on the other hand, offer complete compatibility with all CD players that support MP3 CD playback. Adding to our grumbles, we found the SonicStage software somewhat lacking. The user interface was confusing and encoding both our audio CDs and MP3s to ATRAC3plus was slower than we would have liked.

Fortunately, the D-NE300 supports ATRAC3plus and MP3 formats, so if you want to cram a ton of songs onto one CD you can use SonicStage and burn ATRAC3plus CDs. Meanwhile, if you want to enjoy the universality of MP3 CDs, you can use third-party MP3 encoding and burning utilities. The D-NE300 makes it easy to listen to the music you want, whenever you want it. --Joshua Gunn

Pros