Last week at CES Sony finally brought a couple of products embedded with TransferJet technology that are ready for the market and for you to play with. TransferJet is a new Close Proximity Wireless Transfer Technology enabling the high speed transfer of large data files (photos, HD images, etc.) between electronic devices such as mobile phones, digital cameras, digital video cameras, computers and TVs. Using this technology, data can be sent at speeds of 560Mbps. Here is a little recap for some of you who are not familiar with this amazing way of wirelessly transferring content from one device to another.
TransferJet is an extremely simple wireless technology which eliminates the need for complex setup and operation. For example, just touching a TV with a digital camera enables photos to be instantaneously displayed on the TV screen. Alternatively, downloaded music content can be easily enjoyed by touching a mobile phone to a portable audio player. TransferJet can be used as a Universal Interface among a wide variety of consumer electronics devices.
At CES we have only witnessed wireless photo and video transfer between two devices. Currently Sony will be pushing two digital cameras to the market that are TransferJet compatible: DSC-TX7 and DSC-HX5V. To enable those cameras you will need to purchase TransferJet Memory Stick (MSJ-X8G) that we have unearthed earlier from FCC. If you are going to own two of those cameras, you will be able to easily swap images between the two or share it with a digital photo frame. I remember I was able to do so before with my Sony CyberShot DSC-G1 cameras however it utilized Wi-Fi between the two and involved a bit more complex but doable process of sharing and exchanging pictures.
Sony also came up with a TransferJet Station (TJS-1) – an external solution in the form of a USB dock that you can connect to your device (notebook, digital frame, TV, etc) and make it TransferJet ready!
So with this TransferJet Station it is pretty easy to store, view and share content. Viewing content on a PC or HDTV is a snap, eliminating the need for extra cables. Just set your camera on the TransferJet Station and it will display your photos for you.Also saving photos to your PC or hard drive is going to be easier, simply place your camera on the TransferJet station and it will move the files to your PC or hard drive. I was thinking of getting one and pair it with my VAIO Server VGF-HS1. As far as I remember last year Sony showed it off embedded within this circular looking server as well as VAIO TP1.
The last product that we checked out was a VAIO F series notebook with this techy embedded on its left-hand palm rest area (it so reminded me of Felica use on Japanese notebooks). It will work the same way, if you need to quickly transfer pics to your notebook without any USB wires. Again I have done it before with DLNA enabled notebook and my Wi-Fi Sony G1 and G3 cameras, however the speed and simplicity of TransferJet beats Wi-Fi solution.
Sony also showed off the Japan-only Sony Ericsson Cyber-shot S001 KDDI/au phone with built-in Transfer Jet, which you can see more of in the video.
OK, big question…will this technology take off and will the consumers be utilizing it? Definitely time will tell and if the prices come down and more manufacturers jump on this trend, therefore more (let’s call it TJ) products will be out there, the results will be good! Meanwhile check out the video and let us know if you have any questions.
