I’ve owned a great many of these (including DATs and Elcasettes(!). I currently have (and strongly recommend) the Revox B710MKII (not MKI), the Tascam 122MKII (not a MkI or MKIII) and the Studer A810. You cannot go wrong with these IF they are properly maintained. Importantly, most parts are available for these. Parts availability means problems for many SONY units and the Technics RS1500 decks. The Nakamichis are great, BUT they use a different EQ curve than all the others so forget about swapping tapes between friends. If you are buying used, you should expect some sort of repair bill no matter what the previous owner tells you - unless they can show proof of recent service. For R2R, I’m obviously partial to the Studer A810, but you should also consider a PR99 MKII or MKIV. A “sleeper” would be the Fostex E2 – if the heads are in good shape. I can suggest a few good recorder techs if interested.
Top 10 vintage cassette decks
Howdy folks!
Would like to add an excellent vintage cassette deck to my setup. Luxman PD444 and Victor TT-101 make up my vintage vinyl setup. It would be cool to include a badass old timer cassette deck don't ya think. Also researching 70's, 80's R2R's. There's another thread on that one. Anyway, I appreciate your knowledge and experience with a killer top ten vintage cassette deck. Bam!