The better Sonys, Denons, Tascams, and so on up through the early 90’s seemed to use the Sony KSS151 transport, which is a thing of beauty.
But the drawer mechanisms are unique to the implementations, and some are a major pain the rear to keep in good nick. I’ve spent hours with a Denon DCD1560 and simply cannot get the drawer to open reliably. The mechanism for operating the closure latch gets its latch spring from stretching the drawer belt, and I haven’t figured out the issue with it.
The Tascams are super-serviceable in my experience. I have two of them. But it’s a good thing they are serviceable, because I’ve had to deeply service both of them to keep the drawers working. The drawer mechanics on those are much simpler that the massive drawer in the Denon. Both use the KSS151 mechanism that uses a linear motor to operate the laser sled.
I have three Cambridge Audio players—an old D500 Special Edition, an Azur 640C, and a CXC transport. The first two use a KSS213 laser unit, and the drawer belt is easy to change. The newer CXC uses the current cheapie Sanyo transport, but the issue I have with it is the dimness of the display, which has just about become unusable. I find that annoying in the extreme.
Rick “keeping a fleet going but not finding it easy” Denney
But the drawer mechanisms are unique to the implementations, and some are a major pain the rear to keep in good nick. I’ve spent hours with a Denon DCD1560 and simply cannot get the drawer to open reliably. The mechanism for operating the closure latch gets its latch spring from stretching the drawer belt, and I haven’t figured out the issue with it.
The Tascams are super-serviceable in my experience. I have two of them. But it’s a good thing they are serviceable, because I’ve had to deeply service both of them to keep the drawers working. The drawer mechanics on those are much simpler that the massive drawer in the Denon. Both use the KSS151 mechanism that uses a linear motor to operate the laser sled.
I have three Cambridge Audio players—an old D500 Special Edition, an Azur 640C, and a CXC transport. The first two use a KSS213 laser unit, and the drawer belt is easy to change. The newer CXC uses the current cheapie Sanyo transport, but the issue I have with it is the dimness of the display, which has just about become unusable. I find that annoying in the extreme.
Rick “keeping a fleet going but not finding it easy” Denney
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