... I have the technics carousel player right now, would you chose a 6 disc magazine tray with no single loading slot over the current 5 disc carousel I have already?...
No. In general, carousel CD changers are more reliable than magazine changers, and are less likely to damage your CDs. Of course, some magazine changers are built better than others, so some work fine for many years. But it is a more complicated mechanism and will be less reliable than a carousel of "equal" quality.
Also, there are different features associated with each;
commonly, carousel changers
that are not very old allow one to change out some of the discs while it is playing one (very old ones typically don't allow that), whereas cartridge changers do not commonly allow that. If you like having all of your CDs in a bunch of cartridges, it is quicker to fully load a cartridge player (with a preloaded cartridge) than to individually load up the CDs in a carousel (however, if you don't have the extra cartridges, it typically takes longer to load up a cartridge than a carousel changer). I believe that carousel changers are generally quicker to change from one disc to the next while playing, so there is less silence between discs.
Cartridge changers tended to come in two sizes; those that held 6 disc cartridges, and those that held 10 disc cartridges. Pioneer made at least one changer that held 3 cartridges at once, of the 6 disc type.
Most carousel changers hold 5 discs, though a few small ones were made that held only 3 discs. But the Onkyo and Integra (upscale Onkyo) carousel changers
of recent years hold 6 discs (the very old ones only hold 5). I personally like the Integra CD carousel changers that hold 6 discs and allow one to switch out 5 of them while one is playing. The Integra changers are better than the Onkyo ones, not because of how they sound, but because they are more reliable. Of the 5 disc carousel changers, I have liked Yamaha. (But I do not mean to disparage your Technics in this, as Technics has made some good gear and I am not familiar with your particular one.)
Also, I would not bother with cassettes these days, unless you already have a collection of cassette tapes. The fidelity of them is not as good as other things, like CDs. And these days, most people probably cannot play one, so it isn't going to be a very good way to share music with most other people. You would have better luck with a CDR for sharing music, though the ability of people to play CDs is decreasing, too.
