Amazon.com.au:Customer reviews: Sony NW-A55L 16GB Walkman Hi-Res Portable Digital Music Player with Touch Screen, S-Master HX and DSEE-HX

Top positive review

Very well constructed with good sound quality

Reviewed in Australia on 3 November 2020

PROS:
Beautifully constructed. A solid and visually pleasing device.
Plays music and podcasts very well.
Good battery life

CONS:
Does not connect to wi-fi.
Doesn't play videos. Won't display your photos. Does not play Audible books.
I was able to convert my Audible aax files to mp3 files but it the sound quality suffers with converted files.
Battery life a bit disappointing and not as advertised

Overall I quite like this device because it is constructed so well. I love the size and weight. Fits nicely into my hand and I like the weight of the player. It doesn't have that flimsy feeling of some of the cheaper brands.

I am quite puzzled as to why Sony made such a beautiful screen that can't display photos or video. I have a cheap MP3 player that has no problems with Audible (aax) files and can display photos and even display videos. Why did Sony build such a beautiful, reliable device and then hobble it with a limited operating system ?

I'm still giving it 4 stars because it has a very good sound quality and looks and feels good. But an upgrade to the operating system to include more file formats would make it an easy 5 stars.

One person found this helpful

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Amazon Customer

Sounds as entry level player

Reviewed in Australia on 6 December 2020

It was not bad in sound but expected more from a dedicated player.

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From Australia

Paul Thompson

Very well constructed with good sound quality

Reviewed in Australia on 3 November 2020

Color: BlackVerified Purchase

One person found this helpful

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DZUNG

Great Product. Pricey but Worth It!

Reviewed in Australia on 26 January 2021

Color: BlackVerified Purchase

This MP3 player was the third one I bought this year in my search for a good MP3 player. While the other two units work as they should while being much less expensive, they are absolutely no match for the Sony. The Sony 's hardware design is superb while its software interface has been most intuitively put together. The Sony can do anything an Apple iPod can and more. Most importantly, storage of music is simple drag and drop instead of having to use proprietary distribution network. I should have bought this player from the outset and save the money spent on the two other units which have been sitting idle following the arrival of the Sony. Highly recommended MP3 player for "serious music lovers", as they say :-)

One person found this helpful

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Lu Tao

Great deal for the A55

Reviewed in Australia on 2 December 2020

Color: BlueVerified Purchase

Take a bit longer for shipping from UK, but great deal for this machine

One person found this helpful

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Ralph

Nice eq happy with sound

Reviewed in Australia on 8 January 2021

Color: BlueVerified Purchase

Equalizer detailed enough to tune to my headphones. Very happy with sound. 16 gig storage good. No radio, minor inconvenience.

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Amazon Customer

Sounds as entry level player

Reviewed in Australia on 6 December 2020

Color: BlackVerified Purchase

It was not bad in sound but expected more from a dedicated player.

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ReachForTheSkies

Awesome sound

Reviewed in Australia on 27 November 2020

Color: BlackVerified Purchase

Some people say this little box of goodness has fantastic build quality. I guess if youre comparing it with todays electronics but it cant hold a candle to the portable devices Sony made in mid '90s to the mid '00s that had magnesium alloy cases and big chunky buttons and remote controls which were out of this world. The sound quality of the NW-A55 is incredible especially when loaded with MrWalkmans special firmware. In this regard it is comaprable with the sound quality of the HD amp in Sonys late minidisc players (which could do lossless atrac3 ie flac). It's clear, full and vibrant, slightly towards bassy but not boring like on some dacs which are very clear. Ive heard a lot of complaints about the NW-A55 sticking with the WM-port instead of usb but I dont think it is that bad as a wm-port to usb cable is easily found online and they're pretty inexpensive to replace if you lose the one thats supplied in the box. the WM-port is also a really simple port too with the pin layout a;llowing the output of direct audio. The bigger plug grabs onto the device better than microusb and usb-c.

On the things I realyl dont like:

- I wish the device was bigger. It's hard to hold without having your fingers touch/cover parts of the screen or be on the buttons when youre clutching the device tight when youre switching songs out on a shady street. The screen is small too and has a cramped interface with tiny text... makesit hard to scroll through and make selections in a list. The UI is laid out pretty bad too. Common things you would use are deeply buried in the menus and in non intuitive places. It shouldnt be a chore to find the bitrate of a song. It's easy to bookmark a song but can you work out how to retrieve that bookmark? Why does the briefcase change function on different screens. The menus are terribly laid out and that is sad because during the minidisc era Sony were at the top of the game on this in portables. Using this device as a usb dac is pretty useless as there is a horrible delay. I think it might be the device is slow at processing audio as the visualisation meters dont exactly match the beat of the music. So it is not good as a dac on the computer for watching movies, youtube or gaming.

-cant display cover.jpg in the song folder
-cant play music videos
-cant display lrc lyric files
-no earphones supplied (even a very basic pair would be nice for using outdoors or completness for testing the device.
-needs to rebuild song library every time it's restarted
-no ogg support
-battery unremoveable

On the good things:
+nfc
+bluetooth
+radio (on all units but might be disabled. Re-enable by changing region to Australia)
+unicode support without selecting a Asian region so all your Japanese song names still display correctly when Australia region is selected for example.
+volume limiter can be disabled by changing the region to somewhere like Australia
+sound quality is superb with MrWalkmans firmware
+build quality is a two piece of carved aluminium... Apple tier.
+screen and ui is responsive
+easy drag and drop from the computer to load in new music
+plays most music types
+microsd card expansion

4 people found this helpful

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From other countries

Ultron

ich bin stumm vor Glück ... grundlegende Funktionen fehlen ....

Reviewed in Germany on 25 January 2020

Color: BlackVerified Purchase

Der Player sollte meine gesamte Musikbibliothek speichern. Es sind ca 7.000 Musikstücke.
Das ging auch klaglos - bis ich Musikstücke SUCHEN wollte.
Schlichtweg - es gibt keine Suchfunktion !
Sony erwartet, das man die 7.000 Titel durchscrollt, bis man zum entsprechenden Titel gelangt.
Es gibt auch keine Registerfunktion (A-Z) wo man dann wenigstens schon zu dem entsprechenden Anfangsbuchstaben springen kann.
Weiterhin kann man zwar Playlisten anlegen und auch importieren, aber der Player kopiert den vollen MP3 file in die Playliste. Wenn man also ein Lieblingslied in 8 Playlisten hat, dann wird das Lied 8x in den Player kopiert !
So kann man auch Speicherplatz sinnlos vergeuden.
Das ist erstes Lehrjahr im programmieren, einen Index aufbauen und dann die Playlists nur auf den Song verweisen lassen.
Fazit: Ich sitze eigentlich immer noch fassungslos vor dem Gerät ... absoluter Fehlkauf.

199 people found this helpful

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Hurf

NW-A55

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 15 December 2019

Color: BlackVerified Purchase

I really wanted to like this.

After the disappointing revelation the NW-A105 (with Android) doesn't support 24bit streaming through 3rd party apps, I figured a 'downgrade' to the A55 would still be a solid tactical move, thanks to the inclusion of the LDAC Bluetooth Receiver. This 'new' feature, previously included on the ZX300, basically let's you stream 24bit audio from your phone to the A55 in up to 990kbps.

But that's about all it does.

Compare the A55 to the Fiio M9 and the differences are night and day.

A55
* Proprietary USB connection
* No WiFi
* Very low output
* Proprietary DAC serving both channels

Fiio M9
* USB-C connection
* WiFi AND LDAC Bluetooth receiver
* High output on the 3.5mm jack PLUS a 2.5mm balanced connection.
* Dual AK4490EN DAC - one for each channel

I picked up the M9 for an extra fiver compared to the A55 - and returned the A55 in just a day of testing...Disappointing effort from Sony

99 people found this helpful

Mr. S. RAFFERTY

Great for travelling

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 27 January 2020

Color: BlackVerified Purchase

I really needed something to listen to when travelling (I travel a lot, I was killing my iphone battery and it was dead when I landed). I looked and demo'd some of the Chinese DAPs on the Market and as nice and as well built as many of them are, they nearly all fail on my criteria battery life >20 hours, I wanted something that I did not have to recharge, half-way through my journey. The only DAPs, in my budget <£200 (that met my criteria) were the Sony NW-A45 and NW-A55. I decided to buy the newer A55, as it ticked all of my boxes (pretty much).
I have to say my purchase did not disappoint. The size is great (it is small), battery life is excellent, 40+ hours on a single charge and Sound Quality is great (I listen to FLAC from 16/44.1 to 24/192). I normally use Tin HiFi T2s for wired or Sony WH-1000 XM3s. And hereby is one of my 2 minor criticisms of the WM-A55:
1. Sony do not have XM3s (their best selling noise cancelling headphones) as a headphone profile, so you cannot change the EQ, which you can with the app on a phone.
And
2. Sony's insistence on still clinging to their horrible WM-Port, they should have migrated to USB-C like they have on their NW-A105.

If they had changed these 2 things then this would have been a perfect DAP. as it is I would score it 95/100.

If you are looking to break away from music on your phone and want something that offers good battery life, great SQ, great BT connection and very nice interface, look no further than the NW-A55.

43 people found this helpful

Mr. S

Great, especially if you mod it!

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 3 May 2020

Color: BlackVerified Purchase

Out of the box this is a good device, however the volume is heavily capped by default and with no way around it from within the device. This would not be a bad thing, but somehow I felt the audio quality was not quite as expected. I had heard of a mod that could be done to the A45 that removes restrictions imposed on the device, and with fingers crossed decided to try it on my A55.

Well it was a success and actually easier than I thought when I followed the instructions carefully. Now my A55 is unlocked and uncrippled! Not only does the device now go to a volume that I prefer not to reach due to how loud it is, but the quality of sound at even low volumes is amazing! The difference is night and day!

Before the mod, it was low volume, and somehow lacked the detail I expected. Now the detail is all there! All frequencies from low bass, to mid and those detailed high ranges are perfectly represented! Even taking low quality mp3 files and enabling an option that re-invigerates those heavily compressed files works wonders in recreating lost details. I listen to my music and hear details that were lost when playing for all these years on my mobile phone. I have fallen in love with this player. Battery life is good, the menu`s are pretty clear, not perfect but certainly usable. The device itself feels premium, it has an assuring weight on it, a lovely metallic casing, simple and intuitive controls mounted on the side for volume, play/pause, track skip and a very handy hold switch to prevent touch screen or side button inputs while in the pocket.

Be aware, the mod is software (no hardware modifications required), however I suspect it may void your warranty. For me it was well worth doing, you do it at your own discretion!

38 people found this helpful

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