Picked up this 1981 Nakamichi and was expecting greatness, but knew full well that the chances of a 28 year-old tape deck - even the venerable Nakamichi - working well were slim. Unlike a receiver or amplifier, you've got gears, rollers, lots of mechanical . . .well, mechanisms to wear out over time.Plugged it into my NAD 1600 preamp and my Onkyo Integra M-504 amplifier for a trial run. Having three heads (the deck, that is) is an advantage in evaluating a deck as you can listen as you record. Turns out that the left channel was very low, and when it did work - intermitently, it over-drove the JBL L56 speakers - pumping the woofer at a dizzying rate, and forcing enough air out of the port to almost knock the grill off! I knew this wasn't good for the speakers, so I turned the deck off, cleaned the heads, and tried again. This time - no woofer flutter, but alas, no left channel either.
Oh well. This isn't the "Dragon" model, just the top of the 600 line, and not very collectible. Would have been nice to have a great cassette deck in perfect working order, but this one is in bad need of service. I'll keep it around and maybe pay for service someday or pass it on to my kids who will carry it through the generations - "Son, this is a Nakamichi. . .cough. It was your father's Nakamichi and your father's father's Nakamichi. Now it is yours. Oh, and by the way, . . .cough, you might want to get the left channel fixed."
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