Collectors Snap Up Early MP3 Players

An anonymous reader writes "It looks like vintage MP3 portables are the hot new collectible for old radio connoisseurs. On the cover of this month's edition of Antique Radio Magazine is Sony's first DAP, the Vaio Music Clip. The cover article is the second part of a series showcasing the first players by Sony, RCA, I2Go, and Intel (remember the Pocket Concert?). Part one, which was published in the December 2004 edition, covers the first flash unit the Eiger Labs MPMan F10 (the Rio PMP300 was second), and the first hard drive player the Personal Jukebox PJB-100. CNET also wrote about these first players last January, offering more details on the MPMan and the PJB-100"

How much is too much?

[AtariAmarok]

"How much nostalgia can you really have for an outdated piece of hardware that appeared and disappeared 2 years ago?"

We'll see when we get the first article about collectors of the antique first iPod appear by the end of the year.

"Yeah, sonny, when I was young, the iPod only held 5,000 songs. Nothing like the 50 gigasong models we have now, young whippersnapper!"

Re:Collectors or memoribilia? hahahahhahahahhahaha

[Mike Connell]

I laughed when I saw the Intel Pocket Concert was on that list - I still use mine.

Outdated? Maybe, but still jsut as useful as ever.

Re:Vintage MP3 Players = Vintage Walkmans = Absurd

[rootofevil]

*ahem* that one is broken, and it says so in the item description.

i bid on a broken ipod the other day (description clearly stated the unit did not work) in hopes of getting the accessories (esp the charger) for a decent price. i maxed out at 50$, bidding finally ended at 275$.

i wonder how much a _working_ walkman would go for.

Still have one of the first

[Schnapple]

I still have a Diamond Rio PMP300 [amazon.com] - the one they got sued over and established the precedent on MP3 players being legal. Some dude sold it to me for $10 used - and it wasn't too old at the time (~1999). Of course the 32MB size limit got hit pretty quickly and meant incomplete albums or downsampled ones. And it had this really annoying flaw where the battery door would break and then have to be taped shut.

I think it still works and it's a cool piece of nostalgia. But what struck me was - it has a digital screen across the top and a large, circular interface across the bottom. So did the iPod draw inspiration from this? Or did Rio just nearly get it right the first time?

Re:Vintage MP3 Players = Vintage Walkmans = Absurd

[ZorbaTHut]

According to http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&cate gory=15053&item=5765975874&rd=1&ssPageName=WDVW (another broken one), $350, if it's in new condition with accessories.

That's a lot.

Re:Title is incorrect.

[UWC]

Just for reference, my PSP plays mp3s without changing the format. I know it's not exclusively a digital audio player, but figured I'd throw that out. It plays both MP3 and Atrac3, and I've used it to transfer MP3s between two computers and they came out at the other end with their original format intact. I also have a Sony CD Walkman that plays MP3 and Atrac3 CDs (and has AM/FM/Weather/TV radio tuners). That thing gets some amazing battery life out of two AAs. Instead of my needing to recharge the PSP every day or so even if I only use it for playing audio those days. Of course, I guess the Walkman doesn't have a giant backlit LCD screen or a 222MHz CPU.

Re:Still have my RIO 500

[shokk]

Check the prices on Ebay. Collectors may be snapping them up, but prices aren't that high. Basically they are talking about $20 in your pocket for that old player. It's only going to make a scratch in the price of a new iPod, so you'd better hawk a lot more stuff if you want a shiny new player.