Hi all. I posted recently about issues in updating the firmware on my Walkman NW-ZX300. To recap, When I purchased the unit a year ago the firmware version it arrived with had been superseded by Version 2.0. At the time I had just upgraded my Mac to OS 10.14 (Mojave). I noted that the Mac updater available for download from Sony was shown as being compatible with OS 12 & 13. However the updater wouldn't run, failing part-way through the operation. I spoke to Sony and they suggested that although I was using 10.14 it should work, but after numerous retries they said it might be an Apple or McAfee problem. I went to an Apple store, downloaded the uploader on one of their demo Macs, and was able to update the firmware to 2.0 with no problem. I believe the store Mac was still on 10.13.
Having just updated my Mac again to OS 10.15 (Catalina) that requires 64 bit applications, and Sony having announced firmware Version 2.02, I was hopeful that the new updater would work for me. No - still showing as only being compatible with OS 12 & 13, and not surprisingly the update failed. I spoke to Sony UK and was told that there are no plans to support further Apple OS versions. Maybe it's me, but while it's common for companies to drop support for older operating systems, I've never come across one that decided not to support newer systems. Sony's suggestion was to either a) find someone with a Mac still running on OS 13 or below or b) find someone with a PC running Windows 10, 8.1 or 7 (I tried public library Windows PCs but they block download of .exe files, and most business users these days have similar constraints). I eventually found a neighbour with a Windows 10 laptop and go the job done.
This is hardly a great customer experience. I pointed out that this was unacceptable when spending around £500 on a device; I asked whether thee issue was model specific. The support person told me that if you buy Sony's new flagship DMP-Z1 digital music player, which costs en eye-watering £8,000 (yes, eight thousand) you'll still have to find someone with a Mac running an outdated operating system to update the firmware. Go figure...
