I really need a device just to listen to songs i cant go with the higher model because i dont have that much money saved and since the Sony NW-A306 alr came out a while back not only is it old but still runs on android 12 and i dont really know how good the device is so i came here looking for help. I mainly only wanna listen to music and i use wired earphones

I'm not a technical minded person, so I apologise for not detailing important aspects you might want to know about. That being said, my inital experience with the device is positive.

The sound quality through my Sony WF-1000XM4 is magnificient, compared to that of my Pixel 7. Volume is louder, sounds feel much more crisp and puncy. Audio feels much more balanced and less muffled though the NW-A306, compared to my pixel. Music overall feels much livelier, detailed and snappy.

I haven't ever used an equalizer and don't use any of the additional audio tweaks that can be set through the special audio settings app, although there's plenty to play around with. The equalizer is pretty extensive. I believe the teakable equalizer range is 31hz to 16khz, and there are 10 bars to adjust. There's also DSEE Ultimate, DC Phase Linearizer, Dynamic Normalizer, and Vinyl Processor functions built-in.

As you may already be aware, the DAP runs Sony's lightly skinned and customized version of Android 12. The navigation is button based, not gesture based. The processor inside is definitely low end. I was downloading lossless and hi-res audio from Apple Music to a 512gb micro sd, and had to put the device down for a bit, because the software was becoming pretty unresposive and the device had become unbareably hot. Slow down and heat only seem to be an issue when "heavy tasks" are being performed.

Now that I have my sd card filled up and the device set up to my liking, it's smooth sailing. The device is extremely comfortable to handle, the screen is small, but have no real complains about its clarity. That said, I did change the display size and font size down to small in the display settings because I found words and images to be too large and overcrowded on such a small screen. I'm finding the screen's useablity much more comfortable now.

The buttons on the side are clicky and work very well, as you'd expect from a sony device.

I can't say much about the battery yet, as I haven't used the device for a full 32 hours, but I can give updates in the future if anyone's interested in battery life. Charging however is extremely fast. I charged the device from 5% to 100% in just 1.25 hours, which for me is very reasonable.

Anything else...? - Oh yeah! The device doesn't have any speakers. This was initially a bit of a shock to me, as it does feel a bit like a mini smartphone, but obviously watching YouTube isn't really its intended use. I suppose that's what smartphones are for. That said, YouTube and other Google "bloatware" was pre-installed on the device when I booted it up for the first time. I ended up disabling most of the apps. Don't really understand why they were on there to begin with.

Anyway. Sorry for rambling on. I'm not good with words, but hopefully the above helps you decide whether the NW-A306 is the right DAP for you. If you have any questions, I'd be more than happy to answer them the best I can.