Giving up my iPod for a Walkman

BBC UK ^ | 29 June 2009 | Scott Campbell

[Ole Okie]

My Sony Walkman is black. And I still have it. I don't know if the cassette player still works. I still have some cassettes in the basement.

I have a Sony FX-251 on my desk, right by my MacBook Pro and my 3G i-Phone. A lot of the music I recorded from FM is on tapes, and I use the Walkman and an excellent Sony desk type tape player to listen to them.

And I have a large library of 33 rpm vinyl. Just bought an Ion turntable to convert these to MP3.

Old goats do learn new tricks, but sometimes older technology is useful, too

[mysterio]

I have a tape deck, cd player, record player, and an 8 track player. Just got my first ipod as a gift. I like it. Have to admit, it’s a fine bit of technology.

[antiRepublicrat]

You could even freak them out with this.

The Sony Discman D10 from the mid 80s. I had one, made of metal, almost a pound without a battery. The battery was half as thick as the player and weighed even more. The player attached on top of the battery, and the shoulder strap (no belt hook for this) attached to the battery.

[TChris]

That was an extremely well-built device. My older brother bought one when they first came out. It was audiophile component quality, but portable.

I still remember what a paradigm-shifting event the invention of the digital Compact Disc was. Raspberries to all the analog-loving folks!

[Mediocrates]

Reading this made me realize what a teenaged elitist I was. My Aiwa was better than a mere Walkman.

[RansomOttawa]

My friends couldn't imagine their parents using this monstrous box, but there was interest in what the thing was and how it worked.

Still got one myself. Rarely use it since I bought an iPod, but a) my iPod doesn't play radio, and b) I need something to play all those hundreds of tapes I bought in the 80s as a teenager.