Which Nakamichi to choose?

If you're thinking about archiving precious records, don't think twice. Get a Nak. The medium is viable, the sound good, the build excellent. 

I have owned 5 Naks, and still own 3: an XR-7 and two CR-7a's. The XR-7 is used for a music reference in my lab, where vinyl is not practical. Don't let the digitizers put you off a good technology, well executed. 

@tls49 

Thanks for the Nak link. I'd forgotten about that site!


@lowrider57 

Sorry, I mis-attributed the question to jond. See above. Yes, pretty close to studio quality, IMO.

@lowrider57 

I use Dolby B, but not Dolby C. With Dolby B, there's not much to choose between a hot-rodded Revox A77 half-track at 7.5ips and a hot-rodded CR-7a.

"Hot-rodded" means mainly cap and resistor improvements, not fundamental circuit changes.

@jond 

Not my experience with the CR-7a. The auto-alignment feature makes up for any limitation in what is basically a different compensation curve. 

@jond

My CR-7a with belts is marginally better than my CR-7a with gear train. High frequency was not an issue on Dolby B with either deck when stock. I found Dolby C to sound a little "processed", but not degraded to digital levels.

I suggest that you buy the best deck you can find. My father, a shipyard superintendent, with corresponding hearing damage, compared a high class Denon to a DR-1. His comment, "There’s really no comparison, is there?"

I thought about a ZX-9, but the automatic alignment feature on the CR-7a is really useful.

@cleeds 

"Tape most certainly does degrade."

Quite correct. What I should have said is that saving vinyl to tape, and playing tape until it degrades, gets you thousands of plays before degradation. Sorry to be inaccurate.

And I agree, half track at 15 ips is the standard - but it sure is expensive!

@cleeds

Not an archival medium? Depends. Cheap stuff, 120 minutes, agreed. Metal Type 4, 60 minutes duration, absolutely disagree.

I have tapes made 20 years ago that sound fine. I used the ceramic cartridge bodied cassettes for mixdowns from 15 ips master tapes. Just amateur stuff, but I made damn fine CD’s, if I do say so myself.

Without going into details, I think that cassettes are a perfect way to extend the life of precious vinyl. Tapes don’t degrade; vinyl does, at least on most real-world systems.