Hi People,

Yesterday I went to a very bad hamfest in Aurora, IL. I brought a lot of stuff there and sold 2 items, of which were very low on price...While walking around, I saw a Walkman looking thing in a box and picked it up. It is a Sony Soundabout, model number WA-55. It dates back to 1982-1983 and is about the same size of a WM-1 or maybe a tad bigger. It has AM/FM stereo, Stereo Recording, swiveling telescopic antenna, a backfiring speaker in the back.

Does anyone have one, and is this considered a Walkman or something more like a weird hybrid? This was in its original box, which had a sticker that said it retailed for 179.99 at Montgomery Ward when new...Condition is excellent- The only thing that needed cleaning were 2 of the contacts, which I spruced up right quick...

Not a bad score for 10$ eh?

hi, i have one of those myselfe, it doesn't say "WALKMAN" on it, but you surely can consider it as one, same way as we do it with all those AIWA, TOSHIBA, PANASONIC etc., as well as with those uncounted - but at least thousands - of different made portable stereo-cassette-players (...that's what a WALKMAN is, nothing more, just made by Sony). the WA-55 was made after 1979 means: after the first real named WALKMAN, WM-x - WM stays for WALKMAN, WA-x - WA stays for WALKABOUT, that was initialy the name Sony had previously given to their portable stereo-cassette-players, even to the very first TPS-L" (buddies, correct me if i'm wrong !), for whatever reasons they kept the name WALKABOUT only for a while and only for models with built-in-speaker (like the WA-55). Sony made many years later f.ex. the YPPY-series - also Walkman, but not called WALKMAN (there's a few other ones...),
the WA-55's cassette-movement is based on the WM-1 and became later almost unchanged (just cosmetically) movement of the WM-4 and the F1. don't know wich ones else, but i'm sure there's some...

quote:

...Not a bad score for 10$ eh?

yep, good score for 10 bucks, just the earphones are definitely not original...

This is just a generic picture I found online since I have no camera. I also picked up a Sony TC-40, a tape-player recorder that came out almost 10 years before the Walkman did. VERY old school!

cool, than your's hopefully got that frontpanel (with scale) without that ding...

cheers

Nice score, Matt.

Nice!
$10 is a great price to pay for a WA-55.

I think it is a walkman!

It's portable, it's stereo, it plays cassettes & it has headphones = Walkman.

I have one of these too. Great performance! Great looks!

quote:

Originally posted by autoreverser:
cool, than your's hopefully got that frontpanel (with scale) without that ding...

cheers

Hey Autoreverser,

The unit I got is basically mint (I have the original box and the paperwork with it too), but the thing won't rewind or fast forward...I have never changed out belts on a walkman before let alone know what kind of belt it needs...Looks like this is going to be a research project?