Digital Home Thoughts: Sansa View Pocket Video Player Q&A With SanDisk's Le Tran

DMT: One of the things touted on the marketing page for the Sansa View is the inclusion of pre-loaded content. What was the goal here - to make it an entertainment device right out of the box? And can you delete content off the device itself without needing to dock it with a PC?

TRAN: We wanted to provide users with instant gratification as soon as they open the box. The Sansa View is partially powered, so users will be able to turn it on immediately and with a variety of preloaded videos, photos, and music, they can experience how the various forms of entertainment look, feel, and sound on the Sansa View. At any time, they can delete the content directly from the View.

DMT: Let's get into the hardware itself now. The Sansa View will have a four inch widescreen display, but there's no mention of the resolution. What are the specs for the screen? Is it a 16:9 screen?

TRAN: The screen resolution is WQVGA or 480x272 with a 16:9 aspect ratio.

DMT: The battery is a removable Lithium Polymer - great work on making it removable by the way - but there's no mention of battery life or the mAH rating. What can users expect from the battery with regard to video playback? What about audio playback?

TRAN: Users can expect up to 4 hours of continuous video playback and up to 10 hours of continuous audio playback on the Sansa View. We also offer a regular battery pack and an extended life battery pack for separate purchase. The extended life battery pack offers double the battery life of the regular battery pack, which is the size that comes with the Sansa View in the box. This way users can easily pop in a fresh battery pack, just like they could with a cell phone, when they are not near a power source.

DMT: Buyers always wonder if the device they're going to purchase will work with their other accessories. Does the Sansa View use a standard miniUSB connector for synchronizing? And does it charge over USB? There's no mention of USB 2.0, but I assume it will use 480 mbps USB 2.0?

TRAN: The Sansa View does use 480 mbps USB 2.0. It comes with a 30-pin-to-USB cable connector for synchronizing of content to the computer, and charges the Sansa View at the same time.

DMT: Audio aficionados always wonder about support for things beyond MP3 and WMA - is there support for other audio formats such as AAC, OGG or lossless audio files such as FLAC or WMA Lossless?

TRAN: The focus on the Sansa View has been on video playback, so we support the standard audio formats of MP3 and WMA.

DMT: I see MPEG-4 512 kbps video mentioned on the product page. What video file formats and bit rates are supported? You're using Windows Media Player for synchronizing content, but that software is only as good as the codecs it has installed - and transcoding video content into WMV means a drop in quality and a long wait. What sort of on-device codecs are there to avoid having to transcode video?

TRAN: We designed the Sansa View to support a wide array of video formats at different resolutions, bit rates, and frame rates, including cell phone formats. Though we are still in negotiations around some of the formats we will support, we intend the Sansa View to support the following codecs:

* MPEG4 (SP & ASP) up to 4 mbps
* WMV up to 4 mbps
* DivX up to 4 mbps
* H.263 up to 4 mbps
* H.264 up to 1.2 mbps

Upon successful negotiations, we intend to support up to D1 resolution on all of the above video codecs, including H.264 (baseline). H.264 (MP) is supported up to WQVGA resolution. We will support up to 30 fps on the video codecs.

DMT: There's mention of the SD card slot being used to load up pictures directly from a camera - can you view them directly off the card, and can you chose to copy them over to the player? Is there any sort of bit for bit verification of the copied photos? I can see vacationers using this device to offload their memory cards, but only if they're sure the photos copied over without any errors.

TRAN: You can view pictures directly from an SD card. However, you cannot copy the photos over onto the Sansa View’s internal memory.

DMT: Thanks for taking the time to answer my questions - I look forward to checking out the Sansa View in person.

TRAN: And I look forward to showing you the Sansa View. Thank you for the great questions.







More photos of the Sansa View Pocket Video player are available at SanDisk's site.

Jason Dunn owns and operates Thoughts Media Inc., a company dedicated to creating the best in online communities. He enjoys mobile devices, digital media content creation/editing, and pretty much all technology. He lives in Calgary, Alberta, Canada with his lovely wife, and his sometimes obedient dog. He loves mobile video and continues to quest for the ultimate mobile video device.