A new toy.
Did I need it? No. Not by a long shot. Did I want it the moment I knew of its existence? Absolutely.
Back in the day (i.e. the 00’s) when I was heavily into MD, I had several pieces of gear, among them a Sony MXD-D40 combo CD/MD deck. It facilitated high-speed dubbing from CD to MD and would even properly transfer track marks and CD text (if it was present) as part of the process. I’ve had that model now on my eBay watchlist for the past few months since it would allow me to consolodate equipment, but it seems the only ones that showed up were Japanese units and therefore 100V. Yeah, I could buy a step-town transformer to plug it into, but when we start doing that shit I start questioning if my hobby has turned into an addiction. Granted, there are worse things to be addicted to, but I didn’t want to cross that line since it seems I’m already straddling it. They were also outrageously priced.
After getting my Tascam MD-350 minidisc deck back in January and being so impressed with the engineering and build quality, I started wondering if Tascam had also produced a combo unit. Of course they did. Several different iterations, actually. Tascam is the professional arm of Teac, one of the biggest and most respected hi-fi equipment manufacturers of the last fifty years—and a name all of us cassette-obsessed boys in the 70s turned to.
The latest model of their combo deck was the MD-CD1 MkIII, available from 2011-2017. A cursory eBay search reported several offerings—again all 100V Japanese units. But I knew they’d also produced this for the US/Canadian market from pictures I’d seen online, so was just a matter of time and practicing a little patience (something I am not good at) before one showed up. To be honest, several US units had appeared over the past couple months, but being originally sold as professional equipment (much like the legendary Technics SL1200Mk2 turntables), they all looked like they’d been ridden hard and put away wet.
No thanks. I can wait. It was, after all, a want and not a need…
Patience paid off. One appeared on eBay a week ago. Supposedly a one-owner, fully functional, 120V unit. Except for a tiny scratch on the top panel at the rear, it looked mint. The seller was offering a very reasonable price. I countered with an offer about $40 less, and he came back with a $20 discount (essentially covering shipping). I slapped the BUY IT NOW button and it arrived today.
Since my mantra for this shit is now “one in, one out,” after I’m sure this is actually working properly, I’ll put my year-old standalone Yamaha CD player up for bid. Based on what they’ve been selling for, I should easily recoup what I paid for the Tascam, with money even left over. (I’m also going to sell several of my portable CD players since they’re all but gathering dust on the shelf these days.)
So what do I think of it? Well, for starters, I wish I’d known of this model back when I stumbled back into this hobby. It would’ve saved me a lot of money. For the very short time I’ve spent with it, I have to say it’s also one complicated beast. If there’s one major difference between Tascam and Sony gear, it’s gotta be ease of use. Sony decks function intuitively; a complete novice could figure out how use one of their recorders without cracking the owner’s manual. Tascam? Not so much. Even common functions like splitting, combining, or moving tracks on the Tascam is not as stupidly simple as it is on a Sony deck. (Or maybe I’m just old and used to doing things one way and when presented with something different I go into brain-lock.) I’m not complaining; learning new shit is vital to creating new neural links in an aging brain!
The MD-CDMkIII does everything, but accessing the settings often involves digging several layers deep in the menus. (The owner also supplied the original printed manual, which has been invaluable.) I just dubbed Eurythmics’ Revenge, both at regular and then again at high speed to verify everything was working, and it’s perfect. I suspect this deck never saw the inside of a studio and truly was a single-owner unit, used exclusively in a home setup. And as an added surprise, the seller even threw in about a dozen new, still-shrinkwrapped minidisc blanks—something he didn’t even mention in the auction. Sometimes the Universe still smiles upon you.
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