Sony D-NE500 ATRAC Walkman Portable CD Player (Black)

Review by Carlos Nunez

Sony D-NE500 ATRAC Walkman Portable CD Player

I have gone through more than six CD players of all kinds throughout my life, and this CD Player is quite possibly the best one I have ever owned. The D-NE500 MP3/CD Player continues that trend of excellence while creating a revolution of futuristically-styled products to keep up with our fast paced world.

The one key feature about this CD player is its battery life. Most CD players require 2 “AA” batteries, and some thinner, more versatile CD players use “gumstick” reacting batteries. Furthermore, the D-NE500 maxes out at 35 hours of battery life in MP3/ATRAC3 operation and 17 hours of CD-Audio operation! For a mid-range CD player, this is a very impressive quality that should not be overlooked.

Another great quality about the CD player is, of course, the sound quality. Sony CD players never fall short of excellent in sound quality, and the D-NE500 is by far no exception to this. This CD player has integrated Digital Mega Bass to enhance low-range sounds while keeping mid and high-range sounds uneffected, and it also has Auto Volume Levelling, which can compute the appropriate increase and decrease of volume during song play.

The size of the CD player is somewhat thick, but thick enough to fit in one’s pocket fairly easily. The 4-line LCD on the front of the CD player is extremely user-friendly, and coupled with the “iPod like” circle and joystick controls, it is definitely dummy-proof.

All-in-all, the D-NE500 exceeds the quality of a CD player of a similar price tag. I recommend using Sony Fontopia or Sony CD series headphones as well, even though the stock headphones are alright.