I've had this deck for 3 years...
Written: Dec 31 '00
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Excellent sound quality
Cons: Few special features
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| amigomarco's Full Review: Technics RS-BX501 Dual Cassette Deck |
I bought a Technics RS-BX501 when my previous deck was trashed by a cowboy repair shop. My previous deck was a Pioneer which, although capable of good sound quality, tended to be fickle about tapes and also be very troublesome with its track-search facility. Its recording quality was also not as good as a previous 1983 Pioneer deck I had, and I knew that better quality was achievable from analogue cassette.
I asked the dealer for a single deck, reasonably priced, not so cheap that it might be considered "budget", but at the same time not prohibitively expensive. I also stated that I wanted the cost savings to impact on the "bells and whistles" rather than sound quality.
When I got the deck home, the first thing I did was copy a CD onto a blank tape, eager to hear whether I would get the old sound quality I used to remember from my first high-end deck. I was astonished when it was even better than that, it was indistinguishable from the CD itself. Only in passages of total quiet could you hear any hiss, and even then only when the volume is turned up. The RS-BX501's noise floor is low even with Dolby turned off, and with Dolby on it's amazing. Record with Dolby C and you will produce analogue cassettes that will have people swearing they're listening to DAT.
The TPS (Tape Program Sensor) facility for searching tracks was a nice bonus, especially as the dealer said the deck wasn't equipped with it. It's not as sophisticated as Panasonic/Pioneer's more expensive decks, i.e. you can't skip more than one track at a time. Nevertheless, it is foolhardy and seems to be able to locate gaps even in the middle of fade-ins and unusual track breaks. It doesn't do the annoying thing my old deck used to, where it would stop in the middle of a track simply because the signal from the tape weakened halfway through it.
Winding generally is extremely good and incredibly fast - this deck has two winding speeds - normal and fast - the latter only takes effect in the middle part of the tape, and the deck automatically switches back to normal when it gets close to either end of the tape, or when you switch to stop/play etc.
The sound from this deck is sonorous and full of all the harmonics that make up the sound source. It delivers a punch at both ends of the frequency spectrum, far more than you might expect for a deck of this price. The only downside may be that poor quality or old cassettes recorded on other machines may not sound at their best in this deck; it can be slightly unforgiving on some tapes, and there is no gain control or FLEX like on Pioneers, but on most tapes they either sound as good as they will sound on any other deck or better. And I guarantee you that your own recordings will sound amazing in this deck and in other people's - I know, I've tried my tapes in decks of varying quality, and had unexpectedly great results from all playbacks.
There is an ATC (Automatic Tape Calibration) facility on this deck, which is supposed to increase recording quality. This may be the case with some tapes, but to be honest, in my experience it's never been necessary and has had no noticable effect on recordings.
The build quality of the machine itself can't be faulted, it is rugged and tough. The only drawback physically is that the front panel glass is a little dark, and there is no back lamp, so it is impossible to see the position of the spools of tape once the cassette is inside.
In short, you can't go wrong with this deck, and it proves that the analogue cassette is still a viable medium.
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
amigomarco
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Reviews written: 1
Trusted by: 0 members
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