Sony Walkman NWZ-S738F | Reviews | Techie.com.ph
3:30 PM | Sunday | 08 May 2020

Sony pioneered music-you-can-take-along when it debuted the clunky, cassette-only Walkman TPS-L2 in 1979. Thirty years later, it's still around, though not alone in the market, as a complete digital media player. Which leads us to the important question: Why would you buy the Sony Walkman NWZ-S738F over the iPod?

Noise cancellation

The answer is you would get the S-Series for some of the thoughtful things it has that the iPod lacks. Let's begin with the noise-cancellation feature. The player comes with a special pair of earphones that appear to have some extra bit of cartilage in the buds and a tooth on the jack. All these help in shutting out the din of your surroundings. While we weren't able to count the decibels cut, we know they work because the boss was mute for a good two minutes while we were testing.

Sony has also found a way to predict your mood, by way of what they call SenseME Channels. Using the Play/Pause button in the center of the Sony Walkman NWZ-S738F's wheel (that doesn't turn), you click on this icon and out pops labels like "energetic," "relax" and "upbeat." This is essentially a playlist that your Walkman has made ahead of you; by calculating the beats per minute, this Walkman decides whether a song is "relax" or "energetic" and groups them accordingly.

Now the next pertinent question is: Do you need these things?

We say yes for the noise canceling. It greatly improves on whatever sound you can tweak out of the equalizer. Not so with the mood-inducer. It's one thing to shuffle music and leave everything to chance, quite another for a player to be a musical know-it-all. It's a novel idea, but ultimately a useless one. And while we're at it, someone ought to tell the boffins at Sony that not all human eyes are equipped to watch videos on two-inch screens. Unless the Walkman knows better.