Sony NWZ-E474 Review

[Jeven]

Not at all - your review was spot on, and one of the reasons I decided to get the Sony when I saw that its price had dropped.

I've also noticed from playing around with the player that the screen is really good, with backlit LED, and doesn't fade away when you view it at an angle.

My general impressions are that it is a really nice player. I like the Clearbass and other EQ enhancements, the general sound quality and the ease of drag and drop.

It has a lot of features that I won't use ie. podcast support, video and photos, playback speed etc. but good to have them in a DAP at this price point.

Also, the battery seems to go on forever compared with my clip+

[CrowdAds]

[XTR95]

Cheers then, mate. Good to know the prices have dropped, I've just checked that the 16GB E475 is now 100$ which is awesome

You're right, the new UI released from the E450 series is absolutely stunning, its so smooth and fast that it really makes up for the visual appeal. The screen is very nice too, although I had to increase brightness to 4 out of 5, but the battery life more than makes up for it.

Clip+ is a fantastic little device, and due to size, its battery life isn't much, but if I were a clip+ user (I might be soon lol) I'd just buy two of them as their performance value is so high.

They had to lessen the Battery life of the E470 to 36hrs as it is slimmer than the E460 series. E460 series in my opinion was a huge step in the Sony Walkman E Series lineup, brand new ones still sell around 200$ (@_@) on amazon.com

I love Clearbass, its the reason I got being a Walkman user again. I'm currently listening to it maxed out with just my SRH440s plugged in, and I'm very satisfied by the increased bass response.

Hoping you have a fantastic time with the Walkman!

[Jeven]

Thanks - my only regret is that it is just 8Gb but the cheapest I could find the 16Gb version for was £89.99 versus £59.99 for the E474

But that's still 900 or so songs, or 3 days of music. I've just put albums and tracks that I really want on it, and I like the Bookmarks playlist feature.

[XTR95]

That's a 30 pounds difference in the UK! dang that's a lot. I just went on amazon USA and check it out -

E474 - http://www.amazon.com/Sony-NWZ-E474B...s=e474+walkman

E475 - http://www.amazon.com/Sony-NWZ-E475B...s=e475+walkman

Only 3 bucks difference over there... I actually paid a lot more, 120$-ish for my Walkman as I could only get it from India and it's not available anywhere where I live. But I'm happy though, it's been a nice investment.

And yeah I managed to fill up 939 songs (320kbps/VBR-LAME rips) with 50.3MBs to spare. Deleted the useless Media-Go Setup and a bunch of other videos and wallpapers too.

[mamamia88]

Hey XTR95 you ever have the player not seem to want to come out of sleep mode instantly? For example you hold down the power button to turn it on but nothing happens? Sometimes this happens to me. Eventually it turns on but not before it appears to reset.

[XTR95]

Yes sometimes when I leave the player turned off for around 15+ hrs, it takes a few seconds (~10 secs) to turn back on, it either keeps showing the Walkman logo or a black screen. I honestly thought it was gonna die but I think its nothing, the database refreshes so it takes a bit of time I guess. I haven't used the reset key so far (and I don't plan to), whenever this happens I just wait and it turns on.

However I think this is a battery life saving feature you know? sort of like a "Deep Sleep"; when this happens it doesn't remember what song you were listening to last and goes to the main menu as default. I don't mind, considering I tend to use it below 10 hours intervals, but it is a bit worrying nonetheless. The normal sleep mode is nice, it goes back to what was playing instantly. I guess it takes longer in yours because you have more songs in your 16GB version.

I don't know if this is related to this, but I do have the Battery Care feature turned on that charges it to 90%, I really want this player to last 4 years minimum.

[dimmer]

Hi again, guys,
In one review on the net I heard that you can install another games onto player. Is it true?

[XTR95]

Not sure, I don't even bother playing the games that are already included lol. I've heard about it too though.

[dimmer]

For whose who are interested
It seems that MediaGo software could be used to install games
http://mediago.sony.com/enu/features

[skip252]

I haven't see either a review or any place in the features that say that Media Go will install additional games. Mind linking to what you've seen that says it will?

[dimmer]

Originally Posted by skip252

I haven't see either a review or any place in the features that say that Media Go will install additional games. Mind linking to what you've seen that says it will?

I suppose this says:
Music, movies, TV shows, podcasts, games, photos, and more—whatever it is, Media Go helps you find, organize, and optimize it for playback on your computer or portable device.
Also I see "Games" on the screenshot.

Although I am not sure - my E475 is on its way to me, and E345 doesn't support games.

EDIT: and this is the link to review where it is said that you can install own games, but in russian, sorry.

[Jeven]

I'm not sure why Sony put games on this player - the installed games are practically unplayable as the details, numbers, icons etc. are way too small to view and play properly on a 2" screen. Their voice recorder works well, so why not include something useful like a calculator instead of games.

But it is a really nice player, my only gripe is that it would be nice to delete - or be able to shift around - some of the 9 screen icons as I only use 4 of them. I know you can do this on Sansa and Apple players.

There isn't much available as good as the E474 in this price range.

[The DarkSide]

Wait,...you mean to tell me they put games on this thing? GTFOH!!! ROFLMFAO!!!

[skip252]

We don't want anyone buying one thinking it's possible to add more games due to speculation they read here. I don't see the ability to add more games except for the PSP. Considering Jeven has said that at least the volume warning isn't working as the manual says it should it's be possible it does and just isn't documented.

dimmer has brought this up and has one on they way. Do you mind installing Media Go and giving a conclusive report one way or the other?

I wouldn't recommend anyone install Media Go just to test this. It adds an incredible amount of bloatware that's not needed if all you want is to work with a Sony DAP. My recent experience is that it works decently. Much better than the last generation that required QuickTime. It's just that it's like using a cannon to swat gnats when it comes to managing a simple MP3 player.

[The DarkSide]

I use MediaGo to install games on our psp & pspGo,...I can't wait to see how it plays out with a low-end Walkman.

[Jeven]

It has a sudoku clone and a bubble-matching type game, but they're unplayable - it's like being back in 2005.

[XTR95]

Originally Posted by dimmer

I suppose this says:
Music, movies, TV shows, podcasts, games, photos, and more—whatever it is, Media Go helps you find, organize, and optimize it for playback on your computer or portable device.
Also I see "Games" on the screenshot.

I think, as Media-Go is a common software of PSPs, Walkmans, Tablets and Sony mobile phones, it includes the games tab on the screenshots, but I don't think that necessarily means that is the case with Walkmans. If you feel like it, you can try it out and let us know

Originally Posted by Jeven

I'm not sure why Sony put games on this player - the installed games are practically unplayable as the details, numbers, icons etc. are way too small to view and play properly on a 2" screen. Their voice recorder works well, so why not include something useful like a calculator instead of games.

But it is a really nice player, my only gripe is that it would be nice to delete - or be able to shift around - some of the 9 screen icons as I only use 4 of them. I know you can do this on Sansa and Apple players.

There isn't much available as good as the E474 in this price range.

Life was easier with the older generation Walkmans (older UI), they were simplified and bang on with stuff that was actually needed. So I guess we gotta live with it. But Sony has done the E series some respect by making the Economy line a bit premium. Take the E460 Series, it's a massive upgrade from the E450 Series with huge battery life and proper EX monitor bundled headphones. And the E470 may seem a bit of a downgrade compared to the E460 but the E570 Series now has Noise Cancelling.

Originally Posted by The DarkSide

Wait,...you mean to tell me they put games on this thing? GTFOH!!! ROFLMFAO!!!

I know right? :P Useless addition. I think they included games with the newer Sony UI (from E45x/A84x/equal S-series onwards)

Originally Posted by skip252

We don't want anyone buying one thinking it's possible to add more games due to speculation they read here. I don't see the ability to add more games except for the PSP. Considering Jeven has said that at least the volume warning isn't working as the manual says it should it's be possible it does and just isn't documented.

dimmer has brought this up and has one on they way. Do you mind installing Media Go and giving a conclusive report one way or the other?

I wouldn't recommend anyone install Media Go just to test this. It adds an incredible amount of bloatware that's not needed if all you want is to work with a Sony DAP. My recent experience is that it works decently. Much better than the last generation that required QuickTime. It's just that it's like using a cannon to swat gnats when it comes to managing a simple MP3 player.

+1. Couldn't agree with you more. Media-Go is unnecessary and does more harm than good, had to delete tons of bloatware when I wanted to try it out, it required Internet Explorer as mandatory, lol.

[dimmer]

Originally Posted by XTR95

I think, as Media-Go is a common software of PSPs, Walkmans, Tablets and Sony mobile phones, it includes the games tab on the screenshots, but I don't think that necessarily means that is the case with Walkmans. If you feel like it, you can try it out and let us know

Update - MediaGo cannot load games onto E475, myth is busted MEdiaGo - deleted.