I received the Sony D-CJ500 Disman for my birthday after asking for a discman which would also play CDs of my mp3's. I went to futureshop to check out the different models and prices and the selection was rather limited. Anything under $200 was generally considered to be bad quality. Sony had two models, one which was retailing for $300 and the other at $199. This was the cheaper of the two.

The salesman told me that it was an entry-level mp3 discman and that it did not have all the bells and whistles, but was good quality nevertheless. I wasn't interested in spending $100 more for menial extras. After playing around with it for a little while I discovered that there was, in fact, no shortage of features.

The player supports folders, which is handy if you want to keep your mp3s organized and easy to sort through. It also has a small display so that the artist and title of the song scrolls by as you're listening to it. The battery life is 32 hours with basic cd's and 24 hours with mp3's, which is more than adequate.

One neat feature that is missing on a lot of the mp3 discmans out there right now is that this model allows you to fastforward through songs, instead of just having to listen to either the whole thing or nothing.

While the D-CJ500 is not built specifically for durability, I've dropped mine a couple of times and it still works great. However, be careful. The body is made of basic plastic, so it will break if abused. Also it is vulnerable to rain damage.

The earphones that came with my discman are not those pictured above. Mine are the earbuds, which are small and convenient and which I much prefer to the larger ones.

This mp3 player is perfect for someone looking for something relatively cheap, but also good quality. The Sony name means that it is definitely great quality.