Guts


I've loved this stuff since I was a teenager and first got into HiFi. Those shiny manufacturer brochures touting the advantages of their design over the competition, resplendent with cutaway diagrams and photos of the inside of the gear they were selling were an endless source of fascination. When my buddy who got me into this initially would return from the Chicago CES each year, laden with shopping bags full of brochures, we'd sit in his room and pour over all of it for hours, daydreaming that one day we'd own some of it.

I was kind of surprised that a cursory internet search for photos of the inside of my new Tascam deck were nowhere to be found. Fuck it, I thought. I'll make my own. So I disconnected everything, popped the cover, and snapped a photo worthy of a product brochure.

Even though I already knew (from having the Service Manual) that there was no audiophile-grade CD mechanism in this deck, but instead just a standard Teac (parent company of Tascam) IDE CDROM drive like you'd find in a desktop or tower computer of the era, it was still kind of surprising to actually see it. And the 2015 date stamp on the drive was another surprise, confirming that I'd gotten one of the units from the last year they were in production.

Such a Cute Lil' Nugget!

Sony D-ES301

Another one added to the collection. (Ben has his own collections, so we're good here.)

I ordered this from shopgoodwill.com, as "untested." What attracted me to it was the fact that the case hadn't yellowed in relation to the clasp unlike so many of these units that show up on eBay. And that S2 styling! For a couple dollars more than the price of a fast-food lunch I figured it was worth the risk, and if it didn't work I could put the hours I've spent watching YouTube videos on how to service these things to use. Turns out I didn't need to. It works perfectly.

So of course I had to pop the top panel off the base and peek inside!

Yes, I am a geek.

This is rapidly becoming my favorite of the collection.

I Don't Know How…

I don't know how I did not have this album in some format in my collection, but I didn't—until yesterday.


This is a new pressing, a reissue from 2018 that I got here.

The vinyl is flawless. The space between the cuts is absolutely silent. This is one of those records that my new JBLs were meant for.

Initially I had some misgivings about dropping the amount of coin I did on those JBLs, but after living with the L166s for a week and slowly making my way through my vinyl collection, they were worth every penny. They make (or rather, I should say allow) good recordings to shine, while bad recordings are revealed not just to be bad, but to be glaringly bad; something I was never even aware of with my old Infinitys.

Vintage Audio Porn

Nakamichi 600 Cassette Deck

My friend Gary from high school owned one of these. Even though it had mechanical transport controls (no solenoids yet) I was definitely guilty of breaking the Tenth Commandment where this was concerned.

You Spin Me Round Like a Record

I seem to have rediscovered the joys of vinyl. It's not like I ever stopped, but I would say conservatively that I've played more records in the last two weeks than I have during the last two years. I sensed that the format was making a comeback—especially among the next generation–but I had no idea of the actual extent of it until I started searching hashtags on Instagram, revealing a thriving, vibrant community of like-minded individuals.

This led me to other hashtags, revealing that not only is interest in classic hifi equipment alive and well, there are also many, many people out there who share my passion for the days when stereo equipment was built like tanks and made to last.