Sony Walkman NWZ-A726

For a change, the bundled earphones are pretty neat. They offer an effective in-ear design that brings the frequencies that much closer to your eardrums. The sound is balanced, although the bass might gets murkier as the frequency drops. On a flat band, the mids have a tendency of shying away, but it's nothing you can't fix after setting it right on the EQ.

The player comes with 4GB capacity and costs Rs 8990. But the street price is likely to be negotiable, depending on where you buy it from. Considering the new iPod nano costs Rs 9700 (for 8GB) and offers a host of cool functionalities to boot, you might want to reconsider what you want to buy. So first assess your needs accurately.

The iPod doesn’t have an in-ear set of earphones, and comes with absolutely no drag-and-drop options. The Sony has both of these, but no Coverflow. A higher capacity may be a good deciding factor, but I have used the new nano, and it’s nowhere closer to being as fast as the Sony player. Also, while the Nano has a 2-inch big screen, the Sony is equipped with a 2.4-inch job. So now you should hopefully be able to make up your mind...