While Sony’s lineup of Walkman media players don’t have the same sleekness of elegance compared to the iPod touch, they are favored by some audiophiles due to their ability to playback audio with surprising clarity. In any case we guess for the non-audiophile, it might boil down to a matter of preference, such as design and price, and if you’re in the market for a new media player, Sony has announced the Walkman NW-ZX1 and NW-F880.
The NW-F880 will continue Sony’s lineup of F-series media players and will come in 16GB, 32GB, and 64GB options and will support formats such as FLAC and WAV which are higher quality formats compared to MP3. The NW-F880 will also feature hardware buttons on the side that will allow for playback control so you won’t have to keep looking at the device to adjust playback.
Next up is the NW-ZX1 which will be marketed as a high-end media player. It will support the same audio formats as the F880 but will strip down some features which supposedly will help improve audio quality, and will see the removal of features such as FM radio and even digital noise cancellation. The ZX1 will also sport a larger capacitor and will even come with a built-in headphone amplifier and come with 128GB of storage. Both devices will feature a 4” display and will be powered by Android 4.1 Jelly Bean.
The Sony NW-F880 will be priced at $274, $304, and $405 for the 16GB, 32GB, and 64GB options respectively. The NW-ZX1 on the other hand will be priced at a more premium price of $760, possibly thanks to its more audiophile-like features. Both devices will be available in Japan come 19th of October but no word on international availability.
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