ATRAC stands for Adaptive Transform Acoustic Coding and ATRAC Advanced Lossless is an evolution of the earlier ATRAC1 and ATRAC3 audio systems in use with Sony's SDDS theater audio system, MiniDisc, Walkman and Sony Connect (amongst many other uses). At writing, ATRAC Advanced Lossless is the latest update to the ATRAC family of proprietary compression algorithms created by Sony Corp. While ATRAC Advanced Lossless is supported by Sony's Network Walkman, its support has not yet come to either the PlayStation Portable (PSP) or PlayStation 3 (PS3) consoles, which are marketed aggressively by Sony as entertainment-enhancing gadgets.
There are few lossless audio formats that can offer scalable compression, and ATRAC Advanced Lossless is one. It records the ATRAC3 or ATRAC3plus and the residual information that either eliminated. ATRAC3 or ATRAC3plus data can be extracted as is, or the eliminated data can be added in order to perfectly reproduce the information that was ripped from an original CD, offering as a result, lower storage capacity requirements than storing an uncompressed and compressed version of the same track. As such, it provides excellent backwards compatibility.
Please also view our Glossary entries for..Some interesting ATRAC-related articles from the AfterDawn archives include..
Sony to dump Connect music service - (August 31st, 2007)
Sony acknowledged that its proprietary ATRAC music format was a market flop by shutting down all its Connect music stores and making its devices compatible with other formats.
Sony kills off ATRAC and SonicStage with latest MP3 player - (April 28th, 2007)
The Sony B100 series of portable MP3 players killed off the ATRAC format.
Sony admits ATRAC was a mistake - (January 23rd, 2005)
Ken Kutaragi has stated that Sony has missed out on the sales of MP3 players and other gadgets by sticking to proprietary formats such as ATRAC.
Sony to add MP3 support to its portable music players - (September 23rd, 2004)
Sony confirmed plans to add MP3 support to its players, loosening its reliance on the proprietary ATRAC format.
Sony Connect music service launched - (May 5th, 2004)
Sony opened its Connect music service which used the ATRAC format for downloadable music files.
