HiFi Blog: digital audio goodness

The first installation of reader-contributed reviews kicks of with a review of the Sony NW-A3000 from HiFi Blog reader Morgan Smario. Please note that we don’t necessarily endorse the comments included herein—these are reviews contributed by our readers, and we’re just here to give them a stand to voice their opinions. Without further ado:

“The NW-A3000 is a sleek design that fits perfectly in the palm of your hand and is not too cumbersome to weigh your hand down. All of the buttons are easily accessible and the small bump on the “Play/Pause” button enables the user to quickly locate the button of choice without looking at the device. The LED display shows up poorly in direct sunlight, but in all other cases it looks wonderfully from any angle. Even a direct flashlight beam cannot stop the LED from being readable.

The sound is quite good, even before the volume limit unlock that is available; a round and robust sound with plenty of bass to appease the masses. After unlocking the volume limit, the levels just get louder, and the bass, treble and mids become more intense. Even if you’re going for soft and relaxing sound at lower levels, the bass and treble are still there, so you can appreciate the sound. The EQ presets are also well designed and fit nicely with the types of music they are intended for. There are two user-customisable custom presets to make room for more flexibility.

The software for the computer (Connect Player) leaves a lot to be desired, but from what this reviewer can see, with the updates being pushed out by Sony, they are making every effort to fix the problems. Already three updates into the player, the software is responding quicker and more accurately. Simple changes such as a red “Do Not Disconnect” rather than a black smaller text “Do Not Disconnect” make a remarkable difference. The format for the player is also a bit demanding. If you’ve already encoded your music in the MP3 format, leave it as such. The small amount of difference you would gain by going with ATRAC (in terms of crossfading support and longer battery life) is probably not worth the headache of converting all of your music. If you’re going to rip a CD for the first time, testing ATRAC is easier and much more practical.

The features inside of the NW-A3000 are also fantastic. The “Shuffle All” and “Time Machine Shuffle” are well executed. As is the “Favorites” list and the “History”. All of which hold for about 3 or 4 days, depending on how many songs you go through. The “Search” feature on the device is also very well done, however, if you have a lot of songs and are trying to pull them up, depending on what screen setting you have, you’ll go to a screensaver before the songs will pull, requiring you to re-search for the songs.

If you’ve purchased an FM transmitter for the device (I suggest one from iRiver) the sound quality is also very good. Again, even at low levels, your car will transmit very good sound, that is, depending upon your car’s speakers.

Over all, I strongly suggest this device, or its small counterpart (NW-A1000) to any user who would like an MP3 player and not a photo viewer that also plays MP3s!

Rating: 6.5/10

• In Europe, you can get the NW-A3000 for £150/€220/$277 from Advanced MP3 Players.
• In the US, you can get the 8GB NW-A1200 for $200 from SonyStyle—comes in pink and violet colors.
• In Canada, these models go under the AURA line (as in “Sony AURA NW-A1000”) for ~350CAD/300USD.

It’s been a pleasure hosting Morgan’s review—if you’d like to share a review with us, don’t hesitate to contact us.