price, it's a Yamaha, ease of use, looks

it broke the first day.

Thats right, it broke. I took it out of the box and deck A did not work. I took it back and they (The Brick) would not give me a new one or my money back. I just got the unit back and it seems to work well now. Deck A & B heads where realy dirty and the head was jammed on A side. It took just under a month for the repairs. Not a good start.

unbelievable playback and recording quality, easy to use, easy to read displays, and its very quiet

No volume control for headphone jack (INCREDIBLY loud!), bulky, no pitch control, no HX Pro circuit

I got this thing open box for 125 at Sears as a display model, otherwise i would not have paid the full retail price (200 bucks) for this deck. For 150, Sony offers a unit with HX Pro, pitch control and a bunch of other features (TC-WE435). The yamaha normally sells for 200 and has none of these features. But, seeing as how Sony products are usually as reliable as a politician, I took the Yamaha, and I'm glad I did, so far. Theres not too much choice between brands of tape decks in the 100-150 range any more, its pretty much Sony, kenwood or technics (yeeach)...my 5 year old sony 545 deck had much problems with the auto reverse-namely the heads were never really aligned properly...i'd get one side sounding great and the other sounding flat. I always had to record going backwards to get the good sounding recordings. I bring this up because this made me wary of every buying another auto reverse deck. However, so far all sides seem equal on both decks on the yamaha.

Recording a CD with Dolby C produces fantastic results. I recorded the new clapton CD and switched back from tape to cd playing simultaneously and i swear i could not tell which was which, the quality was that good (I use Maxell XLII cassettes, in my opinion the best available tape since they stopped making the MX-S). Again, I wonder why in a deck this price range doesnt have HX Pro, but whatever Yamaha put in this thing sounds really just as good. The sound is incredibly well defined and superb!

My only complaints are the ones i listed above, the worst being the lack of volume control for the headphones to monitor the sound. It's so friggin loud that you'll literally jump when the first track fires up.

For the price I am absolutely thrilled, I think I got a great deal. I dont think i would have paid 200 for it even though i think digital technology SUCKS. Sound (and music) is naturally analog, and should not be carried on a microchip! Call me old school but i'll continue to use cassettes for recording until there are none left, anywhere.

Similar Products Used:

Sony TC-WR545 (1996), Sony TC-WE305, Kenwood CT401

Value for money, good build quality

No phone volume control on phones socket. No front input sockets. Remote not included.

I bought these as a superceded model in March 2000 when my 20 year old AIWA died.

It's the first time I have owned a twin deck machine, I wasn't really looking for one, but this was $100 cheaper than single deck machines I was looking at.

It has reasonable features and is easy to use, while not as up-market as my old AIWA (a top of the range model), it sounds much better. Age and constant use is not a good friend for tape decks. Build quality was much better than Sony and Optimus players I looked at in the same price range.

I've done some tape-tape dubbing and also recorded from CD and vinyl. Very esay to set up and record. I appreciate not having to set bias and equilisation, but I miss the seperate volume controls for left and right inputs.

I didn't have the budget for an upmarket machine so that's probably a bit unfair.

Overall I am very pleased.

Similar Products Used:

AIWA, AKAI, Sony