Cassette Decks - Better Than I Remember?

Kintarō Hattori · 07-12-2020 4:56pm #1

With a 3.5 year old who is and will grow up in a world of streaming I decided I wanted to get something mechanical, something that would be alien to what she'll be familiar with when she's older. Something that I used when I was small. In my setup at the moment I have a network streamer/CD player, there's a minidisc deck under the bed so I decided a cassette deck was the way to go. I didn't want something with electronic buttons or an electronic VU meter so an old set was the way to go.
I had a goo on eBay and found the Teac set above. Mechanical buttons and old fashioned VU meters. I hadn't intended to actually put it into use, as it was more to be a talking point for when she was older but it actually sounds really well running through a Yamaha A-S501 and a set of Boston Accoustics A25 speakers.

o1s1n · 07-12-2020 5:46pm

Depends on the hardware really! There's such a wide range, and then in tape itself too, you can get a lot of variance in quality.

I used to have an Akai 4000D that I sold a few years back, you'd want to hear the quality from proper store bought reel to reel tape, it's amazing.

magicbastarder · 17-12-2020 9:49am

i was yesterday handed the tape deck my dad bought when i was in my late teens - so it's at least 25 years old. i got great use of it when i was younger, but i've not powered it on since being handed it yesterday (probably 10-15 years since it was last used) but i suspect the rubber bands in it would be shot at this stage. is there a go-to site for ordering new ones?

it's a slightly newer one than this (it's the 520B rather than the 520):
https://www.hifiengine.com/manual_library/sony/tc-k520.shtml

Kintarō Hattori · 17-12-2020 12:29pm

I think in most cases eBay is the usual place to find them. I just had a quick look and there are some kits listed for the TC-K520. Hopefully they'd be compatible.

https://www.cassettedeck.org/sony/tc-k520 - This is a pretty handy resource to have.

magicbastarder · 17-12-2020 2:17pm

looks like this will need a bit of work, it'll intermittently FF and REW but won't play. argh.

basskebab · 17-12-2020 2:22pm

http://www.tapeheads.net/forumdisplay.php?f=6 is a good forum for info and help. Search by your cassette deck name and chances are someone has already serviced one and listed which drive belts work with it

magicbastarder · 17-12-2020 8:41pm

cheers; things got a little worse (just constant whirring when you power it on) and i got it open with a bit of faff, and the main drive belt from the motor has snapped.

Esel · 17-12-2020 8:57pm

What's a Nakamichi twin deck, both auto-reverse, worth? Don't know model no. offhand. Anyone hazard a guess?

magicbastarder · 17-12-2020 9:03pm

i was browsing adverts earlier to gain an idea of how much a bunch of old separates i have would be worth, and pretty much every ad i found had no responses so it's hard to tell.
nakamichi would be a very good name in cassette decks though. i've just seen one asking STG1.7k on ebay...

magicbastarder · 17-12-2020 9:07pm

are you sure it's a nakamichi though?
https://www.tapeheads.net/showthread.php?t=23408

Esel · 17-12-2020 9:34pm

Jesus, I was wondering why I couldn't find any twin deck models! It's in storage, but I was sure it was a Nakamichi. :O

Cassette Decks - Better Than I Remember?

Comments