Walkman Z-Series Video from Sony

 

Sony has a quick promotional video of the new Z-Series Walkman, check it out above.

Both Sony Canada and USA will be offering the new Z-Series.  In Canada, only the 16 and 32GB models will be available on February 13th for $299 and $349 CDN respectively, and in the US there will be 3 capacities, and vailable on March 1st in 8, 16 and 32GB priced at $249, $279, and $329 USD respectively. 

I think the Z has a chance to sell well but MWC is starting in late February with a lot of new phones and tablets which if priced right could make the Z not that attractive.

Sony Introduces New Speaker Docks for Walkman

Apart from an updated E-Series, Sony also introduced 2 new speaker docks for Walkman, the RDP-NWG400 and RDP-NWM7.  The new speaker docks will be released on February 11th, with retail pricing of around $100 for the RDP-NWM7 and around $170 for the RDP-NWG400.  Both will be available in black and white and will unfortunately be only sold in Japan.  I do hope Sony decides to introduce more speaker docks internationally.

More information and photos after the break.

Tiny E-Series Walkman Lives on in Japan

Sony Japan has updated the NW-E050 Walkman lineup for 2012, the NW-E060.  The updated E will be released on February 11th for $90 for 2GB and $110 for 4GB.  This seems expensive but when you factor in the headphones and the added Noise Cancellation it is a good deal.  The bundled headphones are the MDR-NC33, which shipped with other NC Walkman in the past  The updated E will come in 4 colours (red, black, pink, and blue) and compared to the previous E is smaller and lighter.  Supported file formats are MP3/WMA (non-DRM) / ATRAC / ATRAC Advanced Lossless / Linear PCM / AAC (Non DRM) / HE-AAC.

Like the previous generation, the new E also comes with a small speaker dock which thankfully looks a lot better than before.  The E060K comes with a 0.5W colour-coded speaker that is powered by the Walkman itself, attachment is via a WM-Port.  Unfortunately only the E will fit since the speaker insert is molded to it.

Personally I would love to see this on sale in Europe and would definitely grab one to supplement my X-Series.

More photos and hands-on from AV-Watch after the break.

New Sony B-Series Walkman Unveiled

For some odd reason I never seem to receive the Sony Press emails when the information goes up onto the press site, it is always a few afters.  Anyways, Sony is introducing an update the the B-Series, the new B170.  The design is actually different this time around, with the styling matching the current line up of Walkmans.  I was hoping Sony would have thrown in some decent headphones but it appears they have not and it seems the USB is still 2.0, but there seems to be no mention of that in the press releases.  Perhaps the next gen will have USB 3.0.

Feel the bass with new Walkman B170

Light, colourful MP3 player with quick-charge battery

•     Pumping beats with Bass Boost button
•     Quick 3 minutes battery charge gives 90 minutes playback
•     Clip attaches Walkman to belt or clothes
•     Easy drag and drop music transfers
•     Built-in USB connects Walkman® to PC, hi-fi or car stereo

Rest of the press release and more photos after the break.

Sony Walkman Z-Series Debuts at CES 2012

So this was not a surprise, posted about a possible debut after the FCC filing was made back in December, plus of course the teaser from Sony Austra/Switzerland.  Checking out various Sony websites, it appears the new Z will be available soon in Europe, like Germany (32, 16GB), Poland (16GB), UK (32GB), France (16GB), Italy (32. 16GB) with Music Unlimited being available on the device in the selected countries that have the service.  Availability will be from Late February which is a step forward compared to the X-Series release a few years back.  The new Z is nice but it is no different in the end from any other Android Smart phone except for the music quality which I am sure if much better than any regular Android Smart phone.  But if I was to get anything, it would be a tablet with WiFi rather than another phone like Android device with WiFi.

Press release and more photos after the break.

New Walkman Z-Series Teaser

Sony Switzerland & Austria have a new teaser for a new Sony Product which is clearly the new Z-Series.  This can be seen when comparing these teaser shots with the new Z-Series.

This could mean that the new Z will be at CES and will finally have its global launch.  I am still wondering though if the Z will be updated to ICS or remain on Gingerbread.

CES 2012

In a few days CES will be upon us again, almost scary how fast the time has passed since the last CES.  The Sony US media site is down for maintenance, so can't check if there is any prelim information about CES.  Nothing is present on the European Sony press site as of the time I am writing this, so perhaps more will be updates next week.

According to The Verge's CES website, Sony will be hosting their press conference on January 9th at 17:00 local time, which is 02:00 CET, so I won't be covering the conference live this year like I did last year.  So unfortunately any information that is released will be posted the next day in the morning.  I am expecting the new Z-Series to debut with information about a North American release and possibly for Europe as well.  One thing I would like to see is a new OLED based Walkman but I doubt it.