Customer Reviews

Sony Digital Media Port Cradle for iPod (Black, TDM-iP50)

5 star:		(15)
4 star:		(15)
3 star:		(7)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(10)

 

 

I love this little gadget! I was buying the Sony Sound Bar for my Sonia Bravia TV and happened to see this accessory so I ordered it. I have an I-pod Touch (1st Gen) and got this particular one because it said you could watch your videos on the tv. Well this arrived yesterday (my sound bar is supposed to arrive today) and I hooked it directly to my tv and it worked perfectly! It took about 2 seconds and all I had to do was change the input on my tv to the Digital Media Port and it was good to go. I have a few videos that I purchased from I-Tunes that I had never seen any bigger than the screen of my I-pod but they were perfect on the 46" screen. I can't wait to hook up the sound bar tonight and see how my videos look and sound then!

I finally broke down and bought an iPod... Besides the gadget factor it seemed like a good method of moving music between the Sony STR-DH500 AV Receiver upstairs in the den and the Onkyo TX-SR576 AV Receiver in the living room, rather than hand-fulls of CDs, and, though I've set up my LG BD players for movie file sharing from a server, I've not done this with music with much success. A lot of the information in this review is provided because I have the ability to compare behavior between this Sony TDM-IP50 Dock and the Onkyo DS-A3 dock. Any references I make to "iPod" or "nano" are to the iPod nano 5th generation that I recently acquired, I have no experience with any other Apple product or other manufacture's MP3 players.

The IP50 dock is plastic and has a flat-black appearance and a mild amount of heft (weight) to it. I'll come to that later when I talk about connecting/disconnecting the iPod with the dock. There is one cable pre-attached to the center-back of the dock, it's about 3' in length and the other end has a DMP (Digital Media Port) connector for the Sony Receiver. Offset from that, in the back, is a connection for a provided cable. The dock end of the 6' or so cable looks like a headphone jack, the other end is an RCA jack for composite video.

The dock comes with a set of glossy black plastic inserts, which don't look too bad, one of which is supposed to fit the nano or other phone/music player. The electrical/mechanical connection is in the base, the plastic insert is supposed to act as a supporting cradle. The insert '13' which the document said was for the iPod nano 3rd gen was too snug at the base and I had trouble getting a secure electrical connection and electronic handshake with the receiver. I experimented and settled on insert '9' which the doc shows for the iPod clsassic and iPod 5th gen (video), I'm not sure if they're still talking about the classic or the nano, but it's the one I picked. It's a little roomy around the base, so if you have a case or sleeve around the iPod it may accommodate it well. I did try a clear, hard-plastic case that protruded too far beyond the base of the nano for me to get a good connection with either dock (I may pull out a grinder for the $4 plastic case, but that's a different story).

The iPod sits in the dock canted back about ten or fifteen degrees, which makes for easy viewing and access if you place the base above waist level. The IP50 dock has no back-rest for support of the player so it sits in a rather vulnerable position, with only the base dock connector and gravity physically holding it to the dock. With children around, placing the dock at adult shoulder-level would be highly recommended. To remove the player from the dock, one hand must be placed on the dock and the other hand used to carefully and straightly remove the iPod from the dock. If the dock were a bit heavier, it might be easier to remove the nano one-handed in a safe manner.

If you opt for no video, you can connect the DMP cable to the Sony receiver and you're good to go. That interface provides power as well as getting the audio and providing the electrical information needed for the docked Apple product. You can turn on the receiver, select DMPORT, plug in the iPod and use it to select an album or a playlist or whatever. You can also be docked without video and use the receiver's remote to navigate the iPod menu (point remote at the receiver and watch the nano's display), rather than pushing on the nano's buttons while in the docked position.

If you have video stored on the iPod that you want to display, the DMPORT connection will not do that. If you connect the video cable to a composite input on your AV receiver, TV or, in my case, a second monitor (I have Samsung 'picture-by-a-picture' LCD sets). When you power up the Sony receiver after plugging the DMP cable in, you'll see an orange light on the front of the dock. After plugging in the iPod it remains orange and is charging, you can select DMPORT on the receiver's remote then the receiver will play music output from the iPod (selecting music as described above). If you push the button on the front of the dock, the orange light will turn green and the iPod goes into OSD (On Screen Display) mode. At that point, a rather crude menu will apear, in a (kinda cool) "retro-80's" look referred to by other reviewers and you can use your receiver's remote control to navigate. This is the same menu that you would see on your iPod (music, video, etc.) and under music: artists, albums, songs, genres, etc. From comparison with the Onkyo dock downstairs, I feel comfortable saying that this is from the Apple player, not Sony or Onkyo. Fairly basic information and no album art. Also, toggling between the OSD and the iPod display resets whatever was going on at the time. If you were playing a song while in OSD mode, if you turn off OSD mode the music will cease and the iPod interface will show the main menu. Also, if you do not shut off the iPod and remove it from the dock (or don't remove it straight), you might hang the nano, requiring Apple's version of a "3 finger salute", (hold switch-then-menu-while-center) to restart the nano.

From the docked interface besides, obviously, the stereo sound, it appears that the only information provided by the nano is the artist, the album, the song, length of song and time currently played in song. So the IP50 composite output provides a blue multi-toned screen with this information and a blocky 'slide-bar' indicator at the bottom to show how far into the song you are, as well as the length of the song. It's not that bad, the Onkyo dock uses a series of ">" symbols to show progress in song. But both of these video outputs seem based on the limited amount of information that is provided via the iPod's docking interface. The only way to see the album art is to disable the OSD and use the iPod to navigate (which isn't too bad a choice). The Sony dock also has a nice feature, in the OSD mode, where the display goes into a screen saver mode after a few minutes, while still playing music, pressing any button restores the display. In screen saver, the screen goes black and the words "Digital Media Port" in grey pop around the display very unobtrusively.

Playing video from iPod nano (5th gen): If you have video connected to your dock, you can use the menu selections to go to videos or movies and pick a saved video. To test this, I downloaded an MP4 copy of a video I'd made in 720p HD from youtube to iTunes and hence to the iPod. Playback, as expected, is in basic NTSC composite mode (i.e., like you'd get from basic cable stations). Unless you were using this video to keep up with your latest soaps or low-res podcasts, I would not rely too heavily on this feature, due to the video quality limitations, though it may be the best option vs. watching on the nano's display.

Overall impressions: Pretty Satisfied. I went with the Sony docking product rather than a generic so that I could use the DMPORT feature for the remote, as well as inputting audio (the back of my receiver was getting pretty crowded). Setup is quite straightforward if using no video or if connecting the composite video to a open input on your TV or alternate monitor or whatever. I've not tried routing the composite video through the AV system, as it's the only composite video I have in this AV stack. I'm not real pleased with the sturdiness of the physical mating between the iPod and the dock, but I have similar concerns with the other dock I'm reviewing separately. I would recommend this product to a friend with a compatible Sony receiver (DMPORT capable).

Some internet postings suggest the opposite but, in my recent experience,
even after a suggested firmware/OS upgrade to 4.1, this doesn't seem to work with the iPhone 3GS
or iPhone 4. Hoping that Sony has a fix for this, or I'm returning it ...
Any suggestions?

My family owns a 1st generation iPhone, an iPhone 3G, and an iPod Touch. This docking station works for everything but the iPod touch, yet their advertising says that it does work with the iPod Touch.

I have tried everything to get the iPod to work, but to no avail. I contacted Sony, but there really is little they can do. There are no moving parts, no way to update the firmware, no settings that can be changed, in short no way can see that this could be fixed.

BTW, the problem is that it simply will not recognize the iPod Touch. It detects that something has been attached to the docking station, but in the end it always comes back and says "iPod Not Detected" on the TV screen.

Very disappointed.

-Neil

Got this for music only - hooked it up to my stereo receiver in seconds and it worked great right out of the box. The only caution I have is that Amazon lists this as "for iPod and MP3 Players" - but it is actually for iPod devices ONLY. The instructions on the box and inside the owner's guide make that clear, but for some reason Amazon lists it differently. Just thought you non-iPod users would want to know that. :-)

This is a good solution to work with my home theater, but the user interface could be a little better. It's pretty basic while on screen, and does not play video through HDMI. You have to use a separate video component cable to see anything on the screen.

While you can't use the phone function of the iPhone 3Gs when connected to the TDM-iP50, it plays music just fine. The on-screen interface is clunky, but it works.

Even though the documentation says it works with iPod Classic, I confirmed through Sony support that it does not work with my 6th generation iPod Classic 120GB. Very disappointing. Not cheap. Misleading documentation. I'll be returning the TDM-iP50.

I wasted $100 on this since it will not work with 4th Generation (or newer) Nanos. I'm sure it's a great product if you have the iPod version that is compatible, but mine is not. The description is not detailed enough!

I bought this with a Sony Home Theater system so I could listen to my iPod through my surround sound speakers. It is awesome! I have a 1st gen. iPod Touch and it works great - not sure why it didn't work for that one guy since I have had no problems at all. I get the menu right on my tv screen & can scroll through using my Sony receiver remote (not my tv remote). I've watched videos from my iPod too - pretty amazing to see on my 32" HDTV! I have had extremely good luck with Sony products, so this one is no surprise! And (sorry amazon) I got this for $40 cheaper from newegg. So it might be worth your time to shop around.