Sony released in the USA in 1992 the Sony IVO-11, together with the IVO-10, two Intelligent Discmans that were in fact base-case CD-i players. It features the same CD-i logo that was used mainly in Asia, in titles that were published by Japan Interactive Media. Sony had its own names for the CD-i nomenclature: This was a Portable CD-i Viewer. It is still an interesting piece of history in the world of videogames and multimedia technology: Together with Philips, also Sony and Matsushita (Panasonic and others) were involved in the development of CD-i, but in the end this Sony CD-i player is the only physical product by one of the Japanese companies that actually was released. We've heard of some prototypes by Panasonic and of one of their other brands: Sanyo. But these remained prototypes. This Sony IVO-11 was actually released, even in USA. Most Sony CD-i players that we see these days unfortunately don't work anymore: The screen has degradated a lot, capacitors started leaking and the timekeeper is empty. We've never seen before anyone trying to repair the timekeeper battery of a Sony CD-i player, probably because it had more problems that doesn't make a timekeeper replacement worthwile to do. Or are there just very few Sony CD-i players out there? Was the Sony IVO-10 and IVO-11 only released for professional applications?
Credits / Source: Yokaipop
Contributed by CD-i member: Retrostuff