I got this player Two days back and all I can say I'm really enjoying
Before planning to buy this player, I had planned to buy an I-pod(yeah an I-pod{I'm not kidding } , but somehow sound quality of NW-S703F(Bought the golden one ).Series saved Sony & I bought this player. I got this player for Rs 11990(About US$277).Since NW-S703F was quite costly(For me At least & I know It will for most of the Indians ) that’s why I dropped the idea of buying NW-S706/S706F.
It came in a shiny purple box (Like then one in Which NW-1000 or A-series was supplied)
Now I will discuss about this player:
Pros:
Shiny, Looks Solid(except for the earphone plug , Sturdy
-Noise Cancelling Feature
-Clear , Crisp & Booming Bass
-Good earphone supplied(MDR-NC022)
-Charges Quickly(Takes about 115min to charge fully (When the is fully discharged) -Jacket Feature (It is like Cover art of MZ-DH10P){Small album art looks very cute , otherwise it is useless as one cannot read anything )
Cons:
-No Case Provided
-Very Costly
- Recording Features need additional Cable
-Wrong position of Play mode & Sound button
-Slow Fast foward & Rewind (Only Cue /Rev)
1.Body (Durability):
Most of the body of the player is made of metal Back, sides (Except for Front screen & Button), but I couldn't make out from which material Jog Dial is made of. Front Screen, Which is made of plastic (They have used the same material for the front screen that they used in A3000/A1000) & Button are also made of plastic .Player Does look Stylish, Solid and Sturdy.
--Headphones plug moves little bit .IMO it should not be moving.
Marks: 4/5
2.User Friendly (Ease of Use).
Player is quite easy to use once your get familiar with it .Like the previous E4xx/5xx/A6xx series it also has a Bright 3 line somewhat Colored OELD display, but again it has a disadvantage it is not easy to view OELD display in Sunlight.
-Jog Dial make life easy, I’m mean with Jog dial it is very easy to access albums, Songs etc.
-Most of the buttons are positioned well (Except for the Play mode & Sound button).It is very difficult to press Play mode & Sound button (Which is on the backside ) when the player is playing & you want to change sound settings etc b`coz of the position on the back side .Most of the time I ended up Pressing Play or Cue/Rev button (Placed on the front side ).Play mode & Sound button should have been placed little lower on the backside (like E5xx series ).
Marks** 3.5/5
3.Carrying outside or Portability:
Player is very portable .
Dimensions are: 87.2X27.4 X 14.9(w/H/D) & Mass: 47gm .I doesn’t think I need to say anything else.
Marks 4.5/5
4.Transfer Rate:*
Sony NW-S7xxseries manual says HI-Speed USB (USB 2 Complaint).
Transfer rate of transferring songs via sonic stage is Just Ok; it is neither too fast nor too slow.
Marks: 2.5/5
5.Media Files Supported
ATRAC3, ATRAC, MP3, WMA (1), AAC (1), ATRAC Advanced Lossless (2) and linear PCM (2).
1 Except copyright-protected files
2 During direct recording
Still it doesn't support many file formats (like FLAC), but many of use either use single file format so it doesn't matter .Like I most of the time use Atrac 3Plus 192kpbs.
Marks: 3.8/5
6. Sound Quality.
Sound Quality of NW-S7xx series is of Top notch quality..It's great (I don't have words to express myself).Sound Quality of NW-7xx series (NW-S703F) beats the previous walkmans in every way, whether it is in bass or in the treble department.
-It is much fuller & richer when compared with NW-A1000.
-Clear Bass feature Produces clear & booming bass .It is improved version of Mega Bass.
-According to Sony "Clear Stereo" feature delivers crisp, clear stereo sound, but I didn't find any difference whether it is ON or OFF.
-VPT features produces surround sound of different environment Live , Arena , Club , Which I find very useful .
-It also has 5 band Equalizer (Heavy, Pop, Jazz, Unique, & Two Custom Equalisers )
one can use all the features like Clear Bass , VPT, 5 band Equaliser at the same time .
Another New feature called Dynamic Normaliser has been added to this walkman .Basically It reduces the volume level b/w the songs. works well when it is used during shuffle mode
The Most Highlighted feature of this Walkman is NOISE CANCELING FEATURE (Cost of this player is higher b`coz of this feature) which only works with the supplied earphones .Its NOISE CANCELLING feature is quite useful during traveling, especially while traveling in the metro. This features reduce outside(Ambient ) noise by about 75%, but Not all noise is cancelled out .Earphones supplied with the NW-S703F have high sensitive microphone & its sensitivity can be controlled using Noise Cancel Control in the advanced menu of the main unit.
Earphones Used to Test the Sound Quality: I tried Different Earphones to test the sound quality. The Earphones (MDR-NC022) that came with the box produced very good sound.
I was amazed that MDR-E931 also sounded good with this walkman. Other Earphones that I used are MDR-E808, MDR-E10LP, RP-HV288 .Remember If NC feature is used battery life is shortened.
Audio File Used: Atrac 3 Plus 192kpbs. Atrac Advance Lossless 128kpbs sounded good, but I was unable to find much Difference b/w AAL & Atrac 3 Plus 352kpbs...If we need to use AAL, then we need 80 GB space At least (IMO).
Marks:** 4.5/5
7.FM-Tuner:
Like NW-E4xx/E5xx/A6xx, NW-S703F also has FM tuner.FM Reception is just good.
FM Auto Preset (When Scan Sensitivity was on High) tuned 14 channels instead of 9(Delhi only has 9 FM channels).The other 5 channels tuned when selected using Jog Dial made background /awful noise only (I had to manually delete those unwanted Channels)
& When Scan Sensitivity low was selected it only tuned 4 channels .SO FM auto Preset functioned poorly.
Marks:** 2.5/5
8.Headphones:
They are the best ever supplied (Bundled earphones) that I have ever seen. IMO MDR-NC022 needs a separate review, but I will still describe it briefly here .Since Earphone jack of the supplied earphone is different from the normal one, so it cannot be used with other mp3 players.
NC022 produced good sound .Sony provided three Different Ear fit rings or tips.
(i)Small, (ii) Medium, (iii) Large.
-Lows & Highs are quite clear, but mids are not. Also they are good for listening POP/Rock/Dance music songs
Marks: 4/5
9.Supplied accessories:
SonicStage CP Ver.4.1" application software (CD-ROM).(I’m using SonicStage 4.2, I didn’t had the courage of uninstalling SS 4.2 the previous one to check SS CP 4.1)
Headphones (MDR-NC022)
Headphone extension cord,
Quick start guide (In Different Languages .but I need the English one only
USB cable
Attachment (I can be used only when connecting the player to the optional cradle (BCR-NWU3).So it is useless otherwise.
Although there where a few more accessories, but they could have incurred additional cost and inflated my specified budget hence was not able to go for any more additional accessories.
NO Cover/Case for the player has been supplied by Sony.
Also Cover for NW-S703F is still not available in India.
Marks: 3.5/5(As they have not supplied cover)
10.Recording Capabilities:
I couldn't test this feature b`coz I don't have the Recording cable (WMC-NWR1) which is required. This cable is needed to be attached to the WM-Port. According to manual Recorded Songs which are recorded on the player can be imported to PC using SonicStage (I think for that we will have install Sonic Stage CP 4.1 .It might have some additional utility for that , but I cannot guarantee ).
