Yamaha KX393 Review

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Yamaha KX393
★★★★☆
4.0
From 6 reviews
83.0% of users recommend this
  • Sound Quality

  • Features

  • Value For Money

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absintheboy's review of Yamaha KX393

“So like a fool I entrusted my Nakamichi to my parents...”

★★★★☆

written by absintheboy on 12/04/2007

Good Points
Play trim - great for playing tapes made on other machines
Very good sound for the price
Headphone socket with volume control allows variable output to a PC
"tape tune" system automatically tunes the bias when recording on a new tape.

Bad Points
Build is a tad flimsy

General Comments
So like a fool I entrusted my Nakamichi to my parents while I sorted out the service it needed, only to find out a year later that they'd thrown it out!!!!



I needed a halfway decent cassette deck, and the Yamaha not only looks stylish but has the "play trim" function. The Nak used non-standard bias settings so this was an essential feature for playing my old recordings. And the Yamaha does a better job than anything other than another Nakamichi.



As for its own recordings, they are fine. The LED meters are more than adequate (I've used some crappy ones in my time) and while it doesn't sound like a Nakamichi...nothing else does and a Nak costs 6 times as much!



Reproduction of pre-recorded material is very good too. It's not a top end deck, but then it doesn't pretend to be one. What it does do is play tapes very well, especially for the price and make very passable recordings. I'd recommend one to anyone who isn't using cassettes as a major source of music, and lets face it who is today? If you've got a bunch of old tapes that you want to listen to or dub to CD then you won't go wrong with this Yamaha.

  • Value For Money

  • Sound Quality

  • 6 - 12 Months

    Time Cassette Deck Owned

  • Features

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Absintheboy's Response to absintheboy's Review

Written on: 15/05/2014

Update May 2014. For the last 18 months I have been making heavier use of the KX-393 as I have started recording cassettes from the radio again after a decade not bothering.

I really like the deck, it works best with type II cassettes (no longer widely available) but gives decent enough results with the basic Maxell UR available at Wilko. My stash of Type IV tape doesn't really offer any advantage over a good type II with this deck. Still going after about 10 years, no signs of wear.

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