I Gave Up on 7 Broken Cassette Decks

I have a problem. Somewhere along the way, I accumulated seven broken cassette decks. Most of them seemed like good ideas at the time. They powered up. They were beautiful. They were potentially valuable. And they probably just needed belts, right? Yeah. In this episode of The Tech We Keep, I confront my terrifying tower of unfinished cassette deck projects, make one last attempt to convince myself I can deal with them… and then give up almost immediately. Fortunately, I found someone who actually knows what he’s doing. I trade the whole pile to Danny for one good working deck and a couple of records and get a crash course in why cassette decks can be such challenging little mechanical monsters. Special thanks to ‪@botelhda‬ for his generosity, his expertise, and for giving these machines a much better chance at another life. The Tech We Keep is about the stories behind the technology we hang onto as well as the joy, frustration and occasional failure involved in trying to keep it alive. Subscribe for more stories worth saving. thetechwekeep.com 00:00 I Think I Have a Problem 00:20 The Terrifying Tower of Tape Decks 01:49 Spoiler: I Gave Up 02:10 Why Are Cassette Decks So Hard? 04:07 Meet Someone Who Actually Knows What He's Doing 06:12 The Deck I'm Taking Home 06:55 The Trade Begins 07:43 A Very Interesting Akai 09:16 Digging Through the Rest 11:34 Seven Decks for One (and Two Records) 11:51 Thanks, Danny