Sony Dash review – A small internet enabled companion

Pros:

Delivers video, news and music from the Web, good seven inch touch screen display.

Cons:

No real utility, built in speakers are awful, touch screen interface is sluggish, no battery backup.

Bottom Line:

This device is made more for tech enthusiasts. It doesn’t have any real utility and we will recommend it only if you deep pockets

Manufacturer’s specifications:

Sony Dash is a Personal Internet Viewer (as the manufacturer calls it). Supported video formats are WMV 9 (up to MP@HL 1080p), MPEG 4.10/H.264 (up to MP@L4.0 1080p), Microsoft VC-1 (up to AP@L3 720p). Supported audio formats are Windows® Media Audio 9 (up to 384kbit/sec), MPEG-4 AAC-LC (up to 192kbits/sec), MPEG-1 Layers I, II, III/MP3 (up to 320kbits/sec). The device has stereo speakers built in to it. The gadget doesn’t have any internal memory but there is a USB port for putting in thumb drives. This lets you view photos, videos and listen to music.

AC 120 V, 0.6 A,60 Hz are the power requirements. The weight is 1.2 lbs approximately. The device is 7-7/16 inches wide, 5-5/8 inches high, 2-3/8 inches deep approximately. There is also built in accelerometer and ambient light sensor. One big feature here is alarm clock with battery back up. Input and output ports include 3.5 mm headphone jack, DC-In : 9.5 V, 1.5 A, 14.25 W, USB 2.0 port. The screen is seven inches big (measured diagonally) and has a resolution of 800×480 pixels. The display has a capacitive touch screen interface.

Design:

When switched off, the Sony Dash looks more like some kind of doorstop. Just put in the power plug, the device will jump to life and you will be amazed at the big touch screen.

Inside Dope:

We first got to see the Sony Dash at CES and we thought it was some kind of tablet computer made to rival to iPad. But it turns out that the device is a modified version of Chumby. But there are some bells and whistles, Sony’s product comes with Bravia Internet Video platform with support for services like Slacke, Pandora and Netflix. The cost of this device is $200 and it doesn’t feel too high considering all the features that it has to offer. Apart from all this, there is also an alarm clock built in to the device. The product has a seven inch capacitive touch screen display along with stereo speakers on the front. Apart from this, there are volume control buttons on the top and menu/snooze button on the side. On the bottom, you have the recessed power connector. The case is shaped like a wedge and it feels good to hold the device in the hand owing to the rubber exterior.

Sony Dash doesn’t come with a battery and you will have to keep it plugged in the wall outlet all the time. Sony reps told me that there will be a battery in next installment but we there should have been a battery in the first place. The device runs on 500 MHz processor along with 256 MB RAM. The Chumby One, as compared to this, had a 454 MHz processor and 64 MB RAM. The extra power is used for video playback support and to provide power to the 800×480 pixel screen. However, the processor doesn’t seem to be fast enough at times, the OS lagged occasionally.

The Sony Dash’s display is quite bright and we loved the excellent horizontal viewing angles. Vertical viewing angles are not that good but still you can have about three people watching this device at the same time. The device also has a built in accelerometer and the orientation is automatically changed from portrait to landscape mode when you tilt the device. The display is really cool but we wish we could say the same about the speakers. They sound really awful, the sound quality is tinny. Speakers will also give distorted sound if you play bass heavy music and push the volume all the way up.

The Sony Dash runs on Linux and a lot of widgets are based on the Chumby OS interface. You can also see all this on $149 Chumby Classic and $119 Chumby One. Sony has done a lot of tweaking here, and it is mostly to exploit the bigger display but underneath all this, there is the same Chumby Engine. Sony has renamed to Chumby Widgets to Dash Apps and they are tiny Flash modules which pull up the data from a cloud. If you have used Chumby before, then all these widgets will be familiar to you. Apart from all this Chumby stuff, you also have the aforementioned Bravia Internet Video streaming media layer which gives you access to YouTube, Amazon Video on Demand, Slacker, Pandora, and Netflix. The package looks like this is an expensive alarm clock capable of running widgets in background.

When you boot in to the Sony Dash for the first time, you will need to connect to the Wi-Fi network and download any relevant software. The device has two separate Dash home screens. One is “Dashboard” theme which lists the widget collection in horizontal lists which are semi flickable. The other interface I ‘App View’ which enlarges the Chumby box and shows only the weather, time, and selector for app category. For instance, if you tap on ‘Music’ category, you get a list which contains relevant apps like Pandora and Slicker. We played a lot with these themes but they are not for the impatient as the transition takes a while. We thought the App View was the best here but you might think other wise. Our only problem with the Dashboard view was that we accidentally launched the apps when all we wanted to do was flick through them.

Just like the Chumby, you have to set up an online account on the Sony Dash. But you will have to use a computer for this since the device doesn’t have a browser. The online account is needed for managing and creating widget channels. This is like a collection of widgets that are displayed like a slideshow. You can also set up and edit the channels from the gadget itself. This is really good and you don’t need to use your computer.