Almost any box worth collecting is old -- older than many members here. In the course of collecting, you may come across many boxes that perform well, and many that don't perform well. We form opinion and biases based on our experiences with the examples we are fortunate enough to have and test. But how do we know if a box that seems average is really average or simply performing below potential?
I bring this up because one of my favorite boxes, the Sanyo M9994 has always performed well for me. A few months ago, I sold a box to someone in Hawaii. I cleaned it and made sure it was worthy of being transferred. The buyer who owned another example was very happy with the Sanyo and told me that mine performed tons better than the one he currently has.
Well, the cassette deck on his other box refused to work recently and he has sent it to me to repair. Yesterday, it has arrived and I haven't had time to re-belt it yet but the first thing I always do when a box is sent to me to repair is to test and assess all the functions to make sure that no new issues are introduced and no blame can be assigned for pre-existing conditions. In the course of testing, it was apparent to me that the box appears to be operating properly but the performance is NOT what I have grown accustomed to seeing from the M9994. The power is weak and sound quality is lower than I'd expect from this box and it's brassier than I expect. It is apparent to me that the box is in serious need of re-capping, at the very least. It sounds more like a louder than normal entry level box than a M9994.
However, it is also clear to me that someone who does not own another example would not not have a reason to believe that there is anything actually wrong with the box and thus, would have a poorer view of this box not having known any better.
I'm just wondering how many boxes are in our collection where we only have 1 example and our opinions and biases are wrongly formed due to our experience with boxes performing below original specs? Since almost all these boxes are 25-35 years old, it stands to reason that many have electrical components that have degraded values and accordingly, degraded performance.
I bring this up because one of my favorite boxes, the Sanyo M9994 has always performed well for me. A few months ago, I sold a box to someone in Hawaii. I cleaned it and made sure it was worthy of being transferred. The buyer who owned another example was very happy with the Sanyo and told me that mine performed tons better than the one he currently has.
Well, the cassette deck on his other box refused to work recently and he has sent it to me to repair. Yesterday, it has arrived and I haven't had time to re-belt it yet but the first thing I always do when a box is sent to me to repair is to test and assess all the functions to make sure that no new issues are introduced and no blame can be assigned for pre-existing conditions. In the course of testing, it was apparent to me that the box appears to be operating properly but the performance is NOT what I have grown accustomed to seeing from the M9994. The power is weak and sound quality is lower than I'd expect from this box and it's brassier than I expect. It is apparent to me that the box is in serious need of re-capping, at the very least. It sounds more like a louder than normal entry level box than a M9994.
However, it is also clear to me that someone who does not own another example would not not have a reason to believe that there is anything actually wrong with the box and thus, would have a poorer view of this box not having known any better.
I'm just wondering how many boxes are in our collection where we only have 1 example and our opinions and biases are wrongly formed due to our experience with boxes performing below original specs? Since almost all these boxes are 25-35 years old, it stands to reason that many have electrical components that have degraded values and accordingly, degraded performance.
as i have m90 thats in need of recap yet it still works good except now i have to wait atleast 5 minutes for the radio to come on i did notice one cap on the radio board is starting to show its guts 
