I agree that no electronics are selling well, but musical instruments and sheet music seem to be holding up. Windows was a wonderful shop and I think both they and B&O are poorer for the fact that they no longer are associated.

Agree with Martin - the 9000 is very easy to clean and cleaning tapes can be abrasive. Isopropyl alcohol and cotton buds for me too! I know Tim uses the same.

Worth trying a couple of times - I regularly have problems but after one failure, it has just downloaded for me. The problem is usually if you have a slow connection.

I had a Serene for a while and to be honest was not impressed. Mine was unreliable - the motor for the opening would keep trying to shut it when it was already shut and ran down the battery - went back to Struer but came back just the same. The camera was useless as it was incredibly difficult to line up. The screen tends to get a mark across it and

Maybe the next project will to do a turntable comparison. The 8002 versus the 7000 is one I can do quite easily - I do have a tape of about 6 different decks and cartridges playing the same track. At that time the 4000 was my favourite but I confess to an attraction to that deck so will happily admit bias. The 7000 is a very convenient deck but in my

I must confess that this makes me wish for the old style store which had other brands and other interests. My old dealer sold Panasonic, Quad, a number of speaker makes as well as records, sheet music and musical instruments. One felt that they loved the brand - there were specialist B&O sales people but that the love of music of all sorts pervaded

My favourite cartridge was the MMC6000 which I preferred to my collection of MMC20CLs. Slightly sweeter in top end performance - I believe it actually has a slight lift at the top end which might explain that. I doubt I could hear it now! Unfortunately it was lost when I lent my 4004 to a relative. I like the SMMC20EN - interestingly I use it to record

For once, not B&O - but other makes re-branding B&O !! Also check out the power rating article - one of my favourites!

[quote user="soundproof"] Interesting. I haven't heard the Axel, but I have a Soundsmith SMMC20CL+, and I have to agree that there is a stridency to the sound, even at this level of quality. A stridency that surprised me, to the point where I've been thinking of returning it. Ended up putting in the original stylus ... [/quote] If

Well here it is - a face off between the SMMC20EN and the re-suspended and Shibata tipped MMC5000 from Axel. The author has requested anonymity!