Review by K. Swanson:

[Edit: Upgrade from 3.5 to 4.4 stars; see below]

After my poor experience with the Phillips GoGear mp3 player (reviewed here last week), I thought I’d see what Sony can do with an mp3 player.

I bought their first (excellent) FM walkman in 1980 but haven’t used one of their portables since. I am in general a Sony fan, and my 1986 Trinitron is still running like new. Gotta love that kind of quality! But do they still have it?

First, the good:

-Excellent battery life: 30 hours for music, and it does get close to that if you don’t do much scrolling. Nice.

-Lots of gigs for a c-note: about 6 bucks per gig, once you realize that it’s only 14.4 gb. I hate the way companies do that, btw. Don’t tell me I’m getting 16 gigs and then give me ten percent less. Be honest! Stuff like that loses customers, savvy ones at least.

-Good sound…but with that traditional Sony eq curve: very flat. I’ve had a few Sony receivers and cd players and tape decks over the years, and they are all very flat across the ranges. This makes for nice tight bass and decent mids, but the top end is always a little compressed and lacks shimmer and overtones. Still, a solid tone, not tinny.

And seeing as most users choose mp3 files at either 128kbps or 192kbps (I’d recommend the latter if you play this through a car or other decent full-range stereo), there’s plenty of compression already, so no huge loss. Using 320kbps or wav files, which this unit does support, will result however in some noticeable loss of shimmer and breathing room for the high frequencies.

-You can use folders, saves a lot of scrolling time. Put jazz, metal, etc into their own folders. Any smart mp3 player does this.

-***Please note!***Nice, simple drag and drop of files right out of the box, with no need to install the software. Just plug the Walkman into your usb and wait for it to show up on your computer as “Walkman”. Do a few clicks and you’re in the “music” folder; now drag and drop your files, all at once or one at a time. Presto! That’s sweetness, because almost every problem I’ve had with mp3 players stems from badly written software, and avoiding the need for it altogether is preferable. If you can avoid installing your included software for any player, do it; it only causes hassles in the long run unless you need a certain feature. Drag and drop is where it’s at: quick, simple, efficient. And no adware etc installed surreptitiously by the software cd, a newly common scam.

PS I prefer to make the folders first as opposed to using the WMP sync feature; it has glitches, while simple folder drag and drop never has for me.

-Gets good and loud. Helps with certain headphones. Sounds good on my Koss PortaPros and great on my AKG K701s. The phones that come with this are cheese, as usual. Buds will never compare to real cans.

-Excellent for running, my main use for mp3 players. It hasn’t skipped on me once and can take all sorts of shaking and bouncing. Very nice.

-Very thin, light, sleek. Takes up almost no space in any pocket, purse, etc.

-A strange design touch that I haven’t seen anyone mention, but which struck me right off: the control buttons on the front panel are shaped almost precisely like Mickey Mouse’s head! This can’t be coincidence; surely someone in design did this on purpose. So is Sony in bed with the Mouse, or what’s up? In any case, sometimes I see it and hear Mickey’s estrogenic squeal in my inner ear saying, “Pluto! Punch me in the nose and let’s get this party started!”

-Along with the essential external volume buttons, there’s a manual lock switch on the side of the unit. Very useful to not have to scroll to make this go on and off. A good design feature that all mp3 players should have. You might want to use this when it’s off and in your pocket, as the unit turns on with only minor presssure on the front panel button…but that leads to:

-Another major plus, this unit starts playing exactly where the last tune you were playing stopped, in about a half second after the button is touched. Some players take ten seconds. This baby rips right into the music in a flash (literally; flash drive players have so many advantages). Excellent.

But, the bad:

-the screen is waaay thin; it’s already covered with scratches after only a few days in my empty pocket. Not good. I don’t care about the aesthetics, but do need to see the screen!

-to ff or rewind quickly, you must first pause the track: took me a while to figure this out. Not a big con, but could have been been done without needing to pause.

-There’s a bar showing how long the tune is but no way to see time remaining, a very useful bit of data. Until a minute or so is gone, it’s hard to estimate song length via the bar, and one must hit the option button (Mickey’s right ear) and then scroll down to “detailed information” to get the exact song length; too much hassle for a feature that’s standard on most mp3 players. Not a big issue, but an oversight worth correcting.

-and the one thing that will make me return this item next week: you can’t delete songs or files from the player. You must first hook it up to a computer! Terrible design. My years-old Muvo deletes on the fly, as do my Dell DJ and other players. This is a huge mistake: with 4,000 songs, how can I remember all the ones I need to dump? Very major flaw, and a deal breaker for me.

But, for those who only transfer stuff they already know and love, this is a pretty darn decent player. I don’t know who wants to watch movies or vids on a thumbnail-sized screen, but as a music player, this offers good sound and plenty of storage for a good price.

At this rate we’ll get a terabyte for a c-note within a couple years.

Can’t wait! Then we can put everything on in lossless FLAC files, the only real way to go. MP3 is okay, but still a compromise.

Hey Sony: not bad…but how can you leave out such a huge feature as deleting on the fly?

[Edit: 12/30/09. I now have to give this little thang a little more than four stars...and hooray to Amazoon's code writers: we can now finally change our ratings after the original review. I returned my original to the mallwart (so nice of them to let us try stuff out! And so unfortunate they can't pay living wages so I might feel bad about costing them restocking fees...), but after looking around for a few weeks I realized this Sony unit offers far more bang for the buck than any other mp3 player out there. So I picked one up here, saving twenty over the mallwart price, and am very happy with it, barring the above caveats.

The best way to deal with no delete feature seems to be to mark the tracks you don't dig with the "wishlist" feature on the options screen, and then when you charge the unit you can open the files and delete tunes you've wishlisted. Much more hassle than deleting on the fly, but at least a workable solution to my main negative about the product.

If Sony releases a firmware update that lets us delete on the fly (not sure if that's possible or not; hope so), then I'd have to give this thing an almost perfect rating.

Pair it with Koss Portapros and you will be blown away by the sound.]

[Edit: 5/12/10. Still working fine after plenty of use while running, hiking, and hooked up to the car stereo. Zero complaints.

And here's a tip I learned from a battery expert: these lithium units apparently prefer to be full all the time, and seeing as they don't have "memory effect" like normal batteries, it's safe to recharge this unit as often as you like, with no resultant loss of memory over the long haul. But supposedly lithiums also work best and last longest if one lets them drain completely once every 30 recharges or so, and then fully fills them up again. I don't know enough about batteries to confirm or deny (though I've been doing it that way and my walkman is still running a long time before needing juice), but it was a very detailed, well-written discussion by someone with a lot of experience in the field, who wasn't selling anything, and that's the kind of opinion I tend to trust. Just FYI.]

Review by John Bartas:

I almost hate to give this thing only three stars because it has great

sound and hardware features. One the other hand the Sony Windows installer is so bad

it deserves negative stars. But there is a workaround – just use simple drag and drop,

and don’t even run the Sony install or media software on your windows machines.

Since Sony’s famous root kit fiasco (Google “sony rootkit lawsuit”)

infected thousands of customers computers via anti-consumer software,

I should have known better than to ever

let Sony software run on my PC. But I wanted to get my new MP3 player to

working fast, so I followed Sony’s instructions. Bad idea!!! They want

you to plug the Sony into a USB port and then run the install

software that’s already in the Sony. I tried this on my old XP (SP2)

machine, and the Sony installation tried to “upgrade” my windows Media

player. There was no benefit to me for this “upgrade”, Sony’s

“engineers” we apparently too lazy to design an installer without this. Or

maybe they’re still trying to infect their customers with rootkits.

Anyway, the install of the new MS media player failed, and in the deal

corrupted my old MS-media player. Since I primarily use VLC media

player the was just just an annoyance, not a fatal problem – but now my

old XP PC has no MS media player. Thanks, Sony

Being stubborn (and a geek) I then decided to examine the Sony MP3 player a

bit more carefully on my work Windows-7 machine. The Sony mounted as a

USB device named “Walkman”, but instead of just running Sony’s toxic

installer again, I poked around in their file system and found

the music folder. It had a few mp3 files in it, so I decided to see

what would happen if I copied in a few more mp3 files. I did a drag &

drop with windows explorer, the Sony rebuilt the playlist with them.

There they were, playable – it worked! I then select all my mp3 files, about a

100, and dragged them over. Thanks to the magic of USB 2.0, in 10

minutes I had 100 tunes loaded – without running any Sony Windows software. They

all list and play just fine. Why did Sony provide that destructive

install and “Content Transfer” software when you can just drag & drop

files? Why not just tell customers how to load up the files in one easy

step like I did? Write a simple GUI for those who want elaborate

play-lists or auto-synch with an online service, and let the rest

of us just load & go.

But once I had some files in place I discovered the upside of this

device – It sounds great! My kids all have iPods, and this thing sounded

at least as good right out of the box, and at a fraction of the price.

I’m something of an audiophile and plan to experiment with upgrade ear

buds (the ones that come with it are pretty tinny) and maybe a headphone

amp. Just for grins, I put a pair of Sennheiser HD280 studio headphones

on the Sony – and it sounded really good! Like most MP3s the highs where

a bit slurred and mushy, but the mids and bass were clear and as loud as

I could want, even without a phones amp. The dinky Sony could drive the

large form-factor Sennheisers just fine . The better MP3s sound

almost like WAV files played on real high-end audio equipment. I’m

optimistic than when I get some lossless formats in there I’ll have a

really good sound.

I’ve tried hooking my kids iPods (Nano and classic) to real stereo

equipment and never had results like this. The Sony/Sennheiser combo

beats the pants off any iPod I’ve heard hooked to anything.

When I was done setting it up I unplugged the USB I’d been using to

charge the battery, and tossed the player in my backpack, without

thinking to turn it off. That night I got another nice surprise – it was

still playing (4 hours later) and the battery was still fully charged.

I’m not sure how many hours they claim, but I didn’t really believe I’d

get more than 5 or so in actual use. I’m now sure I’ll get 10 or more.

In fairness to Sony, I must add that we’ve also had Apple software

nightmares with my kids iPods, like the time one kid went to

“synchronize” and iTunes erased her entire mp3 collection. She was

in tears! I write software for a living, and bugs like Sony

and Apple have should never get past QA.

Bottom line is this unit will give you great sound for cheap; but you

have to be either very lucky or willing to move files manually to use

it safely.

Review by J.D.P.:

When searching for a new mp3 player the trail always leads me back to Sony. Its more about overall quality then brand loyalty. Over the years Sony’s Walkman line has gone the distance and more. The all new Sony S Series Walkman adds to the legacy.

The S-545 16gb Walkman brings it on with a crisp, color enhanced 2.4″ LCD screen that is easy on the eyes. At 2″ x 4″ x .4″, it comes in a bit larger then its older cousin. A larger body undoubtedly is required to provide support for the external speaker system. The speakers won’t get confused with my home system anytime soon but they do provide an excellent source. With headphones on, this mp3 player delivers a cornucopia of sound. Missing but not that noticeable is the noise reduction feature. The on board equalizer can be tweaked to one’s own preferences or users can choose one of the six presets.

The Navigation pad located directly under the screen is a breeze to operate. Three controls are located on the right side of the unit. One locks in the controls. The second one allows for easy switching from speaker to headset. Volume is the third control. The standard headphone jack and a USB port can be found on the bottom of the unit. The detachable flip out stand is an okay feature that allows for easy standing on my desk or shelf top. I would have preferred that it was permanently mounted.

The S-545 supports mp3, mp4, AAC, AVC, WMV, WMA, and PCM. PCM is Sony’s version of WAV. It pairs well with Napster To Go. Its hit and miss with Rhapsody To Go. Sometimes its a smooth transfer, other times its not. Downloading my playlists from Windows Media Player was a breeze without the usual hiccups associated with older mp3 players.

Amazon video is a new option that is also supported. Video can be synced from my computer as well. I’ve never been big on downloading video to my player. I did download a couple of photographs on this model. The display was outstanding. Unlike my older Walkman, this model doesn’t offer the wallpaper photo display option.

The built in FM tuner picked up all ten of my stations. With auto scanner functionality, thirty preset slots are available. The FM radio is crystal clear when using the headset as an antenna. The alarm and timer features are a nice add on. This model also has an impressive on board microphone located on the bottom of the unit. There are three voice settings. Voice playback quality was excellent. Battery life has always been biggie with Sony. On a full charge, I got almost a full thirty five hours of music.

The Sony Walkman S-545 16gb Mp3 player comes packed with a USB cable, flip stand, ear buds, installed operating manual and the standard one year warranty. Body finishes include; black and red in the 16GB model. Pink and violet are additional choices in the 8GB model.

Economically priced, this latest edition to the Walkman line is a durable and reliable product that delivers. Easy to use and loaded with features, the Sony S-545 is a prime time performer.

Review by James C. Kehl:

Great sounding and easy to use MP3 I have owned. I have had a Philips GoGear (froze and had to format all the time) a creative Zen (stopped working after 6 months) and a Zune 120 GB (great storage but not the best sounding MP3, plus a little to bulky when jogging). This is the easiest MP3 to use and the sound is great. For people who exercise, especially joggers, this is the perfect size and at 16GB holds quite alot of music. The screen size is only 2.4 but is very clear and once you use the transfer feature that comes with the player is easy to transfer photos and videos.

The speakers won’t blow you away, but I got it for when I work outside in the garden and didn’t want to haul out my speakers to plug in. Plus, when I am at work I can use it at the lunch table and not be rude when people sit with me and cannot listen to music. They do sound pretty good for the size, just an extra bonus on the player.

Last, a great price for an 16GB

Review by Ann E. Revelle:

Comments for prospective buyers:

1) PLL (Phase locked loop) digitally synthesized, am/fm/weatherband radio with very low noise, i.e., very good sensitivity as well as good selectivity (the ability to distinguish between adjacent frequency, interfering signals).

2) This radio can only be manually tunned by pressing the + (forward/up) or – (back/down) frequency tuning button. It will even advance semi-automatically if you hold the button down and you will hear the stations as the radio sweeps through the frequencies so you know how/where to locate stations (unlike Sangean pocket radios which mute during automatic scan and seek functions). Thus, there is no fully automatic, press and scan or even a seek function, but I have found this manual tuning capability totally adequate because of the simplicity of the five preset tuning buttons for each band (with 2 sets of five presets on the fm band). It is quite silly that Sony didn’t take the time right now to also add 5 more presets on a second set of am bands just as they did on fm on the SRF-M37V for example which has 25 presets available and not 20 presets as on this newest model. This is especially because the am reception on this radio is quite exceptional in addition to all of its other very nice features.

3) It is as good as the Sangean pocket radios that I have recently tried as well (including the famous DT-200VX). It remains to be seen if the new (June 2008) Sangean DT-400W (with NOAA weather coverage and broadcast alerts) will compete with the Sony SFR-37W.

4) It has a one year limited warranty and clearly not just 90 days as listed on numerous websites, including Amazon.com. This time limit is clearly listed on the instructions with the radio (the included Sony warranty certificate comes attached to the radio instructions).

5) I get excellent reception here in the mountains of New Mexico for a super-portable am/fm/weatherband radio receiver with 20 presets (5 on am/10 on fm and 5 for weather) that lasts 30-54 hours on one AAA battery. Weatherband signals are weak by the nature of the short range, low power NOAA transmitters and you must turn up the volume to adequately hear them and then adjust it back down for most am/fm stations especially.

6) All presets are very intuitive and extremely easy to use (a one button press system) as well as very easy to set. They are also easy to change as needed, especially if you travel a lot. Also, as long as you change the battery within 3 minutes of removing it, no presets will be lost (fortunately changing the battery is a snap).

7) The SRF-M37W is as extremely durable and well made and should last a very long time. In fact, my son’s SRF-37V (its immediate predecessor) was extensively chewed 3 years ago by his young puppy (whose name is his gal Friday since he first got her on a Friday) and it still works quite well! Also, the battery cover is normally hinged to the radio so that it can’t be lost (unless excessive force is used when it is opened and in this case it is designed not to break, but instead to simply pop out, but can easily be reinstalled as shown in the Sony manual). It also comes with a belt clip that nicely and firmly attaches to the radio for convenience. It also has a lock switch to keep all settings unchanged (except for the volume control) with an LCD screen indicator for the locked position as well as a battery level indicator, etc.

When using it inside a building go as close to the windows/doors as you can to get the very best reception. Radio waves do not penetrate very thick structures well so the best reception should generally be found outdoors for hiking, jogging, just plain walking, etc.

9) As others have stated you probably will want a better set of earphones to fully enjoy listening on all bands, but the supplied pair is certainly adequate for most purposes. In addition, however, I have found that if you use a set of headphones with a longer cord (such as the ~1 m cord on the Sony MDR-Q22LP clip-on earphones), substantially improved fm reception results since the cord acts as the fm antenna on these radios.

10) For those like me who will use this device near a computer, some degree of RF (radio frequency) interference (static on both the am and fm bands) can be expected. The RF interference is substantially reduced the further you move away from the computer or if you hold the radio in your hand or if you can extend the headphone cord fully.

This Sony is my personal update for an old analog Sony radio (the SRF-19W am/fm stereo radio Walkman) from the late 1980′s that is still working (also with no speaker and with a DX RF (radio frequency) gain switch even way back then)!

Review by Randy Allen:

I bought this Walkman for mowing the lawn and have ended up using it all the time, riding my bike two miles to work, while putting around my shop,and mowing the yard. The reception is crisp and clear, and even here in “Radio Free Wyoming”, I can pick up several F.M. stations and the weather band. It is like having a mini-stereo system.

Review by Shotzie:

This is my second purchase of a Sony Walkman. My first one was for my husband for our anniversary. I bought him an 8g player (NWZ-E438) and once I got that up and running, I realized that 8g really isn’t that much when I realized that he has a whole bunch of cd’s and videos and pictures. But the reason why I bought the 8g of that model was because it had an equalizer. Now, let’s talk about this beautiful S545 model – WOW! It’s 16g and what a beauty. the sound quality is A-Mazing, and the picture/video screen is clear and crisp. AND it has an equalizer – 5 settings, plus 2 custom settings = 7 equalizer settings. I bought mine at Walmart, and it was 9. I also got it in red – the red color is a nice color, not faded or pastelie. The sound quality from the exterior speakers will surprise you. Keep in mind that you will not be able to host a large dance party with it, but it is just perfect for a personal experience, let’s say in your room or something like that. The sound from the speakers is quite nice, and I would compare it to the speaker from my Motorola RAZR2. My phone can get a lot louder than the Sony Walkman, but the quality of sound is just as good. I was not in any way disappointed with the quality. The only thing I would change on this player is the placement of the speakers – they are on the back, not the front. The picture of this player might fool you to think the speakers are in the front, but they are not. I also learned that this player will not be able to download podcasts. The higher-end Sony Walkmans do.

Another thing is that the software for the player comes loaded in the player, instead of including a cd in the box. It worked really great, it was simple and just way too easy to use. It was much easier to set up on the computer and get going than the one I bought for my husband. With the software, “Content Transfer” all you have to do is drag a song, or a picture or a video right to the Content Transfer window, and POW – it’s there, and it knows right where to put it (music, pictures, video). So you don’t even have to fuss around and click into the different files. I already have 1,926 songs in WMA format in 48Kbps, 38 videos, and 223 photos, and I have 10g left. Right out of the box, because of the software itself, there is 2g being used for the player, and you get 14g to play with.

This player will also record voice recordings and FM radio recordings (song, advertisement, talk show or whatever). It looks like they give you 99 hours and 59 minutes of recording time.

The FM player will only work if you have either your headset plugged in or your speakers plugged in. The FM won’t work with the external speakers – it needs to use the wire as an antenna. And I didn’t think the FM was bad – worked and sounded just fine to me.

So, if you are looking for a player, you just might want to consider this one.

Review by Erhard Schreck:

Review: Sony 16GB S545 mp3/video player (nov 26 ’09)

I only will report on the MP3 part because I have not used the video part. Got the player for at best buys 3 weeks ago.

Pros: I like the sound quality – just excellent – also has 2 user programmable equalizers. In addition it has an extra Bass enhancement which works very well. I also like the possibility to sort/select music through the usual album/artist/etc stuff but also through normal folder selection as you see it on your PC. This is very convenient if you have CDs that are not available on the internet catalogs. Startup and menu response it acceptable quick.

The built-in stereo speaker sound very nice for their small size when the special equalizer settings are used (menu item). it also comes with a small plastic piece, attached to the back, which allows to have the player sit with about 45 degrees.

To make it short as a pure mp3 player this is an excellent choice.

Cons:

1. you can not define a playlist on the player -hello Sony are you sleepy!!!!!

2. if you like to listen to audiobooks which usually have file length of 30min or longer you cannot set a bookmark. That is ridiculous – how can they miss this. It took me a few days to figure out how I can quickly get to let’s 20min in to a recording of 40min. first I just used to hold down the fast forward button but that takes you about a few minutes to get there – I think it only advances at 4x normal speed. I found no other way in the manual. But here the solution: while playing the file – hit pause-now hold down fast forward or fast backward. Both work and get you to the place quickly. nice thing is that both of these functions also wrap around at end or beginning of file.

3. here a bummer. The player has a sleep and wakeup timer. Very nice but you can not use both at the same time. They cancel each other out. So either you go to sleep with sony music or you wake up with it.

4. built-in microphone. No sensitivity adjustment and default is quite insensitive. You really need to speak at close distance in to the microphone to have good recording. I used AUDACITY to renormalize voice recordings.

5. if connected to PC the player is only recognized in MTP mode – can not be changed. I do not think it is a big deal but e.g. you can not use the right click SEARCH function usually available in windows explorer.

Conclusion:

Very nice player for the money.

i subtracted 1 star for all the cons but they may not be important to other users.

Review by mtk5150:

This is a perfect little radio. The reception is very good (much better than a few headphone/radio setup’s I’ve owned), and it is very well made. It’s solid and tough. And it’s smaller than a pack of cigarettes.There are only 2 downsides I can think of:1. It doesn’t have a digital tuner. This can be a major problem with this radio if you’re a profuse channel changer. Dialing in your stations is a bit tricky as the slightest adjustment to the tuning dial will send it across many channels. But if you’re like me (I pretty much stay on one channel all the time), you’ll find this radio to be perfect for you!2. The headphones stink. They do the job, but the radio is actually much better sounding than the headphones allow you to appreciate.It takes only one AA battery and it will last a VERY long time. A set of two AA’s will last you dozens of hours.I recommend this radio highly.

Review by adjective:

Man, I wish I knew about this radio a year ago when I bought a highly-rated but, as it turned out, temperamental digital pocket radio. This one has most of the digital radio’s virtues and none of its flaws. Reception of the stations I listen to is fine, AM sound is good, and FM sound quality is fantastic, comparing quite favorably to the digital. The local classical station sounds sublime, and “Coast to Coast AM” doesn’t fade out on me. Construction is lightweight and extremely rugged. The tuning dial is a little difficult to fine-tune; if Sony wants to improve this model, they’ll make a large disk-type dial with a recessed window that shows the frequency instead of this tiny and ambiguous linear scale. The included headphones don’t do justice to the radio’s clean sound–an extra to and you’re good to go. The belt clip appears to be rugged, but only time will tell. It holds the radio firmly in place.

If you want a simple pocket radio, this one is the best value for the money. Sony still makes really good low-end stuff.

Review by Erik Nelson:

I have owned many of the high end tape and cd players sony has offered,

including the most recent ultrathin DNE20 cd player, a mini-disk player

and the original silver-blue metal walkman.

The sound quality on the E series player is exceptional, qualitatively

exceeding all previous offerings. Listening to a good recording of,

say, classical piano music, you may get the impression that the piano

is in the room, and even be able to make out some level of structure

( for instance, how far away the piano was during recording ).

The user interface is self explanatory and very adequate for listening

to cd’s. If you have a pc with the right windows operating system

and media player, it is easy to transfer disks to the player using the

few printed instructions that come in the box.

The actual execution of transfer still has some problems : If your disk

was sold by a distributor not linked to microsoft’s ( proprietary? )

database, you may find that the cover photo and track titles have been

replaced by the closest thing microsoft can find in its online database.

Although I could type in the right titles myself, I couldn’t find a

simple way to insert the right cover photo and occasionally ( once or

twice ) cover photos did not get transferred into the player.

On the other hand, windows media player is supposed to ‘rip’ the whole

content of the cd, which does appear to get transferred into the player.

This, along with the onboard 5-channel equalizer may account for the

difference in sound quality compared with the ipod.

If your main interest is listening to music, and have regular access to

a windows pc, the E-344 is very well worth the ~. Sony also offers to

replace the player after 2 or 3 years for an up-front payment of ~

( 2 years ).

Review by Subhradyuti Sarkar:

The E-series walkman has really good sound quality, long battery life, easy to use UI and classy look all combined. Also, it is a really open system (specially considering it is from Sony): A. simple drag-and-drop is all that is required to transfer music (though you can create a traditional sync partnership with Windows Media Player 11 if you want to) — not having to deal with a bloatware like iTunes is pure bliss; B. no special port/sync/charging cable — the player has a mini-USB port, and a (supplied) mini-USB to USB cable does sync and recharging the battery. Only one gripe: there is no way to create on-the-go playlists from the walkman; you must create the playlists beforehand in Windows Media Player and sync. Oh, and the 2″ LCD screen is bright and has nice contrast.

Review by Richard Kaplan:

This is the same item as the FX-290, now with a W added. Only difference is the absence of the TV audio band, which will be irrelevent next February. I ve had three of these walkmans in the past couple of years. One shattered upon impact to the ground. I didn’t have the case on it, and with the other two the fast forward button, which I use quite a bit fell off.

That being said, this is probably the greatest walkman I ve owned. The radio cassette player is a dying breed and I m glad to see Sony put out a new version of an old favorite. With 35 hours on one AA battery, this is one of the great values. I still have hundreds of cassette tapes that I have taped from XM the last couple of years, and I still take my walks listening to those. Transferring to a CD is an option,but its too much of a bother. With the belt clip its so easy to just walk listening to a cassette, even though the sound quality is not as good as a CD,but it fits my purposes fine.

With AM and FM and all the presets, and a weather band this is a nice value for and free shipping. I m glad I still have my other two units without the fast forward button. This is becoming a relic, and I want to make sure I have this walkman for some time to come. No MP3 for me. I m satisfied with this unit.

Review by J Keistler:

My first prerecorded cassette was ELO’s first album–that’s how long I’ve been listening to them! We all know the day of cassette recording or playing is long gone; even CD’s are considered done in this day of MP3′s. However, that doesn’t negate the millions, maybe billions, of cassettes that have been sold over the past 30+ years. Cassettes have their faults, but there are so many productions out there that aren’t available on any other medium.

I’ve owned cassette players running 0 ‘way back in the 80′s; these are gone also. The challenge now is to find a portable Walkman-type player that doesn’t sound like crap, and that’s last longer than a week or so. I came across a number of books on audio cassette at home and wanted to do a re-listen. Only a couple have been converted to CD.

I initially purchased a ‘Craig’ model for less than ; it’s also sold as a Jensen, a Coby, and various other names on Amazon. It was a piece of crap; see my review under the Coby name. Virtually useless radio because of tuner problems, and a cassette function that ran at whatever speed it felt like. Needless to say, an adventure for the book listener and worthless for music listening.

I came across this very inexpensive Walkman and didn’t expect much for the price. Have I been surprised! Now, the photo shown at the top isn’t my model, as it has a TV band on it that mine doesn’t have. Mine has AM/FM/Weather/cassette. It appears identical to the one shown.

Unlike virtually ever other cassette player I’ve owned, this one only uses 1 ‘AA’ battery–not ‘AAA’ as other reviewers have stated. The great thing about this is that not only are ‘AA’ batteries ordinarily cheaper, but they last longer, too. I expected the battery life to be shorter as the result of only one battery, but I was wrong. Sony states they are using some new technology to extend battery life, and it’s true. A decent ‘AA’ will last around 35-40 hours, and when running on cassette, around 30 hours. This will vary, of course, according to the quality of battery purchased.

Unlike the Coby/Jensen/Craig derivative, this machine uses digital tuning with an LCD readout. The tuner has functioned with complete band accuracy; none of that playing with a stiff little wheel trying to find the best signal. As stated in the item description, there are 33 presets for the radio. I live outside Houston and can’t imagine needing 33 stations to store, but I guess it’s good for someone. Additionally, the procedure for storing and revising stored stations seems unnecessarily complicated. Probably not for the younger, computer generation, but it does require a lot of steps. I will certainly be retaining the instructions! Actually, it seems equally easy just to set the thing on ‘manual’ and use the rocker switch to find stations. Regardless, through the included headsets, the sound is equal to those players I’ve had in the past costing 10 times as much.

The tape loads through the back, not visible on the photo above. It is a dark smoked plastic cover that flips open with a fingernail. The cover contains two little tabs that hold the cassette, then the cover and cassette flip closed to contact the tape heads. Again, much, much less fiddly than the Coby version.

Another advantage for this Walkman over some competitors is that it contains a ‘rewind’ button. Many players, compact and otherwise, have deleted it over the years. If one is listening to a book or music and needs to re-listen, those units require taking the tape out, flipping it, using the ‘fast-forward’ button, then reversing the procedure. The convenience of a ‘rewind’ button can’t be overestimated.

I don’t think there’s any Dolby noise reduction on this machine, but I never liked using it anyway. I prefer a little hiss to the muddy sound of Dolby-B.

The tape mechanism has worked perfectly for me on a bunch of different cassettes, both well-used and new. Some players get touchy with used cassettes, and are weak with the power required. I have no doubt this Sony will weaken with age, but for now works great.

Headsets are an individual choice; I prefer earbuds. However, the included headsets give a fine sound, especially for their price.

One practical benefit of this machine is that there is an LCD battery life indicator included. For those of us who do a lot of listening it saves being stranded.

No doubt the market for these players will continue to contract. I’m thinking of buying another example of this little Walkman because I do have thousands of cassettes I still enjoy. Highly recommended for those shopping.

Review by D Darkman:

Bought this for a friend & loading it with their music for them (they’re not tech savvy). A good player for non-tech savvy people as the menu / interface is fairly simple & obvious. However:

1) Sound is not that great. I had to create my own “equalized” setting (it lets you create & save two equalization curves) in which I boosted the bass and minimized the treble, to get it to sound normal. Probably the ear buds — my Apple iPod sounds much better when I plug them in — but even so not quite as good as an iPod. However, if you’re willing to fiddle & make your own equalizer setting with the bass up high, the treble down low, and everything a straight line in between, that’s okay.

2) Poor programming in many ways. They may improve the firmware, but as I write this (end of Dec 2009) the sort of software bug I find is: load up songs of one album that has more than 9 tracks, and track 10 plays immediately after track 1. That is, it ignores the actual track number, and orders the tracks by a simple alphabetical reading of the name. Shouldn’t do that!

3) FM reception is okay but not superb. (Just so you know, there is no AM). Easy to set presets and flip around the presets, but no way to label the presets (e.g. “WNPR” or “OLDIES”…)

Here are the plusses:

Looks nice, feels nice, very small (approx business card size, about 1/3″ thick), certainly saves $ over an iPod if the recipient will definitely not want to put applications on their device or do anything other than simply listen to music.

Review by David J. Rogers:

This is a great MP3 player. Very easy to use. Sounds great. Easy to download from ITunes and Microsoft Media Player. A good price for the memory as well. Had a Zune and had alot of problems with it.

Review by Ray:

This is a wonderful little MP3 player for someone looking for excellent audio quality, small form factor, low weight, and low cost. Even the screen quality on this unit is good enough to support good video playback, but that’s not really this player’s forte. But what it does do audio-wise, it does exceptionally well, and Sony has certainly developed the unit with the same high quality electronic audio circuitry that has been used in many other of its recent MP3 units.

The player is small and light, and has a solid, high quality feel, with no squeaks or loose parts. The menu is driven from Sony’s standard MP3 menuing system, a system which is very easy to master within a minute or two. The 16gb storage space provides plenty of room to store albums, too. At 192kps, this unit will hold well over 100 albums, and still have room for storing digital photos and some videos with room to spare.

Throw out the supplied “headphones” (and I use that term advisedly) away, and combine this player with a set of Klipsch headphones (or even one of Sony’s better ear bud products), and then you’ll experience see the true audio capabilities of this player. The audio performance will easily surpass many of the other MP3 players on the market, and at higher bitrates with a good set of headphones, you’ll have a true marvel of miniaturized electronics.

At under 0, this is a real bargain, and an enjoyable one, at that. Five stars for performance, five for price.

PROS

1. Extremely high quality sound reproduction

2. 16Gb

3. Bright, crisp screen (OLED, of course)

4. Small form factor

5. Quality construction and quality internal electronics

6. Low price

7. Excellent battery life (20 – 30 actual hours per charge)

CONS

1. No 32Gb version available

2. Color available only in red or black (nice, but where’s the other colors??)

3. Album browse still not available in text-less format (which makes it easier to see more albums per screen; why was this abandoned?)

4. Headphones are a joke: unless you realize this, you’ll not experience the units’ true sound capabilities

5. Somewhat limited set of cases (apparently, no hard plastic case is yet available for the unit, only flexible polypropylene)

Review by Tarun Gudipaty:

When I was thinking of buying an mp3 player for my girlfriend….my obvious choice was an Ipod. But then I gave it a thought to go check out Sony. Sony is a great brand with historic products like the walkman. Yes they were late into this game of mp3 players…but it had a reputation to maintain. This and the nice reviews from the Amazon users gave me a sense of confidence to buy sony walkman for half the price of an ipod 16gb!! It made perfect sense to take the risk. And it gave me good returns!!

The sony walkman was a delight to hold in my hand and was stylish too. Even the screen was glossy and really clear which made scrolling through photos fun. The only backlash was it attracted smudges pretty easy. Then the sound quality. It was absolutely top notch. It was very much in the same league as an ipod and sometimes I feel like its a little better too. The battery lasted a long time…although I do not exactly know for how many hours. If ipod is the competitor then it would win in sleekness and battery. The rest of the specifications of sony are as good or better.

But the biggest aspect where sony will win hands down is the price. Its half the price of an Ipod with the same capacity and its easy to load songs, photos or videos into this one!!! Beat it!!

I would definitely recommend buying this product if you care about your money as much as I do for the same quality!!

Sony has once again proved it’s worth it reputation.

Cheers,

GT

Review by H. Ongaro:

This is one of the best CD players I’ve used. I listen to a lot of Books on Tape and this player picks up exactly where you leave off even if you stop it to do something else for awhile. It’s fairly good about playing scratched CDs and has not jumped while I have been working out in the yard or walking with it. The ear phones are OK but get bit irritating after wearing them for a time. If you are looking for a good CD portable player without the radio, this is it. It is pretty light on battery use also.

Review by Audiophan:

When I first began listening to a CD I was not impressed with the sound of this player as it seemed somewhat veiled or recessed. I played with some of the functions, such as the Mega bass boost, which basically ruined the sound by drowning it in bass, then I tried using the AVLS automatic volume limiter – a function I can’t ever foresee using.

I found my answer through a careful read of the instructions regarding “G protection.

By canceling the anti-skip function the sound VASTLY improved. Since I do my listening in “non” active mode, I’m not jogging or wrestling while listening to the music, this listening mode is the perfect one for me.

To disable or enable the G mode, press the off button, then press and hold down the fast forward button then press and hold down the play button. Wait a second or two and look in the display window for G-off or G-on. You will then notice a dramatic improvement in the sound quality.

As for battery installation, it took me about 20 seconds to install a pair of Lithium batteries. A child could do it blindfold.

Pair this player with a decent set of headphones ( I bought Sony MDR-150) and you’ve got quite a nice sounding setup. In normal mode, which I use exclusively (meaning no bass boost and G-off) the sound is rich, extended, clear (meaning surprisingly transparent for a player in this price range) and most importantly, it does not pain your ears during long listening sessions.

Overall, I am quite happy with this Sony.