I’ve had Walkmans for a long time. The place I listen music is on the go and it has always been that way. In the picture is my own Sony Walkman cassette player WM-FX251 and that device was a godsend when I was a kid. I could listen music what I wanted and as loud as I wanted and nobody knew what I was listening. I could be in my own space and alone in it with the soundtrack I wanted to bring with me. And portable audio has been with me since.
I had a CD version of Walkman but that has disappeared in all these years. It was my go to device when cd came but it was a flimsy device. It had stabilizer so it didn’t skip when you moved around. If I remember correctly it broke eventually.
Then came mp3s.
I had cheap mp3 players which were size of usb stick and contain about 1 giga if lucky. I wasn’t all that pleased with any of them. I loved the portability but using those wasn’t fun. Eventually I got Ipod Nano 4th gen and that became my go to music device for many years. And that could be it’s own story some day. The thinness and lightweight and using the scroll wheel felt futuristic at that time and in a way feel futuristic today.
Then I started to listen music on my phone like a normal person but I always wanted to just listen music and podcasts and not be interrupted by notifications or calls. So I started to look for a modern mp3 player. I started to look for what Sony was doing. My first real mp3 player was Sony Walkman NW-A45 and that thing became my go to music device for many years. It could fit all my 200 gigabytes music in SD card quite easy. It run its own linux version without any wifi. It had bluetooth. And the battery life was spectacular.
But moving files with usb from computer felt kind a slow in these modern times we are living. It had no memory what I was listening so using podcasts or audio books wasn’t great. I upgraded to Sony Walkman NW-A105 because I wanted more a phone like features without the phone. And that device was a bust. It had horrendous battery life and it bricked after a couple of months.
Finally I arrived to my current device – Sony Walkman NW-A305. Finally I got the mp3 player I have dreamed of. It has all the best features of modern smart phone (support for streaming and podcasts) and tactile buttons and finally an equal battery life with the old NW-A45. My first couple of months with this device have been a blast. It is a great device. It has a great power input for listening with wired headphones.
Main differences between phone and this dedicated audio device for me have been a great and enough power for audio. My current phone hasn’t got audio jack and listening with usb-c adapter is painful – there is this white noise which drives me crazy. I have started to hate bluetooth and I just like to plug in and not worry about connection issues or poor audio.
I can again be in my own place with music.
This isn’t sponsored post but if Sony Corporation is interested… You can get in touch with my people so we arrange something.
