Sony's NW-A800 launches

Sony's NW-A800 launchesPosted Mar 1st 2007 2:31AM by Ryan Block
Filed under: Portable Audio, Portable Video


We were expecting the A800s March first, and with the ides of March marches in Sony's NW-A800 flash Network Walkman. Outfitted with up to 8GB of memory and a supposed 30 hour battery life (surely that's playing ATRAC files, as always), the A800 also has a 2-inch QVGA display -- not too bad, especially considering it plays back H.264 video. Audio codecs are the usual: AAC, WMA (sorry, no PlaysForSure support -- maybe Sony's being forward thinking here), MP3, and ATRAC. Models listed on Sony's Euro sites are A808 for the 8GB, A806 for the 4GB, and A805 for the 2GB -- what, was A808, A804, and A802 too hard to name 'em? Whatever their reasoning, we're a little baffled by the price: £199 for the 8GB, which is close to $400 US (that kind of pricing sound familiar?). Seriously. Granted, these will probably get a little cheaper when they head stateside, but we're definitely shaking our heads at you, Sony, on behalf of our European readership.