Yes, that's a Sony tape deck--and it's new

(Credit: Akihabara News)

It's one thing for Sony to reminisce about the good old days when they ruled the music world, but at some point it's time to let go. That was our immediate thought, anyway, upon seeing this dual cassette tape recorder. That's right--tapes.

Akihabara News says many people still use them, though we'll have to take their word for it because we haven't known any since about 1989. It also has a CD player in case they want to experiment with some of that cutting-edge stuff, as well as an AM/FM radio. We're still looking for the 8-track slots.

[aznxtcwcboy]

tapes? CDs? what is this stuff?

haha...i havent even used a CD since i got a car with an iPod jack...haha...

[radex08]

Sony tape deck - a useful device

This tape deck will be very useful for people like me who bought a couple of BBC foreign language courses, complete with tape cassettes and books, about 10 years ago, and would now like to use them. I also have a lot of classical music on cassette tapes, which it would be great to play again.
I hope it comes on to the UK market quickly!

[stevepo67]

Don't have little kids, do you?

Tapes are still quite common for books on tape for children, esp. for ones checked-out from a library.

For our young children, we prefer the music player in their room to have a CD player and tape deck; iPods are (thankfully) not relevant to most 5 or 6 year olds ;)

[kriswa]

radex08 -- you'll probabky buy it in the next year and have it sit on the shelf unused for another ten years before you get around to using those old language tapes... by which time, the price of (oil and therefore) flying will be out of reach for all but the filthy rich, that foreign country may be at civil war (murphy's law), and the AC connector will be superceded by a different frequency universal power outlet... just my cynical prediction :-)

stevepo67 -- my 2 yr is already her own ipod touch, it's much easier for little ones to use, and saves money on replacing scratched CDs\DVDs every week. tapes are nothing more than an historical curiousity / nostalgia -- even if I still had a top end Nakamichi tape deck I wouldn't use it now, the sound quality and convenience doesn't compare to modern media. I still find occasional
stuff at the library on redundant magnetic formats, but the age and deterioration is what makes them worthless, not only incompatibilty.