So I know I’ve been negligent in posting for some time. February and March were incredibly busy and full of significant dates (My 1 year anniversary with Summer, 30th birthday, etc… more on those soon) plus a bunch of travel preparation landmarks (Sold my car :(, Purchased my Eurail pass, more on these too in upcoming posts) but today I’m going to rant about Sony.
I’ve purchased a great many devices from Sony over the years and have been let down many times. Today was the final straw. Sony makes excellent electronics, but has horrible software and worse support. Here is a list of some of the problems I’ve had with their stuff…
Sony PS2 – about 6 months after purchase the console stopped reading new games or DVDs. Only after some serious VooDoo (opening and closing the tray repeatedly at different angles) would they occasionally play.
Sony PSP – excellent game platform, again, horrible software and support.
Sony Minidisc Recorder – This is the industry standard for high quality mobile audio recording. However, due to their misguided interpretation of DRM, you could not move the audio you recorded off the device in a digital format even though it was stored in one. This caused you to run a cable to your audio-in on the laptop and record it in real time. This is an incredibly painful process and can lead to a loss of quality. They have yet to make any changes to their software for this despite the user community’s loud protests.
And finally the Sony IC Recorder (ICD-SX46) – I’ve really enjoyed this product as a voice recorder. It records a very high quality signal and lasts a very long time on the two AAA batteries. Today I decided to get my recordings off of it to make some space for an upcoming project and needed to load the software on my current laptop. Off I went to Sony’s support site in search of their proprietary software (which was amazingly poor in earlier versions but allowed transfer of the recordings in digital format) and I couldn’t find it. Just the updates, not the main product. I chatted with support who told me to call the Accessory Sales department. According to her they don’t post original software since it was shipped with the product, just the updates. The Accessory Sales department asked me for a credit card so that I might be billed $28 for a new copy. I asked for the customer service number, same story.
I wouldn’t pay $28 for the software in the first place based on it’s limited performance, let alone pay for something every other electronics company provides for free to its registered customers so that they can use the products they’ve purchased.
So, Sony, I’m done with you. I’ll recommend to anyone that will listen, not to buy your products. You need to mend your ways, at least in the realm of software and support.
Thankfully, someone out on the web had the presence of mind to back up their copy of Digital Voice Recorder 2 on an openly accessible site, you can find it here (Note: This only works with Sony Voice recorder products and only allows you to manipulate files in it’s proprietary format, no bonus functionality here, you must actually own a Sony product for it to be of any use.)
Anyway, sorry for the rant, more positive posts to come.