chadbang
Headphoneus Supremus
- Joined
- Aug 2, 2001
- Posts
- 5,998
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- 33
Just a brief, informal review FYI.
I just picked up a Sony D-NE715 portable CD/MP3 player to fill in a hole in my audio system. I didn't have anything that would play MP3 CDs in my main system, and there have been times I've wanted that option.
The Sony D-NE715 was release March 2003 and it's budget model, costing around 90 British pounds (US$120 approx). It plays CDs, MP3 CDs and also Atrac3 CDs (it comes with PC software to create Atrac encoded cds).
The unit itself is built moderately well. Primarily made of plastic. Construction and build quality is nothing to write home about, however. It feels solid enough but looks "budget".
The main reason I picked this unit was its layout. Because I wanted something to plug into my home stereo, I desired a unit with it's function bottons on the top. With smaller Sony portables the buttons are usually place around the edges of the unit. That keeps the players looking sleek, but makes them a pain to access when the unit is sitting on a flat surface. Hence, I wanted top seated buttons, which this unit has. It comes with a remote, but I didn't care about that option.
Also important for home use was an LCD display on top of the unit. A lot of portables put the LCD on the remote. The D-NE715 has its LCD on top and it's a three line display - which is nice.
USABILITY:
I'm very pleased with the unit as far as functionality goes. So far the unit has played every MP3 CD I've made in the past. No problem with Variable Bit Rate or sample rates. Happy as a clam with its ability to play mp3s. It reads disc info in about 8 secs. Nice quick start up. Skipping around folders and songs is also speedy enough - maybe an average of 3-4 secs.
All the buttons are large and easy to operate and all the functions of the unit are accessible on the top of the player.
A dial wheel that lets you scroll through folders or tracks works very nicely, it is simply and well designed. Sony has fixed the former complaint about not being able to fast forward or reverse through a song. You can now do that.
Digital Megabass - Utter crap. I don't know what they did, but not only does it boost the bass - Sony seems to have added some kind of false "dynamic push" to the bass. It sudden sounds like someone's thumping the bass driver on your speaker. Unbelievably bad. A simple and much subtler boosting of the lower frequencies would have been so much better!
The "display" button gives you all the basic info you need. You can toggle between time remaining, elapsed time and total disc time. Basic, but useful. The LCD scrolls ID tags, gives you folder, track or song names. It works great and reads the info on the disc very well (and I even burned my discs with Toast on a Mac, simply using the "folders and files" format).
A nice function is a "bookmark" function. If you have an MP3 disc with 140 songs. You can bookmark your favorites and the unit will play back only those songs in "Bookmark" play mode. It remembers up to 10 bookmarked discs. (haven't figured out how to clear bookmarked discs, yet.)
All in all, the unit is easy to work and well laid out
Out of 10, I rate its overall fuctions and layout a 8.5
SOUND
CD PLAYBACK
Playing Redbook CDs I was pleasantly surprised for such a cheap unit. Very listenable. I think its a fairly analytical player, not much on "romance", but pleasant enough. The soundstage is center/forward weighted, but not overly forceful. Material further back in the recording gets a bit blurred, but retrivial is overall quite good. My worse complaint is that the treble at the very upper ends have a bit of bite (cymbals are a bit too bright and tizzy). Most people won't be bothered (or even notice), but audiophiles won't be rejoicing about that aspect of the player. Now, I shouldn't be playing a $130 player through a home system, anyway, and I've got to call it as I see it, but I would have preferred a little bit more rolled off high end - or at least smoother. But again, CD playback is surprising good for a cheap portable. I could certainly live with its cd playback in a pinch.
Out of 10 I rate the sound its CD playback a 7.5
MP3 PLAYBACK
Well, MP3s will sound like MP3s. But on this player I think they sound far too lean - even at 320 bit sample rate. They're okay for a short listen, but I'm sort of disappointed with its MP3 playback (the reason I bought it!)
Out of 10, I rate the sound of its MP3 playback 5
And I guess that's about it. The bottom line is that it will play MP3 cds very well - just don't expect it to make them sound fantastic. I think this player could have used some more tone controls to "fatten up" or smooth out the MP3's sound a bit. I think that on this player they sound a bit flat and lean (even more so than ususal).
Do I recommend the player? I couldn't until I heard another MP3 portable to compare their MP3 playback. Hopefull improvement is possible. If a slimx or higher end portable cd/mp3 player sounded similar, then I would recommend this unit based on its price and excellent funtionality.
Playback system: Harmon Kardon Citation 21 Preamp, Adcom GFA535 amp, Proac Tablette 2000 speakers
I just picked up a Sony D-NE715 portable CD/MP3 player to fill in a hole in my audio system. I didn't have anything that would play MP3 CDs in my main system, and there have been times I've wanted that option.
The Sony D-NE715 was release March 2003 and it's budget model, costing around 90 British pounds (US$120 approx). It plays CDs, MP3 CDs and also Atrac3 CDs (it comes with PC software to create Atrac encoded cds).
The unit itself is built moderately well. Primarily made of plastic. Construction and build quality is nothing to write home about, however. It feels solid enough but looks "budget".
The main reason I picked this unit was its layout. Because I wanted something to plug into my home stereo, I desired a unit with it's function bottons on the top. With smaller Sony portables the buttons are usually place around the edges of the unit. That keeps the players looking sleek, but makes them a pain to access when the unit is sitting on a flat surface. Hence, I wanted top seated buttons, which this unit has. It comes with a remote, but I didn't care about that option.
Also important for home use was an LCD display on top of the unit. A lot of portables put the LCD on the remote. The D-NE715 has its LCD on top and it's a three line display - which is nice.
USABILITY:
I'm very pleased with the unit as far as functionality goes. So far the unit has played every MP3 CD I've made in the past. No problem with Variable Bit Rate or sample rates. Happy as a clam with its ability to play mp3s. It reads disc info in about 8 secs. Nice quick start up. Skipping around folders and songs is also speedy enough - maybe an average of 3-4 secs.
All the buttons are large and easy to operate and all the functions of the unit are accessible on the top of the player.
A dial wheel that lets you scroll through folders or tracks works very nicely, it is simply and well designed. Sony has fixed the former complaint about not being able to fast forward or reverse through a song. You can now do that.
Digital Megabass - Utter crap. I don't know what they did, but not only does it boost the bass - Sony seems to have added some kind of false "dynamic push" to the bass. It sudden sounds like someone's thumping the bass driver on your speaker. Unbelievably bad. A simple and much subtler boosting of the lower frequencies would have been so much better!
The "display" button gives you all the basic info you need. You can toggle between time remaining, elapsed time and total disc time. Basic, but useful. The LCD scrolls ID tags, gives you folder, track or song names. It works great and reads the info on the disc very well (and I even burned my discs with Toast on a Mac, simply using the "folders and files" format).
A nice function is a "bookmark" function. If you have an MP3 disc with 140 songs. You can bookmark your favorites and the unit will play back only those songs in "Bookmark" play mode. It remembers up to 10 bookmarked discs. (haven't figured out how to clear bookmarked discs, yet.)
All in all, the unit is easy to work and well laid out
Out of 10, I rate its overall fuctions and layout a 8.5
SOUND
CD PLAYBACK
Playing Redbook CDs I was pleasantly surprised for such a cheap unit. Very listenable. I think its a fairly analytical player, not much on "romance", but pleasant enough. The soundstage is center/forward weighted, but not overly forceful. Material further back in the recording gets a bit blurred, but retrivial is overall quite good. My worse complaint is that the treble at the very upper ends have a bit of bite (cymbals are a bit too bright and tizzy). Most people won't be bothered (or even notice), but audiophiles won't be rejoicing about that aspect of the player. Now, I shouldn't be playing a $130 player through a home system, anyway, and I've got to call it as I see it, but I would have preferred a little bit more rolled off high end - or at least smoother. But again, CD playback is surprising good for a cheap portable. I could certainly live with its cd playback in a pinch.
Out of 10 I rate the sound its CD playback a 7.5
MP3 PLAYBACK
Well, MP3s will sound like MP3s. But on this player I think they sound far too lean - even at 320 bit sample rate. They're okay for a short listen, but I'm sort of disappointed with its MP3 playback (the reason I bought it!)
Out of 10, I rate the sound of its MP3 playback 5
And I guess that's about it. The bottom line is that it will play MP3 cds very well - just don't expect it to make them sound fantastic. I think this player could have used some more tone controls to "fatten up" or smooth out the MP3's sound a bit. I think that on this player they sound a bit flat and lean (even more so than ususal).
Do I recommend the player? I couldn't until I heard another MP3 portable to compare their MP3 playback. Hopefull improvement is possible. If a slimx or higher end portable cd/mp3 player sounded similar, then I would recommend this unit based on its price and excellent funtionality.
Playback system: Harmon Kardon Citation 21 Preamp, Adcom GFA535 amp, Proac Tablette 2000 speakers
