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[Vamps]

Just heard that Sony are to stop making pc's and laptops as the Vaio range is losing them money, they are going to concentrate on Tablets etc

I always thought of the Vaio range was made for yuppie types and pretentious wannabees   

At this point I would like to confess to having once bought a Vaio laptop   That truly was a really cathartic experience

I have never felt so relieved even taking into account admitting to being an ageing drug taking alcofrolic

I wonder what if anything they will dump next, The mini disc lost official support recently if I remember correctly

An old colleague and I mean old as in he was the cabin boy on Noah's Ark still uses a minidisc in his car, they will no doubt have to prise it from his corpse when he decides to shuffle off this mortal coil

I still mourn the loss of the cassette player and the 8 track.

My Jeep, being superior to some lesser vehicles, has facility to play cassette's, CD and radio........

[pscocoa]

I suppose they will drop the cameras soon as well. A shame because the fittings are good for my old SLR Konica Minolta fit lenses. (Sony took over the Konica camera division)

[Ever Ready]

They used to be ahead of the competition with things like Trinitron monitors, Bravia TV's and the ubiquitous Walkman but always in my opinion tried to control the public and the public as we all know are a fickle bunch

[TheBoy]

They used to be ahead of the competition with things like Trinitron monitors, Bravia TV's and the ubiquitous Walkman but always in my opinion tried to control the public and the public as we all know are a fickle bunch

I'd agree with most of that, except Bravia, as they were no better than anything else, and suffered poor reliability (they were already suffering to meet financial targets, even then).

For me, an ex-Sony loyal customer, around the late 90s/early 00s, they lost their way in consumer electronics, and followed the dangerous corporate short term profit over and above long term health for the company, and produces a whole range of poorly designed junk sold at the (then) premium Sony prices, and lost a lot of loyal followers, me included, in the process.

[Ever Ready]

One of my oldest friends is a still a Sony fan boy, he has to have all his stuff matching and will chop and change if they released something newer.

When dvd's came out and region locking was new, he defended his Sony's refusal to change region codes via hacks etc as what you get with a premier product.

Original Playstations with their black cd's were another one, stopped pirated discs in their tracks, yeah right   I don't think I knew anybody that had not had theirs chipped.

They obviously saw propriety hardware as the way forward but in my opinion it will be the rock that they perish on.

Their fans like to think that they alone invented the cd   I think Philips may have something to say about that.

[Kevin Wood]

My problem with Sony stuff is that, of late, they seem to try to lock-in consumers to using their (overpriced) proprietary technology and their "way of doing things" instead of adopting industry standards. I "inherited" a nasty Vaio laptop years ago and it would have been very handy to have an SD card slot but no, it had some Sony-only memory stick format so it may as well not have existed.

Ditto with their cameras at the time, of course, so yes, if you worshipped the ground they walked on and bought Sony everything it was great, but it was either that or not touch anything Sony. I chose the latter.

Then they started shipping audio CDs which tried to root your machine and install malware to stop you trying to rip them, and the true disdain with which they view their customers started to come to the surface.

Then there was the debacle of the Playstation online gaming network going tits up on e regular basis and not exactly treating subscribers' details with due diligence when it did actually work..

When you consider what a giant they were in the "Walkman era", not only in consumer electronics, but broadcast kit as well, it's rather sad, but entirely of their own making IMHO.

Then again, did we expect to be saying the same about Nokia, Motorola, Blackberry, etc? Microsoft could well be next, as they appear to be pulling Windows 7 from sale while Windows 8 is regarded as the "new Vista" by most. Again, technology that tries to enforce an unwanted new direction on customers who want a commodity product that has no frills and "just works".

[Marks DTM Calib]

The shame is that their home audio kit is actualy pretty good!

[tunnie]

http://www.engadget.com/2014/02/05/steve-jobs-sony-vaio-mac-os-x/?ncid=rss_truncated&a_dgi=gravity

 

[2boxerdogs]

They used to be ahead of the competition with things like Trinitron monitors, Bravia TV's and the ubiquitous Walkman but always in my opinion tried to control the public and the public as we all know are a fickle bunch

I'd agree with most of that, except Bravia, as they were no better than anything else, and suffered poor reliability (they were already suffering to meet financial targets, even then).

For me, an ex-Sony loyal customer, around the late 90s/early 00s, they lost their way in consumer electronics, and followed the dangerous corporate short term profit over and above long term health for the company, and produces a whole range of poorly designed junk sold at the (then) premium Sony prices, and lost a lot of loyal followers, me included, in the process.

   

Always had Sony Bravia tv's for around 15 years, never had any problems whatsoever. I change them every 5 years my Grandson has the 1st one I purchased & my daughter the 2nd, my present one is 2 years old .My brother in law now retired from the computer business he ran, always said after 5 years with any electrical equipment that you had your monies worth nothing is worth repairing,so trade up & get the new technology , my latest TV  cost a third of what I paid for my 1st one & is a 42 inch the first was a 32 inch.

[Ever Ready]

My problem with Sony stuff is that, of late, they seem to try to lock-in consumers to using their (overpriced) proprietary technology and their "way of doing things" instead of adopting industry standards. I "inherited" a nasty Vaio laptop years ago and it would have been very handy to have an SD card slot but no, it had some Sony-only memory stick format so it may as well not have existed.

Ditto with their cameras at the time, of course, so yes, if you worshipped the ground they walked on and bought Sony everything it was great, but it was either that or not touch anything Sony. I chose the latter.

Then they started shipping audio CDs which tried to root your machine and install malware to stop you trying to rip them, and the true disdain with which they view their customers started to come to the surface.

Then there was the debacle of the Playstation online gaming network going tits up on e regular basis and not exactly treating subscribers' details with due diligence when it did actually work..

When you consider what a giant they were in the "Walkman era", not only in consumer electronics, but broadcast kit as well, it's rather sad, but entirely of their own making IMHO.

Then again, did we expect to be saying the same about Nokia, Motorola, Blackberry, etc? Microsoft could well be next, as they appear to be pulling Windows 7 from sale while Windows 8 is regarded as the "new Vista" by most. Again, technology that tries to enforce an unwanted new direction on customers who want a commodity product that has no frills and "just works".

Hear Hear  The memory stick was called Magic Gate

[Kevin Wood]

Hear Hear  The memory stick was called Magic Gate

That's the one.  The real PITA is that it always appeared in explorer regardless of whether there was an (overpriced) stick in it, so I'd always plug in a USB stick and then click on the wrong drive.

Still, that machine is dead and buried now, and I won't have to put up with another.

[Ever Ready]

I think in all the time I have been using pc's, I have used one of those sticks. I threw out three old Vaio laptops on Monday, well past their best and slow as a week in the jail

[Taxi_Driver]

The shame is that their home audio kit is actualy pretty good!

I still have a Sony home surround sound system thats probably 15years old now....the main amp is double the height of an old dvd/vcr player. The back of it is completely covered on different inputs...including 4 fibre optic inputs, of which im using all of them. It boasts 125W RMS /channel which is pretty good i reckon.....unfortunately living in a terraced house the volume never goes over 1/4 way and the base box is turned down low.....gives excellent sound....imo and wont change it unless it goes bang 

[TheBoy]

The shame is that their home audio kit is actualy pretty good!

My surround amp is pretty good, but it was old technology even when I bought it 10yrs or more ago, using s-video only for video passthrough, so I guess they were repackaging old kit and giving it a new lease of life once the DVD thing kicked in. It meeted my needs, and still does.

The speakers they packaged with it, though, are very, very poor.

[05omegav6]

http://www.engadget.com/2014/02/05/steve-jobs-sony-vaio-mac-os-x/?ncid=rss_truncated&a_dgi=gravity

 

Hardly a surprise... just shows the arrogance of Crapple expecting the world to adjust in order to make its little white boxes compatible