Rating: 
Summary: The worst of them all
Review: Do not ever buy one of these. After loading 400 CDs, naming or rather seminaming them since you only have 20 characters in a very akward and difficult way, and playing maybe 10 times, the machine stuck and could not move again. It is a faulty and cheap design which not only does not work right, does not show the complete names of the CDs but also any time you have to look for a CD it moves so the motor should not last. Well, anyway, before it got stuck. It is a shame that Sony should sell something like that.
Rating: 
Summary: Losing the memory
Review: First of all I love this system, and glad I bought it. The reason I only give 4 stars is because that would mean it is perfect and matches everyone of my needs. Which nothing does unless it was designed specifically for me. But they did a good job.If you plan on changing the CD's in and out of this system a lot than this isn't the system for you. I have over 400 CD's and I put all of them in there, (up to 400 that is). Yes you can give each Disc a Artist Name and a Disc Title. These names correspond to the slot on the machine NOT the disc. So if you put a new disc in the slot it will be called whatever name you gave the slot. Unless the CD has text display on it. Than it will automatically over write what you typed in and you will have to go back and re-due it for the old disc, if you decide to replace it. This makes it hard if you want to shift discs around or alphabetize them. You CAN'T shift names down a slot. You will have to rename every slot. So once a disc is in it is better to leave it were it is. Use the Keyboard for entering the names. It is much faster than using the unit's jog wheel or remote. Once you have it all set up. You have 3 program settings you can set up. A program can contain up to 32 "steps", One step may contain a track or a whole disc. I believe program steps can overlap but I am not sure. I have never used the program yet. There is one Hit List. You can store 32 tracks in the Hit List. Your 32 favorite songs. I have yet to use this feature also. Now you have 8 Groups. You can assign as many discs as you want to a group. But each disc can be put into only one group. So you can have a Jazz, Rock or Punk group. You can play continuously through the group. Shuffle all the discs in a group or cont/shuffle only one disc of the group. Shuffle does not repeat a song until all songs of the group are played. Unless you go out of shuffle mode. or something like that. Now you also classified your discs according to artists, You can have 200 artists. You can continuously/shuffle play through all the discs of an artist or through one disc of that artist. So if you must have a discs in multiple groups. You can make a program of discs up to 32. And have a Group of discs. Or you could possible use Artist. But only one artist per slot. I don't have labels corresponding to a slot. I use artist mode to find the artist I want to play and then select the CD title I want to play. I don't really care what slot it is in. It does take about 15-30 seconds to switch songs in all disc shuffle mode. But be realistic. If your playing disc 1 and the next disc to play is 250, it has to put the disc back into the slot, turn the carousel all the way to the other side, get the disc and que it up. These are CD's not mp3's. It doesn't display the Artist of the Disc your currently playing, just the Disc Title. Unless it is a CD-Text CD. If you put a disc in backwards, it doesn't work. I had it lock up in shuffle mode once. I hit stop, had to look through all of the cd's and find the one that was in backwards. This is not Sony's fault, This is my stupid fault. Make sure you put the disc in right. Don't transfer the unit with CD's in it. I did, They fell out of there slots and into the corners of the machine. I had to pull out most of the cd's to get at the ones in the corner and re-insert them. Another my stupid fault. I hope this helped.
Rating:
Summary: What they don't tell you
Review: First of all I love this system, and glad I bought it. The reason I only give 4 stars is because that would mean it is perfect and matches everyone of my needs. Which nothing does unless it was designed specifically for me. But they did a good job. If you plan on changing the CD's in and out of this system a lot than this isn't the system for you. I have over 400 CD's and I put all of them in there, (up to 400 that is). Yes you can give each Disc a Artist Name and a Disc Title. These names correspond to the slot on the machine NOT the disc. So if you put a new disc in the slot it will be called whatever name you gave the slot. Unless the CD has text display on it. Than it will automatically over write what you typed in and you will have to go back and re-due it for the old disc, if you decide to replace it. This makes it hard if you want to shift discs around or alphabetize them. You CAN'T shift names down a slot. You will have to rename every slot. So once a disc is in it is better to leave it were it is. Use the Keyboard for entering the names. It is much faster than using the unit's jog wheel or remote. Once you have it all set up. You have 3 program settings you can set up. A program can contain up to 32 "steps", One step may contain a track or a whole disc. I believe program steps can overlap but I am not sure. I have never used the program yet. There is one Hit List. You can store 32 tracks in the Hit List. Your 32 favorite songs. I have yet to use this feature also. Now you have 8 Groups. You can assign as many discs as you want to a group. But each disc can be put into only one group. So you can have a Jazz, Rock or Punk group. You can play continuously through the group. Shuffle all the discs in a group or cont/shuffle only one disc of the group. Shuffle does not repeat a song until all songs of the group are played. Unless you go out of shuffle mode. or something like that. Now you also classified your discs according to artists, You can have 200 artists. You can continuously/shuffle play through all the discs of an artist or through one disc of that artist. So if you must have a discs in multiple groups. You can make a program of discs up to 32. And have a Group of discs. Or you could possible use Artist. But only one artist per slot. I don't have labels corresponding to a slot. I use artist mode to find the artist I want to play and then select the CD title I want to play. I don't really care what slot it is in. It does take about 15-30 seconds to switch songs in all disc shuffle mode. But be realistic. If your playing disc 1 and the next disc to play is 250, it has to put the disc back into the slot, turn the carousel all the way to the other side, get the disc and que it up. These are CD's not mp3's. It doesn't display the Artist of the Disc your currently playing, just the Disc Title. Unless it is a CD-Text CD. If you put a disc in backwards, it doesn't work. I had it lock up in shuffle mode once. I hit stop, had to look through all of the cd's and find the one that was in backwards. This is not Sony's fault, This is my stupid fault. Make sure you put the disc in right. Don't transfer the unit with CD's in it. I did, They fell out of there slots and into the corners of the machine. I had to pull out most of the cd's to get at the ones in the corner and re-insert them. Another my stupid fault. I hope this helped.
Rating:
Summary: Memory Does NOT erase when power goes out
Review: I am interested in purchasing this mega changer, but was put off by a review that stated the data you enter is lost if the power goes out. Skeptical, I called sony support and inquired about this problem. The memory WILL retain the data if power is lost...similar technology as flash memory I suppose.
Rating: 
Summary: Could have been a great product.
Review: I bought this item mainly for it's advanced memory features. The ability to store the title and artist for each CD, as well as specify which tracks on the CD to skip, makes this unit's playback options almost as powerful as a PC-based music playback system.
Unfortunately, to take advantage of these features requires quite a bit of work since all of the data must be entered manually (a PS/2 keyboard connection on the front does make the task easier). Supposedly the unit can read some artist/title information directly from the CD if that information is encoded
on the CD, however this was not the case for any of the CDs I loaded into the machine. Most of my CDs are fairly old though ( >5 yrs ), so I can't really say whether or not newer CDs would have a better chance of having their artist\title info read by the unit automatically. Regardless, I feel safe in saying that if you plan on filling the CD player to max. capacity and utilizing its advanced playback options, you should be prepared to spend alot of time entering data into its memory. For me, all of this work could easily be justified if the unit stored the info in non-volatile memory, but it doesn't. In other words, if your power goes off (rolling blackouts), or you have to unplug the player (which may have to be done if it starts acting up), it's memory will not retain the information you entered. It will be as blank as the day you bought it. Now I find this a major flaw in the machines design. I can't imagine having to reenter so much information every time the power goes out. Heck, I think it's a pain to have to reset my alarm clock. But at least my alarm clock has a battery backup -which, by the way, I let run down. What were their engineers (or their engineers' managers) thinking? I have an idea what they were saying, "We gotta cut cost!" Granted, non-volatile memory would make the CD player more expensive, but so be it. If it were too expensive I'd buy a model with less features, with the idea that the features it did have would be fully supported.
Because of the aforementioned complaint, I decided the day after I bought the CD player that I would return it and get a lower priced model. Although I must admit, I did have reservations about taking it back; all things considered, it is a cool piece of equipment and it does hold a tremendous amount of playing material. Fortunately though, before I could change my mind, the CD playing mechanism in it went out and so my only option was to return it. And not only did I get my money back, I didn't buy another model either.
I may (emphasize may) have given this model 3 stars if the unit I bought hadn't quit playing. Nevertheless I feel a rating 2 stars is fair.
Rating: 
Summary: Its An Awsome Piece Of Equipment
Review: I Have Had It For Over A Year. And Have Had No Problems. The Only Thing I Hate Is having To Reset It Everytime I want to take out some cd's and put some new ones in. I Really Like the Play List But I Wish It Was Longer 30 Tracks. I Mean if your Gonna have 400 cd's in There surely your gonna have more than 30 favorite songs Other than That Its A Good System.
Rating:
Summary: Sony CDPCX335
Review: I have had this about six months and am very pleased with it. It does everything I wanted it to, and has so many features, I am still learning how to use it. I recommend keeping a log of your CD's and their location in the machine, to facilitate finding them. My taste in music is eclectic, so I appreciate being able to group CD's into 8 groups, and listen only to Dixieland if I wish.
Rating:
Summary: SONY 400-MEGA CHANGER
Review: I loved this unit the day I bought it. Took me all weekend to type in all the CD titles and used it just about everyday. Until the thing jammed. Apparently, as I selected a CD to play, the machine dropped the CD and then the carousel started spinning, jammed, made a very loud jerking sound and stopped working since. HAD SONY THOUGHT OF MAKING A LITTLE TRAP DOOR IN THE REAR CLOSE TO WHERE THE CD LOADS, I WOULD HAVE BEEN ABLE TO TAKE THE CD OUT IN TIME BEFORE THE CAROUSEL STARTED SPINNING. THE BIGGEST FLAW IN THIS UNIT IS THAT YOU CANNOT REACH IN THE BACK TO TAKE A DROPPED CD OUT. THE ONLY WAY TO GET TO THE BACK AREA (IF A CD IS DROPPED BY THE MACHINE), IS TO TAKE THE SHELL OF THE UNIT OUT. THERE ARE ABOUT 10 SCREWS TO TAKE OUT. TERRIBLE! Just keep your CD's in a couple of CD wallets and you can save yourself the headache!
Rating:
Summary: Discontinued by Sony
Review: I own this CD Changer and I love it. It's a little slow and bulky, but I'm sure it would take me a lot longer to load and unload CDs myself. However, it has been discontinued by Sony who has introduced the Sony CDP-CX455 and it has MP3 PLAYBACK! It is being offered at a comparable price and if Amazon doesn't carry it now, they should.
Rating:
Summary: Discontinued by Sony
Review: I own this CD Changer and I love it. It's a little slow and bulky, but I'm sure it would take me a lot longer to load and unload CDs myself. However, it has been discontinued by Sony who has introduced the Sony CDP-CX455 and it has MP3 PLAYBACK! It is being offered at a comparable price and if Amazon doesn't carry it now, they should.
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