Sony - What were you thinking?

Oh boy how bad!!

Think stumbling along, no thinking required. Sony's entire audio business has been in the financial and design red for years, part of which explains their failed r&d efforts as evidenced in the new high res line. I've been a great fan of Sony, mostly owning many of their cd players 'oldies' including their first cd player, which still works. Recently word has come that Sony will exit the laptop PC business. How they lost their way makes for a great business school study. Can you survive on a one product business, like the PlayStation? Maybe, I have one and will be getting the new one soon. I'll look to others, mostly the better Chinese firms for product leadership.

I personally love mine!!

Dweller, you clearly do not understand what the HAP-Z1ES is intended to do. It's a dedicated networked hard drive digital player. In order for it to operate you need a separate computer for sourcing audio files and the Sony supplied software for transferring those files to the HAP-Z1ES. The transfer can be done either via WiFi or ethernet. The benefit of this approach is that you do not have to have the computer in the same room with your audio system, you're not relying upon your WiFi network to play back music and you don't have to setup or maintain a network drive.

If you want to digitize your vinyl you could use something like the PS Audio NuWave, your computer and appropriate record/edit software. You could then transfer the audio file to the HAP-Z1ES.

Do you criticize DAC's for not having analog inputs? Not having any digital outputs -- that's a legitimate criticism!