Bill Evans wrote:
Sony Canada and its sales representatives tell me they cannot repair my Sony
WM-2091 Walkman because the motor drive is no longer available. I solicit
the opinion of the experts on the validity of this statement and whether
there are any other repair agents who can assist me.

The WM-2091 was Sony’s absolutely “top-of-the-line” cassette Walkman when I
purchased it about ten years ago. It has no tuner, but produces excellent
sound and thundering bass from a package that fits in a shirt pocket and is
driven by a single, double AA cell. I paid a premium price for it, based
significantly on expecting Sony to support it. Also key was the quality of
the sound, which is as good as a CD player when I use my metal tape
cassettes.

The unit was used for about 500 to 800 hours, during long flights to / from
Europe and Asia, was treated very carefully and has gone nowhere for about 6
or 7 years. When I finally took it on another business trip last month, the
motor did not turn, suggesting (to me) that the belt had gone – not
unexpected after ten years.

The Sony dealer told me that both the belt and motor required replacement
(the latter surprised me because of no previous problems, the low usage and
the tender care that this unit has always received). “Perhaps they are just
running up the service bill on me”, I thought.

About a week later, they called to tell me that the motor for this unit was
no longer available and they therefore could not fix it. I am out my $40.00
for the troubleshooting activity. There are no apologies from Sony for the
lack of support for a unit that, in my opinion, is not that old, was
purchased with higher expectations of a well-known brand name and that is a
“top-of-the-line” product.

My main concern now is to identify a potential source of repair for this
unit, as I have a substantial investment in metal cassette tapes and would
prefer to use a repaired WM-2091 rather than be forced to go to an MP3
player (it won’t be a Sony).

Any comments and suggestions would be very much appreciated.

Bill


Your post, and my need imminent need for a personal voice recorder,
really got me thinking much more about purchasing a portable player. I
found that some of these portable units have the voice recorder built
in. For me, and I guess like you, portability and sound quality were of
utmost importance. I've borrowed friends Ipods and Irivers products, and
I also own an Iriver product, but it's a not so portable CD player that
plays MP3s. It sounds wonderful playing MP3s. I checked out what Iriver
has to offer and read some reviews on the IFP-190T and the IFP-390T. I
decided on the 390T but couldn't find it in a lot of places at a
competitive prices. So, I decided on this;

http://iriveramerica.com/prod/ultra/700/ifp_790.aspx

It's right down the family line of the well reveived Iriver IFP-*90T
series. It looks like the perfect blend of portability, quality MP3
playback, and a voice recorder all in one. It even has an FM radio built
in which I do not really care for, as well as a few other features.

I'm probably going to have to replace the iriver headphones with some
better units. The IFP-190T came with some well reputed Sennhieser's.
They're earbuds which I'm not much a fan of. I need headphone that are
enclosed, sensitive, and capable of producing deep, deep bass. If anyone
can suggest some good heaphones with those qualities, I'm all ears,
excuse the pun

Other than that, I can't wait to receive my new MP3 player!

CD