CES NEWS: Fun on the run with Rolly and Mylo

Any guesses?

In fact this is the new Rolly from Sony, the company's "new way to listen to and enjoy music". This personal player, hand-sized and including speakers, 2GB of internal memory and Bluetooth is weird enough - and that's before you discover it can also dance to its own beat.

Seen here in a rather more sensible picture, Rolly is described by Steve Haber, president of the company's US Digital Imaging and Audio Division, as "the latest example of Sony's expertise in entertainment and technology. This isn't just another gadget; the Rolly is a sophisticated piece of entertainment technology.”

It has horizontally opposed speakers behind its end-caps, and these use neodymium magnets and are driven by a digital amplifier to deliver what the company claims is a powerful sound.

Meanwhile built-in robotics technology allows the Rolly to move iss arms shoulders and wheels to the beat of the music, while onboard lighting offers up to 700 colours. Software is provided to choreograph the Rolly's routines using a PC via a USB link.

Shaking the unit switches it into shuffle play mode, it having the ability to store over 500 songs stored in 128kbps MP3 format, and it can also stream music via Bluetooth from phones or PCs. The battery life is claimed as up to five hours of music along, or four hours of music and movement.

And this is Mylo, Sony's new pocket commiunicator. It combines the functions of a PC and a digital media player, and can be used anywhere there's a wireless hotspot.

In fact, buyers in the States will get free access to Wayport hotspots, including over 9000 in Macdonald's outlets, until the end of 2010.

The Com-2 mylo device has a QWERTY keyboard, touchscreen control via its 3.5in display, a 1.3 megapixel camera and 1GB of internal memory, plus a MemoryStick card slot to add extra memory.

It also works with messenger services such as those from AOL and Google, and can make Skype calls, as well as storing and playing digital video and music files. A set of dedicated software 'widgets' allow it to search the web, and keep up to darte with services such as YouTube and Facebook.

Technorati Tags: MP3, Skype, Sony, video phone

Andrew has written about audio and video products for the past 20+ years, and been a consumer journalist for more than 30 years, starting his career on camera magazines. Andrew has contributed to titles including What Hi-Fi?, GramophoneJazzwise and Hi-Fi CriticHi-Fi News & Record Review and Hi-Fi Choice. I’ve also written for a number of non-specialist and overseas magazines.