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(Update 21st of February 2021.)

After dozens of work hours spent on Akai GX-F80… It started to work the way I wanted it. There is a lot to finish, but I am satisfied what I did so far:

I must say it is very unfriendly machine – not a single connector, all wires are connected directly to boards. As my friend Bane said “It looks like engineers were in fight with service technicians…” :).

While I am waiting for a few more parts, here is a Papa of the famous Teac Z series – model C1 MkII. I don’t know if I will manage to fix it, I am already scared of this… I did Z6000 a few times, but this is worse…

(Update 14th of November 2020.)

I bought Fisher DD-350 deck from a very nice gentleman, this was a part of his collection. Cosmetically it is in an almost mint condition and I have to admit that I haven’t had Fisher deck for as long as 30 years, since I was almost a boy. It is an interesting model – very fast VU meters, LED peak indicators, DD motor. It looks it needs a basic servis, but no matter – this thing is a silver beauty.

(Update 07th of November 2020.)

I bought Tascam DA45HR, so here is it on my working bench. I haven’t had DAT machine for years, and this one looks interesting. It is one of the few double speed DAT machines with 24 bit resolution.

I bought it broken with Error Mech. Com message on display which was flickering as the cooler was working. It can be anything – from belt, microswitches, power supply to something worse… we’ll see.

(Update 15th of October 2020.)

The theme I used for my site is totally outdated and not supported so I had several bugs, like I couldn’t put any new picture to my post.

I I had to make a temporary change until new one is ready.

But I have a good news: months of collaboration with Mr. Branko Nojkovic – an electronic engineer and a real audio genius came to official announcement, after several months of preparing posts from his side. I am very happy to say that so many things Mr. Nojkovic has to share will be published right here. So stay tuned!

(Update: 4th of April 2020.)

I think we should always try to see some good points when things go bad – although it is not always possible. This virus has put us in isolation in our homes, so I decided to spend my spare time in different ways, one of which is repairing old cassette decks which are too long at my home, waiting…

One of them is this Nakamichi 482 from my dear friend Retro, being at my repair shelf for 7 or 8 years (sorry Retro and thanks for understanding…:))… Belts are broken, plastic parts cracked, doesn’t record on left channel, switches don’t work, somebody tried to repair it… so I started…

With removed transport:

Nakamichi 2nd generation transport disassembled:

(Update: 17th of December 2019.)

After long search I have found a suitable CD plejer, for sentimental reasons. I was looking for one which is build solid, with a good sound and not too much expensive or overrated. Last week I bought T+A CD1240R, a great CD. Looks ordinary, but is pretty fascinating inside (not taking into account flimsy plastic transport).

(Update: 4th of September 2019.)

I bought an interesting player, a day ago. It is Philips TR5660. To be honest, I can’t remember that Philips made it’s own stereo portable cassette players of this kind, at least quality ones. Model TR5660 is great little semi-plastic thing, but it’s not Philips at all. I have recognized other manufacturer – it is Japanese Standard Radio Corp., an old manufacturer, actually a good one.

The interesting thing is that TR5660 can be found in 1984. Philips catalog, as a top model. Well, 35 years have passed from that point on, but TR5660 still works, and judging by screws it was never touched inside. Headphone connectors (two of them, like Sony WM2, WM3…) needs to be cleaned from dust, Mute button also needs cleaning. The speed is lower and there is an audible wow since belt is… 35 years old but the damn thing works! The highs are there, the bass is present and good.

I can’t find words how much I am surprised by this little thing… I have several newer Aiwas, even Sony walkmans with SMD capacitors dead, so recapping is needed. But Philips/Standard is one of these that hold record… and still counting after 35 years.

(Update: 13th of August 2018.)

Just a day after I finally finished repairing TCD-3014A, I got a beautiful present from Mr. Branko Nojkovic, a genius designer of audio amplifiers. It is a Tandberg TCD-3034, beautiful two header.

It doesn’t work, which is something I expected after several years not being used, but I will make him young boy again 🙂

Stay tuned.

(Update: 29th of June 2018.)

Several weeks of work done by myself and a great HiFi service guru Misa Lukic started to give positive results. This Tandberg TCD-3014 is 90% finished, I plan to order rollers and chase some ghost still left in it.

The sound is extraordinary and this is a very respectable machine.

(Update: 18th of April 2018.)

The Dragon arrived. I bought it from a passionate cassette deck collector.

(Update: 17th of April 2018.)

I have finally ended test of modified Onkyo TA2570.

I also bought beautiful Technics RS-M88… here underneath Revox B215.

I was delivered in a huge box, I mean really huge. HiFi manufacturers use such boxes to transport amplifiers which weight 30 kilos or more…

Inside…

M88 looks beautiful and is in good cosmetical shape. It was serviced quite a few times, which is normal for it’s age.

However, I have to do detailed check on it. The idler is bad, the roller is old and also bad, and the right channel is louder than left. This multiplies using phones amp, where both channels have audible distortion, left even more than right. Interestingly, phones output is ended with two impedance transformers, never seen this on the deck.

I performed a quick measure of this device, and left chanel is mostly 1.5 dB below right, having THD of 2.6% while right has only 0.6% using Rec Pause mode. Peak meter doesn’t actually show this, whil VU meters would show it easily.

So, I will have to start working on this little beast.

(Update: 26th of February 2018)

I have finished testing Pioneer CT-A9, a new deck in my collection. But, the primary task was modifying Onkyo TA-2570 cassette deck… so stay tuned, new article is coming soon :).

Just some parts replaced in TA2570…

TA-2570 on test:

(Update: 10th of February 2017)

Although I have several decks tested and reviews in preparation, I started writing about some other HiFi devices…

Stay tuned.

(Update: 31st of October 2016)

Dual C844 and Sony TC-K666ES on test:

I also started fixing Sansui D550M: dirty and full of dust, which normal after 35 years or so…

But, I will make a real beauty out of it…

(Update: 26th of August 2016)

Four machines, pictured this morning:

Top to bottom:

NAD 6100

Aiwa AD-F850

Onkyo TA2360, silver

Pioneer CT-A9, the legend.

First of all I checked how each one of them is working – functions, overall sound, frequency response, W&F etc. Two of them needed capstan motor replaced (NAD 6100 and Onkyo TA2360). I noticed, during last few months, increased need for replacement of capstan motors, although these decks had small working hours. I think these capstan DC motors are aging or deck were kept in ON/STOP mode during long time in which the capstan motor was working.

The fight of dinosaurus and tiger… Which one is playing better: new or old components?

(Update: 20th of March 2016)

I started a little project over two months ago: I began to buy quality but cheap 2nd HiFi components from local Serbian market to show that it is possible to make a very decent quality HiFi system for a small amount of money.

I called it “Poor Man HiFi” and posts will be published approx. once a week, so far only in Serbian.

I invested, time, energy and money in this and I must admit that I am a little tired…

(Update: 24th of December 2014)

Lot of work these days, not so much spare time but I didn’t give up working on this little site.

Many thanks for the help to Nune and Tamara, making design changes!!!

I always like to think that Hitachi in Japan was in audio terms similar to Telefunken in Europe.

These are two beautiful Hitachi machines – which one would You choose?

(Update: 9th of September 2014)

This is a pretty rare Uher machine and arguably the best they made… pretty interesting. It was broken, fixed and after several hours of use broke again… will fix it and continue testing….

I was waiting for fifteen years for my friend Voja to decide to sell his cassette beast: Lux 5K50M.

This really is a monster, looking even much better in reality than on these pictures. Beautiful machine. I will have to make a group test of it together with the best decks in my collection (Nak CR7, Teac Z6000, Studer 721 etc.).

WAY Cables supplied me with some interesting power cables:

So… STAY TUNED!

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