Portable players are NOT dead: meet the SONY Walkman NW-A306
4,2 / 5,0 | 
The Sony Walkman NW-A306 (also called the NW-ZX707 in some territories) is a new addition to the old world of personal digital music players.
Although they seem to be keeping this market up singlehandedly, Sony isn’t shy of refining the features and promising a higher fidelity listening experience with the AI-assisted DSEE (Digital Sound Enhancement Engine) technology.
The new Sony Walkman NW-A306
The latest addition to the Sony Walkman family, the NW-A306 is equipped with WiFi and a 3.6-inch touchscreen for easy navigation. You can also operate the basic playback functionality with the physical buttons, and the battery provides up to 36 hours of listening time.
Music players of this nature are somewhat of a rarity. The NW-A306 isn’t that compact and only allows streaming via WiFi. Moreover, I couldn’t see many people using it for exercise. So those who’d prefer it over their phone would surely be a minority of fidelity snobs.
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- Front view · Source: Sony
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- Angles
If however, you do fall into this category, then this could be the mobile listening experience you’re after. The NW-A306 runs on Android 12 and has Bluetooth 5.0 support to connect with your favourite wireless earbuds or headphones.
The list of compatible audio codecs is very impressive. However, I’m wondering about the percentage of people out there that actually have digital music collections backed up on hard drives.
Either way, this should be a high-resolution listening experience. Sony has a great reputation for their digital audio converters. So when combined with the S Master HX audio amplifier it promises convenient audiophile playback for road trips or long flights.
Pricing and availability:
The Sony Walkman NW-A306 / NW-ZX707 will be available later this month in Europe for a price of £350 / €400.
- NW-A306 full spec sheet
More about Sony:
- NW-A306 official product page
- Everything Sony
- More about music players
Video:
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4 responses to “Portable players are NOT dead: meet the SONY Walkman NW-A306”
i definitely have digital music collections backed up on hard drives.
Me too
Many musicians forget that using a music player for break music is far more preferable to tying up their phone…
But this one is WAY overpriced for that. I use an old no longer used iPhone for break music, Dirt cheap!
Got lot of music backed up on drives and there so much missing on the streaming services still, but this device isn’t for me.