Sound changes

There's been a few changes in the 'spare room' system recently with finding using a combination of small boxes was awkward  having to hold down one to adjust anything and then find as one wire moved, the other bit moved  too.
It seemed I was needing less wires and a more solid single unit which wasn't appreciably longer so it would fit on same space

The other thing was although it could play loud at times it would sound 'soft' and beyond which it would start sounding harsh because it's power is fairly low.
Enter a used oldie from the 1980's that had a fair bit more power (25 watts per channel RMS), not too long and relatively short height so the overall form factor was still small being well way from the sort with big front panels loaded with features and flashing lights.

The Rotel RA 820B has inputs for a radio (or portable device), a cd player (designed specifically for their higher output) and circuit for  turntable that uses a Moving Magnet cartridge that can just plugged into it.
Outside of that it has full tape recording and monitoring (see later), a button to put anything in mono,  a volume control and headphone socket, that is just it.

On the rear you have the sockets including a grounding tag for turntables and the + and - left and right outputs that you push your loudspeaker leads into although I found I needed too extend mine a little.

I did mention 'tape monitoring' because some cassette (and open reel) decks actual allow you to hear what is coming off the tape you may well be recording so you know it's recording okay.
One thing the switching box couldn't do is just that and that comes into play with the entry of a circa 1991 three headed direct drive cassette deck by Technics of Japan, the Rs Bx 707.
First off on the record side it has a tape tuning system to make the best possible recordings on whatever tape you have rather than relaying whatever it was set to at the factory enabling you to set it yourself.
The record level meters have a wide scale which can switched to the portion that you use most of the time for greater accuracy.
On the playback side it has the monitoring button so when recording you can compare what you are recording with what it sounds off the tape and can use Dolby B or C noise reduction for playback (and record) which was typical of the period. 
I tended to use either B or if the tape was fairly quiet none as sometimes you can hear the noise reduction especially on tapes made on other machines typically as a either a dulling of the sound or sounding as if the noise reduction circuit wasn't quite keeping up with fluctuations in the tone.
The tapes are loaded by a motorized draw and the tape types are set between types I ("Normal"), II (High Bias aka "Chrome") and IV ("Metal") automatically using sensors.
The motor speed is set by a quartz crystal and adjusted in real time and featuring no belts is extremely steady.