A stereo with a twist

Nice design! Funny that with the simple speaker setup and the equaliser included they still did the effort to put a tape equalisation switch on it... I guess the erase head is just of the permanent magnet type?

The 'other name' which people called Boom Boxes when I was a kid I didn't even make an association to anything dodgy in any way at the time, but then again I also thought the song RELAX was about being calm and relaxed before going somewhere.

As a kid, I always just called a small stereo like that a "tapedeck". A boom box, or ghetto blaster was one of those huge things you'd see carried on the shoulder in movies or pictures. The sort of thing, as a young fella, I could never afford, but always wanted.

A bit strange audio on this one, feels like sitting inside a barrel

Interesting that there's ever a chorus of "we used to call them ghetto blasters." From the American midwest, we called them boomboxes as the regular term. A ghetto blaster, to me, is a derogatory term that suggests... let's say antisocial use by a social undesirable. It's not a term you'd use in polite company. It's very much a term I've heard, but I don't think I'd ever use it.

You've changed, dude... you used to be about blasting ghettos and booming boxes.

https://www.boomboxcity.info/boomboxes-1980-1989.html

Sony referred to their small to medium-sized boomboxes as "TranSound", but I don't think that name would fly today. A name I thought of instead is "handlebox" -- a boombox with a handle but no "boom".

A small correction. At time 1:35, you say, "play and rewind point to the left," but I think you mean "play and FF/Cue point to the left."

Ok. Here's my attempt at a suitable name for your video. The BBB. That stands for the Baby Boom Box!! I know, I had to at least give it a go 😀

Cracking video, Matt. Kinda interesting that this looks like a unit my uncle had in his garage in my late teens. Had spray paint all over it, and brings back some good memories. Cheers, Lee

I would imagine aiming the speakers downwards would increase base?

The angled speakers kind of remind me of the Philips AW7694 from the early 90's https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/276396386169?mkcid=16&mkevt=1&mkrid=711-127632-2357-0&ssspo=vB9tff3nS72&sssrc=4429486&ssuid=Zix7OFIUSYS&var=&widget_ver=artemis&media=FB_MSG

What a great little device! Incidentally, we always seemed to call those smaller devices "radio cassettes" or "radio cassette recorders". They seemed to be far more common than the larger type of units that we called "ghettoblasters", probably due to price.

Liked the video. When you talked about pointing the speakers backwards it reminded me of a stupid craze in the late 70s when I was in college. It was to put your floor speakers in the corners of your room and then to flip them around so the speakers faced the corner. That was supposed to give a better spread of sound. My roommate thought it was cool and every time I’d return from class he’d have the things facing the walls, cranked up twice as loud as they needed to be… and they were my freakin’ speakers. Needless to say, we weren’t on the best of terms. And yes, I ended up having to get new speakers. And a new roommate.

Just found a black one on ebay Australia. For parts $100 AUD with $75 ship

I just used to call them "portable stereos".

What an intriguing device. Personally, I'd want to label it a "Portable Stereo". However, I'm not sure that will catch on.

What a great video! With its red colour, sci-fi font and Nostromo vibe this is definitely something I would have gone for back in the day.

In Dutch we would have just called this a “radiocassette (speler)”. “Speler” being “player”.

As soon as I saw the coiled up wires on the back, I wondered if they thought the user might have the speakers detached long-term. Not much stereo separation with such short wires though.

Totally offtopic but I like your talk about resemblance with the Nostromo :) For me Alien is a yearly rewatch. Actually the whole franchise, also the rather poor ones :)

Interesting video but a little concerning after watching directly on YouTube. There is no comments section there, not on any video I'm watching today. Is it an internal issue or the beginning of the Australian government's censorship on social media? Yes, they have been working on it.

Great speakers on that tape recorder well thats what my father would call it. Great video. I enjoyed it very much Mat.

PSRCR, PS RCR, piss racer 🤪

Fun fact: Akai is the Japanese word for red. I bought a very used red Akai PJ-35 without speakers in about 1987 which I used with some cheap music centre ones for years. It wasn't until years later that the ionternet showed me what the real speakers looked like. Dolby was a high end feature back then, while the deck is one of those power assisted "softish touch" ones.

I watched the video right after work and really enjoyed it. The design is certainly unusual, perhaps a bit gimmicky, but surprisingly functional. I’d love to help out with a catchy international name for that device, but all I’ve got is 'Brüllwürfel' (literally 'blare cubes'). That doesn’t quite work, though, as most people over here would associate it with cheap PC speakers, and they’d no doubt be quick to point that out in the comments. The starship Nostromo was named after a novel that’s been on my to-read list for ages. I’ve at least managed to buy the ebook. It’s not about starships, but rather a fictional South American country plagued by dictatorships and political turmoil. The book was written in 1904, so I imagine I’ll have to look up a fair few words, but hey, I did make it through Flatland (written in 1884).

I think I would've liked to have had this back in the 80s, the separate speakers coupled with the portable nature of it is quite charming. Not quite as useful today perhaps, but still. Let's hope the funky thumbnail gets people's attention.

Your rate of talking is erratic like you need the bathroom badly for some parts... Not quite as relax and (Techmoan Relaxed) as usual. Cute system

• I am so happy to see this in your hands. It's a cute little thing - let's ask the YT Gods for maximum views. • Your voice over sounds 1.25X but that may be due to my slow brain response affliction. • Prepare for the barrage of 'why didn't you' comments: test wow and flutter, take it apart, test it outside, use more aux components, etc. It's enough to want to ask them 'why didn't you take a hike during the last thunderstorm?' • I've seen some of those other models on eBay in the US; many of them extremely beaten up and at extortionist prices. • The Nostromo would be blushing at the favorable comparison, if it not were blown to bits. • I love this little video and I enjoy seeing this rare item. Will you be displaying this, perchance? Take care. 🤍

Lovely little unit, that. A small Boombox could be a Popbox.

I can imagine the conversations that went into the concept of this. Several Japanese salarymen went to the local bar, got hammered on sake and one of them said "I know...let's combine a small portable cassette radio with a Rubik's Cube!" And the next day at work, one of them remembered what was said.

totally had one of these. it was pretty neat, though underwhelming in almost every metric. did sound good for the smal size, and i used the aux a lot, but it wasn't powerful enough.

Some videos I've been meaning to share with you, that showed up in my recommendations. I small namecheck in one from The Verge: https://youtu.be/2DWtkSVNvTg A long play CD format for muzak: https://youtu.be/ffcIt-XdTNc

Hi Mat. Did you add the blue Hi-Fi-archive.info text at 4:25? The URL is hifi-archiv.info from what I can see.

Very cool -- thanks!

I appreciate people who took some pride in unusual industrial design. Things can be something other than a plain black functional Borg cube.