Fisher Walkman (1987)

211 points · 39 comments · view on lemmy.world

39 Comments

artifex@piefed.zip · 33 pts · 3d (5 replies)

80s/early 90s industrial design was sooo good.

BilSabab@lemmy.world · 17 pts · 3d (4 replies)

hard edges, man. makes everything look cooler

lemmyng@piefed.ca · 17 pts · 3d (1 reply)

Plus physical buttons, knobs, and sliders.

BilSabab@lemmy.world · 8 pts · 3d

the hardest button to button!

captain_aggravated@sh.itjust.works · 5 pts · 3d (1 reply)

Shockingly busy. My smart phone has three buttons on the exterior and they aren't labeled. You're supposed to know the long one is a volume rocker and the short one is the power button. There's a big G logo on the back.

Imagine a smart phone with the design language above. All the writing and graphics on it for an AM/FM cassette player.

BilSabab@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 3d

more button more fun

calliope@retrolemmy.com · 22 pts · 3d (5 replies)

I don’t know how practical it is to have an equalizer on the outside if it’s portable, but it looks incredible.

Also the cassettes inside look amazing too!

Tahl_eN@lemmy.world · 18 pts · 3d (3 replies)

Those sliders were pretty stiff

Imgonnatrythis@sh.itjust.works · 9 pts · 3d

Hard not to be that close to that ass.

calliope@retrolemmy.com · 6 pts · 3d

I actually wondered about this! I appreciate the confirmation.

I’m so jealous!

VieuxQueb@lemmy.ca · 3 pts · 2d

And the middle point had a strong detent you could feel easily.

Zachariah@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 3d

yeah, those are some sexy reels

Sanctus@anarchist.nexus · 10 pts · 3d (11 replies)

God I fucken miss Walkmans. I can't figure out what's wrong with either of mine and I have taken them completely apart 🫠

faythofdragons@slrpnk.net · 21 pts · 3d

I'm gonna guess that right now the problem is that they're taken apart

yuri@pawb.social · 9 pts · 3d (5 replies)

usually belts, but if you’ve taken them apart you’d probably notice that? otherwise the most common thing to go wrong in vintage audio is blown/tried capacitors, and that’s ALWAYS a fucken headache.

what’s actually going wrong with em? if they’re eating tapes it’s probably just a gummy pinch roller!

Sanctus@anarchist.nexus · 3 pts · 3d (4 replies)

I thought it was the belt because the flywheel bounces when it stops on both. But the belts are new, shit the fly wheels are brand new. Everything looked fine when I inspected the parts, nothing seemed weird putting it back together. I cleaned the photoreceptors just in case because they both also randomly stop. Nothin' 💀

yuri@pawb.social · 5 pts · 3d (3 replies)

sounds like maybe the autostop is triggering when it shouldn’t. i had a similar problem on a full size cassette deck but i never actually found out what caused it specifically. i just kept cleaning everything until eventually it worked correctly. MAYBE there’s a tried spring somewhere that’s finding resistance where there isn’t any?

it sucks that everything looks like it should work, but it’s doubly annoying that the problems are happening on a walkman. at least on a desktop cassette deck you can easily tear it down to parts and watch everything work in realtime. that’s a bit of an ask for anything miniaturized 😄

Sanctus@anarchist.nexus · 4 pts · 3d (2 replies)

They are both WM-EX631's (Japanese Purple). Thank you for the advice anyway. I think when I get the chance next I'll do a deep clean and hopefully it works for me too. Because you are right these parts are so small and so compact to make the device thin that I find it not fun to work on. I do have a transparent case on both of them though so some things I can see. Thanks, again!

yuri@pawb.social · 3 pts · 3d (1 reply)

ah jeeze my FIRST thought was something like “wow those are crazy thin, i bet some tiny part could break in half and i’d have a hard time even knowing” hahahah

were i in your shoes, my next course of action would be fucken around in the service manual. sorry if i’m getting a little too invested in a stranger’s walkmen, i just have a passion for repairing dead tech!!

Sanctus@anarchist.nexus · 3 pts · 3d

They're pretty cool when they work! I only have two cause the first one started doing this and I asked the seller if he had any repair advice and he just sent me another one and apologized.

BilSabab@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 3d (3 replies)

i had like six or seven generations of walkman at this point - a pair of cassette players and then mp3 players. those mp3 players are sturdy as hell.

Sanctus@anarchist.nexus · 2 pts · 3d (2 replies)

I got an MP3 after the cassettes broke and transferred everything, but it doesnt hit my heart strings the same unfortunately.

BilSabab@lemmy.world · 5 pts · 3d (1 reply)

cassettes have this peculiar sound that just makes everything harder

Sanctus@anarchist.nexus · 3 pts · 3d

I miss listening to the Cassette Beasts ost cassette on my cassette player

lemmysmash@piefed.social · 3 pts · 3d

That fisher used a great bait.

miked@piefed.social · 2 pts · 3d

Fisher was garbage in the 80s (always?).

Sony had the good stuff.

cerebralhawks@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 2 pts · 3d (5 replies)

Are they waterproof? I feel like the question is begged by the brand name, like I have to wonder if the rear window of a Lincoln car is bulletproof because... why TF else would you name it after a president who was shot in the back of the head? I mean really. Oh, and also because of the bathing suit on the model holding it.

Also, I'd go with the bottom one for the colours alone. Black and gold, like a Trans Am.

HakFoo@lemmy.sdf.org · 2 pts · 3d

The Fisher brand was named after Avery Fisher who founded the company. They were very well regarded in the tube era, but after solid-state took over, they got sold a few times and ended up in Sanyo's portfolio where they dragged around as a low-end brand until the 1990s.

I have one of their early 1980s amplifiers which is fairly heavy, but not nearly as well put together as most '70s kit.

yuri@pawb.social · 2 pts · 3d (2 replies)

they’re super not waterproof! sony had some “sport” walkmen that featured rubber seals and a lil locking clip, but even those i’d be careful around water with hahah

corsicanguppy@lemmy.ca · 2 pts · 3d (1 reply)

My first yellow Sony Walkman Sports, the yellow one, fell into The Chuck while I was working on the pens at a fish farm. A week later it was found on a 'mort' dive and, yeah, I should've been more careful.

I was more careful with the second one and didn't trust the belt clip.

yuri@pawb.social · 1 pts · 3d

i have that same one! funnily enough they actually hold up REALLY WELL over time because the “sealed” interior makes the rubber belts age slower lmao

corsicanguppy@lemmy.ca · 1 pts · 3d

question is begged

"Begged" is short for "beggared", so no.

Tikiporch@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 3d (2 replies)

Amazing how her pants fabric color matches her skin tone on her arm so perfectly.

BilSabab@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 3d (1 reply)

pants?

Tikiporch@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 2d

Oh. I see.

FavouriteShapes@sh.itjust.works · 1 pts · 3d (2 replies)

Were women invented around 1985? They seem to feature in all the adverts up until 1999

zarkanian@sh.itjust.works · 5 pts · 3d

You should see some of the arcade machine ads from '70s.

BilSabab@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 3d

i think Steve Jobs stole the patent from some dude who also invented what later became an iPhone. that motherfucker was cooking ngl

A_norny_mousse@piefed.zip · 1 pts · 3d

Not sure about Fisher quality, but damn they were ugly.

Sony had much better design back then. Smaller, too.