Well, I remembered having some lower end models with asticker too, so I laid them side by side: These are the stickers: "Aiwa's Best Quality" and "Best Value"
There are great replacement batteries available, chargeable via USB-C I love this design and weight, the JX929 that also belongs to this line.
Here is the front of the JX929, back of the JX70: buttons galore. Also shown are the replacement batteries. One I sanded ever so slightly as they are a hair too thick, impossible to remove from the units. They are great, also in my all time favorite Aiwa
Nice Emiel! Thanks for the hint about the replacement batteries, don't have them but will order. The JX929 is fantastic indeed! I don't have one... yet, can imagine it's your favourite Aiwa. I personally also like the older top models from Aiwa a lot, as I tend to look at them from the time perspective they were launched - The HS-P08 and HS-J08 were really impressive when they were released.
The HS-P08 is a really nice player... I have only one, and it has some wear. From the case you can already tell this is not just any mainstream player.
This was released in 1985 and it was incredible how much functionality they packed into a single device at that time.
At that time, "logic control" or "touch buttons" or whatever you want to call it - the fact that there's no mechanical connection between the PLAY/FF/REW/STOP buttons and the mechanism, allowing for very easy operation and also enabling wired remote control, was absolutely not common. Sony showed it with the WM-7 but not many models had it. The HS-P08 had that, and auto-reverse, and remote, and two headphonejacks, and "Music Sensor" automatic search, and a high end case... it had it all. Except for tuner and recording but we'll get there in a minute.
From opening the lid, you can tell this is a device the engineers who designed it were proud of. So much care was taken to design the inside in a nice way - the "scale" and "play/reverse play" labels, the "Full Logic Control", "Anti Rolling Mechanism", "Rewind Auto Replay System"... If you wanted features and technology in your pocket, you wouldn't be disappointed by this Aiwa.
And the HS-P08 specifically mentions "Staar, Brussels, Belgium"... not sure, is this related to licensing? The red connector looks a bit like a mic/line input of a recording walkman, but it is the external power connector. The HS-P08 cannot record, unlike...
The HS-J08, it's larger brother! Isn't it beautiful and so eighties with this fantastic button design?
Those are nice! Can you include a front picture? We don't have the P08 nor J08 on Walkman.land yet, and I am happy to add them using your pics.
The HS-J08 adds tuner and recording capability, as if the super nice feature set of the HS-P08 wasn't enough yet.
"Auto-stop patent. Just about everyone had to license this at the time." https://www.tapeheads.net/threads/tascam-122-mkii-vs-nakamichi-mr-1.108956/
It's crazy how many features Aiwa packed into this one. It has an external mic jack as well as an internal one. Dolby is only for playback, as with most recording walkmans. The reverse mode switch also does "OSC o" or "OSC oo", no clue what that means - maybe some anti hiss for the tuner by shifting the demodulation frequency?
Also here, if a device is as beautiful inside as the outside, you know the engineers did their best to make an incredible device.
Side by side... you can see that the J08 is significantly larger than the P08, which is not a surprise. Note that the silver sides are actually plastic, only the lid is metal (and in case of the J08 also the back it seems). Still, despite not being a full metal device, they feel very solid and high end. I really like the design and button layout of these beauties.
Initially I though they were the same devices except for tuner/rec, but they're not. There are many differences actually, the P08 is operating on 2xAAA batteries whereas the J08 runs on 2xAA. Also, check out the different position of the volume potentiometer, the different sizes etc... Even though look & feel are very similar, under the hood there are quite a few differences.
I serviced and repaired a few of them. It's a lot of work and they're very sensitive. They can be repaired but take your time, even installing a new belt is quite lot of work and requires good soldering skills.
More side by side: HS-P08 in case, HS-J08 in case and HS-J08 without case. The case is a plastic hardcover, quite thick and robust, offering great protection. The cases are quite different: I like the HS-P08 case best with the silver "leather"(?) with its stitching. That one also has a hole to swap batteries while keeping it in the case, the J08 doesn't have that. P.S. If you look very carefully at both J08s you'll see another difference. Hint: It's the color of a switch.
