Not quite 20 years ago but about 18 or 19 years ago I purchased a Panasonic RQ-V500, it could stil be kicking around the house somewhere, last time I used it (about 5 years ago) it was working and I used it to transfer some old mix tapes to my PC for MP3'ing.
IT was about the same price as the S15 but had a plastic case and took 2 x AA's instead of a rechargable battery, it's party trick was the digital AM/FM Radio with presets which I loved. The downside was that if the batteries were out (or went flat) for more than 30 seconds it lost it's settings.
It did see me nicely through about 3 years of college and then several holidays.
Carl.