Customer Reviews:
 Great sound, Comfortable Headphones September 9, 2008
I just got my third of these(I broke one and lost the other), and I couldn't be happier with it. The player itself has a very easy interface and the controls are easy to use even through the mesh pocket on my backpack strap. The sound quality is tremendous, with clean full bass and enough range to pick up subtle sounds that my iPod and Creative didn't.
The biggest selling point for me, however, is the headphones. These are the most comfortable in-ear buds I've ever used. The sound quality (paired with the player) are surpsingly close to Bose buds and the addition of Noise Cancellation is icing on the cake. I don't have to worry about them falling out or losing their tight seal, and I'm yet to experience discomfort from wearing them over long periods of time. For <$200, this is the best bang for your buck.
Best sounding MP3 Player September 5, 2008
Its the best Mp3 player in terms of sound quality and resolution for videos. The ear phones are much better than those bundled with other mp3 players. Noise cancelation is not perfect but still offers opportunity to listen to your music in relative peace (especially important since I am a mom of two). The video resolution is very good with a bright screen. I have managed to watch an entire movie on it.
 Great device, three flaws August 26, 2008
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
Overall, a great music player, the best of 5 I've owned (2 ipods, cowon D2, iriver clix). The battery life is unbelievable, the video is really good, the noise cancellation is just fantastic, and the sound is excellent. The UI is very easy and intuitive to use, but with a limited feature set. From a usability perspective, there are three flaws
1) The headphone jack has a ridge on it that prevents you from using it on any other device. So you need a separate set of headphones to listen to music on your computer, or on the exercise machine at the gym
2) You can't make or edit playlists on the fly, you have to create them on the computer, which is cumbersome. And you have to use something like Windows Media player, which, like the itunes interface, I really dislike. I much prefer the drag and drop approach that the Cowon or the iRivers take.
3) I have my entire music library on the walkman, and haven't figured out how to rearrange the existing songs into playlists. The only way I know to make playlists is to copy the songs into the playlist, so if a song is on multiple playlists, there are multiple copies on the mp3 player
If you can live with these issues, this is a terrific music player. I'm torn between the flexibility on my iriver clix and the sound quality on the Sony, but the battery life and noise cancellation makes the Sony superior. The Cowon probably comes closest, but the noise cancellation and sleeker form factors gives the win to the Sony. The ipods were markedly inferior and I gave them away, not worth mentioning them here.
probably 4 1/2 stars July 25, 2008
20 out of 20 found this review helpful
this Sony Walkman has noise canceling mechanism built into the player. For what it's worth it does an adequate job. It probably won't do the job those expensive noise-canceling headphones can do, but it is in my opinion sufficient.
My experience in reading reviews were best if I arrange it in points rather than narratives. So I will do that here.
Strength:
1. it has outstanding sound quality. It is not that outstanding right out of the box, however. You have to tweak and toggle some settings. You have to turn on bass features and play with equalizers. I had every single version of iPods and the only iPod that comes close (but not quite) to the sound quality of this is first generation iPod shuffle. It has amazingly clean bass. The earbud that comes with the player is miles better than iPod earbuds. You usually have to spend $40-$50 for this type of earbud.
2. I actually like the size of this player over iPod nano because it is easier on my hand to grab. iPod nano was too thin and it is difficult to navigate since it is too small.
3. interface is really clean and I really like how you can skip fast to the last of the list by clicking right button. This is just one of those subtle feature that makes the experience better.
4. I like how this player has dedicated tactile volume button.
Weakness
1. it does not have gapless playback. This is a problem for me because I listen to a lot of Euro style mix musics.
2. it does not arrange songs by disc numbers. This is a problem since I arranged my albums in a way that it sorts out by disc numbers.
3. the biggest knock on this player probably is limited types of playable formats. It plays mp3, aac and wav. The problem with this is that if you have some odd formats like mp2 or ogg, when you are importing the music via windows explorer you will have problems with system crash. This is mostly windows Vista issue, however.
So most of the weaknesses are either subjective or nitpicky. Overall I love this player's sound quality. Since sound quality is the top 1st, 2nd, and 3rd important thing for me when I choose my mp3 player, this one is a winner.
The Best July 19, 2008
9 out of 9 found this review helpful
I have an Ipod Nano, which I was very happy with. But, I always thought the audio quality wasn't quite that good. I also wanted an FM Tuner. I have to say the Sony absolutely blows the Nano away when it comes to audio quality. I really didn't realize what I was missing! As I said, I liked the Nano, but I would strongly recommend the Sony instead.
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