PortableCdPlayer
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Portable CD players see a resurgence in the UK
Unless you have some unexplained obsession with gadgets of yesteryear, you probably haven't been paying close attention to how many brands of portable CD players your local retailers have been stocking. According to Currys over in the UK, however, it's being pressured to order up truckloads of 'em to satisfy the 50 percent uptick in demand compared to last year. Moreover, John Lewis (a department store) has begun stocking the units again some four years after originally putting them to rest. Analysts are asserting that the lagging economy is leading people to select these devices as stocking stuffers, with their ease-of-use and rock-bottom prices making them highly attractive in the current market. Word to the wise, though -- chances are that special someone would much prefer a low-end 1GB DAP over something they probably already have. Or, you know, a Pizza Express gift card.
Hitachi's HMR-1 CD player and MP3 recorder
Portable CD players are just so retro, that is, until you slap in some new tricks like an SD card for line-in recording or MP3 playback. Affectionately dubbed the "i.μ's" (Eye Muse), the HMR-1 supports MP3/WMA playback and can record direct from CD or from externally attached sources (192kbps max) direct to SD cards without the use of a PC. No, it won't record to writable CDs and it doesn't support DRM'd WMA files. We'll see if the ol' dog hunts when these hit late November for a steep ¥25,200 in Japan or about $214. [Via Impress]
