New ULT POWER SOUND Products Arrive

The latest additions to Sony’s bass-focused audio lineup include the ULT FIELD 3 (R3 999), ULT FIELD 5 (R6 999), ULT TOWER 9AC (R17 999), and ULTMIC1 microphone (R2 999). These join existing products in the range: the ULT TOWER 10, ULT FIELD 7, ULT FIELD 1 portable speaker, and ULT WEAR headphones.

Each product in the ULT POWER SOUND Series emphasizes deep bass performance, portable design, and durability for outdoor use. The range targets consumers who prioritize powerful sound reproduction and flexibility in various environments.

“We’re investing in infrastructure that treats South African consumers as first-tier customers, with access to our full product range and global launch parity,” said Jobin Joejoe, Managing Director of Sony Middle East and Africa. “This platform allows us to deepen our relationship with Sony fans while strengthening our brand presence across the consumer electronics landscape.”

Product Availability and Purchasing Options

All ULT POWER SOUND products are available immediately through Sony World and existing retail partners. The direct e-commerce platform provides nationwide delivery, while brick-and-mortar retailers offer hands-on product evaluation before purchase.

Black Friday promotions run throughout the traditional shopping period, with specific deals rotating across product categories. Consumers can monitor Sony World for updated offers and exclusive online deals.

ULT POWER SOUND Series Current Lineup:

• ULT TOWER 10 (flagship tower speaker)
• ULT TOWER 9AC (new tower speaker)
• ULT FIELD 7 (large portable speaker)
• ULT FIELD 5 (new mid-size portable speaker)
• ULT FIELD 3 (new compact portable speaker)
• ULT FIELD 1 (ultra-compact portable speaker)
• ULT WEAR (over-ear headphones)
• ULTMIC1 (new wireless microphone)

Key Features Across Range:

• Deep bass emphasis with ULT button
• Portable designs with varying sizes
• Battery-powered operation
• Weather-resistant construction
• Wireless connectivity
• Party Connect multi-speaker pairing

The Immersive Open Back Monitor Headphones for Spatial Sound Creation MDR-MV1 is a flagship product that promises an unparalleled audio experience. These headphones are designed to produce high-quality audio with an emphasis on spatial sound creation. They are equipped with a unique open-back design that allows sound to flow freely in and out of the earcups, creating a more natural and immersive audio experience.

Moreover, the headphones feature large 40mm drivers that deliver exceptional sound quality with a frequency response of 5Hz-80kHz. This wide frequency range allows the headphones to reproduce audio with incredible accuracy and detail, making them ideal for mixing and mastering. The headphones also feature a detachable cable that can be easily replaced if damaged or if a longer cable is needed.

In addition to the headphones, Sony has also launched the Condenser Microphone C-80, which is designed to meet the demands of professional studio recording. This microphone features a large diaphragm that captures sound with incredible clarity and detail. It has a frequency response of 20Hz-20kHz, which means it can capture a wide range of audio frequencies.

The microphone also has a cardioid polar pattern, which means it is highly directional and can capture sound from the front while rejecting sound from the sides and rear. This makes it ideal for recording vocals, acoustic instruments, and other sound sources that require a focused sound capture. The microphone also features a shock mount that reduces vibrations and noise from handling and a pop filter that reduces plosives and sibilance.

Both the Immersive Open Back Monitor Headphones for Spatial Sound Creation MDR-MV1 and the Condenser Microphone C-80 are designed to deliver exceptional audio quality for professionals. They are built with high-quality materials and feature advanced technology that ensures accurate and detailed sound capture and reproduction. These products are a testament to Sony’s commitment to innovation and excellence in the audio industry, and they are sure to be a hit among audio enthusiasts and studio recording artists.

Both the MDR-MV1 and C-80 will be available from mid-May 2023. Pricing is yet to be announced.

Past generations of the WH-1000X lineup have consistently been ranked among the best wireless headphones money can buy and are particularly lauded for their unmatched Active Noise Cancellation (ANC) capabilities. With its improved hardware specs and revamped design, expectations are that the Sony WH-1000XM5 will likely continue to set the benchmark for flagship-grade wireless headphones.

The Sony WH-1000XM5 is also the first WH-1000 series product to launch after Apple announced the Airpods Max back in December 2020. You will be able to buy the Sony WH-1000XM5 starting July, 2022. Sony is very mum on pricing.

Given the massive popularity of the Sony WH-1000 series, Sony seems to have been reluctant to tweak the design of the headphones for several generations. However, the entrant of Apple into the fray seems to have prompted Sony to make sweeping changes to the design of the WH-1000XM5.

The result is an overall sleeker-looking product that looks contemporary and more modern. In addition, Sony has also made structural changes to the product in the form of a stem-style, stepless slider. Apart from these, the headphones also get an entirely new type of synthetic leather for the headband. These changes claim to make the headphones more comfortable while also taking some pressure off the user’s ears.

To keep old WH-1000X fans happy, Sony has refrained from changing the controls. The WH-1000XM5 continues to support gestures to control audio playback while also retaining the physical button that lets users switch between ANC and ambient modes.

With Sony’s WH-1000XM4 headphones already known for their stellar active noise cancellation capabilities, expectations were high for the next-generation ANC capabilities of its successor. While we are yet to test it out, Sony claims that it has made more refinements to the noise cancellation capabilities on the WH-1000XM5.

Most of these improvements come courtesy of a new second processor on the WH-1000XM5. Known as the Integrated Processor V1, it works in tandem with the Sony HD Noise Canceling Processor QN1 to control the eight microphones that Sony uses for noise cancellation. Apart from helping the headphones reduce mid-to high-frequency noise, the new processor also lets the WH-1000XM5 automatically optimize noise cancellation modes depending on the environment and ambient noise. Another notable change to the WH-1000XM5 is Sony’s decision to ditch the 40mm drivers in favor of smaller 30mm drivers. The company believes this move will enhance the bass response and make it less muddy — a chief complaint against the larger 40mm drivers on the XM4.

Apart from these significant changes, Sony also claims to have made incremental improvements to the overall voice quality on the WH-1000XM5 thanks to four beamforming mics and AI noise reduction algorithms.

The LinkBuds have been created with a unique open ring design and allow users to tune into the outside world whenever they want, without compromising on the listening experience.

The newly-developed ring driver unit, has the centre of the diaphragm open for audio transparency, allowing you to clearly hear the sounds around, so you’ll always know when someone calls your name whilst on a call or easily chat with friends while listening to your favourite songs.

Linkbudswill be available in selected stores in South Africa from 24 April 2022. The recommended retail price is R3999.00

According to some industry peer reviews, Sony’s 2019 WF-1000XM3 earbuds demanded a little compromise to go along with their ANC talents. They sounded great, and delivered excellent noise-cancellation, but they were big and so was their charging case. The model was later introduced in Mzansi, but we never got to reviewing a pair.

What we can tell though is that with the WF-1000XM4, Sony has dialled back those ergonomic frustrations considerably. They’re smaller than before, with a 40-percent smaller charging case too, but battery life is actually improved. Like the more modern rivals which left the WF-1000XM3 looking a little like a Star Trek prop, the new earbuds fit into your ear a little more discreetly.

There are other practical improvements, on paper, like IPX4 water and sweat resistance, making the earbuds more practical for use when exercising or in inclement weather. The case now charges via USB-C or a Qi wireless pad, if you have one. Of course, all those changes would be for naught if the ANC itself had been side lined by Sony, but happily that’s far from being the case.

In fact, the WF-1000XM4 improve on their predecessors markedly. Sony has used its new Integrated Processor V1 and DSEE Extreme audio processor – the latter of which debuted in the WH-1000XM4 headphones – to power both sound and active noise cancellation. The result is astonishingly good, bringing the earbuds within spitting distance of their excellent over-the-ear headphone cousins.

Background hum, wind noise, A/C fans, that annoying sound in planes and everything else disappear as though someone just threw a switch and shut it all down. It’s a little like the almost-unsettling silence when a power outage hits, and suddenly you realize just how many things were making sounds that you never really consciously registered. Only this outage also affects people talking, TV noise, and other environmental chatter.

It’s better than Sennheiser’s Momentum, and I’d go so far as to say it’s better than any other ANC earbud that I’ve tested out there right now. A set of WH-1000XM4 headphones will be a little better still, but the delta is shrinking dramatically.

You need a good fit for ANC, and Sony has changed up its ear-tip design. You no longer get the old trio of silicone and trio of foam tips as came with the last-gen earbuds, with a new set of memory foam-style tips instead. There are three sizes, and they have a squish, sticky feel.

I have troublesome ears, and can struggle with earbuds, but Sony’s design has proved to be both comfortable and reluctant to accidentally falling out. You can either just twist them into your ear, or slightly shape the tip first so that it expands in your ear canal. Sony’s Headphones app that’s available for iOS and Android has a new sound leakage test, which can recommend whether you should switch tip size for a better fit.

The app is also where you tweak audio settings, turn on Sony’s upscaling and other AI-powered EQ – along with Sony’s LDAC codec which can handle up to 990 kbps music with compatible devices – and control the ANC. As with previous models, by default the earbuds will adjust the level of noise cancellation depending on environmental sound and what it thinks you’re doing: sitting in a quiet room, for example, versus on a plane or in a busy urban setting.

You can also enable Speak-to-Chat, which promises to automatically turn on transparency mode when you start speaking. It works, but it also highlights just how much I unknowingly sing along to music and generally talk to myself while working, so I shut it back off again.

When it comes to music playback, there Sony continues to wow. Slabs of bass, but with power that doesn’t overwhelm precision. A crisp and distinctive high-end, never too sharp, with an airy soundstage that leaves vocals and brighter instruments clear and defined. Somehow Sony manages to avoid the mid-tones getting muddy or flabby, too.

It’s a profile that lends itself well to a huge range of styles. The thunderous bass stabs through amapiano and rap, never leaving you with the feeling that Sony’s custom 6mm driver is struggling to keep up. Switch to more vocal-heavy tracks, though, and that broadness carries over: voices are clear and crisp, but the whole thing is still cohesive. In short, regardless of your genre of choice, it’s going to sound great.

Nonetheless, there are a few lingering annoyances. Biggest is the absence of Bluetooth Multipoint support: you can’t have the WF-1000XM4 simultaneously connected to two devices.

Similarly, Huawei’s earbuds have the edge when it comes to microphone performance for calls. Sony says it pairs its beamforming microphones with ANC and bond conduction sensors, so that they know when you’re actually talking, but the results can still be a little jagged. Nowhere near dealbreaker levels, no, but still something to bear in mind if you’re on voice and video chats all day long.

It’s frustrating because the WF-1000XM4’s battery life make them an excellent match for this hybrid age of remote working and Zoom meetings. Eight hours from the earbuds alone, and that’s with ANC turned on: switch it off, and you get another four hours. The battery in the case can fully recharge the earbuds twice, for 24-46 hours in total, depending on if you have noise cancellation running.

The Sony WF-1000XM4’s are smaller, lighter, sound better and last longer, and their ANC gets you so close to what Sony does with its full headphones that the reasons not to buy them are vanishingly small.

No multipoint Bluetooth and slightly less impressive voice calls are the key sacrifices now, and of course the fact that R6999 isn’t inexpensive in a category where far more affordable ANC earbuds are widely available. Problem is, those alternatives may be cheaper but I hesitate to call them “rivals” as such. Sony’s wizardry with active noise-cancellation elevates the WF-1000XM4 clear above the competition.

That should be music to your ears, whether you’re facing air travel, back to a crowded office, or simply trying to carve out a remote workspace at home. Music, that is, along with blissful silence. Should you get them? Hell yeah.

The Sony HT-G700 soundbar features a classic design that can be placed beneath most televisions; the bar works with a related wireless soundbar for more bass from whatever part of the room the user wants. The soundbar comes with multiple modes, including a theatre mode for home cinemas, a music mode for listening to tunes, a night mode for hearing things clearly at low volume, and a voice mode for things like watching the news.

As expected for a soundbar, the HT-G700 features HDMI-in and HDMI-out, plus there’s a TV IN optical port and Bluetooth wireless connectivity. The hardware offers 3.1ch audio; Sony’s Immersive AE ‘upscales’ the audio to ‘close to’ 7.1.2-channel audio, according to the company. The speaker has 400 watts of power and measures nearly 40-inches in length.

The audio-upscaling feature is triggered using the Immersive Audio Enhancement button. The speaker packs Dolby Atmos, DTS:X, Vertical Surround Engine, and S-Force Pro Front Surround technologies. The soundbar has a digital amplifier and S-Master amp; it weighs a bit under 8lbs, which is around half the weight of the companion subwoofer.

Finally, the soundbar features 4K HDR 18Gbps pass-through, as well as HDCP2.2/HDCP2.3, HDR10, Hybrid Log Gamma, and Dolby Vision. The soundbar is available now for R8 99, which includes the subwoofer.

Now in their third-generation, Sony’s headphones have gone from upstart Bose rival to segment-shaking heavyweight.

Most of us can attest that room in your carry-on bag is precious and hard-earned, and so Sony has brought its A-game. The R5999 WH-1000XM3’s promise to be a triple threat: the best noise cancelation; outrageously long battery life; and all without compromising on comfort. With just a few small frustrations, they do well.

The visual differences between these third-generation headphones and their predecessors is minimal, at least at first glance. The ear cups now have a smoother finish – it makes tapping and swiping on the right ear cup’s touch-sensitive pad easier – and the detailing is now picked out in coppery gold.

You notice it more when you put them on, though. Sony has redesigned the headband, so that it more closely follows the contours of your head; it feels less bulky as a result. Better still, the ear cups have more padding and larger cavities, which make them far more comfortable for extended use.

They keep the folding design, and Sony still provides a useful carrying case. That now has dedicated slots for the headphone cable, twin-plug airplane audio adapter, and charging cable. The latter makes a welcome switch to USB-C, too, with a Quick Charge feature that Sony says will get you 5 hours of wireless playback after just ten minutes plugged in. Total battery life is a whopping 30 hours – that is with Bluetooth streaming and noise-cancellation turned on, too. I got through two full days of music streaming and Zoom calls, totalling up around 20 hours use in all, and still had power to spare.

That lawnmower I mentioned earlier gave me a good opportunity to test out the Sony’s noise-cancellation. Indeed, with its motor going crazing on the other side of the wall, the new HD Noise Cancelling Processor QN1 faced a significant challenge out of the gate.

I was sceptical, but my uncertainty was unfounded. The WH-1000XM3’s handily squashed that irritating motor noise and reduced the sounds of my fellow passengers to the faintest murmur. They were comfortable enough, meanwhile, that I could sleep with them on. For about 35 minutes or so. Holding my palm over the right earcup allowed ambient noise through temporarily, which proved handy for listening in to pilot announcements.

Sony’s noise-cancelation has been improved, but what is arguably more important is how it’s now more flexible, too. The default is for the headphones to power off after five minutes, but you can now adjust that to up to three hours in the Sony Headphone Connect app. You can also have them stay on all the time if you prefer. Unfortunately, there’s no on-ear sensor: the headphones won’t automatically go into standby, or pause your music for that matter, if you take them off. I missed this about my Beats Solo’s.

You do not need the app in order to use the WH-1000XM’s core features. They pair as regular Bluetooth headphones, after all, and there’s a button which cycles between noise-cancellation being on, ambient noise being allowed in, and the cancellation being off altogether. Swipes and taps to skip forward and backward through tracks, adjust the volume, and play/pause are recognised natively by iOS and Android devices.

Still, the app is important if you want to customise the sound. It is there you can turn on Adaptive Sound Control, for instance, which automatically adjusts the level of noise-cancellation and ambient noise depending on the conditions around you. A little background noise when you’re trying to cross the road can be helpful in avoiding getting run down by a bakkie.

Having options is good, but out of the box the WH-1000XM3’s sound great. There’s plenty of bass, but it doesn’t outweigh either the top end or the mids. Enthusiastic but balanced describes it best, I think, with the combination of noise cancellation and Sony’s processing given the headphones an unexpectedly expansive soundstage.

The app is also where you’ll find the option to switch the noise cancellation mode button over to a Google Assistant trigger. While you can use the headphones to control Siri or the Assistant running on your phone, you can also access Google’s AI directly. That includes asking questions, setting alarms and reminders, sending messages, and having notifications read out.

Because that all demands a data connection, your smartphone will need to be connected over Bluetooth at the time. You’ll also need to be running the Google Assistant app for iOS, if you weren’t already. Still, if you’re firmly embedded in the Google Products niche, having quick and easy access from your headphones could be a real boon. All of this is null and void in non-Google Play Services devices like the Huawei P40 Pro.

Not everything is perfect. Multipoint pairing is possible – connecting to one device for music and another for hands-free calls – though a little complex. If you want to use an iPhone for calls, for instance, but an Android phone for music, you need to pair the latter with the WH-1000XM3’s first, then manually disable calls on that device, before going through the iOS pairing process. Otherwise, Apple automatically monopolizes both types of connection.

I’d also prefer the supplied 3.5mm headphone cable to be fabric braided, for a little extra resilience, and the blinking blue LED for Bluetooth is annoying. I’m not entirely sure why it still needs to be flashing once you’re done with the pairing process.

They’re minor annoyances, though, and they fade when compared with Sony’s incredible noise-cancellation and eminently enjoyable music performance. At R5999 they’re not inexpensive, but I feel more confident recommending them than I do the likes of Sennheiser’s Momentum, which in comparison are now showing their age. Sony just does a better job at isolating you from the annoyances of the outside world.

That has obvious appeal if you’re a frequent traveller (given that things get back to normal), but I found it also pays dividends if you’re simply listening to music more normally. Several times, taking the WH-1000XM3’s off, I was surprised at just how much ambient sound there was – even if, beforehand, the room had seemed relatively quiet. Being able to shut a virtual door and step into your own imaginary music room, and have the comfort and battery life to enjoy that for hours on end, makes Sony’s headphones a winning combination.

For specifics, they use the company’s EXTRA BASS system, which enhances the low-end in music. Sony promises that doing so won’t come at the cost of high-end clarity, however, making sure that vocals are still crisp and clean.

As you’d expect, the WF-XB700 use Bluetooth for connecting to your smartphone or laptop. They recharge in the supplied charging case, with up to 18 hours of battery life from a full charge. 10 minutes plugged in is enough for 60 minutes of music playback.

Unfortunately, unlike the WF-1000XM3 earbuds, there’s no active noise cancellation. You do, though, get what Sony is calling an “Ergonomic Tri-hold structure” to keep them in your ears even if you’re exercising, along with IPX4 ratings for water resistance: they’ll hold up to splashes in the rain, or sweat in the gym, for example. Sony will be offering the WF-XB700 in black and blue and will be will be priced at R2 999 when they go on sale this month

They’re based on Sony’s HD Noise Cancelling Processor QN1e, which works with two microphones on each earbud. Their predecessors had just one each.

It means Sony can promise the same sort of noise isolation as you’d get from its WH-1000XM3 over-the-ear headphones, launched last year. They arrived to rave reviews, with their combination of lengthy battery life and Bose-besting background sound cancellation – we’re yet to get some hands-on time with them, by the way. Now, some of that same magic is going into in-ear buds.

As you’d expect, there’s a compact charging case within which the earbuds themselves are store and their batteries charged. That uses USB-C. An individual earbud lasts for up to six hours with noise cancellation turned on, and with the power in the case there’s up to 24 hours of total playback with recharges.

Turn the noise cancellation off, meanwhile, and the earbuds last for eight hours instead. That makes for a total of 32 hours of playback after the charging case’s top-ups. A ten minute charge in the case is good for 90 minutes of playback with active noise cancellation switched on.

Unlike the old earbuds, the WF-1000XM3 use a new Bluetooth system. Before, your phone, laptop, tablet, or other audio source would pair with the left earbud, and then that in turn would pipe music to the right earbud. Now, both earbuds connect to the audio source at the same time.

It improves audio quality in calls and overall connection stability, and means you can choose to use just one of the earbuds if you prefer. Take one out, and sensors automatically pause the music. There are also touch controls on the outside, to control music playback, answer or end calls, and trigger the assistant on your smartphone.

For voice calls, unlike before the noise cancellation works there, too. Sony combines this with noise suppression, isolating the frequencies of your voice with the background frequencies, so that the WF-1000XM3 can tamp down the latter. The QN1e also includes a DAC and 24-bit audio signal processing. Sony has included its Digital Sound Enhancement Engine HS (DSEE HX) to upscale compressed music to higher quality.

As with the over-the-ear headphones, the WF-1000XM3 work with Sony’s companion headphone app for iOS and Android. That allows you to adjust the levels of noise cancellation so that, for example, you could have it cranked up to its maximum for a flight, but then lower it so as to allow in ambient noise if you’re in an office. The only difference is, Sony tells us, that the earbuds don’t have the auto-adjust system that the headphones do.

The Sony WF-1000XM3 earbuds are available in SA, priced at R6 499 in a choice of black or silver. Better yet, you can scoop them in Black at Incredible Connection for R4 999

Sony’s Mobile and Professional Solutions divisions haven’t announced if a similar shut-down is in store for their versions. Yay! More underwater selfies.

[blockquote]”Due to the volatile business environment and intense competition, Sony South Africa (Pty) Ltd (“SSA”) will cease its local operations and direct distribution of consumer and audio-visual (CAV) products in South Africa by end Jan 2015. Sony Middle East & Africa FZE, the regional headquarters for Sony in Middle East and African regions, is currently studying the possibility of a new business model for selected Sony’s CAV products across South Africa. As far as Sony Mobile and Sony Professional Solutions products are concerned, they are not included in this cessation and will continue to operate as they do at present, due to different business models and business environment.”[/blockquote]