The Sony Walkman branding has, in my opinion, stood for music quality for a very long time now. While I haven’t really got too many complaints about the audio quality of the mobile handsets that bear that name or the PMPs/DAPs, sometimes the product as a whole fails to impress. One of the latest PMPs to hit the Indian shelves is the NWZ-E436F Walkman player and here’s how it fares.

Form Factor
Like most Walkman players the E436F is slim (8.5 mm), sleek and easily portable as it weighs just 50g. It has a 2-inch QVGA High Brightness Color LCD that’s just a little difficult to view in direct sunlight but looks great in normal lighting conditions. I don’t recommend watching full length movies though as the display size could cause a bit of headache considering its small size and the strain you’ll to exert on your eyes. Short videos are no problem.


The controls are simple – a five-way nav-pad for navigation, a Back/Home menu shortcut button and a sub-menu button are located just under the display. On the bottom you’ll find the 3.5mm earphone socket as well the proprietary USB port for PC connectivity and charging. On one side are a set of volume keys and a key lock/hold slide.

The NWZ-F436F is available in four colors – Blue, Pink, Red and Black.  

Features and Performance
The interface is nothing new as compared to any of the other Sony Walkman players we tested in the past. It’s simple, easy to navigate and smooth. The drop down sub-menus are well positioned and have access to all relevant features for all the players functions. 4GB of capacity is quite adequate for toting around a large portion of one’s favorite music for playback. USB 2.0 connectivity ensures quick data transfer rates and even though the device comes with the Sony Media Manager PC application, you can simply copy paste your files onto the drive and you’re good to go.


Audio
Since you can copy paste music onto the player you don’t necessary need to create a playlist that you’ll then need to transfer to the player via the PC application. You can store tracks according to folders of your preference and play them form each individual folder. There a total of 6 EQ presets that include two customizable options via a five band graphic Equalizer. The decibel level is quite decent. Any audio files above a 128 bit rate will require you to reduce the level a few points below peak.

The audio quality is great and the bundled earphones are very comfortable. Of course you have the choice of upgrading if you want but at least it’s not required as with some devices. The bass line will have you tapping your feet and the total depth of the frequencies is really good. The highs and lows (treble and mids) are well balanced for a thorough music experience without jarring the earphone speakers or scraping at your ear bud because the highs are too sharp. It supports MP3, WMA, AAC, L-PCM file formats for audio playback. You can also search for music via name, alphabetically.