[Baba booey]

I purchased this from Sony Style for 179.99$ plus Tax and their "Accidental Damage Plan" which was 36.99+ for 2 years. The price is plenty competitive with similar players(less than the Nano, more than the View, around the D2's price).

The player is presented well as you can see from my ok picture taken with my Lumix LZ-5(ebay

). You see the player and the headphones of course.

Before I get to the player I want to talk about the headphones. The cord says Made in Thailand and the model number is MDR-EX082. They are well built but are big and hard. They look similar to the JVC Air cushions(HA-FX66).

When wearing them I can really feel them even with the tips that are on them when taken out of the bag. You get small, medium, and large, which is to be expected. They do hurt though, even as I wear them over-the-ear. But I'll say this much:they sound good(similar to my HA-FX55s, but I can't say anything about my X3i's because they are in for repairs)

, they isolate better than the HA-FX55's, and the bass is nice and punchy. I'm listening to Super Shooter by RipSlyme right now(Gantz

) and the bass is punchy and the vocals are pretty good. I also listen to a lot of heavy metal, such as System, Rammstein, Megaherz, etc. and they do well for this type of music. And rap as well. I can't say much for the lows, mids, and highs, because I don't know much about that type of stuff. I might consider Kramer-modding them though.

And now the player itself. It's 9.3mm thin, or .37", which is great.

Far thinner than my D2 and E270, which both might be sold. The screen is a bit of a smudge magnet and the control area is a bit as well. It uses a proprietary USB cable, but oh well. The navigation is rather easy because of the 5-way control, the 2 buttons, 1 on each side,and the dedicated volume buttons and the hold switch(which is on the SIDE, not the back like the NWZ-A816(yes?)). The headphone jack is on the bottom left. There is a little indent in the back to hold the kickstand, which I loop through the lanyard hole which is on the left(along with the hold switch and volume rocker). The player is made in Malaysia as opposed to China which contributes to the very sturdy build quality.
The sound quality is impressive to me. Although it doesn't play .FLAC or .OGG, it does play .wav, which I encoded all of my .flac files from the D2 to. The EQ is solid with 5 bands that go -3 to +3 and a Clear Bass option that goes from 0 to +3. The options are:None, Heavy, Pop, Jazz, "unique", and 2 custom ones. There is also VPT(Surrond), DSEE(Sound Enhance), Dnamic Normalizer, Clear Stereo. One thing that bothers me being someone who listens to big files(5+ hour Stern show) is that the player does not have an audio bookmarking feature like many other players did. When you pause the player, the FF/RW is pretty good, but still, I guess I have to anticipate audio bookmarking in a possible future firmware update, possibly with things to dream of such as DivX, .FLAC, and Ogg Vorbis.
The now playing screen displays a small album art that can be stretched with the option button.

I tend to use the folder browsing because I download my music and encode it separately. The list in the Music Library menu has:
All Songs, Album, Artist, Genre, Release Year, and Folder.

The video playback impressed me. I encoded my files with the JetAudio video converter. I used 384kbps video, 128kbps audio, MP4, 320x240,and 25fps, I believe. It takes a while to convert with my computer(~40 mins for a 22 min anime episode) but YMMV. The video orinetation can be viewed landscape left and right and horizontal(kind of silly, but some will find use for it. The video looks pretty good for what the player is.

The player does not have an FM Tuner like the S616 but becoming a Stern Fan I no longer have need for one but some people here might. My first player was an Iriver H10 which I got over the mini because of the color screen and the FM tuner and recorder but that's back when I was...14 and listening to...Z100

. Well back to the Sony. Don't confuse this for the A828, that one does bluetooth and noise cancelling. They didn't have it at the store when I went either. Another cool thing about the player is that when you turn off the power, it's not that it turns off but when you press the power button again it goes right back on. The battery life of the player is very good and probably somewhat close to the 36 hours music/10 hours video that they guess. If I were to measure, it would probably be ~26/8 because of higher bitrate music and changing video files. Those are still VERY solid numbers.

In closing, this is a great player. Definitely look into this player and consider my review before pulling the trigger on other players.

 

[souperman]

I can't wait for the 729 16GB.

 

[RoadHazard]

Like expected it sounds like it's exactly like the A818 (except that the 728 has a larger screen, and as a result is larger overall), which definitely isn't a bad thing!

 

[shigzeo]

ive not held the 728 but the 828 and the 900 series i have fondled on many occasions. very nicely made players - quite a step up from the cheap plastic that is the a600 and 700 series (the ones here in japan)

 

[thetuc]

I got mine on Thursday from Best Buy ($159). I agree wholeheartedly with your review except for the complaint about the headphones being hard or uncomfortable. Again, I've only had them for a few days, but I find them very comfortable, even when wearing for eight hours in a row at work.

 

[Amblin]

Great review, very informative, I like how you covered the bundled buds, one of only a handfull of freebees they throw you that are actually worth a review of their own. Oh yes, and I'm glad you are enjoying the FX-55s.

 

[1UP]

I've loved my 818 - the scuttlebug from the atrac forums is the new range is primarily a capacity/cosmetic upgrade - Sony did so well with this range and this new one looks a great player!

 

[Baba booey]

another small critique is that instead of showing hours and minutes for a bigger file, it only shows minutes. MY current file is 328 minutes, or 5 hours, 28 minutes.

 

[Ypoknons]

I actually like this player better than my P2, even if the P2 is far more featured. The interface is faster with the physical buttons, and the included headphones are great. Even for a spoiled E500/triple.fi owner like me, the included headphones are pretty good - they sound big and are not sharp. I'd say pleasant. Bass is definitely Sony - boomy.

I also really like now it knows to default to UMS in linux/mac and MTP in Windows.

 

[cuba0555]

To me its still a toss up of the P2 or this sony player.

 

[Baba booey]

I'd say the Sony is better than the P2. Unless you're really going for video playback AND a touchscreen.

 

[lucky_star]

i have one vote for the sony NWZ-A729 16GB. I got this one 2 weeks ago. Its sound is very good and have long battery life.

 

[moseboy]

I've been thinking about buying the Sony NWZ-A818 ever since I saw a video review of it on CNET. This past year, one of my friends came to me asking about which mp3 player he should get and I recommended the A818 to him. He ended up getting it and let me try it out. I loved pretty much everything about it. It was amazing, and I was going to buy it as well, but in my head I kept going, "Just wait and see what Sony will come out with next before you buy it...."

And so I've waited....

Now the NWZ-A728 (and the A729

) is here and it looks great. I think my decision will be made soon (after over two years of searching for that "one" mp3 player).

So I have a question at this point: Is the A728 better or worse than the A818? Pros/cons for each? What do you guys recommend?

 

[Trastan]

Quote:

Originally Posted by moseboy /img/forum/go_quote.gif I've been thinking about buying the Sony NWZ-A818 ever since I saw a video review of it on CNET. This past year, one of my friends came to me asking about which mp3 player he should get and I recommended the A818 to him. He ended up getting it and let me try it out. I loved pretty much everything about it. It was amazing, and I was going to buy it as well, but in my head I kept going, "Just wait and see what Sony will come out with next before you buy it...." And so I've waited.... Now the NWZ-A728 (and the A729 ) is here and it looks great. I think my decision will be made soon (after over two years of searching for that "one" mp3 player). So I have a question at this point: Is the A728 better or worse than the A818? Pros/cons for each? What do you guys recommend?

I hear you! Same deal here, and I certainly found my happy place with the A818 teamed up with MediaMonkey and a Zune Pass subscription. I honestly can't imagine getting much better than this.

As far as choices between the A72x and A81x, it's definitely down to personal preference. They sound the same and have an identical interface, and even feature the same resolution in their screens. I chose the A818 due to its smaller screen (making it more durable), the smaller size, and the better price (got mine at the end of a sale at the online Sony store for $127 with free shipping). They're so close in features, it's really a question of how much you value putting videos on it. I have my iPod touch for videos and podcasts, so a smaller music-only player was perfect for me. If you value video playing ability, you might want the newer players.

Either way you'll be happy.

 

[moseboy]

Actually, at this point, if they didn't worsen anything going from the A818 to the A728, then I'm probably going to get either the A728 or A729. I really like the cosmetics and ergonomics of the A720 series over the A818. Not that there is anything really wrong with the A818. I was just looking for a different style: And I found that style that I'm looking for in the A720 series.

Now to find a good deal on either the A728 or A729.... I'm willing to wait.