Nakamichi 1000 Tri-Tracer Stereo Cassette Deck -

This is my Nakamichi 1000 cassette deck.  When this deck was introduced it knocked the audio world completely off its feet.  (I sincerely apologize for the crummy ancient camera phone shots of my Nakamichi 1000 from 2007.)

Nakamichi had been building cassette decks for several years and also  built some very respected reel to reel tape decks.  A boutique company who found footing working with ADVENT Corporation.  Nakamichi was building the ADVENT 200 cassette deck with Dolby noise reduction.  They built the transport and ADVENT supplied the electronics.  It was a production disaster.  The ADVENT 200 was release with great fanfare, and when it was working properly was the finest cassette deck in the world at that time.  Soon after shipping, customers were lining up to return the decks with broken transports.

So many were returned and sent back to Nakamichi that audio stores were afraid to sell them.  ADVENT ended up engineering a fix for the weak transports and rebuilt nearly everyone they sold in-house.  The ADVENT electronics were a marvel, the Nakamichi built transports were fragile.  This is when Henry Kloss went looking for the most industrial, bullet proof transport he could find, and find it he did.  3M Wollensak built an industrial cassette deck transport that was used commercially in the broadcast and educational field.  This was the transport used for the ADVENT 201, which became an audio legend.  (This transport was also famously used by NEAL, HeathKit, Wollensak, and Bell & Howell.  While the decks all had similar appearance, only the NEAL came close to the ADVENT in performance specifications.  We will address the ADVENT in a later post.)

So you can imagine the surprise in the audio world when Nakamichi introduced the 1000.  This from a company that just two years earlier couldn’t build a basic cassette deck transport to last more than a few months.  Here, everything was Nakamichi.  The design, the electronics, and motors.  

When this deck was introduced the ADVENT 201 was the undisputed king of high end cassette decks.  The pain-in-the-neck to operate Wollensak transport was indestructible.  The ADVENT could make recordings virtually indistinguishable from the source material so this was Nakamichi’s target.  The ADVENT 201 was an expensive machine at $399.00.  The world was stunned when Nakamichi’s retail price was $1100.00.  We’re talking 1973 dollars here when the average household income was around $9500.00  Today that would be a $7560.00 machine.

 

Mechanical controls were the norm for tape transports during this period, especially cassette decks.  Nakamichi used soft touch solenoid controls.  Two head cassette decks were also the norm and a three head design was thought to be impossible due to the restraints of the cassette housing itself.  Nakamichi had three heads, three discreet heads, with user azimuth adjustments.  Unbelievable.  Nakamichi was still reeling over the ADVENT 200 reliability issues, so this machine was tested in every imaginable environment.  They were making a statement that they were capable of building the finest cassette deck in the world.  They also went one further.  A properly set up ADVENT cassette deck had an incredible frequency response of 31-15000hz which rivaled some reel to reel machines.

Nakamachi set their sites a bit higher, achieving a first ever perfectly flat unweighted frequency response of 20-20000hz and a weighted frequency response of 35-20000hz +/- 3db.  There are reel to reel machines that can’t achieve that spec, and Nakamichi did it with a cassette deck.

The rest is history.  They were the king of the hill.  Every audiophile wanted one.  They would go on to introduce lesser machines, all outstanding and typically outclassing their competition.  The line included the  1000 Tri-Tracer three head deck, the 700  Tri-Tracer three head deck, the 600 Dual-Tracer two head deck, and the 500 Dual-Tracer two head deck.  The entire line of machines were extremely well made, reliable with better performance than most anything else on the market and due to the success of the 1000, the entire line of machines had something no other manufacture could offer - panache.  It was a statement to own a Nakamichi.  This continued for nearly a decade as others tried to catch up. 

My deck was a transitional machine, having the record calibration controls moved from the back of the machine right up front for chrome and normal bias tape where the blend mic input jack sat on the original model.  The serial number places mine to early 1976.  Mid 1976, is when the Nakamichi 1000II would be introduced. Along with the calibration controls being moved, the new machine also sported a new cassette door with a window to see tape travel.  Now priced at over $1650.00 US, and still the deck to have today if you can find one.

I purchased my 1000 from the original owner, who seldom used it.  Everything functioned perfectly.  The sound rivaled any of my reel to reel machines, except maybe the half/track Pioneer RT1050 at 15ips.  Maybe.  That’s how good the deck was.  I used it for maybe  6 months.   The machine is big, and 19” wide without the case, so it could be rack mounted in a standard professional EIA Equipment rack.  Many studios did just that.

Things I didn’t like about the machine was the necessary azimuth and bias adjustments to dial the deck in every time you wanted to record.  I missed the set it once and forget it appeal that the ADVENT 201 and Nakamichi 500 had.  Both of these could be calibrated with adjustment pots found in the rear and underneath the machines.  I basically always used either Maxell UD or UDXLII, so they were both set up for those tapes.  Additionally, you could calibrate the Dolby processing on both of those decks as well.  Once set, you’re done.  I also used TDK SA cassettes, and found the settings used for the Maxell XLII more than acceptable and within .5db. 

As impressive as the 1000 was, I really didn’t need a  machine that can site a 20-20,000hz spec, there is very little if any program material that goes below say 40hz or above 13,000hz.  So, I came to realize that my ADVENT and Nak 500/600 could make recordings remarkably close to that of the 1000.  Many would be owners found the same when auditioning the Nakamichi 500 and 600 Dual-Tracer machines.  Yes, there are audible difference, but they are very small.

Still if you wanted the no-holds-barred best machine ever, this was the deck to have.  I really liked it, but didn’t love using it, so sold it off to a collector who loved it more.  Highly recommended. Of all the machines I have owned, NOTHING was built like the 1000, NOTHING sounded like the 1000, not even the mighty ReVox B-215 (a nightmare I will talk about in a later post).  Possibly the finest cassette deck every made and infinitely more reliable than any Nakamichi built after 1980.