Hello there again! My second thread in this forum! This time I'm looking for information about the Sony Walkman WM R55. This is probably my favorite Walkman of all time. It has an amazing design, recording capabilities, auto-reverse, Dolby B, and a speaker. All this in 1985. How cool is that? It's definitely the Walkman I think about when I hear the term "Walkman". I'd love to get one sometime. But it seems pretty rare to come by. In fact, its even rarer to pop up on ebay than the most desirable ones, like the TPS-L2 or DD9. And they also tend to fetch a big price, around the 300-500 eur mark, most times as parts-only. What I'd like to know, especially in case anyone here owns one, is how good it is. Obviously its not on the DD line level, but is it a nice Walkman? Is the sound quality good, wow/flutter levels good? Also, what kind of consumer did this Walkman target? The casual listener, the professional, the in-between? The thing I like the most on it is definitely the speaker. If you do have one, please send some pics! I'll leave a few here as well from the internet. Thank you, TreezZ
Hi @TreezZ . Some items you can find in the freely available service manual. My guess about W&F, between 0.30 and 0.45, not in the realms of the really portable Professionals: D3 and DC2. For some reason Sony stopped listing the W&F values in service manuals somewhere in the 80s, or at least did it inconsistently for anything but the DD series. In Aiwa service manuals, frequently they use “less than 0.45%”, even for the Dolby C capable ones. See my Dolby C and DD overview for more info. Frequency response might be the same as the DC2 or D3. My guess, certainly alright for casual listening but don’t expect wonders from the small mono speaker. See more here: https://walkman.land/sony/wm-r55
