The Sony NWZ-ZX1 review- thoughts

[Al ears]

Very nice to see the review of the recently released Sony NWZ-ZX1 digital music player. I have been awaiting this for a while to see how it stands up against my Colorfly C4 Pro.

And oh dear...

Cost should not have been higlighted so much in my view as it merely puts it along with other available players of this ilk. (perhaps I should say quality players) like the Mark 2 version of the Astell&Kern AK110 and indeed the Colorfly C4 Pro.

Generally I love the look and build of the Sony possibly in preference to the Astell&Kern who's 'stuck out' volume control appears to be a misplaced afterthought.

Where the Sony is going to fail big-time is the lack of a micro SD card slot as noted in the review.

Whilst it has more storage than the Astell&Kern you can, at least, add more to it's 96gb.

Sound quality, at a guess, is going to be very much on a par with the Astell&Kern.

The real kicker in my view is going to be the lack of DSD support. As hi-res downloads go this is going to become far more readily available and rightly so. For a modern digital player to ignore it is a bi mistake which is exactly why the Mark 2 version of the Astell&Kern AK110 now supports this format.

All in all it sounds like a bit of a rush job by Sony ...... unless they have a Mark 2 version of the NWZ-ZX1 waiting in the wings... yours for £1000.

 

[Andy Madden]

Hi Al ears. Sony has told us that future Walkman products will support DSD and feature expandable memory. Seems like this is the first of a many (or a couple at least...) We actualy have the A&K MkII in the building too. We're going to put them head-to-head in the April issue of the magazine...

 

[KidKomet]

I have been waiting for the ZX1 for quite a while, definitely picking up April's edition of the magazine. I must admit, I was a little shocked at the price. Hopefully the performance justifies it!

 

[Al ears]

Hi Al ears. Sony has told us that future Walkman products will support DSD and feature expandable memory. Seems like this is the first of a many (or a couple at least...) We actualy have the A&K MkII in the building too. We're going to put them head-to-head in the April issue of the magazine...

Thanks Andy I'll be looking out for that April issue for sure.

 

[Al ears]

It was always going to be up around there. They know the only real competition are the Astell&Kerns AK100 which is around £560 for the original or around £650 for the Mark 2.

Didn't surprise me one bit I'm sorry to say.

Perhaps though Sony have priced it just right. I don't know what DAC is inside it but the AK110 has a Wolson DAC.

Now assuming both are very simiar on the SQ front then the high amount of main storage compared to the AK's 32GB means you'd have to factor in the cost of 2x32GB microSD cards to get a maximum of 96GB into the AK100.

So it's pretty much a 'go get' for the Sony but only if comparing it to the original AK100, not the Mark 2 version.