So out of the blue two days ago I dug out this discman - which is certainly more than 12 years old, and I haven't used it for about 8 years. When I was just no more than 15 y/o and my only toy being the discman and a gameboy, I really loved both. I didn't care about sound quality at all.

Well...  it's old, but still functioning. 8 years later, my ears are now royally spoiled, my good headphones in position, can I love the discman again?

It's still a pleasant to listen to it, though now I can tell it has serious flaws. There is an apparent bass boost, but bass is very well defined, no smeared low end. It's amazing that I'm hearing low end things I've never noticed. It resolves. Meanwhile, the midrange and treble are strangely pulled away - resulting in a magnificent soundstage, but all other elements are placed so far away, it's sometimes irritating. Unplugged CD sounded very fine, but the Hatsune Miku magnet CD sounded quite problematic. I doubt it was an impedance thing, but adding ALO Rx into the chain did not mitigate too much.

Other than these, there are occasional breaks in tracks, the digital grain is quite obvious, and the physical buttons are failing.

So now I have some questions:

- how to pyrates diagnosis the strange "midrange and treble being placed very far away" thing?
- what's pyrates' take on discman?
- does any Canadian pyrate know where to replace discman parts/refurbish the discman?
- is it suggestable to buy a new discman?

Edit:
http://panasonic.jp/radio_casse/p-db/SL-CT500_spec.html
- the headphone out seems to be 16 ohm. WTF!
- there is a bass-heavy circuit called S-XBS. Any idea pyrates?