Ladies and gents there's something very wrong with the a306 - i can't believe anyone in their right minds would release something sounding so off.
Just so my tests don't falsify some data due to balanced armature impedance tonality changes, I plugged in the 306 in my headphone amplifier - Woo WA8 and tested with HD800s
To compare and contrast, I aligned the volume with all my other test devices (and all Sony DAPs were set to volume 100 on 3.5mm, I noted they all (AM2, ZX507) sounded the same level on 3.5mm scale, plenty loud and the 306 I have is uncapped for sure.
I started with Mojo 2: It sound excellent, wide, detailed, instruments separated, also smooth, sparkly, tight and articulated deep bass. All great
WM1AM2: Similar to Mojo 2 but a bit more together sounding (Sony coherence),but less instrument separation and little fuzzy and less articulated, but still a nice listen.
ZX507: a lesser AM2 essentially, but nice bouncy warm bass, groovy if not so refined.
a306: Oh, did i accidentally turn on a bass shelf eq on the DSP, sounds like everything below 125hz is chopped off by about 10db - and I mean everything. Nope, DSP is off, what in the world is going on here something must be wrong with my player, maybe some rogue process is running chopping off all the bass or there is a hardware fault. It is THAT BAD I'm serious. This is no precision audio instrument that costs 350$ - this should be a 5$ dac dongle with a cheap Android OS phone slapped on.
Please someone tell me things improve massively with burn in, otherwise this is absolute trash. It's seriously as if Sony have put on an EQ shelf cut from 120hz down, if not higher.
* I don't mean to diss anyone enjoying their player - but if you listen to a ZX507 or an AM2 on 3.5mm and jump to the A306 for same track, you should hear a massive decrease in bass; it's not even a neutral-bright, it's a super compressed bass that moves almost no air like there is a serious problem. The 3.5mm on the a306 should at least be on par with the ZX507