Pono player is a portable audio device that can play any audio format from mp3 to high res 192kHz/24bit. The Pono system will also include a website (PonoMusic) where you can download albums in high res FLAC files.
Both should be available by October 2014.

Pono Music web page : [www.ponomusic.com]
Pono Music Facebook page : [www.facebook.com]
Pono Music kickstarter page : [www.kickstarter.com]

Interview with Neil Young about Pono Music : [www.rollingstone.com]

The Pono player :



Interviews with Neil Young about Pono Player and Pono Music










Testing the Pono Player :







Edited 15 time(s). Last edit at 2014-04-24 16:29 by kowalski.

It may be great. I may get one. However you can get already get CD quality on an ipod and yet most of the time I rip MP3s at 320 and occasionaly apple lossless and I'm usually happy with the results so much will depend on cost.

I thought it said Porno at first.

Problem 1 with lossless files and portable players is the capacity of the player.
Problem 2 is the digital analog converter

C

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Braincapers
It may be great. I may get one. However you can get already get CD quality on an ipod and yet most of the time I rip MP3s at 320 and occasionaly apple lossless and I'm usually happy with the results so much will depend on cost.

The difference with current players capable of playing CD quality files is the Pono player can play files at a much higher bitrate - up to 9216 kbps.
This kind of high res files are usually available on DVD audio or Blu-ray. Or can be bought on sites such HDTracks.

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schillid
I thought it said Porno at first.

I thought it said Poncho at first.
Psychedelic Pill

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shortfatfanny

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schillid
I thought it said Porno at first.

I thought it said Poncho at first.
Psychedelic Pill

I thought it said Pony. Although I hope it isn't.

As far as capacity. I believe it is cloud based, no storage on the player. Neil discusses this in his new book quite extensively.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2012-10-11 19:45 by jabhead.

Pono is an hawaiian word and it means something like uprightness or proper, accurate.

[www.wehewehe.org]

Posted today on Facebook, some news about the Pono from Neil Young.

-------------------

To everyone who loves music –

I’m very happy to bring you some good news. All of us at Team PONO have been focused on getting everything right for our early 2014 launch of Pono.

The simplest way to describe what we’ve accomplished is that we’ve liberated the music of the artist from the digital file and restored it to its original artistic quality - as it was in the studio. So it has primal power.

Hearing PONO for the first time is like that first blast of daylight when you leave a movie theater on a sun-filled day. It takes you a second to adjust. Then you enter a bright reality, of wonderfully rendered detail.

This music moves you. So you can feel. That’s why so many musicians are behind PonoMusic – this is important work that honors their art. This is the way they wanted you to hear their music.

PONO starts at the source: artist-approved studio masters we’ve been given special access to. Then we work with our brilliant partners at Meridian to unlock the richness of the artist’s music to you. There is nothing like hearing this music - and we are working hard to make that experience available to all music lovers, soon.

Our mission is also to make PONO just as accessible as any music you buy and listen to today. So we’ll be launching both the PONO portable player – an updated version of the one I showed on David Letterman’s program – and an online library, with all your favorite music available in PonoMusic quality. Everything you need to feel music anew.

Stay tuned for more updates. And be sure to follow us on Facebook and Twitter for the latest information. We hope you’ll try PONO when it comes your way, and that it brings you the soul of music.

Yours, for PonoMusic –
Neil Young


------------------------------------

OK, I'll buy one. I'm a sucker for this sort of thing.

Sounds expensive! Speaking of bluray audio I need to check into the release date of the Japanese bluray dvd of Exile On Mauinstreet that I ordered last month...totally forgot about it!(I'm OLD!)

Here two another HD 192kHz/24bit portable Player:


The Astell&Kern 120:



And the FIIO X3:




The Astell&Kern 120 plays also SACD-DSD-files. On a PC or Mac it's possible to play DSD-files with JRiver, Foobar2000, Audirvana+ or Puremusic. You can also transfer your Vinyl-collection to DSD by yourself with the KORG MR2.


Online libraries for HD music so far: HDtracks, Linn Records, Qobuz, Highresaudio, 2L, Blue Coast Records, Channel Classics Records, e-Onkyo (japanese).



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 2013-09-04 11:15 by Irix.

Twelve months from now : Pono is a reasonable success, Apple suddenly discovers there's a market for HD files and they miraculously proclaim 24/192 stuff is what they wanna sell... ><

Been waiting for this. Glad its finally coming together.

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kowalski
Pono is an hawaiian word and it means something like uprightness or proper, accurate.

[www.wehewehe.org]

It's also not far from Phono.

...or Porno



ROCKMAN

This is all just a lot of space-age mumbo jumbo.





Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 2013-09-04 15:13 by tatters.

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Silver Dagger

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kowalski
Pono is an hawaiian word and it means something like uprightness or proper, accurate.

[www.wehewehe.org]

It's also not far from Phono.

Bono?

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jabhead
Neil discusses this in his new book quite extensively.

Does he ever! Between that and the LincVolt, he kept coming back over and over to these recurring infomercials...



Still, an interesting read.

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Braincapers

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shortfatfanny

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schillid
I thought it said Porno at first.

I thought it said Poncho at first.
Psychedelic Pill

I thought it said Pony. Although I hope it isn't.

hmmm, well I dig a pony.

I thought it said Poco, which is a nickname for a bedroom community near Vancouver.

Apparently Pono music player will be launched on March 11 : [www.noise11.com]

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Neil Young will launch Pono, his new music player, at the SXSW music conference in Austin, Texas on Tuesday, March 11 at 5:00pm.

SXSW has officially announced Young as a keynote speaker for the conference although they fall short of announcing a Neil Young showcase to unveil his new album ‘A Letter Home’.

Pono is a high-quality music player aiming at the opposite end of the market to those content with poor quality MP3 players such as the iPod.

According to SXSW, “Neil Young has long been an advocate for studio-quality music in the digital age, and laments the relatively inferior sound quality offered by the current services. Pono, built from the ground-up, is his attempt to remedy this problem, and deliver to the listener the exact, full sounds the artist intends. Young – a Grammy-Award Winner and Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Inductee – will certainly go into more detail on Pono and deliver choice lessons from his legendary and storied career at SXSW”.

Running out of reasons not to go to SXSW this year . . .

The price of the device will make or break Neil's idea. If it's priced as high as the AstellnKern line I'm afraid it'll flop.

Porno??????????????

The Australian ------- 25 Jan 2014



ROCKMAN



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2014-01-24 23:38 by Rockman.

I think it is a great concept as playback quality has gone down hill with the intro of MP3's. I just wonder if there are enough people who care to adopt this player as most music fans these days seem satisfied with crappy low bit rate MP3 files.

For some reason I got the impression there'd be Neil Young nudity in this thread.

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oldschool
as most music fans these days seem satisfied with crappy low bit rate MP3 files.

Yeah human beings get used to mediocrity very easily. Mp3 junk food pix mae with a mobile phone that-you-need-to-show-to-everrrryone...

Hopefully this takes off.