The evolution of the Sony Walkman

Delta Steve

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On the left is a Sony Walkman WM-F 100 from 1986 and on the right a Sony Walkman NW-A45 from 2018.
I guess that would be 32 years apart and yes my WM-F 100 still works with a new belt installed.
Now it is 2019 and many folks listen to their music on a smart phone. I have to say IMO this new Walkman blows music played on a phone away. Sony did a good job with the DAC on this player. When I plug it in to my car stereo it even makes it sound better. On my HIFIMAN HE400I headphones it a real treat to listen to.20190223_101843.jpg
 
I've still got my Walkman 2. Haven't used it in years, though; don't know if it still works. A mate of mine worked for Sony's repair centre in Feltham, and got it for me in 1982 as a B-grade unit for £30, instead of the RRP of £100 at the time. Headphones still work, although the cable is a bit iffy...
 
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My thirty-gig Zune MP3 player is the best-sounding hand-held music player I've ever owned, and is still working perfectly in year 15. Absolutely wonderful GUI, too. FM is also built in.

And +1 on the HE-400i.
 
Somewhere at my mothers, my Sony auto reverse Walkman is waiting to be enjoyed again. Worked as of 2015. I lent it to my father while he was in the hospital wrapping up his battle with heart disease. He'd listen to bible tapes.
 
I've owned numerous Walkmans and other portable music devices. The earliest Walkman model I have is the WM-1, which was actually the third model introduced. I also own a Sony 3" portable reel-to-reel tape recorder which predates the Walkman by about a decade, but certainly looks the part, the TC-905A, with its matching SSA-905 amplifier/charging cradle (not pictured below):
sony_tc905a_1.jpg


Here's a picture I took showing some of the Sony portable audio devices I own, next to an early Apple iPod:
portableaudio.jpg

From left to right: Walkman WM-F12, Discman D-T3, MD Walkman NZ-R37, Apple iPod (third generation 20GB)
 
I still have my Sony D5 Discman, bought new in 1984. My youngest son (the music major) uses it with his Kenwood/Advent stereo.

I still have mine as well. I thought it was broken when I pulled it out of the closet several years ago, but then I discovered it won't play CD-Rs. I also still have the massive "portable" battery pack.
 
I've still got my Walkman 2.

Neat one. A friend from school I'm still in contact with also had one back then - including that fat external battery box (for two D/Mono cells, iirc).

My own first walkman was that funky Toshiba KT-VS1 with the cassette-shaped tuner module and foldable headphone. Whereas my biggest one still is a Sony WM-D6C - which is just a little smaller than six Sony PCM-M10 recorders.

Greetings from Munich!

Manfred / lini
 
As an aside : do you guys consider the quality of the DAC inside phones when purchasing those? Just curious. I know it's better to have a dedicated audio player. But it's fun knowing your phone sounds better than the average phone, when you need a quick 'n dirty music fix.

recently I've been looking at a new phone and I'm a cheapskates, so I'M looking at 2-3 year old phones since they can be had refurb or NOS for $100 to $150, and are still gonna be WAY better than what I have now. And I read about the LG V20 having a pretty decent DAC and output for audio, and I think I might get one. it has me intrigued. I'd love having good sound source always with me, to put in the car via AUX cable, or using headphones with it for listening while walking etc
 
I've got a Sony Watchman sitting on a shelf in my office as object d'art, and next to it is my sony ericksson walkman phone, from right before 'smart' touchscreen phones eliminated everything else. It was a fantastic phone, but the 'walkman' part was hobbled with DRM, for with Sony has been guilty of for twenty years now. Dunno about their latest versions of walkman.

here's a stock pic
68641-phones-review-sony-ericsson-walkman-w810i-mobile-phone-image1-v59dD2OJBi.jpg


it had add on speakers that used the propietary connector on the bottom. If they made one like this with bluetooth and usb C, a sd card slot, and no DRM I'd likely buy one today.

sony-ericsson-w580-full-1.jpg
 
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Part of my cd Walkman collection. Most work, a few don't.
That's a trip down memory lane for sure! Unfortunately, I'm a music freak, so all my previous walkmans, were broken over time. I had one of the sport cassette players and the sport cd player. Back in the early to mid nineties, my portable cd player (NOT a sony, iirc, panasonic had a better transport, but it's been decades so don't quote me) would only get one cd's worth of playing out of 4 AA batteries. So, I bought a fanny pack that was large enough to hold the cd player and 4 D cell batteries that I wired in series to be the proper voltage (?1.4v?) and I had a pair of Sennheiser headphones, over the ear style, but somewhat minimized and made water resistent, and would often go for long walks in the snow listening to 3 or 4 cd's. Musta looked pretty funny, but I didn't care.

At the same time, the first Sony mini disc player/recorders were being introduced, and I was fascinated with the whole concept of compressing the data down, They didn't call it MP3 though, iirc, but they did use the words Freunhoffer, I remember that from the literature that I devoured, never could afford one.

@Yodathedog , got any of the sony minidisc? were they 'proper' walkmans?

In 97 or early 98, a guy came into my shop in california, and showed me this tiny device he told me was 'the future' of music, it was called an mp3 player (I forget whos version it was) As he was describing what and how of it, i was reminded of mini discs. (of course, this was before the internet as we know it, there was no Google, just Yahoo and maybe Ask Jeeves, so knowledge wasn't as widely available, back then /alt/music/... was it. ) It only held a couple of cd's worth of songs (I think) and it was tiny, smaller then a pack of cigarettes.

Funny, i had an apple Newton back then, and I had the modem card for it, but I couldn't have imagined all these various threads converging into today's smart phone, although I wish I had... coulda made some cash.
 
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Back in the day, when my beloved Concord HPL-101 car stereo was stolen from my old 2002, I replaced it with an
Aiwa HSJ01 walkman, chosen because it had better FM then the similar Sony.

That was my head unit for the next couple years, and it performed perfectly. Back when cassettes were the preferred
source of choice, a mix tape and a powerful ADS amp were, to me, car audio nirvana.

The Aiwa walkman had an external antenna, and an alligator clip from that to the 2002’s antenna lead led to fantastic FM reception. Those days have definitely passed, in many regards.
 
Agreed, the A45 is light year's away from the orig.

Not too pleased with the menu set up, :thumbsdown: but the performance is great! :thumbsup:

Q
 
image.jpeg @Yodathedog , got any of the sony minidisc? were they 'proper' walkmans?

These are most of the portables in my "collection." I also have several component decks including the MXD-D40 cd/minidisc combo. When I set my eye on something l'm always all in.

They all work and are mostly in excellent cosmetic condition. I use them for listening when I walk. Sound quality is fine. Sonys' ATRAC compression software is amazing, and I get cd quality sound. It's absolutely amazing they could get the same amount of music time (74-80 minutes) on a disc that looks like the love child between a cd and an old style floppy disc. And that many of them run on one AA battery, boggles my not so technical brain.
 
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I have but a single md portable, in a gold color MZ-N505 type R. Slick little devil, tho I never ever use it. Cool as can be.
 
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