Amazon.com: Customer reviews: Sony SA-NS310 Compact Wi-Fi Speaker with AirPlay

Top positive review

Positive reviews›

Great flexible speaker for the money

Reviewed in the United States on March 10, 2013

Dnla and AirPlay support. Good value for money. I would rate it 5stars if it had a battery for this money

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Critical reviews›

Jeff

So much promise, but falls short

Reviewed in the United States on May 1, 2013

First the good,
-Small footprint but great sound at normal listening volumes.
-Easy setup.
-Supports AirPlay and the Sony Audio Remote (a.k.a Media Remote, iPhone app)
-Supports Pandora and other streaming services.
-Easy to update over the Internet (just press the button on the bottom of the unit!)
-Great WiFi reception. Never had any issues with streaming.

And the "not so good":
-When switching between Airplay and songs started from the Sony Media Remote (iPhone app), it always get's confused and can no longer play anything. Restart is necessary.
-If it's been on and idle for more than a few hours, it won't play anything. Restart is necessary.
-After Party Streaming, it won't play anything else. Restart is necessary.
-Using the Media Remote and accessing a Windows Media Server can be very slow. It doesn't cache the lists so if I choose All Artists (or God forbid "All Music") it takes many minutes to complete the listing. Only then can you search. So if you really want to play some music regularly, you have to create special playlists and put them in a quickly accessible folder.

In summary, great hardware, bad software. I've been hoping that they would fix this with an update, but there hasn't been a new one since I purchased this in Dec, 2012.

Therefore, I could only recommend this unit if you will always be streaming the same kind of media source and you have a small library (and don't mind rebooting each time you want to use it).

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8 total ratings, 8 with reviews

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From the United States

Jeff

So much promise, but falls short

Reviewed in the United States on May 1, 2013

Verified Purchase

One person found this helpful

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Yvan

Good speaker - BIG price jump though!

Reviewed in the United States on February 2, 2013

Verified Purchase

Good speaker, for ease of setup and airplay use. Streams easily and no dropped sound issues - sound quality is decent but it's a small driver so = small sound - I wouldn't use for a big room.
My only major issue is the major price jump! I bought it for 81$ last month and now i see it's 200$!!

I WOULD NOT pay $200 for this speaker! IT Was a good buy at 80$ though...

Helpful

Great flexible speaker for the money

Reviewed in the United States on March 10, 2013

Verified Purchase

Dnla and AirPlay support. Good value for money. I would rate it 5stars if it had a battery for this money

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William R. Porter

Outstanding Speaker

Reviewed in the United States on January 12, 2013

Verified Purchase

I purchased this for my bedroom. I found the sound is much better than I anticipated. I particularly like the crisptness of each note and the clarity from bass tjhrough highn notes. There is one problem with the set-up. The app has a message that the unit must be registered before it will work and refers to a web site that must be used. The web site does not exist. I reccalled that my Sony Bravia was activated at the Sony Essentials site. When I went there I found a picture of my TV and one of thr new speaker. Clicking on the Speaker asked for the activation code and registered the product and brought up a menu of Sony's features for the speaker including Pandora. The speakers iPhone and iPad apps work well withj the device. I use the speakers with Windows 7 and find that Windows Media Player and iTunes Air Player easily send music to the devise. I also purchased the Airfoil for Windows program which forwards music from any Windows 7 source and provides a list of all wi-fi apeakers on my home network tjhat inclludes my iPad and iPhone. Music can be sent each device from a menu that allows you to send to any or as many of the devices which is much better than Air Play or Play. I now can play Spotify from my laptop and have the sound on all of speakers in my house. .

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R. Ferguson

Fantastic speaker for a small, quiet setting.

Reviewed in the United States on October 24, 2012

Vine Customer Review of Free Product( What's this? )

Summary:
Sony really has done a wonderful job designing and building this speaker but I find that its size restricts its usefulness. While the speaker is impressive for its size and can be loud, you can't really crank it and base response is understandably lacking. However, if you are looking for a speaker for a small, quiet room to play music at modest levels, this is a perfect speaker. The speaker is a good deal when there are steep price drops.

In Detail:
I've had the unusual opportunity to test a fairly wide range of Airplay-capable speakers from Philips, JBL, Logitech and Sony. This is a fast moving product category and it is being driven by the ubiquity of iTunes-related devices that have Airplay capability built into them. The SA-NS310 is a great little speaker, well thought-out and well made, but it really cannot surmount the limitations of its physical size. When speakers get small, they simply don't have the ability to vibrate significant quantities of air. So as much as I like the design of this speaker, I can't recommend it for anything other than a kind of ambient sound speaker. It would work well if you are listening in a small space and tend to keep sound levels at what would be a "3" on a traditional stereo setting that goes to 10 (it would be completely inappropriate for Spinal Tap). I did see a Youtube video on the device where the reviewer suggested that the speaker could be great for a party. No. Since Airplay speakers are more expensive to begin with, I suggest you go a little bit bigger for a bit more money. If you are set on buying a Sony, take a look at the SA-NS410 . The Philips SoundAvia line got middling reviews (and its price has dropped fast), but it offers a lot more punch simply because it is bigger and can throw more air. If you really must have a small size Airplay speaker, then I prefer this one over similarly sized competition (e.g., the JBL On Beat Air). If you are looking for the best Airplay speaker from the major manufacturers, I recommend the Logitech UE Air Speaker , but this is a pricey speaker.

As for sound quality, this speaker has what I find to be a very "Sony" sound. It is bright and, as much as it can, thumps the base. The sound has a filtered and tweaked quality that makes the most out of the speaker's limited size. Some people like this sound. I prefer a more flat response because it just sounds less manipulated. I'm not making a value judgement about the sound (no stars taken off for this). I have a similar take on the larger SA-NS410, but the larger speaker is able to deliver a much more adequate amount of base and volume.

[For the most part, the following comments apply to the SA-NS410 as well.] This speaker sets up very easily once you download the installation app to your iOS device. This process is typical for most Airplay speakers. First, you steer your iOS device onto the speaker's WiFi signal (via preferences) and then you use the app to specify your network's ID and password. That is pretty much it. Once you've given it a minute or two to handshake with your network and then confirmed the connection, you will want to press and hold the "Update" button on the speaker so that it can perform a firmware update. Also, move the slider on the speaker from "Standby" to "Network Standby" so that the WiFi connection doesn't time-out after 30 minutes. If your WiFi router is WPS capable, then you can use that to automate the installation process.

There are a bunch of other options and capabilities for this speaker which, frankly, I think most people are not going to use. Some of this reflects the fact that an earlier version, the SA-NS300, came without Airplay functionality, relying instead on a competing and less widespread standard, DLNA. The SA-NS310 still has DLNA functionality and works with Sony's proprietary HomeShare system. Additionally, there is a "Party" mode that allows the speaker to sync with other Sony WiFi speakers. If you have iTunes running on a computer, however, you can port to any combination of Airplay speakers on your network (single or multiple). You can't port to multiple speakers from an iOS device yet. There is also a remote control, but with all the Airplay speakers I've used, I find the remote entirely unnecessary because I just control the volume from my iOS device or computer (where I'm fiddling with the play list anyway...). Thankfully, this speaker does not include a dock (something that was becoming increasingly tedious given the size range of iOS devices and the introduction of Apple's new connector).

This and other Sony Airplay speakers have done a fine job holding their WiFi connection. As with ALL WiFi speakers, there is a delay in porting the audio signal and there are occasional drop outs (say, for example, when there is interference from a microwave oven). I don't find that the Sony speakers are any more or less susceptible to transmission problems, and your mileage will vary. This speaker also includes an ethernet input and a 3.5 mm audio input jack in case you need a wired solution.

A few final comments about Airplay speakers in general:
-Airplay has been very good at allowing other people to play their music in our house. In an environment where there are a number of music collections, it is handy for different people to port to whatever speaker they want (and this can be done simultaneously with different iTunes accounts in different parts of the house).
-Airplay has been very useful in porting our iPad's sound (the iPad's own speaker is lacking). For example, if I am playing a video on my iPad, I can port the sound to a nearby Airplay speaker. This has been very, very handy.
-Unless you are in a small living space, speakers like this Sony or the aforementioned Logitech work best in conjunction with a traditional stereo speaker system that is itself receiving an Airplay feed (e.g., via an Apple Airport Express).

Cheers

10 people found this helpful

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Douglas Figueredo

Well made and great airplay

Reviewed in the United States on February 21, 2013

Vine Customer Review of Free Product( What's this? )

I've had several AirPlay speakers since the technology came out and they weren't always this easy to set up. The free app you download makes this speaker connect to your home network very quickly. The only down side is that the app doesn't let you rename the speaker (but perhaps it will in an update and that's not a deal breaker by any means).

The very BEST thing about this speaker is that the transformer (power brick thing) is 'in-line' with the power cord; meaning it's in the middle of the power cord and NOT on the plug end. This is fantastic because then you don't have to worry about a huge adapter fitting into your electrical socket with other items (like a blow dryer plug for me, since I have this in my bathroom).

The overall sound is very good. Strong bass and nice highs, but just a smidge muddy in the middle. It can probably be EQ'ed to perfection but I haven't bothered.

I send out music from iTunes to my AppleTV (2nd gen) and two other Airplay speakers and this one always connects quickly and rarely drops out (compared to the others that drop out more frequently).

My overall score would really be a 4.5 stars.

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Martin A Hogan

Good Idea - Tough Setup

Reviewed in the United States on October 27, 2012

Vine Customer Review of Free Product( What's this? )

UPDATE: A freind added more information, which I have included, regarding setup on the Android app, Sony support, registering with Pandora and Wi-FI.

It is said that connecting to your system is easy. It is not. They say the setup is easy. It is not. I tried setup by using my iPhone and going through "settings", but the SONY wireless connection kept switching on and off under my Wi-Fi. So I tried the direct LAN configuration and that didn't even respond. The CD setup did not respond, saying something about my GOOGLE CHROME being amiss. I installed the two iTunes apps required - NS SETUP and DISCOVERY before finally I got a quick connection. This all took me about 45 minutes.

Update: You may experience a few more bugs. The code returned by the Android app isn't the code you register with. Sony support was able to fix that right away. That is a plus. You can register with Pandora but that is a little trickier as the Android app crashed. But after a restart, it worked. You may get dropouts with Wi-Fi but you can hook it up to the wired network.

The speaker is attractive and does send out a fairly loud, balanced, even tone of music. The treble, mid-range and bass is actually quite good. The `PARTY' button really does little to improve the sound.

There is a 3.5mm connection installed, so you can install just about any handheld device or smartphone for sound. The idea of not having this be a docking station is a good alternate idea, but that comes with an assortment of other problems, like three different ways to set your system up (which is not always a great idea). Now with the system setup and working and considering the sound and now the price, I can't say this is such a great deal. Maybe half the price would be fair to ask the consumer.

2 people found this helpful

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Zeb

Very nice product Good sound and setup.

Reviewed in the United States on December 26, 2012

Vine Customer Review of Free Product( What's this? )

This product has been reduced to a super price on Amazon recently. It is a great buy and offers real value and price performance. I found the setup very east and the sound and general construction high. I tend to have little setup problems with products - If one follows the instructions it is a real charm----enjoy.

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Sony SA-NS310 Compact Wi-Fi Speaker with AirPlay

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Sony SA-NS310 Compact Wi-Fi Speaker with AirPlay

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