D-265

The D-265 brought anti-skip into a lighter, less feature-heavy part of the 1996 range, pairing ESP buffering with a practical layout that kept battery life sensible and movement less risky than on older players. It is the kind of Discman built for regular carrying instead of occasional careful use.

By this stage, skip protection had already become part of the baseline expectation instead of something worth advertising on its own. The D-265 was part of the stretch where that shift was being normalized across the range. It helped make "portable CD" feel less conditional.