Sony brings music streaming to their new Walkmans at IFA 2019

If you've been looking at Sony's Walkmans and thinking the only thing missing is the ability to do music streaming, meet the NW-ZX507 and NW-A100. Both of these Walkmans add Android with Wi-Fi, DSEE HX support, and LDAC support so you can truly enjoy your music whether you're listening wired or wirelessly.

The NW-ZX507 stands out with its Φ4.4mm balanced connection along with DSD Native (11.2MHz) and 384kHz/32bit PCM playback supported by S-master HX, so you can truly enjoy listening in Hi-Res Audio. It also stands out thanks to its premium build.

The player has a high-quality aluminium frame and Copper milled block to give clear and powerful sound. Meanwhile, it also uses a newly developed FTCAP (high polymer capacitor) and Electric Double-Layer Capacitor to ensure bold bass levels.

As mentioned above, the player gets online by Wi-Fi so you can access download services directly from your Walkman. Music can also be stored on the NW-ZX507's built-in memory, or on a microSD card for times when there's no internet access, so you'll never be short for music.

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Physically, the NW-ZX507 stands out with its premium aluminium milled body and 3.6-inch HD screen with touch. There's a full set of control buttons on the side, and the Walkman features a special cassette tape user interface and screen saver.

This features a cassette tape visual that varies depending on the codec of the track you're listening to. It has a battery life of 20 hours and uses USB-C for charging and transfer.

Meanwhile, the NW-A100 offers DSD (11.2MHz/ PCM conversion) and PCM (384khz/32bit) supported by S-Master HX. The A100 gets the same quality audio parts from the ZX series and NW-WM1Z. Like the NW-ZX507 above, the NW-A100 lets you stream music over Wi-Fi as you can access download services directly from the Walkman.

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Like the NW-ZX507 above, the NW-A100 also has a 3.6-inch HD screen with touch. It has a 26-hour battery life and USB-C for easy connectivity. It comes in a choice of red, black, ash green, blue or orange.

There's also a special NW-A100TPS version that's been created in conjunction with the 40th-anniversary celebrations for the Sony Walkman. This has a printed 40th-anniversary logo on the rear panel and a specially designed soft case and packages that pays homage to Sony's first portable cassette player - the TPS-L2 Walkman.

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Both Walkmans will be available in selected Asia Pacific countries from December 2019, but no pricing information has been announced.

This article was first published in Hardware Zone.