Sony HMP-A1 Media Player Review

Sony's HMP-A1 is a 20GB portable media player that plays music, videos, and images - and happliy doesn't require Sony's ATRAC file format.

Summary

Sony’s HMP-A1 media player is tiny, fashionable, and surprisingly useful. Anyone considering the A1 should first consider how they will get video content, and what they will do if that method is shut down. If that doesn’t faze you, you’ll enjoy one of the first PVPs on the market. The simple, straight forward interface will appeal to many first-time users, as will the overall build quality and aesthetics. The battery life is acceptable, the screen bright, and the software simple to use.

The Sony HMP-A1 could have been the video iPod if it weren’t for the requirement to convert the video and audio files into a different format, which makes transferring files an annoyance. At a whopping $700, the 20GB A1 is vying for customers who would consider multimedia intensive PDAs, portable DVD players, and higher capacity digital audio players. If you’re a fashion conscious commuter, the A1 is sleek, small, and offers great picture and sound quality. Just don’t forget your headphones.

Introduction

The big gadget buzz word over the past year has been Portable Media Players; handheld devices with an integrated screen and the ability to playback music and video files. The HMP-A1 is Sony’s first offering in this category. Even though the A1 is only available in Japan, it can be imported from various companies that specialize in language conversion, such as Dynamism.

Unlike many of the other similar devices coming to market, the A1 does not run Windows Media Player Edition. Sony opted to use a proprietary operating system that crosses the border between ‘simple’ to ‘too simple’, lacking many, if not all power user features. Aesthetically, the A1 sports a nice glossy plastic finish and offers a glimpse of the design and build quality most likely seen in the upcoming Playstation Portable.

The HMP-A1 features a proprietary OS – not Windows Portable Media Center.

Features and Design

Sony’s HMP-A1 is a media player designed to play audio, video, and image files as well as act as an external storage device. Unlike other Sony audio players, it doesn’t require that audio files be transcoded into Sony’s proprietary ATRAC file format