I thought this thread was over with a good ending. However after hooking it up to my Kenwood system, and there's no good way to say this, so I'll just say it... that deck sounds horrible. Unless there is something else wrong or I did something wrong.
Characteristics of the deck itself: has a low hum on fast speed, when switching speeds there is a audible pop, but going into the slower speed the hum goes away. Now having said that, lets talk about the sound quality keeping in mind I've tested for a few hours on a few different reels (scotches, realistic, maxell) all the same outcome. Hard to describe but its sounds shakey or nervous especially in slow speed, but can tell at fast speed also. All the decks I've ever had u could not really tell the difference from a recording from its source, here it is obvious.
So I'm not sure what happen here. -Q