[saronian]

I bought a prestine used D-E905 on eBay a few months ago and haven't looked back.

Using it with Grado SR-60's and still looking around for additional headphone options.

Scott

 

[meatman]

I have :

1x Sony D-777 (bought in 1992? I know I paid ~$400 for it)
1x Sony D-E900 (bought last month, got the last one from Bluetin who provides AWESOME service BTW)
2x Sony D-25S (with 3x BP2-EX... I wish this thing took AAs)
1x Sony D-35S (from Ebay... doesn't quite work right)
1x Sony MZ-1 sitting at the bottom of a drawer somewhere never used
1x Sony TCD-D3 broken from too much usage
1x Sony TCD-D7 bought four weeks before the D8 came out

1x Panasonic SV-80 (Coolest SD player ever... awesome quality for the size)
annnd da Ipod.

 

[netsurfer]

Discmans:

Sony:

PBD-V30 (DVD-Discman)
D-777
D-421
D-303
D-25s
D-EJ01 (Sold)
D-E905 (Sold)
D-35 (Sold)

Technics / Panasonic

SL-CT570 (Sold)
SL-XP6 (Sold)
SL-XP300 (Sold)

Walkmans:

Sony:

WM-DD9
WM-701s
WM-EX900
WM-EX1 (Sold)
WM-EX2 (Sold)
WM-EX2000 (Sold)
WM-EX808 (Replaced)

Panasonic:

RQ-SX7 (Sold)

 

[redshifter]

netsurfer:
nice collection. i also own the dd9 walkman. what is your opinion on it?

i also see you kept your d777 discman over the de905. can you tell me why?

 

[krayzie]

Hey to the owners of the DD9 tape player, have ya guys tried using really high-end tapes like TDK MA-XG Fermo / Maxell Metal Vertas / That's Suono / Sony Super Metal Masters??? If yes any comments?

I've recently bought some Sony Super Metal Master 90min tapes and used them with my old Sony Walkman that came out the same year as the DD9 (EX80 - the best there is with a remote) and holy crap it sounds really close to my MDs (except for the tape hiss as I can't use Dolby B NR on the recording cuz my old ass Sharp tape deck screws up metal tape rec. with it on)...

 

[redshifter]

krayzie,
i only use the maxell mxs90 metal tapes, no dolby. it is not as quiet as md, but there is a lot more instrument presence and wider soundstage on tape. i'll bet those metal master tapes are sweet. where did you get them?

 

[krayzie]

Glad to hear the Maxells are working for you... I've given up on Maxell tapes cuz somehow they don't hold the music up well after a few years, while my Sonys and TDKs are still fine... Lately I've gone back to recording old CDs I find at the library with tapes after I couldn't find much MP3s to load my MDs with... I find that the Fuji ZII TypeII tapes a perfect match with my deck.

Somehow over the years I've never had much success with metal tapes even turning off Dolby which improved things a bit, so these Super Metal Masters were a huge gamble (I bought them just to see if they're that wicked as I've never found high-end tapes b4 around town), I only found the last couple of them at some hi-fi store near my skool campus, but at 15 bucks CDN OUCH! a piece they better be good, which they are it turned out!!! (Sony ES MD blanks are 7 bucks CDN a piece in comparison, can't find them anymore tho).

I got bored of MDs so I went back to tapes recently...

 

[redshifter]

i've noticed some high frequency loss on the maxell mxs90 tapes after a year or so of use. still, other mxs90 tapes sound fine. i actually haven't tried the other tapes you mentioned yet.

 

[krayzie]

My goodness, I've just found out that my ancient tape deck on the mini hi-fi is at fault with the metal tapes... I've started recording some rock music with more obviously bommier bass and the low-end sounds all distorted, same exact problem with my previous attempt in using other metal cassettes, but yet classical music sounds wonderful. I think my cheap deck wasn't meant to be used for recording metal tapes (biasing problem I guess, it's all auto so I can't do anything about it)...

Yeah cuz I did a search on the newgroups and turns out the Fuji ZII was rated top TypeII cassette out of a total of like 30 different products or something back in a '93 Audio Magazine... so I gave them a shot and it's all good! Maxells are rated highly too along with the TDKs in all three categories I think (TypeI/II/IV).

 

[redshifter]

i have found this to be true about recording on metal tapes: although they claim you can have the levels up to +4 db, i never let the levels go higher than 0 or the db (dolby) symbol. if it goes higher the low frequency sounds get distorted. you do get more tape hiss, but the recording is very clean and undistorted. the mxs90 tapes have a very wide frequency range, and are especially impressive with deep bass.

 

[stuartr]

Am I late? I have a D-777. I like it. Great mix of style, sound, portability and battery life. I use it more than my Panasonic 780, even though that is a nice player (it is so damn loud with its super funky skip protection thing -- it bugs the **** out of me unless I put it under something or am wearing my etys.). I also have a MZR-55. I also have a denon DCP-100, unless my dad threw it away....I loved it, but now I cannot find it. It had the best sound out of a portable that I ever heard (granted you could not look askance at it without it skipping, nor could I really bring myself to provide all the 9 volts that I needed to get it to run any amount of time on DC power, but on a desk....man oh man did it sing.) I never did get a chance to do a head to head with it and the D777 though....

 

[netsurfer]

Redshifter, I kept D-777 instead of D-E905 just because D-777 is the 10 years' anniversary model. I like the sound quality from both the PCDPs actually and i couldn't tell which one was better for my taste.

But now, i just put away my D-777 because i found that metalic tape with DD9 is the best match. I like the sound from Type II and also Chrome tapes. It's much more natural than that from MD's even CD's. It touches your mind your soul much more deeply too. The only shortcoming is that these tapes cannot be kept for a long time.

I am planning to buy a new cassett deck or something like Sony's professional walkman WM-D6C. Does any of you have any good suggestions?

 

[krayzie]

Don't people say the best cassette decks are the Nakamichi's (especially the Dragon line) which can handle metal tapes probably better than another other brand out there...

I would just keep the DD9 and buy a home deck rather than buying a D6C if I were you...

 

[Duncan]

Nakamichi Dragon ~ £2300 ($3150) that was one sweet deck... could record well into the red no matter which type of tape I, II, III or IV (whatever happened to type III ~ Ferri-Chrome??)

A semi-classic cassette deck would be the Sony TCK-611S came out in about 1995 and was very well reviewed... the first Sony deck with Dolby S... might be worth a look on the used market

 

[netsurfer]

Duncan, it seems that a semi-class Sony or Teac or Akai or Nkamichi could meet my requirement. The dragon deck is too much for me. Actually i saw some guy bought from Ebay with buy it now a Dragon deck at more than USD800 several days ago. I can use this sum of money to rent for a two bedroom apartment in China for almost a year!