Sony unveils portable music player with 305 hour battery life
Posted on 09/12/05 01:13 by Seán Byrne                             
Sony unveils portable music player with 305 hour battery life

Even though manufacturers of portable digital audio players have worked on bigger storage capacities, including models which hold over 15,000 songs, one thing that has not changed much since the first digital audio players is battery life.  Some early MP3 players feature a 10 hour battery life and many players these days, including iPods still offer only up to 20 hours of battery life. 

Well, Sony is aiming to revive its MiniDisc format yet again with the XM-C37 Hi-MD player, which features a 305 hour battery life in LP4 mode, the longest runtime ever for a portable audio device.  This provides enough playback time for close to two-weeks continuous playback.  For those who run short of time, the player will deliver 15 hours runtime from 20 minutes of charging time, while a full charge takes just over 2.5 hours.  The player can run on disposable batteries as well as by battery pack, however the maximum playback time is based on a combination of both batteries. 

The player is fairly slim with dimensions of just 75.8 x 18.4 x 82.6 mm, with a weight of 82g (109g with battery pack).  Each Hi-MD disc has a capacity of 1GB and holds up to 45 hours of music.  The player comes in a choice of three colours and features an external remote.  It is expected to begin shipping from the beginning of February next year, although so far no pricing has been anounced.

Yes, the near two-week battery powered music player is here and it's courtesy of Sony's now ancient MiniDisc. Japanese maker Victor has built the XM-C37 to compete with newer MP3 players that give up the ghost after less than a day's constant use.

We don't think it'll hail the revival of little plastic discs but it's perhaps another reason why you might want to give them a try. The format's managed to re-invent itself over the years with Net-MD - allowing you to drag and drop MP3s onto a disc - and Hi-MD. which enhanced the drag and drop interface and increased capacity to 1GB. That's up to 45 hours of music on discs costing less than a fiver each.

Some further info can be found on the original Japanese press release.

With such a long battery life, chances are that this player will outrun the standby time of many mobile phones.  However, as a Hi-MD MiniDisc only holds up to 45 hours of music and this assumes one is happy listening to ATRAC3Plus audio at 48kbps, in my opinion having a player with a bundle of MiniDiscs is not going to be of any more benefit than carrying a large HD based MP3 player with a bundle of extra batteries.

Source: Stuff Magazine

Reactions
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By heystoopid, Fri 9 Dec 2005 02:03
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Probably, as it is a Sony product, it comes with the usual flawed half finished DRM security nightmare software replete with hidden rootkit and other downers!puke
By petera, Fri 9 Dec 2005 02:09
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peteraI've got to admit I had a minidisc recorder that I had for a while and I sold last year. I quite miss it, and the sound quality was very good (as long as you didn't go for the very high compression), and the battery life was impressive for a 3 year old.
By jdub, Fri 9 Dec 2005 02:42
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Don't listen to them! It was ANYTHING but convienient. I had a netMD and you had to import your music to their crappy software and then convert it before loading it to your player at mind numbingly slow speeds. Basically to make a full disc you needed to set aside an hour of your day. I don't care what they've done in pentance... i'll never use it again.
By FidelC, Fri 9 Dec 2005 03:54
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FidelCMy Malaysian Walkman is long gone and i still hate it. It couldnt even center the tape right. This one i think looks cool but only good for a Ginnes records. Why couldnt they tell the actual recharge battery life? Who knows.. may be because the number looks better when combined with say Lithium source. And the size is dinosaurs. So i guess ill pass on this one, still waiting for some warm consumer rights gesture from Sony. Cheers. FidelC
By CORRSA, Fri 9 Dec 2005 10:29
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no thanx it's got the word SONY on it
By Roj, Fri 9 Dec 2005 13:33
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1) Minidisc was and is poser proprietary technology (as is ATRAC which has the WORST audio quality of ANY lossy format). The future is flash or microdrive. 2) If it's typical Sony junk, the player will not support UMS (Universal Mass Storage - plug it in and it is seen by the system as a hard drive) and will require Sony software to load and unload tracks. Anyone who haas ever used Sony software knows the kind of garbage it is. 3) Anyone who risks using Sony software TODAY should be sterilized to protect the gene pool. 4) It's Sony. Given recent and continuing events that should automatically equal "BOYCOTT!!"
[edited by Roj on 09.12.2005 13:40]
By pupfiction, Fri 9 Dec 2005 15:51
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All well and good, but if you are happy to/have to carry around MD's why would you be worried about carrying some extra batteries?
By Kevin2, Fri 9 Dec 2005 19:46
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You got that right. I won't forget. Frown
By Oz., Sat 10 Dec 2005 01:45
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2) If it's typical Sony junk, the player will not support UMS (Universal Mass Storage - plug it in and it is seen by the system as a hard drive) and will require Sony software to load and unload tracks. Anyone who haas ever used Sony software knows the kind of garbage it is. DAMN STRAIGHT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
By cynicalbastard, Sat 10 Dec 2005 23:11
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1) MP3 is also proprietary: http://www.mp3licensing.com/ http://www.mp3licensing.com/royalty/software.html (as is DVD, etc) ATRAC was conceived before MP3 and actually isn't the worst quality lossy format by a long shot. It's not the best either, but definitely not the worst. Actually, the format was designed with portable hardware in mind. Power consumption and chip processing power in portables was one of the main design considerations. Hi-MD recorders (not players, obviously) can also record in linear PCM. 2)All Sony Hi-MD recorders since their release last year have been standard USB Mass Storage Devices with no drivers required for Win2000/Windows XP to be able to be used. But for music, you're right - SonicStage is needed. And it deserves the reputation it has. It's horrible and DRM-laden and extremely confusingly restrictive (although since version 3.2 has been less restrictive with your own recordings now than it used to be). 3) No comment Wink MiniDisc (Hi-MD) is basically still a good tool for recording, and not much else. That is its strength. 4) A boycott should definitely be happening now for all Sony have done. And more bad press. The average joe still doesn't know what's going on. The people in charge of the company now are only hurting it and need to be fired or actually start listening to their customers. Maybe the new CEO, Howard Stringer, will make that happen. Maybe not. I'll just add this article is highly misleading. It's a Victor/JVC product. Sony just invented the format. But I guess articles with Sony in their title get more hits Wink
By shimman, Mon 12 Dec 2005 02:47
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i think Roj meant ATRAC as proprietary because ATRAC isn't open to anyone buy sony itself unlike mp3, ATRAC isn't open, you can get a license for ATRAC to produce minidisk compatable devices but not the software players or other things that utilize ATRAC techology. at midisk player size, i think someone can easily make flashmemory mp3 player with 300hours of playback i suspect that that mp3 player won't be able to play that much after few months of use sony seems to have major attitude & quality control issues i would not buy any sony products until they are changed

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