[jerf]

I think you could get there with appliances that existed in the 60s or 70s, but in many cases you simply aren't going to duplicate functionality of a modern device any other way. An MP3 player needs an IC to decode the MP3, if nothing else.

Although this makes me wonder if an analog MP3 decoder made out of maintainable parts is possible. It would be awfully big, though.

[bonzoesc]

Big, expensive, and unreliable. The most unreliable parts of most electronics I've owned are user-manipulated wires, connectors, and ports. Taking the whole unit back to the store for an exchange when there's a tiny defect (as I did with my iPad a couple months ago) is actually more valuable to me than the prospect of being able to do maintenance and component replacements on something the size of the box an iPad comes in and twice as expensive.