WM-EX20

The WM-EX20 is a playback-only cassette Walkman released for Sony's twentieth anniversary of the format, and one of the few portable audio devices to use a stainless steel body. That choice gave the player a noticeably harder, more resistant exterior than the plastic or lighter metal shells uses elsewhere in the lineup, with a weight and surface finish that felt deliberately permanent. Inside, it retained the late-period cassette essentials: auto-reverse playback, Dolby B noise reduction, Mega Bass, and MEGA SURROUND processing to widen the stereo image through headphones, all built around an efficient transport built to conserve battery life.

reads less of a step forward and closer to a statement of closure. Sony was no longer trying to push cassette into new territory, but to present it in a form that felt complete and materially resolved. The EX20 works because it treats the Walkman not as a disposable portable, but as something you could keep.