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Why Sony can't bring back its classic Walkman models

obsoletesony.substack.com

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Re: Why Sony can't bring back its classic Walkman models

#81

Post by snapetom »

trencedamp wrote: post #13

This is a really interesting read. But it doesn't answer one question I have, which is why can't Sony or Apple or anyone else bring back decent MP3 players? None of this technology is lost, and there are plenty of small-time two bit no name players out there still making them, often in a much smaller, much slicker form factor than than the original digital Walkman or iPod. If I want to buy a new MP3 player, I have to…

Apple got it right with the original iPod, and your ask, and others, is just to extend it to modern times. A lot of these comments simply aren't helpful, and people chiming in know it. For me, I was looking for

1) Music player that holds a ton of songs.

2) Lossless.

3) No touch screen control.

4) Battery that is long lasting and semi-replaceable.

5) Smaller than modern phones.

6) Great software experience, which for me meant Apple Music compatible.

7) Wired. Not Bluetooth.

A $400 Sony Android-based player doesn't meet 3, 4, nor 5. Most importantly, $400 for a product that doesn't meet some pretty important criteria is ridiculous. A shitty tiny Chinese player isn't going to meet 3, 4, 6 and it'll die on you in a couple of years and you'll be back at square one.

My solution was to buy a 5.5 Gen iPod off eBay ($100), a microSD card carrier (iFlash.xyz - $40), and four microSD cards (Back in my day, $50 each for 256gb). Yes, I had to open the iPod, but yes, it checks all my boxes. And it came in less than the Sony player.

Re: Why Sony can't bring back its classic Walkman models

#82

Post by ButlerianJihad »

dotancohen wrote: post #69

It's all the same arguments as the "Why can't we build another Saturn V rocket" and the like. The parts are no longer available, the technical blueprints that remain do not paint a full picture of the manufacturing process, and the engineers and machinists who did know the full picture are mostly retired and decreased.

We can't build Saturn V rockets because there are not enough Egyptian slaves to do it today, and also we can't figure out how to prevent damage to the rockets as our donkeys roll them across the ground to the launch pad.

Re: Why Sony can't bring back its classic Walkman models

#83

Post by tonyhart7 »

plorg wrote: post #63

Article is just a (wordy) recapitulation of this tweet from a former Walkman engineer: https://x.com/akiraa_tanaka/status/2080114490830680500 But fair play to OP, you'd have to bounce it through at least Google Translate to make it legible to the predominant English-speaking HM crowd: https://x-com.translate.goog/akiraa_tanaka/status/2080114490... Still would have been good for the Substack author to link to the twee…

Yes, that is the primary reason

people just want it but not enough people to buy the thing

same happen with physical games

Re: Why Sony can't bring back its classic Walkman models

#84

Post by johncoltrane »

bombcar wrote: post #77
cbmuser wrote: post #50

It’s really only economics, there is simply no relevant market for mechanical cassette players that would justify the investment. I don’t think it’s true that the capabilities to make these devices are lost. There are still companies like ALPS that are capable of making the necessary parts. But in the end, the market is too small to justify any investments.

There's still TAPE drives out there, but nowhere near as many as there were, and they're expensive. You could make a Walkman; it'd cost $3-10k each.

There are lots of portable cassette players on the market, starting at 20€ or less.

Re: Why Sony can't bring back its classic Walkman models

#85

Post by geon »

johncoltrane wrote: post #84
bombcar wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's still TAPE drives out there, but nowhere near as many as there were, and they're expensive. You could make a Walkman; it'd cost $3-10k each.

There are lots of portable cassette players on the market, starting at 20€ or less.

Only low quality. But yes, building better quality shouldn’t cost $ 10k

Re: Why Sony can't bring back its classic Walkman models

#86

Post by klausa »

parl_match wrote: post #72
trencedamp wrote: post #13

This is a really interesting read. But it doesn't answer one question I have, which is why can't Sony or Apple or anyone else bring back decent MP3 players? None of this technology is lost, and there are plenty of small-time two bit no name players out there still making them, often in a much smaller, much slicker form factor than than the original digital Walkman or iPod. If I want to buy a new MP3 player, I have to…

> which is why can't Sony or Apple or anyone else bring back decent MP3 players the burning answer is really, by the time you've chosen a modern merchant soc, and put a screen on it, you're really more or less at the same BOM cost as a very low end android device (and frankly, the soc bsp you chose is likely to be android/aosp to begin with) so you're basically competing head to head with every shitphone maker out th…

>the burning answer is really, by the time you've chosen a modern merchant soc, and put a screen on it, you're really more or less at the same BOM cost as a very low end android device (and frankly, the soc bsp you chose is likely to be android/aosp to begin with)

This is, incidentally, also almost universally an answer to "why doesn't nobody make a dumb TV anymore?!"

The off-the-shelf SoC that handle the TV decoding/HDMI bits already has a bunch of general purpose ARM cores; might as well put Android on it instead of writing your own firmware.

Re: Why Sony can't bring back its classic Walkman models

#87

Post by smolder »

trencedamp wrote: post #13

This is a really interesting read. But it doesn't answer one question I have, which is why can't Sony or Apple or anyone else bring back decent MP3 players? None of this technology is lost, and there are plenty of small-time two bit no name players out there still making them, often in a much smaller, much slicker form factor than than the original digital Walkman or iPod. If I want to buy a new MP3 player, I have to…

You want an mp3 player with no DRM lockin and proprietary store and so on? Sorry, that's not competitive anymore. That will not happen for the same reason people don't make affordable dumb TVs anymore. The manufacturer needs a way to spy on you or get recurring revenue some other way.

Re: Why Sony can't bring back its classic Walkman models

#88

Post by phire »

trencedamp wrote: post #37
SpecialistK wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's an irony here, because Sony do make MP3 Walkmans based on Android: https://electronics.sony.com/audio/c/walkman-digital-recorde...

That would be "some sort of enthusiast audiophile flac player thing that costs way too much" The entry level Walkman is $400 and only has 32gb internal storage. It's all about flac and hires audio but you're paying through the nose for the brand

I guess there just is no room in the current market for a mid-ranged product.

The segment is being squeezed on at least five sides (probably more):

- Cheap low-end no-name players;

- Audiophile products like the Sony walkman stuff;

- People who are happy using their phones;

- (for the exercise "phone too heavy" use case) A smart watch, paired to bluetooth headphones;

- Second hand iPods from the 2000s, often refurbished and/or modded;

Maybe one of the low-end no-name players meets your needs... But how could you find it wading through the crap?

Re: Why Sony can't bring back its classic Walkman models

#89

Post by rustcleaner »

sdevonoes wrote: post #4

Got it. But then why Nike/Adidas/Quicksilver/etc cannot bring back clothes from the 90s? Buying second hand is not that nice (smells that never go away) and “vintage” places sell min. catalogue buy way overpriced.

If we ban the FED from conjuring new Dollars for buying debt and securities, and the only way fresh printed Dollars enter circulation is if apportioned to every citizen equally (debt-free), then we could have all these nice things again. Companies and rich people would need to cater to the populace in order to rake in the inflationbux and pay their taxes. Right now only governments, big businesses, and big asset owners get first spend on inflationbux, and it has resulted in we the people having only 1/3rd the purchasing power for the Dollar earned in wages as we had in 1960!

My TradingView (Yearly) model for the phenomenon: 23.05*10^12/M2SL*A4102C1Q027SBEA/(USPOP*CIVPART/100*(1-UNRATE/100))

A4102C1Q027SBEA is total US wages/salaries,

A4102C1Q027SBEA/(USPOP*CIVPART/100*(1-UNRATE/100)) attempts to get a rough average of individual wage/salary,

23.05*10^12/M2SL normalizes the time series to today's Dollar value (in M2 terms).

Re: Why Sony can't bring back its classic Walkman models

#90

Post by jjav »

snapetom wrote: post #81
trencedamp wrote: post #13

This is a really interesting read. But it doesn't answer one question I have, which is why can't Sony or Apple or anyone else bring back decent MP3 players? None of this technology is lost, and there are plenty of small-time two bit no name players out there still making them, often in a much smaller, much slicker form factor than than the original digital Walkman or iPod. If I want to buy a new MP3 player, I have to…

Apple got it right with the original iPod, and your ask, and others, is just to extend it to modern times. A lot of these comments simply aren't helpful, and people chiming in know it. For me, I was looking for 1) Music player that holds a ton of songs. 2) Lossless. 3) No touch screen control. 4) Battery that is long lasting and semi-replaceable. 5) Smaller than modern phones. 6) Great software experience, which for…

> For me, I was looking for

To add:

- A physical switch to turn off all inputs. The older ipods had a slider switch that disables all buttons and screen inputs, which was awesome.

Mostly I use an mp3 player when working on things (yard, cars, house, etc) and need something very small and very light, so not a phone. My older ipod with the switch broke down so I'm stuck with a newer ipod which lacks that switch and I hate it. Every few minutes it activates some button press from being in my pocket and ruins the listening.

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