[nanaholic]

  If your belief regarding the android OS is to be believed then it also applies to the  Music player app. No upgrade either way.

 
Er how do you come to this conclusion?  Upgrading an entire OS is entirely different than updating just a tiny app that runs on top of the OS.

 

[Cecala]

   
Er how do you come to this conclusion?  Upgrading an entire OS is entirely different than updating just a tiny app that runs on top of the OS.

".................Also I really doubt that the mobile division is even heavily involved in the creation of this device, plus Sony has a bad habit of division in-fighting so I won't hold my breathe either for the OS upgrade. As far as I'm concerned though, out of the box the core OS is fine and pretty much irrelevant and transparent to the user experience, what I would want instead is that Sony would commit to updating the music player app.............."
 
No OS update therefore no Music Player either... They both work fine according to you so why would Sony Update them.

 

[nanaholic]

 
".................Also I really doubt that the mobile division is even heavily involved in the creation of this device, plus Sony has a bad habit of division in-fighting so I won't hold my breathe either for the OS upgrade. As far as I'm concerned though, out of the box the core OS is fine and pretty much irrelevant and transparent to the user experience, what I would want instead is that Sony would commit to updating the music player app.............."
 
No OS update therefore no Music Player either... They both work fine according to you so why would Sony Update them.

 
No you really don't get it - as I said the music player is stand alone app that sits on top the OS, they aren't linked together.  They could easily update the music app without touching the OS at all.  From the looks of it the Walkman division is completely separate from the Mobile Phone division, but the Walkman team happened to have gotten some of the core Android OS code and resources from the Mobile team they could use to build the Walkmans, but there's no guarantee that they would have the same access to the later builds, hence no guarantee for the core OS update.  However again this has nothing to do with the music player app itself as that part is completely separate from the core OS, so the Walkman team can still be dedicated to updating that music app.

 

[EveTan]

the ui found on an idevice may well be nice. but at the expense of sq. what do you prefer, nice ui or better sq? exactly how nice does a ui need to be able to play an album from start to finish?

In terms of enjoyment, UI takes priority over sound for me.

If i have to waste time fiddling with the UI, i distract myself from the music.

Hence, the Ui has to be good for me.



I have another question about a ZX1. How do you think an app that reskins the entire device would perform? Would it stagger performance?

 

[Audiowood]

  Sony do update the OS normally when there is a Walkman firmware upgrade (they updated Android when they introduced Flac playback), they don't appear to update unless there is a reason... if the milli-second delay bothers you when compared another OS I would suggest it's best sticking with what you got.
 
as for the assumed 'impedance' problem.... there are many on here that own totl CIEM/IEM's and no-one has complained one iota about impedance issues... that said, many have stated how well their CIEM/IEM's perform with the ZX1/F88X. These DAP's have been designed in the main for use with IEM's.

 
I highly suspect the impedance level is not that low. I tested it with shure 846 (9ohm) and ZX1 stock with Dac port (1 ohm), Imod & Pico slim (less than 1 ohm), M8 (1 ohm switch), zana duex se (3ohm) and this is my findings;
 
The ZX1 has slightly more bass overall and less treble as compared to these other amp/dac mention above which lead me to suspect the impedance level is highly unlikely to be at 1ohm. When I compared it with M8 at 10 ohm switch, the bass of M8 bass is slightly more than zx1 and treble is more recessed than zx1, this findings lead me to believe that the hope of getting 1ohm level is almost out of the window. But then again, the added bass slam is much needed here, so what I did, I added +2db on 16K and +1db on 6K and the treble now sound a lot closer to a 1 ohm mode treble quantity and now I still have the added bass that comes with higher impedance (I call this cheating mode).
 
I am only suspecting until someone measure it to confirm my findings. I think its around 8-15 ohm imp level but I am speculating.

 

[nanaholic]

I have another question about a ZX1. How do you think an app that reskins the entire device would perform? Would it stagger performance?

 
I wouldn't bother to be honest.  Unless you plan to use the device for things other than music playback you'll be interacting with the Walkman app for the most part anyway so you won't be seeing much of a custom launcher.  The Xperia-like skin is also light on resources which can't be said of most Android launchers.  Plus I would bet good money that Sony has better artistic taste than your run of the mill OSS developer could muster together for a custom launcher anyway.

 

[OK-Guy]

   
I highly suspect the impedance level is not that low. I tested it with shure 846 (9ohm) and ZX1 stock with Dac port (1 ohm), Imod & Pico slim (less than 1 ohm), M8 (1 ohm switch), zana duex se (3ohm) and this is my findings;
 
The ZX1 has slightly more bass overall and less treble as compared to these other amp/dac mention above which lead me to suspect the impedance level is highly unlikely to be at 1ohm. When I compared it with M8 at 10 ohm switch, the bass of M8 bass is slightly more than zx1 and treble is more recessed than zx1, this findings lead me to believe that the hope of getting 1ohm level is almost out of the window. But then again, the added bass slam is much needed here, so what I did, I added +2db on 16K and +1db on 6K and the treble now sound a lot closer to a 1 ohm mode treble quantity and now I still have the added bass that comes with higher impedance (I call this cheating mode).
 
I am only suspecting until someone measure it to confirm my findings. I think its around 8-15 ohm imp level but I am speculating.

 
I think someone measured the WM-Z and said it was around those levels you quoted... I'll have a hunt, think it was about May/June last year.

 

[anil]

  Not sure that's possible, since unlock always brings you back to the screen you before you lock. For me I just put the player icon in the menu bar (and removed DLNA since I don't use it) so it's just 1 click away.

 
BTW, I was looking around the settings (just got the player) and you can actually disable the lock screen altogether in the Security section of the settings app.  In this case, the power button just acts as a screen on/off and it immediately takes you to the player UI.   Sorry if this has already been mentioned in the past few weeks - kind of hard with these long linear threads to figure out what has already been posted
 
Anil

 

[Liono]

Got my Cruzerlite case today! Very pleased with it, very good fit and feels good quality. The anti dust lug just about still fits...

 

[Audiowood]

   
BTW, I was looking around the settings (just got the player) and you can actually disable the lock screen altogether in the Security section of the settings app.  In this case, the power button just acts as a screen on/off and it immediately takes you to the player UI.   Sorry if this has already been mentioned in the past few weeks - kind of hard with these long linear threads to figure out what has already been posted
 
Anil

 
Thanks I just disable it.

 

[xjaynine]

I have another question about a ZX1. How do you think an app that reskins the entire device would perform? Would it stagger performance?

 
A custom Android launcher/ reskin app, such as Nova Launcher on the ZX1 runs comfortably on the without any perceivable performance hit to the UI experience. My estimate is at most a 5% consumption of RAM when using a custom launcher. When in use the Walkman app plus a custom launcher never exceeds 70% RAM usage which is acceptable.
 

   
No you really don't get it - as I said the music player is stand alone app that sits on top the OS, they aren't linked together.  They could easily update the music app without touching the OS at all.  From the looks of it the Walkman division is completely separate from the Mobile Phone division, but the Walkman team happened to have gotten some of the core Android OS code and resources from the Mobile team they could use to build the Walkmans, but there's no guarantee that they would have the same access to the later builds, hence no guarantee for the core OS update.  However again this has nothing to do with the music player app itself as that part is completely separate from the core OS, so the Walkman team can still be dedicated to updating that music app.

 
I am not entirely sure, but I believe Sony offered an update for the NW-F880 Walkmans that specifically added functionality to just the Walkman app. Namely the DSEE-HX enhancement about the time the ZX1 launched in December.

 

[audionewbi]

Zx1 or hd700, both the same price....

 

[OK-Guy]

   
I am not entirely sure, but I believe Sony offered an update for the NW-F880 Walkmans that specifically added functionality to just the Walkman app. Namely the DSEE-HX enhancement about the time the ZX1 launched in December.

 
there was an update at about that time... no idea what for, I just clicked & updated.

 

[Cecala]

   
No you really don't get it - as I said the music player is stand alone app that sits on top the OS, they aren't linked together.  They could easily update the music app without touching the OS at all.  From the looks of it the Walkman division is completely separate from the Mobile Phone division, but the Walkman team happened to have gotten some of the core Android OS code and resources from the Mobile team they could use to build the Walkmans, but there's no guarantee that they would have the same access to the later builds, hence no guarantee for the core OS update.  However again this has nothing to do with the music player app itself as that part is completely separate from the core OS, so the Walkman team can still be dedicated to updating that music app.

I do get what your saying although you have to understand that if nothing is wrong with the stock player why would Sony update it. What I'm saying is if they all work fine and you agree here why change anything. What you want is something like the stock player having the functionality of say something like 'Poweramp'. Contact Sony and tell them your wishes. I for myself would like the responsiveness of the screen to be just that little faster, kitkat would offer and provide me with that. I think the stock player is 'stock' at best, it works fine although lacks features. I have purchased Poweramp to that end.

 

[xjaynine]

 
I do get what your saying although you have to understand that if nothing is wrong with the stock player why would Sony update it. What I'm saying is if they all work fine and you agree here why change anything. What you want is something like the stock player having the functionality of say something like 'Poweramp'. Contact Sony and tell them your wishes. I for myself would like the responsiveness of the screen to be just that little faster, kitkat would offer and provide me with that. I think the stock player is 'stock' at best, it works fine although lacks features. I have purchased Poweramp to that end.

It depends on how well the stock Walkman app player was optimised originally. Plugging a few memory leaks, improving the code, or even changing the way the app handles the caching of album art for example might improve the fluidity of UI. 

It's probably cheaper for Sony to update the Walkman app as opposed to creating a new custom Kit Kat ROM for the ZX1.

Personally I am quite content on the software side of things, and don't really see the need for an OS update.