Sharp's Back-to-Back Boombox mixtape madness

Sharp's intriguing but compromised twin-deck portable stereo radio cassette portables.
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[@K-o-R]

My first thought is "You can't change one tape while the other is playing for continuous playback."

[@RegebroRepairs]

Yeah, but copying tapes without added wow and flutter would be nice.

[@VikingTeddy]

I don't think flipping tapes in and out when copying was the hassle he makes it out to be at all. We were teenagers, we had time, and it was fun. But not being able to switch one while the other is playing is a drag. Remember how sometimes you had to sacrifice a few centimeters to the beast when it got hungry? I bet untangling a twisted tape from this would have been an actual nightmare.

[@RegebroRepairs]

@@VikingTeddy I never made mix tapes from tapes anyway. It was all from vinyl. Every tape I had was a copy of a friends vinyl. I guess pre recorded tapes never really took off in Sweden.

[@borjesvensson8661]

​@@RegebroRepairsmight have come in later than when you were a teen? I certainly seem to rember some prerecorded cassetes in the music stores in the late 90s still in a corner. And of course a pile of country, dansband, pop compilations and heavy metal in the gas stations untill the mp3 finally killed casette in the car

[@bugstomper4670]

But you can put a bluetooth cassette in the back slot, and load a cassette tape in the front slot?

[@rienpost3145]

You know you're getting old when Mat features your old boombox in a retro-tech video. Yes, I had one of those.

[@mrb692]

What did you think of it? Did your experiences match his?

[@RJDA.Dakota]

I had something similar to this machine. I always made sure to buy one with a number of shortwave bands, as I would take it with me out to the country where there were few stations. The shortwave bands really helped me out. Also got music that way from WRNO or at the time Superpower KUSW. Great times, great memories! I also remember a walkman that took two tapes like this.

[@rienpost3145]

@@mrb692 Yes, kind of. The sound was not too bad but the dual cassette mechanism was a nuisance.

[@Seattlelegacy51]

I had that exact JVC PC-V77, man I thought that was cool. Wow does that bring back a lot of memories!

[@trublgrl]

@@Seattlelegacy51 I had a JVC that was probably a little later that one. It had all those features, and the same look, but the case was a little big rounded around the edges. It actually still works, it's in the kitchen and never gets touched, but if I actually need to play a CD, it's there for me!

[@pjuk]

I like how it tells you how to open the door if it gets stuck, inside the door!

[@darinb.3273]

You were supposed to remember that BEFORE it would hang up 😂, then you knew what to do if it jammed 😅.

[@KevinT3141]

Yup, I practically laughed out loud when I saw that.

[@andrewhaines3259]

As good as a gas boiler we had at work. It said in the instructions for relighting the pilot light to "first remove cover". Guess where these instructions were! Yep, on the inside of the cover you needed to remove.

[@mal2ksc]

@@andrewhaines3259 To be fair, that's kind of an obvious place to look _if_ you've ever had to light a pilot before. Not so helpful if you've never done it before.

[@syahminorizan8064]

DOOR STUCK

[@eddiepetrick6222]

I love how pre-internet, companies produced those beautiful catalog/brochures.

[@whyyoulidl]

Was thinking the same; kinda like lusting after the latest Kays or Grattan catalogues to browse thru 🤭

[@urglegurgle5807]

I had a version of this for a while as a teenager. A friend is a computer programmer, and we used it for copying the games he had written (before he went professional). It was a very competent machine for direct dubbing, probably due to the shared mechanism, and the output was much more reliable for this specific purpose than the other BPC with more traditional twin cassettes we’d also tried to use for the same purpose.

[@dualityk]

This is exactly what I was thinking as I watched this: all the other drawbacks aside, having a common capstan meant the tapes were always being pulled at the same relative speed, which probably made for pristine copies.

[@darwiniandude]

I'd never thought of this benefit. I have 3 or 4 different Sharp double decker models and various vintage computers that take tapes, I should try this vs a normal double deck.

[@gentuxable]

@@dualityk I think for data tapes with exactly the same tapes it works great but for audio where you sometimes use different lengths it might mess the tape up more than a traditional twin deck because if the equal speed, the capstan has a bit of give.

[@gentuxable]

@@mal2ksc exactly what I meant to make mixtapes I used 90min tapes all the time but the source tapes were often 60min.

[@HerraPlagu]

Yes, as kid one friend had one of these and it was only machine that could copy c64 games.

[@solwidotnl]

One benefit might be that the dubbing introduces no or little additional wow and flutter, as the two cassettes are driven by the same mechanism

[@ianharvey868]

Great point! In a real world this sounds great but when you could have 1 pinch roller slightly dirty or the tape "sticky" from damp, however I never thought about it like you said! Great suggestion!

[@georgebliss964]

Also, the copied speed will be accurate.

[@itsPenguinBoy]

I was thinking the same thing!

[@TheUglyGnome]

Came here to say the same.

[@chinnyvision]

Trouble is having owned the unit covered in the video and now owning an older model I got from a chazza, you can never get the tape alignment for both decks spot on. You'll get one right and the other will be slightly off. My current one plays bright but lower on deck 1 and more muffled but higher on deck 2. Which is my memory of my original one in the 90's.

[@BENBOI_1]

The outside and the locker really make this video feel special!

[@regulatormachine2788]

Sad to see he has become homeless, having to shoot his video's outside....

[@Hotpack7279]

I owned a JVC PC-W300 and this box was what I would almost call “high end”. This machine was right between a boombox and a stationary hi-fi system. Dual Auto-Reverse, Aux IN, Record OUT and Phono IN. Detachable speakers and handle. I stored/forgot it in my parents' basement and the water pipe developed a leak and the Mighty JVC sank. It was sad. The day we threw him into the recycling plant, I paused for a moment, looked at him and said, “Goodbye, old friend.”

[@thisisnotachannel]

A basement flood took several precious items from my childhood, as well... chief amongst them were my Atari consoles... 2600, 5200, and the 7800. Dozens and dozens of games lost, as well. Also many of my original NES carts... luckily, the most important ones... and the console, were upstairs where they should have been. R.I.P. to the rest... You are still sorely missed. We must band together and fight against basement floods!

[@svenjansen2134]

I lost a Colecovision with games and a small comic collection to a flood.

[@ka8syv203]

I am sorry for your loss. I had a Sony I lost to a battery leak. The batteries were impossible to get out, so we just listened to the radio until it finally faded away. It was like listening to HAL sing "daisy."

[@richardjones38]

I had a WQ-T282E, which was the more compact version without detachable speakers. I too was sad when I gave it away with neither tape deck still working after about 10 years. It was a great bit of kit.

[@RickThornquist]

Well done, Mat. Enjoyed the change of scenery and the funny bits.

[@hrothgar014]

I like the on location work. It has shades of James Burke and Connections. Nice.

[@elbiggus]

It just needs more beige jackets.

[@marcusdamberger]

@@elbiggus And thicker rimmed glasses

[@sprint955st]

And more space rockets taking off

[@andymouse]

I just wrote a comment saying 'should be on TV' and saw this and your dead right Burke was awesome and Matt would be to.

[@regulatormachine2788]

Sad to see he has become homeless, having to shoot his video's outside....

[@3rdalbum]

8:24 The "cardboard stand", or indeed anything on display that lists the features, is called a Silent Salesman. It's one of those lovely old-fashioned terms that remains in use today.

[@LMacNeill]

Wow -- I have never in my life seen one of these. Fascinating!

[@Paul-yh8km]

You probably have but didn't know it😊

[@LMacNeill]

@@Paul-yh8km Quite possible -- they definitely don't look any different than normal single-cassette boom boxes. If I ever did see one back in the '80s and '90s, I might not have even known it. I guess I should've said I was never *aware* of one of these before. 🙂

[@Aeduo]

I'm sure people had them around when I was younger but I might be a bit too young. Most of my awareness was mid to late 90s and by then most people I knew had more modern boomboxes. Smaller units that were out of the way which were secondary to their bookshelf systems or larger hifi (though these were becoming kinda rare) for like a kid's room or garage or something. Lot fewer gimmicks in general.

[@cho4d]

5:50 personally i think 3 knobs for EQ is perfect for 98% of consumers. I am very happy to just be able to tweak bass/mid/trebble. It's absolutely adequate.

[@disrealnow9664]

The thing is its just not a graphic equalizer - no display, no graphics.

[@3rdalbum]

Beats the pants off those with a single knob.

[@NandR]

I love that Matt and I have the same musical tastes. And no one would suspect either of us. Also that Osmo tracking was very smooth.

[@JamesOKeefe-US]

Same 😂

[@videomax9500]

I had one of these back in the early 2000s when I was a teenager, got it for a few bucks at a flea market. The "X-Bass" port on the front is actually the mouth of a folded transmission line (a spiral-formed tunnel that is integrated into the base of the unit, which horn-loads the 3-Inch woofer driver that you showed on the backside of the unit to give it more sensitivity for bass frequencies - similar to what e.g. Bose is doing in their WaveRadio systems). I remember it had a decent amount of bass for what it was, but the Twin Tape mechanism was awful. On my unit, it broke almost instantly and only one of the two slots remained operational until it eventually broke completely. It didn't bother me too much though because I had a discman from Panasonic connected to the RCA-Line-In almost all the time and used it as an active portable speaker system for listening to CDs when I was out and about in the park with friends. Wild times back then...

[@DavidHeafield]

Your musical tastes have always been a life disappointment for me

[@trashtrash2169]

I need to know what music this guy likes to earn that dire response.

[@tezcanaslan2877]

@@trashtrash2169 a CD-R containing extremely crusty versions of mainstream pop of the time (and Puke)

[@JacGoudsmit]

Even if I would have been okay with the compromise that you have to eject both tapes at the same time, having the wind/rewind functions only on the RECORDING deck would have been enough to return it to the store the same day. If they would have been only on the PLAYBACK deck, I might have dealt with it but putting the functions on the RECORDING deck only is just plain dumb. Thanks for posting, Mat! I didn't even know these double decks existed.

[@Bakamoichigei]

THIS! Who in their right mind thought it was reasonable to have ZERO CONTROL over the playback deck, i.e. the thing you are more likely to need to cue up?! That's ludicrous. 🤦‍♂

[@yuriykorotkevych8838]

BTW, if they had it the other way, it wouldn't be any harder to make mix tapes than on regular two-cassette devices. One doesn't need to rewind or fast forward the tape being recorded, only the source tape needs that.

[@SonicBoone56]

​@@yuriykorotkevych8838 that's crazy, wtf were they thinking with this.

[@man_eating_monkey]

On the other hand, if you were recording from a microphone to a single tape, you’d think it was pretty stupid to only have FF and RW controls available for the empty deck!

[@jamesdecross1035]

Walks off listening to the back of the boombox!

[@SenileOtaku]

Two possibilities there: 1: he wanted to listen to the sub-woofer on the back 2: years of listening to loud music means he has to be careful about loud music now. (the second is more like my issue. Hanging out at The Left Bank, and other nightclubs, you'd find me leaning in the speaker)

[@capt.bart.roberts4975]

My minds still boggled by you being a big Hip Hop fan! NO SLEEP 'TIL BRIXTON!!!

[@grahamparks8885]

Brixton? BUXTON more like.

[@RJRC_105]

​@@grahamparks8885No Sleep Til Buxton is a song by the Macc Lads about sheepshagging.

[@whyyoulidl]

Let me clear my throat...

[@cgoad]

Mat with his cap on backwards and a boom box on his shoulder.....that's an image that's both hard to forget and difficult to comprehend. 😮 😂

[@nofreenicksWTF]

Are both decks sharing the same motor\capstain? Cause if they do, this device should be the Ultimate Dubbing Machine. Given how any wow and flutter introduced in playback should be nearly perfectly canceled out during recording. NGL, kinda bummed out this test wasn’t included. Otherwise, great video as usual. Thanks for sharing!

[@jonbly]

Yes, that's the other key advantage of this design.

[@static-san]

Sharp did briefly advertise this advantage. It did make high speed dubbing of whole tapes somewhat better.

[@chinnyvision]

They do (having serviced mine a few years back). Huge thick belt as well. But it's impossible to get both decks perfectly aligned for some reason. You get one perfect and the other one will then go slightly out.

[@thetechsavvy01]

I'll just stick to my reel-to-reel, thanks

[@md_vandenberg]

@@thetechsavvy01 I'm sure your mom thinks you're special, too.

[@suikogarden]

My parents used to own Sharp WF-T379 (with the similar twin deck mechanism) in late 80s. I was 6 around that time. I'm still amazed at the fact that I learned how to record sound/radio broadcast and dubbing/mix taping on my own with that boombox. I doubt my parents even know how to use it other than playing pre-recorded tapes and listening to FM radio.

[@chickenman484]

As always never mix your batteries up….😂😂

[@ekowstevens4054]

He's just taking the piss now :) haha

[@YevYav]

@@mal2ksc Do not mix manufacturers ≠ Do not mix chemistries

[@ArlenMoulton2]

Love the camera work and different scenery in this one, also like the more mundane subject matter, great video Mat!

[@regulatormachine2788]

Sad to see he has become homeless, having to shoot his video's outside....

[@carlpollington5059]

Seeing that Hitachi model in the Argos catalogue with the big "3D Bass" print on the front (8:05 first page, bottom left) took me back to my teenage years as I lusted after it. No idea if it was any good but at least it had two separate cassette compartments!

[@middlesbroughmike1027]

I got the Hitachi 3d80 for my 11th birthday and I loved it. It was pretty good but ate batteries. I've actually still got it!

[@lpbkdotnet]

I hauled an 3D80 out of a skip in 1996 and used it for years, listening to pirate radio in the midlands. It was great! I wish I still had it.

[@mrnmrn1]

That's the 3D88, i don't know that model, but I had the 3D8 (number 5 at 9:01 ), and it was amazing. Unfortunately mine was already busted when I got it, but I still used if for 5+ years, when it finally gave up the ghost beyond repair (burnt mode selector switch due to bad contacts). I still have most of the parts from it, I reused its transformer in a Vinix VPC-7714 boombox, its full range speakers in a lowly LEVIS boombox and its woofer in a speaker enclosure that I found on the street with a missing woofer, I used that speaker for 10+ years attached to my TV than later to my father's TV.

[@polbecca]

I still have mine! It was bloody loud if you turned it right up. Mine barely plays tapes now though - I ought to send it to Mat to put new rubber drive belts in it.

[@whyyoulidl]

​@@middlesbroughmike1027me too!!!

[@gwheregwhizz]

I'm old enough to have owned one of the original boom boxes, and now I can't lift the bloody thing.

[@jason_a_smith_gb]

Laughed. Yes, is a bit like that!

[@marcelhannover3]

Try and try again, that is your weight lifting program !

[@dieseldragon6756]

Don't worry, it's the same for us younger folk too. We have a bit more youth, but with all our childhood tech being unreasonably small and light we never built up the strength to lift stuff like that in the first place! 🙃

[@marktubeie07]

_Techmoan on location !!_ see online for the tour dates !!

[@regulatormachine2788]

Sad to see he has become homeless, having to shoot his video's outside....

[@UptownBoogieDown]

Wow I literally had that model!! I believe it was a 9th Christmas/Birthday present. I used to stay up late and tape House / Techno off Radio 1 in 91

[@EvenTheDogAgrees]

Lol, so Mat was into hip-hop, you were listening to house and techno, and I was a rock/metalhead. Back in the 90's, locking the 3 of us together in a room would've meant instant war! 😂

[@whyyoulidl]

Steve Jackson's 'The House that Jack Built' 'tho on Kiss100fm iirc?

[@mRahman92]

What's crazy is that even this low spec boombox is still more feature packed than the portable decks that came out later in the 2000s. Do they even drink Moxie in the UK? Where the hell did he get that hat? Has to be one of the most obsure and oldest soda pops in Britain.

[@joshuarosen6242]

I don't think we do. I've never heard of it and I was wondering what Moxie was.

[@mRahman92]

@joshuarosen6242 old sodas, some current ones too, contain 30 or so milligrams of caffeine. It became a term for having energy. Maybe he got the hat from visiting the United States.

[@joshuarosen6242]

@@mRahman92 Thank you. That is informative.

[@HowardLive]

@@joshuarosen6242 Moxie was invented in Massachusetts in 1876, and New England has always been where the soda has been most popular. Even growing up in New York I never saw it in stores, although I've occasionally encountered it in California. Taste: it's noticeably less sweet and more bitter than most other sodas (probably because it contains gentian root extract). I like it, others apparently abhor it.

[@joshuarosen6242]

@@HowardLive sometimes KZbin can be quite informative. This is one of those occasions. Thank you.

[@EmyNN]

My dad had the model dispayed at 8:24. He got it as a wedding present in 1992. It was in use around the house till 2015 and got me hooked on classical music before we got a Panasonic 5 CD changer stereo system as a long overdue upgrade😅. Good times. This is my first comment on your channel

[@rickm.2956]

That is a fairly weird design. It really enhances your videos with the changes of location vs. a talking head at your workbench or voice-overs. Mat keepin it trill! ✊

[@J4sonkempson]

The hours i would spend leafing through catalogues as a kid and researching things, was that argoose by chance.

[@nazznomad]

I can't pin point it but maybe my favorite video you've done. What you showed and how you showed it. Excellence!!!

[@slidegrass]

Agree, but coulda used some puppet.

[@Manualtransmissions]

Techmoan has a way of presenting the details, but keeps you hooked because he's authenitic

[@whyyoulidl]

​@@slidegrasspuppet? 😂

[@LagrangePoint0]

@@whyyoulidl You new to the channel?

[@mazdaman1286]

I have one of these still ! its somewhere in the loft. Used it for years playing Rush tapes in my workshop. never missed a beat. Then used to play my Sony Atrac CD player through it. Still sounded great in the workshop with every thing turned up.. Radio was very clear , can't comment on the battery life as I only used it with the mains. Dubbing worked ok as I backed up my tapes onto chrome cassettes for the car.😁

[@RCAvhstape]

One can never play enough Rush.

[@timothystevenhoward]

Fisher PH-W704 is my current favorite in my collection. Something nice about being able to see and control each deck independently.

[@jezusmylord]

in my country in the 80s and 90s we called the two casette boombox a "dachshund"

[@tenorman]

Please tell us why. Inquiring minds want to know.

[@jezusmylord]

@@tenorman i didnt find an answer to the question (i wasnt looking that hard tho) but i guess is because they were long like a dachshund.

[@powder-phun949]

Jamnik?

[@jezusmylord]

@@powder-phun949 hell yeah!

[@technoman9000]

Weiner-box?

[@rhodaborrocks1654]

I remember seeing people walking along the street supporting those monstrous boxes on their shoulder, probably all deaf in one ear now.

[@london19657]

What?

[@tenorman]

@@london19657HE SAID...

[@mal2ksc]

Not so much, they had their ear in between the speakers so mostly what they heard was the gentle slurping of the cassette mechanism.

[@3rdalbum]

Probably not. Those boom boxes were so heavy they had to switch arms periodically. Therefore, becoming deaf in both ears.

[@paul_grimsley]

Every so often you remind me that I didn’t get the internet until 2001. This really is ‘Argos as a search engine’ stuff. Great video as always

[@makkles9087]

i would love to have seen someones reaction if they'd come across you with your cap backwards, rockin a boom box with old skool hip hop blaring out.

[@deydododontdedoh.5672]

'Graphic equaliser' 😂 in the 70's they'd probably be bass, tone and treble rotary controls. Oooh let's put them on sliders and call it a 'graphic equaliser' 😂 Also when you've got just three sliders for your 'graphic equaliser' they often seemed to put the very same sliders next to them for Volume and balance, just to make it look like a five band equaliser 😂😂😂

[@andrewgwilliam4831]

I'm pretty sure I can recall some models where the manufacturer even put switches next to them, superficially disguised as sliders!

[@romemancer7905]

Pioneer had them for car stereos in the seventies and yes they were proper ones with many fine tuning slides...their car stereos were fantastic and way ahead of the game !

[@middlesbroughmike1027]

I was hoping you'd do a video on the back 2 back system at some point. I remember them from back in the day but I really wanted the Hitachi 3D80 as it looked so cool with the x4 speakers across the front and the 'table top' layout of the decks and controls across the top. I actually picked up a back2back from a car boot sale a few years ago, still in its box. It works well and although has limits when compared to separate decks, it obviously had a lot of design work put into it. I wonder, would you be able to do a 'how it works' follow up video Matt?

[@xyzrandom3981]

Absolutely fantastic video. You did an awesome job showing off the compromises here in an entertaining way!

[@CarlosPCmx]

Nice scenery!! As I remember my friends and my family loved the SHARP brand as it was cheaper than SONY but had lots of features to play with. We as kids managed to get by with whatever was working, we made our own "radio shows" on tape. For that we used SHARP double deckers. Fun times!

[@TheCerealHobbyist]

I’m 51, in the US and all of my friends and I were ABSOLUTELY trading mix tapes all the time! My wife is 45 and has the same thing. They are how I discovered most of what I still listen to.

[@mx0r]

Hahaaa! PC-V77, I never expected to see that one on this channel! Had it in my room thru my childhood!

[@aeiouxs]

"I just knocked on this guys door - 50-something year old - told me I'd interrupted him preparing a Hip Hop mixtape for his friends. 1.36 million of them." Great stuff Mat, more Boomboxes and retro HiFi please!

[@justinpoirier5285]

Love the "Moxie" hat! That's my favorite soda! I didn't realize it made much reach outside the northeast US.

[@2bithacker]

I’ve got the same hat! Miss being able to find Moxie since I moved away from NH though.

[@Roboat06]

Is it sinful that I've lived in Maine for 10 years now without having tried Moxie? To be fair, I don't enjoy living here much 😅

[@hellbreakfast1590]

HOLY SHIT, we had that Sharp one that you showed first! Our car's radio was royally screwed up for a short time, and I would hold the boom box across my legs as we drove around, listening to our tapes. I remember the handle and how heavy it was (I was on the small side, even for my age, so I had to stabilize it with both of my lil hands), so clearly, and watching the tape spin. It was the late 90s. so it wasn't the cutting edge anymore. I can't remember where we got it, we might have borrowed it from my uncle, who loved his music. I'm happy to see it again, it made a really big impact on what I thought technology should look like.

[@robertcurrie9977]

Great video, love the outdoor setting. Was hoping the ending would resolve into a crane shot pulling up and back to show an enormous on-location crew with Mat's trailer, catering, lots of PAs and boombox wranglers.

[@regulatormachine2788]

Sad to see he has become homeless, having to shoot his video's outside....

[@JohnVance]

It never fails to delight me that he's such a huge vintage hip hop enthusiast

[@killerbee2562]

I miss the time when everyone had a boombox.

[@VRStoned1978]

So crazy how everything changed with digital media, lithium batteries, Digital amps and dsp

[@deleted_redacted]

Haha, I quite enjoyed this one! Good to see you out and about.

[@badger_claws]

I've been subscribed for many years but it still makes me laugh when I see your old skool hip hop tapes, sometimes just in the background. Never judge a book by its cover 👍🏼

[@Sigma-INFJ.]

Mat definitely showed his Moxie in this video.

[@MrMegaManFan]

Your love of hip-hop music never fails to please and impress me. Cheers!

[@krispyai4229]

I had the Sharp WQ-T238X, another back to back, when I was a kid. I emptied my children’s bank account to get it and made miss takes for every girl I fancied. I used my Walkman for the ff and rw. Didn’t really pay me back.

[@Satansclawps3]

"AND MADE MISS TAKES"?

[@jpdemer5]

@@Satansclawps3 You'd make the miss take the tape back to you.

[@jimfarrell4635]

I made lots of misstakes with girls too...

[@zeilentrafo9915]

I had the WQ-T 238, too. It was my first stereo boombox in 1988. It was a christmas present from my parents. After only a few days of usage, it killed the first cassette. The damage was that strong that the cassette door could not be opened any more. After having serviced that, the machine did quite a good job. The sound quality of the recordings was really good, especially when using chrome tapes. They even sounded well when played on my father's Pioneer tape deck.

[@tylaranderson8559]

Thank you, another great video . I've been watching some of your older videos as I'm stuck inside with covid and realized I miss the puppets at the end of some of the older videos, I think you should bring them back

[@TylertheMiller]

Wish I could do a second thumbs up for that ending, I love your creativity

[@austinrhubarb]

I had the Sharp WQ-T384 'back to back' as a kid and it was a vastly superior unit to this one. Underneath the door it had a horizontal row of electronic buttons facing upwards. Sharp called it "full logic control". Not only did you have complete control over each deck, but it also had AMSS... auto music search system. Whilst a tape is playing, you could press FF or RW and it would then scan to the next or previous blank gap between songs and then automatically start playing from that point. It was a dream for skipping those less liked tracks on an album. And because it was full electronic controls, dubbing games or music albums from friends was a magical single button affair, without any of the mechanical sequence as Matt showed on the conventional side by side deck. It even automatically dealt with tapes of different lengths. The final bonus for me was that as both auto reverse decks could keep playing in a loop, I could have 3 hours worth of music continuously playing whilst revising. Personally, I loved this version and it was my well loved music machine from around 14 to 18, when it was then replaced by a Technics 4 box midi system.

[@DumahBrazorf]

I wonder how that mechanism was cheaper than 2 "simple" ones with all the added complexity.

[@Techmoan]

one motor, one door, one set of controls. The only ‘complexity’ is a lever which operates a simple slider which engages either spindle.

[@xpehkto]

@@Techmoan if it's so simple, why they stopped at two decks? Or did they?

[@Mister_Brown]

@@xpehkto interesting idea, just keep stacking tapes on one ever lengthening capstan, it would work a lot better for cart based endless loop though than cassettes because you need to drive the takeup reel on cassettes

[@3rdalbum]

@@xpehkto A 5-deck version likely wouldn't fit on your shoulder

[@darinb.3273]

​@@TechmoanHello Matt is there a way we could speak privately, email or some other type of chatting program? A computer store has a computer part I need (an I/O shield) and they don't ship to the USA. I've searched and searched and searched and no other seller has this specific I/O shield for this specific motherboard. I'll explain more if you are willing to help me in getting this I/O shield. Thank you in advance.

[@itslessfunincanada]

I had the SHARP WQ-T484 boombox (shown at 8:47) with twincam dual cassette with double auto reverse and full logic controls from 1990 to 1992. It had fast forward and rewind controls for both cassette mechanisms unlike the model in your video. The buttons were front mounted and it had a record and wake up timer. I upgraded to the SHARP CD-JX20 boombox in 1992 with CD player, digital tuner, remote and double cassette without the twincam arrangement strangely. Both were made in Japan and I loved them!

[@padraigcollins6525]

We never called them mix tapes back in the 80s, not in Ireland or Britain anyway. We just called them tapes. Mostly I made them for myself, some I made for friends and a lot were made to show girls how cool/hip/sensitive I was. That rarely worked.

[@borjesvensson8661]

Is not the entire plot of the book high fidelity basically about making mix tapes in a cool london record store?

[@medes5597]

​@@borjesvensson8661people did call them mixtapes. Melody maker had an entire column from 1983 onwards called "mixtaping" that was people sending the magazine their playlist for being rated. What he means is he and his friend group specifically didn't, and thus assumes no one else did and it must be an American-ism (it isn't).

[@stragulus]

We typically either copied entire albums, or made our own 'mix tapes' by recording songs off the radio, including DJ's talking through the start and end of the song. The latter was 90% of what we used to! Even today when I hear certain songs, I remember the stupid DJ banter that would be recorded on the tapes. And what the next song on those tapes was.

[@cho4d]

@@stragulus i remember waiting patiently by my stereo for hours so that "that song i liked from the radio" could be recorded start to end. and then missing the start by 5 seconds anyway.

[@Z64bit]

So then what did you call retail tapes?

[@Kochiha]

Watching one of these is like watching an old-fashioned PBS or BBC documentary, the kind that puts more value into explanation and information rather than flashy whiz graphics or sensationalized narration. It's a style underappreciated both then and now, but it's the style I'll choose every single time, because I can actually learn something from a video like this.

[@Arthur_C]

Hi Mat! Again, I LOVE how you can bring me back to that time when we were browsing the shops, bringing back that feeling. It is so recognisable and I would like to hop in the car and go browsing those shops again... My kids tell me there are no such shops anymore... (Love the outdoor videos😊)

[@neilw3149]

This has brought back ao many memories, we had one at school for assembly in junior shool, remember being impressed that it had 2 cassettes in a single. Haven't thought about it for years! Would have been around 90-91ish.

[@QLTD]

I bought one from the thrift store for AU$7 and only found out that it is a double deck when I got it home! I made a video about it and will be uploaded in the near future

[@konradc12]

During the Sharp brochure, @3:53 I saw my old Sharp GF8989 which was stolen during a burglary back in the mid 1980s. It was great, but didn't support chrome tape recording. Yet it supported metal tape! Most of my other portable 'boom boxes' had auto reverse cassette decks. The best recording quality of my radio cassettes was my mono Sanyo with auto-reverse, the Sharp and Akai portable hifi with 5 band qualiser and LCD spectrum analyser. The Sanyo is in the garden shed, and the AFAIK is in the loft.

[@armron94]

Opening That's a little too big How much does a thing weigh That's Three times taller than my Unit

[@bugstomper4670]

From muscles cars; There's no replacement for displacement! 🎉

[@stephenellis3430]

I remember these Sharp players well and was advised at the time in Dixons that they were compromised and brought a Hitachi TRK-3D95E instead with twin decks. Plus it had a RDS digital tuner and that sealed the deal. Much pocket money went on that system. Used it everywhere. Took to scouts and youth club. Was hammered as it had the two microphones 🎤 inputs and was used as PA and for party’s. Sadly it was a total loss when it got wet in a building and was still plugged in the mains at the time. So was fried. Think I brought it in 1990/91 around that time.

[@stephenellis3430]

The Line in was used for a CD player and it was so basic it only had a 2 segment Red LED display and no remote control. Was still loads of paper round money to buy. But I loved the instant track selection of CD.

[@Rareparrot]

"You put cassette 1 in Tape 1and cassette 2 in tape 2................." Younger Generation - "You've lost me..........." :)

[@phaenius]

What a beautiful landscape.

[@BillyTheKidsGhost]

Companies solving problems that weren't problems to begin with.

[@jpdemer5]

That's 90% of corporate "R&D".

[@chinnyvision]

They wanted a more compact unit and the mech works great for that. The problem is when they rolled out the mech to all of their range. In the original 1986 models (one of which I restored a few years back) you get alot of punch in a smaller unit. But the problem comes with the 90's unit which is twice the size yet still uses the space saving mechanism.

[@BrennanYoung]

the "problem" they try to solve is usually "how do we make this more cheaply and sell it at the same price?" and with Back2Back, reducing the number of doors, controls and transport mechanisms "solves" that problem beautifully. Re-using the speed control for the tape type setting is another such "solution". (What could possibly go wrong?)

[@The_Necrogeddon]

What sweet memories this Sharp boom box brought! I used to own one and I was carrying it with me on school excursions blasting heavy metal to my poor unsuspicious classmates. Actually it is still alive, only needs a good cleaning and some slight maintenance

[@frankowalker4662]

maintenance must also be a nightmare with that mechanism.

[@Moonlightshadow-lq4fr]

I was just thinking about how long these brilliant pieces of engineering will last though before the components disintegrate? Which components last the longest and or can be replaced because if just one plastic cog looses a tooth it will be very difficult to get a replacement these days?

[@frankowalker4662]

@@Moonlightshadow-lq4fr 3D printing has come along way, so I think making parts is possible.(?) (not that I have any experience with 3D printers). But putting those parts in place would be a terrible experience.

[@chinnyvision]

Comes apart fairly easily and you can can replace a belt by just removing one screw if you are careful. But tape alignment is an utter pig and have never managed to get it spot on for both decks at once.

[@frankowalker4662]

@@chinnyvision Imagine trying to replace a pinch roller. OMG. LOL

[@planetX15]

​@@Moonlightshadow-lq4frloses*

[@dieseldragon6756]

One of my mates had one of these, which he'd picked up for a couple of quid on a car boot. To make mixing easier and as it was a cheap unit we found that removing the door and putting a plastic shim between the cassettes to keep them aligned really sped-up tape swaps, though because it made it easier for the reels to disengage from the spindles we had our fair share of chews doing this as well. 📼🎰😇

[@yuriykorotkevych8838]

There was one more drawback of a back-to-back boomboxes: narrower stereobase. It's not that it made a huge difference in stereo sound scape, because the difference in the distance between the speakers was just about the length of a cassette, but still it was noticeable when listening from a close distance, from my experience. And it was nice to have that slight improvement, especially for those of us who could not afford to have also a proper stereo at home, and a boombox was the only device to play cassettes for all occasions.

[@mal2ksc]

That is easily worked around if they let you detach one or both speakers to move further away.

[@MrMersh-ts7jl]

As a proud Mainer that Moxie hat makes me very happy!

[@2dskillz]

Appreciate the dynamic shooting of this one.

[@LakeNipissing]

I have a few of the Sharp WQ-282 mini dual cassette 'boomboxes'. These are notorious for the speaker foam going to crumbs. Another one seen in the ad at 4:28 in the HUGE Sharp HK-9000. This actually has wood speakers and a wood case for the main unit. The carrying handle is more like what would be on a guitar amplifier. Although the blue and red 'diagram' graphic are a bit hokey, this thing has surprisingly good sound, and an incredible amount of power.

[@TheAugust8]

I spent my entire childhood with a similar Sharp WQ-T252. And recently I was given a Sharp WQ-T281Z. All the Sharps that I had to deal with were from this series.

[@robertmiddleswarth4770]

In the case of the mix tapes, it just means you needed to do a bit of pre-planning. The 1 advanced these boxes would have would be size. Many of the later boom boxes were big hollow plastic boxes that means you wouldn't need as much surface space for 2 deck so it would make dual deck BB that could be made a bit smaller.

[@brianartillery]

I wouldn't have bought one for the simple reason that I'm a bit of a tape snob, and always mistrusted decks where the tape was inserted upside down. My first 'Boombox' was a Hitachi TRK - W55E. I got it in 1986, and it was still working perfectly in 1994. Great bit of kit.

[@LorchVHS]

I always liked the Sharp boombox I had with back to back deck though I rarely played tapes in it. When I made mixtapes, it was recording music from CDs, PlayStation games, my 386 PC or VHS tapes. The limitations of the back to back arrangement never occurred to me.

[@pojuantsalo3475]

I owned model WQ-T238H back in the late 80s and early 90s before moving onto hi-fi. This video was a nostalgic memory trip for me, but it ignores the whole idea of SHARP's twin cassette mechanism: Since both cassettes are on the same axel, there are no speed errors (increased wow & flutter) when copying cassettes.

[@organiccold]

I have a GF 555 and i love it. It was a present from my uncle when i was 10❤. I have to repair the cassette decks sometimes already but they work, they suffer of bad rubber wheels in the flywheel shafts, the rubber falls apart

[@CoolDudeClem]

I remember a strange boombox I used to have. It had twin tape decks, one deck was your standard playback deck, the other deck could only record, there wasn't even a pause button on either deck. It was really bottom of the line and so was the quality of the recordings it made. That said though it would still have been easier to make a mix-tape on it, not that you'd want to. I think actually it's in one of my really old videos.

[@video99couk]

3:57 Dolby B was what set apart the really decent blasters, in my humble opinion. I had (still have) a Sanyo MX-315L with Dolby and soft touch controls. Metal tape recordings from that still sound wonderful. But where other manufacturers put in big amplifiers (Hitachi for example), Sanyo put in a super cassette deck. Manual record levels would have been the ultimate addition, jealous of anyone who had that too.

[@garywatts9836]

I repaired these for a sharp service agent many years ago. It was a real pain if a tape got stuck. Another claimed benefit was that as both tapes used the same capstan, the dubbed copy should be identical.

[@jroemling]

04:16 I have the WQ-T282H. Got it when I was a kid, probably the year it came out, and I still have it and it still works. The advantage was the hight speed dubbing for copying tapes, and because both tapes were driven by the same spindle, you could be sure it wouldn't introduce any wow and flutter.

[@Daniel-79]

It’s cool that Sharp was trying something different, but it gives it an 8-track vibe with the playback only deck.

[@SonicBoone56]

Love the change of scenery in the video.

[@B_T_B]

WOW!! I used to have one of them!! Loved it at the time!

[@abausc80]

Thank you Matt for that Video that reminds me on my Sharp WQT238 which i got at the second Trip to West Germany after the Iron curtain was opened. The Seller told us that the Twintape mechanism leads to more space for the speakers 😅 As a ten year old boy i was happy with the Radio that was better then the east German 'Boomboxes' i knew. After 34 years the Sharp is still in use at my Parents Gardenhouse.

[@aaronperl]

I remember seeing decks with this type of mechanism when I was trying to choose a unit with my dad. I thought the idea was neat, but now seeing the limitations on the buttons, I'm really glad I ended up getting one with two doors. I did go through a phase of doing a fair bit of copying little bits from one tape to another to, for example, put together my own lyrics (yes, it sounded as "great" as you'd expect, but it was fun!), and that would have been a nightmare on this thing.

[@davedyer2951]

"A boombox can change the world You gotta know your limits with a boombox This was a cautionary tale A boombox is not a toy."

[@philipkern6774]

“Back in the day, before we had the Internet, we used to buy things in shops. Remember those?” 😂😂😂

[@mjg263]

Very convoluted setup, I’m glad I never had to deal with one. I always made mix tapes on my home stereo, still have a bunch in a drawer somewhere.

[@neildavies9351]

I still have my Sharp WQ-T352E and still sounds as good as it did when i brought it with my first wage packet back in '87. Sound quality is excellent when using the X-Bass and Surround features and 3 equaliser controls are more than enough in my opinion. Tape copying quality is second to none. Also have a Sharp WQ-T380E and this one is much larger and has detachable speakers and weighs a tonne.

[@TheTrueKailash]

i was mesmerised by those ghetto blasters back in the 80s, especially the ones with the writing on the speakers. i think it's the Hitachi ones that had 3D Bass all over them and FOUR speakers along the front. it just blew me away, i wanted one so badly.

[@willmatheson]

My mother had a JVC like the one you showed after the giant Sharp thing. Really nice that it had an auxiliary input and a digital tuner.