The MP3 player, bane of the RIAA and friend to commuters everywhere, was first unveiled in 1998. The first device with built-in MP3 decoding and dedicated storage was the SaeHan Information Systems’s MPMan F10, debuting at Cebit (see this post from a couple months ago). Boasting an impressive 32MB, the machine could play back files loaded via an included serial cable.
I remember the first MP3 device I bought was a generic model I found at a pawn shop for $40. They weren’t sure what it was, but it was mine after I talked them down to $25. I had to get a $40 64MB MMC (not SD!) card via eBay to make it work. It would hold about 5 albums (I compressed well) which I ripped myself. The AA batteries lasted about 16 hours, not bad for the day.
Now, of couse, we have iPod and Zune and iPhone and a million imitators. Our phones, picture frames, and even cars play MP3s now. But nostalgia is awesome, so I must ask: what was your first MP3 player? And what was the first MP3 you downloaded? Let’s share!
I totally remember the first MP3 I ever downloaded, because it was my junior year of high school (1999), and one of my friends had bought this 128MB player that was the envy of our entire class.
My first downloaded song… the cover of Blue Monday by Orgy, thanks to some seedy AOL Chat room where people were swapping MP3s via email. The song was like 8MB and took hours to download on my parents’ 28K modem.
Totally worth it.
I had the first Samsung Yepp. I had to download songs using the Parallel Port. It had 32MB of built in memory. You could buy additional memory, some kind of Yepp memory card. I bought it on clearance for $30 from Office Max or Depot.
It worked well for jogging. I still have it, but I don’t have a parallel port anymore…
Its crazy to think about. My first mp3 player was my car stereo deck. Haha. Then I bought my iPhone. I got a pretty late start on the mp3 world.
My first player was an MPIO FL 100 128Meg MP3 player. It has an FM tuner, A-B looping, FM/voice recording, and a mirror finish. It was nice and small too!
My first player was also the MPIO FL100. I remember after class my friends and I would either share the headphones or if we were lucky we would find someone with a splitter. Had that thing for awhile. Then came my 1G Nano and then my 80gb Zune.
My first player was a generic-no-name chinese player back when 128mb makes people “that’s huge!” Cost me 90 dollars.
But my first mp3 file, long before I bought the player is “Wannabe”.
I used to be a Spice Girls fan. USED TO. damnit.
The first player I had was an RCA Lyra with 32mb removable compact flash card. That was in response to my friend’s purchase of a Diamond Rio 300. Later I would see the value of mp3 cds and got a Panasonic CD player that could read them.