A $900 Sony Walkman vs My Modded 2006 iPod: An Honest Scorecard
Scoring a Sony NW-ZX707 against an iPod Video 5.5G with Rockbox, flash storage and a 2000 mAh battery, category by category: where the old player wins, where the Walkman earns its price, and who actually needs one.
People who spend $900 on a music player are not all fooling themselves, and people who keep a 2006 iPod are not all being stubborn. Both players are good at different things. This post scores them side by side, category by category, with my own iPod as the old player.
The scores are my judgement, not lab results. Where a number comes from a spec sheet or a measurement, I say so; where it comes from experience or an estimate, I say that too. The Pocket Hi-Fi series explains the background in more depth, and its part on pairing IEMs with both players is the companion to this one.
The two players
| My iPod | Sony NW-ZX707 | |
|---|---|---|
| Base | iPod Video 5.5G, 2006 | Current Walkman, launched at $899.99 |
| Firmware | Rockbox 4.0 | Android |
| DAC | Wolfson WM8758, 16-bit/44.1 kHz | Modern DAC, hi-res PCM and DSD |
| Storage | SD cards on a flash adapter (64 GB fitted; a 1 TB card is confirmed working on this model) | 64 GB built in (about 47 GB usable) plus microSD |
| Battery | 2000 mAh replacement | Sony rates about 23 h for 24-bit/96 kHz FLAC |
| Outputs | 3.5 mm | 3.5 mm and 4.4 mm balanced |
| Wireless | None | Wi-Fi, Bluetooth with LDAC |
The iPod is not a stock iPod. The flash adapter removes the hard drive, the 2000 mAh battery is more than three times the original, and Rockbox replaces Apple’s firmware. Those three changes remove the weaknesses people usually cite against old iPods.
The scorecard
Scores out of 10.
| Category | My iPod | Walkman | Why |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sound with easy IEMs | 7.5 | 9 | With a single dynamic driver and lossless files, the gap is small. The Walkman is cleaner and quieter. |
| Sound with demanding IEMs or headphones | 5 | 9 | The biggest gap. The iPod’s output impedance and limited power show here. |
| Background noise | 6.5 | 9 | Fine with ordinary IEMs; very sensitive ones can reveal hiss on the iPod. |
| Power | 5 | 8 | No balanced output on the iPod. |
| Formats | 9 | 10 | Rockbox plays FLAC and almost everything else. Hi-res is resampled to 44.1 kHz. |
| Battery life | 9 | 7 | My estimate is 40–55 h of 16-bit FLAC, not yet timed. Sony rates about 23 h. |
| Storage | 9 | 8 | Up to 1 TB inside the iPod against 64 GB plus a card. |
| Standby | 10 | 7 | Rockbox switches off completely. An Android player drains in standby. |
| Features | 6 | 9 | No streaming or Bluetooth on the iPod. It does have ReplayGain, crossfeed, scrobbling and a custom theme. |
| Controls | 8.5 | 7 | A click wheel and a music-only menu, against an Android touchscreen. |
| Stability | 9 | 9 | Rockbox’s 5G port is its most mature. |
| Repairability | 8 | 7 | Cheap, standard parts and settings kept in version control. |
| Value | 10 | 5 | A used iPod and parts against $900. |
| Overall | 8 | 8.5 |
The overall scores are close, but they are close for different reasons. The iPod wins on battery, storage, standby, controls and value. The Walkman wins on everything to do with the analogue output and on modern features.
Where the Walkman earns its price
Not in the sample rate. A 24-bit/192 kHz file played on the Walkman does not reveal anything you could hear that the iPod’s 44.1 kHz output loses; the first part of the series explains why.
The real advantages are in the analogue stage after the DAC:
- Output impedance. Multi-driver IEMs with balanced armatures often have an impedance that swings with frequency. A source with high output impedance changes their tuning, sometimes audibly. The iPod measures somewhere from about 3 to 11 Ω depending on frequency and on who measured it. Sony does not publish the ZX707’s figure, but a current high-end player is designed to be low.
- Power. Full-size headphones and some planar IEMs want more voltage than the iPod can give. The Walkman’s 4.4 mm balanced output adds headroom.
- Noise. Sensitive IEMs amplify any hiss. A quieter source keeps the background black.
- Everything else. Streaming apps, Bluetooth with LDAC, a modern screen, equalisation. Real conveniences, not sound quality.
Where the iPod wins
- Battery and standby. With a big cell and Rockbox’s true power-off, the iPod can sit in a drawer for months and still play for days.
- Storage. A flash adapter takes cards far larger than the Walkman’s internal memory.
- Focus. A click wheel, no notifications, no apps, a menu with three items. It is a music player and nothing else.
- Cost of mistakes. If it breaks, the parts are cheap and the whole configuration rebuilds from a script.
Who actually needs the Walkman
You probably do not if your IEMs are easy to drive (a single dynamic driver or a well-behaved hybrid), you listen at normal volumes, and your library is lossless. With that setup, most people fail to tell the two apart in a level-matched blind test.
You probably do if any of these are true:
- Your IEMs are multi-BA or tribrid designs with low impedance dips.
- You use full-size headphones that need power.
- You want streaming, Bluetooth or a modern interface in the same device.
And some buyers simply enjoy owning a beautifully made object, the way people buy a mechanical watch that keeps worse time than a quartz one. That is a fine reason, as long as it is the honest one.
How to find out for yourself
Run a blind test before spending $900. Use the same IEMs, match the volume of both players with a meter or a test tone (a louder player almost always sounds “better”), and have someone else switch between them without telling you which is which. If you cannot pick the Walkman reliably, you have saved the money. If you can, you know exactly what you are paying for.
My conclusion for my own listening: with IEMs chosen to suit it, the modded iPod is as good as the Walkman where it counts for me, and better on battery, storage and standby. I would buy the Walkman for a demanding IEM, not for the files.
Sources
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What did you take away?
Thoughts, pushback, or a story of your own? Drop a reply below — I read every one.
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