PIONEER CT-S800 Laser Amorphous Cassette Deck, IT'S HERE!!!! (04/09/2009)

and here it is!!!! all i can say is, WOW. this sucker is ORDERS OF MAGNITUDE better than any deck i've ever owned! everything about it exudes quality. about as indestructible as it gets. the sound quality is as gorgeous as a cassette can get. it is plainly clear that this sucker makes absolute full use of the best TYPE IVs, such as the TDK MA-XG. in fact, the first thing i recorded was my aforementioned "BUBBLEGUM CRISIS" collection onto the 1986 MA-XG that member STUWEE so kindly gifted me over a year ago. and i thought it sounded good when i recorded it on that CT-W910R dual-well!! O.M.G... anyway, here are some shots, taken as i was cleaning, re-lubing, and tightening up everything good before setting down to start recording...
















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setting it up:

http://i291.photobucket.com/albums/l...8004-9-096.jpg


some detail shots of the "REFERENCE MASTER MECHANISM"


http://i291.photobucket.com/albums/l...004-9-0924.jpg

http://i291.photobucket.com/albums/l...004-9-0925.jpg

some detail shots inside the chassis:


http://i291.photobucket.com/albums/l...004-9-0923.jpg

http://i291.photobucket.com/albums/l...004-9-0922.jpg

http://i291.photobucket.com/albums/l...004-9-0926.jpg

http://i291.photobucket.com/albums/l...004-9-0927.jpg


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my first mixtape made on this sucker! (JEEZ, i haven't made one of those in YEARS...) a demo set, covering a wide variety of music, on a late-80's version MAXELL XL-IIS, that i'll be sending out to my best bud, member STUWEE, ASAP:







A FOOTNOTE; when i bought this deck from WWW.TAPEHEADS.NET member "Dimitar Georgiev" he told me that the BIAS setting for TYPE-II was screwed up, and that he could not fix it for me due to the fact that he lacked dual layer chromes such as my MAXELL XL-IISes, and that i'd have to do it myself by ear with the service manual that he emailed me on PDF. i did just that. there are FOUR BIAS adjustment pots, accessable via the narrow slit opening in the metal case surrounding the BIAS board, mounted along the front, opposite the transport assembly. there are TWO (?!?) pots for TYPE-I, and one each for TYPE-II and IV. using the S.M. only to locate those pots, i had the TYPE-II BIAS dialed in perfectly by ear, inside of five minutes. the direct results are the ABSOLUTE BEST I HAVE EVER HEARD FROM A TYPE-II. suprisingly close to a good TYPE-IV, even!!!! as mentioned above, my pal STUWEE will be able to audition the smashingly excellent results just as soon as i get that demo tape out to him...

Glad you like it. Like i said before it looks incredible.
Congrats and enjoy!

I'll wait patiently....wait till you hear a super ferric like a TDK AD-X on it, it'll blow you away! I prefer not using dolby on a deck like yours, unless the source is Lp and noisey. You're gonna be making ton's of tapes with that beauty. It was almost mine . I knew you'd enjoy it more

but i thought that TYPE-III ferrics were abandoned in the late seventies, with the advent of the TYPE IV metals? aren't they inferior? i know for sure that i do not possess any TYPE-IIIs, not a one, and i do not even know where to find any, as they seem to be quite uncommon...

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Hi John:

Glad you like it. Revox B215 made me part with this beauty. I have one Revox B215 and got second one. The problem I had with this CT-S800 is that 70% of my records were Nakamichi-made, 20% - Revox, and 10% - CT-S800. The Nak- and Revox- made cassettes did not sound very well on this deck. So if I wanted to listen playback on CTS800 I found myself spending considerable amount of time calibrating azimuth. One point - all the records made on CTS800 sounded excellent on the rest of my decks; the opposite was not true though. And after all it is just another toy. This deck is very well organized and very maintainable as you have probably found out - replacing the belts of this deck is a piece of cake compared to the belt replacements of Nak or Tandberg. The only drawback I found with this deck - bias calibration not very good (need to open the hood for XLII-S) and record sensitivity calibration is missing. AFAIK, there is MKII of CTS800 which has record sensitivity near the bias.

regards,
Dimitar


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recalibrating the azimuth, eh? well, i certainly have had no problems with that, thankfully. "Mk. II of the CT-S800" huh? ah, that would be the CT-S810S,the model that in 1992, directly replaced the CT-S800, which i believe PIONEER ceased production on around 1990/91. there is also the CT-93, which is the REFERENCE version of the S810S. it replaced CT-91 REFERENCE version of the CT-S800. i know that BRAXUS lusts after a CT-93, and prefers it to the CT-S800/91. i happen to prefer the CT-S800 for several reasons. for one, it is better built overall, IMO. it also has a more 1980's cosmetic appearance, which personally is an overall must for me. granted, it lacks the much vaunted DOLBY S that the CT-S810S/93 possess, but that is of no concern to me, as i prefer to leave DOLBY out of my recordings. i mean, what's a little hiss at the beginning and end of a selection, compared to recordings that are so incredibly pure and accurate? i'll admit that there are probably noisy blanks out there that benefit from DOLBY, especially with recordings with quiet passages, but again, that is of little concern to me, as since i am a CASUAL tape head, i'll only ever be making recordings with the very best TYPE-II and IV tape stock. anyway, i'll let you know that, at first, i was actually a little intimidated by the concept of a superdeck, what with an external BIAS control to fiddle with all the time and all, but i was pleasantly suprised to find that not only was the internal TYPE-II BIAS as easy as pie to adjust, but since i received the deck a couple days back, i have made STELLAR recordings on my single 1986 TDK MA-XG and two of my late 80's MAXELL XL-IIS. i left the external BIAS trim control CENTERED on ALL of them. i realize that that is a grand felony in the eyes of a true tapehead, but the results stand on their own. at least to my ears. they all sound, by any degree of measurement, good. DAMN GOOD. orders of magnitude better than any cassette recording i have previously made. it would seem that this deck seems to be designed to operate flawlessly with little BIAS fuss. for that, i am grateful, as if i was having to ride that BIAS all the time, than i'd have to remove the GR-777 spectral graphic EQ from the system, in order to free up the TAPE 2 MONITOR on my receiver, as that is the only way that i'd be able to use the deck's MONITOR function, the only way to adjust BIAS by ear. so far, i have A/Bed the recordings i have made to the source, and have found nothing short of SUPERB results. someday i may run into a BIAS problem, but not as yet. again, thank you. i am THUROUGHLY pleased...