Wonder what Sony is up to. It has just announced a product that would please guys who’ve held onto old vinyl records, but it would downright baffle the puritans. The PS-LX300USB is a turntable that converts tracks on a record into an MP3 file. The USB vinyl player plays back the records at 33-1/3 and 45 rpm and uses a belt-based system to cut back on the noise levels. The USB operation means that the device can easily be connected on to a standard Windows PC and the Sound Forge Audio Studio software that’s bundled along would digitize the tracks. Of course, you might choose to stick with the old-fashioned records of yours. Connect the PS-LX300USB to a receiver with phono-input and you’ve got the old-school playback. The USB turntable hits shelves next month for $150 and maybe we’d be able to make more sense of the move then. Why would somebody hold onto a record if he was going to digitize it in the first place? Maybe Sony didn’t think this through at all.
