Android powering Sony's top new Walkman

Sony has refreshed its Walkman line-up, slipping Android Ice Cream Sandwich into the new top-line model.

The F800 series leads the new Walkman range, with a 3.5-inch touchscreen and Android ICS under the hood, giving users access to all of the apps in the Play Store, plus Sony's own Music Unlimited streaming service. It also supports a decent range of music file codecs out of the box, including MP3, WMA, AAC and FLAC.

Sony has announced pricing in the US, with the 16GB model selling for US$269, and a 32GB variant for US$299. There's been no word yet on Australian RRPs or local availability.

The S770BT Walkman is Sony's new mid-range music player, and includes video-playback functionality alongside the standard music file support, but only on a 2-inch QVGA resolution screen. The S-series Walkman does come with Sony Bluetooth wireless headphones, though.

Filling in the budget end of the Walkman refresh, the new E570 unit was also announced, offering a straightforward music-player experience without the Android OS and the apps that go along with it. Sony has the E570 is a range of eye-catching colours, and prices the different SKUs at US$79 for 4GB, US$89 for 8GB and 16GB for US$109.

As with the F800, there is no news regarding local availability for the S- or E-series models yet, but we'll be sure to update this when we find out more.