Sony NW-A300 Walkman Revealed

In addition to the new NW-ZX700, Sony has also released the new A-Series. The new player is on the Sony website, labelled as Coming Soon, and will come in black and blue, with Japan also receiving a gray option.

In Japan the new A-Series will be available at the end of January on the 27th and will come in 32GB (A306) and 64GB (A307) capacities, with Europe only getting the 32GB model. The price in Japan is 46,000 Yen for the 32GB and 57,000 Yen for the 64GB, where as in Europe it will be 399 Euros or 349 Pounds.

The screen is a 3.6in with HD resolution (same as before), using the Android 12 OS, previously Android 9. The biggest improvement is the battery life, now rated up to 36 hours for MP3 (128kbps) and up to 32 hours for FLAC (96Khz/24bit). Compare this to the old model which had up to 23 hours for MP3 (128kbps) and up to 19 hours for FLAC (96Khz/24bit). This is a huge change and a welcome one.

The Bluetooth playback has also improved significantly, up to 22 hours for MP3 (128kbps) over SBC, and up to 11 hours for FLAC (96Khz/24bit). Previously it was up to 10 hours for MP3 and up to 8 hours for FLAC. 

Here is the full battery life for the other codecs:

MP3 (128kbps) - Approx. 36 hrs
FLAC (96kHz/24bit) - Approx. 32 hrs
FLAC (192kHz/24bit) - Approx. 32 hrs
DSD (2.8224MHz/1bit) - Approx. 28 hrs
DSD (5.6448MHz/1bit) - Approx. 22 hrs
DSD (11.2896MHz/1bit) - Approx. 14 hrs 

The Bluetooth version is 5.0 as I initially reported in the first post, and for those wondering about NFC, it is absent. Bluetooth codec support will include SBC, AAC, LDAC, aptX and aptX HD. Since we only have BT 5.0, there will be no LE Audio or LC3 codec support. Could Sony add it in the future? Unlikely as the Qualcomm QCS2290 is only certified for 5.0.

The USB port has been upgraded to version 3.2Gen1, up from USB 2.0 in the previous model, this should speed up transfers. It appears that the noise cancellation function has been removed. Not a big issue, since one can use the NC function in the WH-1000XM5 or WF-1000XM4.

The weight has gone up 10g to 113g, and the dimensions are 56.5mm x 98.4 mm x 11.8mm, with the previous model measuring 55.2 mm × 98.9 mm × 11.0 mm.

A full battery recharge will take around 3.5 hours, which is 2 hours faster than the A100. This is great, because waiting more than 5 hours for a full recharge is unacceptable and a pain.

Both the new A and ZX continue the tradition of using the S-Master HX, the CXD3778. This chip is a workhorse for Sony.

It is crazy to think, that over the many years and generations of Sony Walkmans and headphones, this S-Master HX probably has not changed much. I am sure there have been improvements in the algorithm and so on, but it looks like the size of the chip has not changed from the original.

Here are some tidibts from the Sony A300 Engineer interview. Check out the rest of the interview how Sony went about to improve the audio quality from the previous model, it is an interesting read.

According to the engineers, the new A-Series is "packed with Sony's power-saving miniaturization technology". I would guess would be components Sony makes themselves and not the new SoC.

Sony does mention there is a new SoC, but does not specify which one. We know it is the Qualcomm QCS2290 from the benchmarks. I do wonder if this is the same SoC in the new ZX700 as well or something else. 

So, looks like I was wrong, I was told we would see them in February, but it looks like Sony decided to roll out the new Walkmans early. Nice of them to do that, wonder what changed.

Anyways, sorry for the haphazard post, but Sony does not share their press releases early for me, so I have to make due with the product pages. 

I would love to pick up the new ZX700, but I cannot afford it, so if anyone from Sony is reading, I would love to review it (hint hint). If that is too much to ask, I could also review the new A-Series as well. Knowing my luck I will have to buy the new A-Series myself. As for everyone else, what are you thoughts for the new A?