NW-E003 Hands-on review

Following on from last week's post of exclusive pictures of the new E-Series Walkman Flash MP3 players I now have my hands on a production unit of the NW-E003 1GB Flash Walkman. I managed to blag the NW-E003 at the Sony offices in Weybridge just before travelling to Brussels for work so I don't have a digital camera to hand to take pics - I'll try to beg/borrow/steal one tomorrow.

First impressions

Packaging for the NW-E003 is similar to the NW-A3000 I bought before Xmas. A cardboard box with metallic purple finish is opened to slide out a plastic tray that contains the NW-E003 and, underneath, a set of headphones. In addition there's a software CD (SonicStage 3.4), guarantee certificate and manuals in various languages.

First thing to note is that the NW-E003 is noticeable lighter than the 400 and 500 series Flash Walkmans. Without using the manual I managed to set up day/date and navigate around the various menus.

I just plugged in the headphones to listen to the pre-loaded demo tracks. The sound quality is pretty good with the supplied headphones. Swapping to my favourite Westone UM2 headphones reveals excellent sound reproduction. The NW-E003 doesn't drive the Westone's as high as the NW-A3000 but the sound is very good and I certainly don't need to use maximum volume.

Anyway, enough for now. I'm off for dinner. If anyone has questions feel free to ask & I'll try to answer them asap. 

Comments

[Drew]

How is the USB cover? Does it seem to come off easily?

Also, does the casing seem resistant or prone to scratches?

Thanks.

[silvabokis]

The USB cover comes off with a slight tug.

It's difficult to tell how well the casing will resist scratches but I have an NW-A3000 that is made from the same material and it has coped very well with 5 months of almost daily usage.

[ulric]

Hi Silva,

Two questions:

1. Is the NW-E003 using USB 2.0?

2. Can music files be directly copied and played by the NW-E003 without using the Sony Connect software?

Thanx in advance.

[silvabokis]

1. It has USB 2.0.

2. It uses SonicStage not Connect. Direct copying is still not possible.

[Bas]

Hi Silva,
I also have 2 questions:
- how is the menu structure of the player? Is it easy to navigate between songs/artists/albums?
- do you need the software to (re)charge the battery, or does any usb-slot work?

Thanks for the review anyhow.

[silvabokis]

Bas

- I found the menu structure & navigation to be simpler than the previous NW-E400 series players.
I was easily finding my way round the menus within minutes of using the NW-E003 without needing to refer to the manual.

- You can charge the battery via the USB port on any pc. I tested the machine by installing SonicStage on my laptop but did the initial full charge using the USB port on my desktop pc.

[Tom Mat]

Hi,

Is it possible to drag and drop DATA (Word documents etc.) without installing software? In other words, to use it as an ordenary usb stick?

Greetings

[silvabokis]

Tom Mat - Yes, you can use it as a USB stick without needing to install drivers.

[Mrki]

I have problems with my NW E003! When i connect it to computer my computer won't recognize it. I tried everything reinstaling drivers,new firmware,formating,reinstaling windows it just won't recognize my MP3 player. I can't put any new music on it please can you help me with this problem???

[NareZ]

hi,

is there any volume hack for european models yet?

[Tom]

Hi everybody, looking for something like Volume hack for NW-E003 I am not happy with volume at the moment.Please help me with some good news.Thanks

[aki reinhart]

uhm hi, i have the same problem like this one:

"I have problems with my NW E003! When i connect it to computer my computer won't recognize it. I tried everything reinstaling drivers,new firmware,formating,reinstaling windows it just won't recognize my MP3 player. I can't put any new music on it please can you help me with this problem???"

Posted by: Mrki | Tuesday, 01 August 2006 at 03:28 AM

worse is, there's no song left in my player (because i formatted it by pressing the tiny button at the back of the player) so i cant use it anymore. it's still working, although any computer just wont recognize it. i tried insatlling a new driver, but then it still wont recognize the device.

can you help me with this? i already did everything i could..i miss my mp3 player.

[DOROTHY MANSFIELD]

MAKE SURE YOU COMPLETELY INSTALL THE DISC THAT ACCOMPANIED THE PLAYER. RESTART YOUR COMPUTER AND THEN PLUG IN AND YOU SHOULD BE GOOD TO GO.