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sony-zs-s4ip-boombox

 The boombox seems to making a consistent comeback these days with the MP3 boombox and the surprise hit, the spirit of st. Louis boombox doing quite well for themselves this year and SONY has jumped in on the game with the release of its SONY ZS-S4iP iPhone Boombox.

Having a look at it, the SONY ZS-S4iP iPhone Boombox looks like an old -school cassette player and it even has an eject button that opens a compartment so you can insert your iPhone or iPod Touch just like a cassette.

Once that novelty wears off however the SONY ZS-S4iP iPhone Boombox is just a regular boombox which also allows MP3 CD playback. Look out for it sometime this year if you really want one and expect to hand over about $100 of your cash…

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 I’ve been getting into camcorders ever since we reviewed the Canon VIXIA HF100 and when the chance to review the Sony DCR-DVD108 DVD HandyCam came along we thought that we may as well (enthusiastic, aren’t we?).

As always we like to start our reviews with negatives and the stuff that SONY don’t want you to know about the DCR-DVD108. For a camcorder noon, the HandyCam can be surprisingly hard to use. Getting your video onto a PC for further editing can be somewhat tricky.

The quality of still images on the Sony DCR-DVD108 DVD Handycam Camcorder is laughable. In today’s age of 5 mega-pixel cellphones and mobiles, a camcorder that cannot even muster up a 1 mega-pixel still image is a definite disappointment.

Motion capturing is also very poor and if you move much (read ‘at all’) during recording, the DCR-DVD108 HandyCam gives you a quickly deteriorating picture. Not good.

I know I said we would start with the negatives and move onto the positives in this review but in truth, the positives are few and far in-between. Admittedly on the plus side you have a cheaper than average camcorder so if your on a budget then this is a winner.

If you’re also not too fussed about getting your recordings onto a PC or Mac for editing and just want to shot and show either directly on the camcorder or via a television than you’re good to go also. The biggest plus point about the Sony DCR-DVD108 DVD Handycam Camcorder is the 40x zoom so you can get real up close and personal.

In all, the Sony DCR-DVD108 DVD HandyCam is decent but not great and for a camera with a more stable zoom and greater image quality you should check out the Kodak KZi6 for a more friendly camcorder.

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10 mega-pixels have been seen before but SONY’s new Cyber-shot DSC-T500 pumps up the goodness by adding full-screen, high definition, 720p movie recording at 30 frames per second.

As Cyber-Shot’s go, the DSC-T500 packs the pre-requisite Carl Zeiss Vario-Tessar 5x Optical zoom, MPEG4 AVC/H.264 codec movie function and up to ISO3200.

Digital cameras are stepping up their game all over the shop and with the likes of the PowerShot G9, and even girly (manufacturer’s description not mine) Canon E1 being packed to the brim with functions, even with touch-screen controls, the SONY DSC-T500 is just keeping up with the competition rather than smashing them out of the park…

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Have to give props to the design heads at SONY for this new autonomous DVD recorder. The SONY VDR-MC10 takes HD video recorded on your HandyCam or camcorder and records it onto DVD, without the need of a PC.

What makes it stand out from the rest is that the SONY VDR-MC10 is tailor made for the 1080i Sony HandyCam (well, any HandyCam in fact) and with its inbuilt HDMI out, you can plug it into your television set and watch all your HandyCam videos on the big screen easily.

The SONY VDR-MC10 looks pretty intuitive and is designed with a 2.7 inch LCD allowing you to easily set your options and control the device. No word as yet on price or availability.

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Hot on the heels of the recently introduced Nikon s60 Digital Camera, SONY have just announced their two new digital camera offerings, the SONY DSC-T700 and SONY DSC-T77 Cyber-Shot digital cameras. This pair of point-and-shoot digicams both come equipped with Carl Zeiss lenses (he gets everywhere!) and 10 megapixel sensors.

The SONY DSC-T77 is SONY’s slimmest Cyber-Shot digital camera model to date, sliding under the door gaps at a shade under 5/8 of an inch. It also comes with a generous 3-inch touch-screen and has a range of features including up to 3,200 ISO and in-camera image management.

Its companion model, the SONY Cyber-Shot DSC-T700, has all of the above plus an addition 4GB of built in storage and a 3.5-inch touch screen (we all know at GadgetHeat that all those half inches add up ^^).

The campaign tag-line of having a ‘photo album in your pocket’ may be a tad cheesy but the Cyber-Shot T700 does come with a Picture Motion Browser application allowing you to “downsize images from full-resolution to VGA and export them back to the camera’s internal photo album.”

Look for the SONY DSC-T700 Cyber-Shot to sting you for $400 when released in September and the SONY DSC-T77 digital camera to be in your pocket for about $300 when released around the same time.

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These days GPS is being added to everything leaving stand-alone GPS units such as the 3D Navman and the Garmin Nuvi having to get cleverer and cleverer in order to stand out from the pack. SONY has decided to compound their misery even further by releasing the GPS add-on for the PSP, and has now hinted that GPS games for the PSP may soon be on their way as well.
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GadgetHeat has no idea how a GPS game would work but it does sound pretty cool and according to John Koller over at SONY, developers are thinking much more about how they can integrate GPS into their games for the PSP.
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All you Final Fantasy and RTS fans will never get lost on those huge maps again once GPS is fully integrated into PSP games. The rest of us, who just want a cool GPS, will be happy with the add-on that allows us to turn our PSP into a fully functioning GPS that can play games. Sweet.

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SONY have unveiled their latest round of Bluetooth headsets, the new SONY DR-BT14Q. The headset comes in four dashing colors, Pink, Black, White and Silver (the manly men at GadgetHeat are quite fond of the pink ones ahem).
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The DR-BT14Q comes with built in lithium batteries (usable for 12 hours play back time) and as with all new Bluetooth headsets it supports the Bluetooth 2.0 protocol, covers a frequency range of 16Hz-24,000Hz and also supports A2DP/AVRCP/HFP/HSP profiles.

No word yet on price but going by the rest of the SONY DRBT series you can expect the DR-BT140Q to retail from anywhere between $25 and $50.

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We announced a few weeks back that Napster had got back into the legal MP3 downloads game big time with the launch of the worlds biggest MP3 store (and without any copy or DRM protection to boot). Well it seems like they aren’t just stopping there, they have teamed up with SONY and more specifically the SONY NWZA-820 series, to bring mp3 users some free tracks.

Those who buy any one of the three players within the SONY NWZA-820 series will now get a FREE 14 day trial of ‘Napster to Go‘. The sad thing is that this is only for UK consumers, everybody else is straight outta luck. Customers can use the service on upto three different PC’s and can even keep upto 5 tracks after the trial period is over, DRM free for use on the SONY NWZA-820 series.

We have an indepth review of the SONY NWZA-820 series, have a gander and see if it’s up your street. The NWZA-820 series comes in 4GB, 8GB and 19GB flavours and it’s one of the best MP3 Players GadgetHeat has seen this year.

The good times for SONY NWZA-820 owners doesn’t end there though. SONY has also formed a partnership with media company 7 Digital in order to allow vouchers for free downloads to be packaged with the NWZA820 sold through Argos shops in the UK. Looks like SONY really wants to sell some MP3 players this quarter…

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Surround sound is old hat- Sony have officially conformed the release date (20th June) of their non directional speaker, the Sountina NSA-PF1. This thing looks like a ready to go light-sabre but is in fact a self-contained speaker system ready to fill your room with bass line no matter where you put it.

The Sountina NSA PF1 (catchy name) is a six foot tall omni-directional speaker mainly built from organic glass with a vibration range of 50 to 20,000Hz. The tweeter is also made of organic glass unlike the 13cm - Sub Woofer and the 7cm Mid (If you have small children who like to touch stuff then I’m guessing that the Sountina was not built with you in mind).

The standard range of digital and analogue inputs are included including RCA, digital coax and optical TOS. You can also input up to 24bit/96kHz stereo linear PCM. As an added sweetener for those of us who like shiny-shiny gadgets the Sountina NSA PF1 comes with a super slick aluminium remote control which is customisable to your environment via the colour LCD’s and comes in black or silver.

If you have $10,200 burning a hole in your pocket and don’t mind picking up your goods from Japan give SONY a call and they’ll hook you up.

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As far gadget innovation goes, Apple are seen as ahead of the pack and not afraid to be different when it comes to design. Well SONY have decided to jump on the bandwagon and bring out the SONY Rolly to US markets.

Already available in out territories worldwide, the SONY Rolly is a portable MP3/ Music player. It is definitely different to look at and when you see it moving, you can see that SONY really wanted to show their moves on the dance floor.

This is billed as a portable ‘music entertainment player’ by SONY in other words, a multi-format MP3 player. This is all set to be a cult classic with SONY Rolly forums discussing how best to program your Rolly to do the moves you want and showcasing choreography.

Each Rolly unit comes preloaded with three songs and combined coreography for each song so that when played, the Rolly’s arms and shoulders start moving to the beat as it gets down. It also gets funky colour wise with upto 700 colour combinations as the music plays.

From the Press release:

Made for producing superb audio quality, Rolly features 180-degree,
horizontally opposed stereo speakers. As a result, listeners can enjoy high
quality sound from nearly anywhere in the room.

    Sound reverberates from the surface the device is placed on, whether on
a desk or on the floor. With a digital amp for high sound quality and
speakers with neodymium magnets, powerful audio performance is delivered
from the compact unit.

    Rolly Brings Music to Life

    With built-in robotic technologies, the device is designed to move its
small arms, shoulders and wheels-six moving parts-to the beat of the music.
With about 700 colors in its repertoire, lighting adds to the impact of the
motion.

The SONY Rolly Retails for about $400