Cool stuff for sale mega-thread.

Even with a new cassette player

Mini lettore di cassette registratore a nastro Radio FM con controllo del J0U8 | eBay

 

A week or two ago @Mister X was asking what a Music Centre was.
Browsing through eBay for something else I spotted this which makes it 100% clear.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Vintage-...997364?hash=item3b485b0df4:g:nTsAAOSwNpZe2Q07
I like the way that "Stereo Music Centre" is written prominently in a font that looks as if it has come straight off a sheet of Letraset.

If you had one of these in the 1970s you would have been very proud of it. For most people something like this would have cost about a months wages. There are actually three on Ebay.co.uk at the moment so they must have still been popular.

 

Here is another GEC product I found which made me think of @autoreverser

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Vintage-...446165?hash=item5db4183e15:g:oSkAAOSw~gxfa2rM

If it was 1/10th of the price or perfect condition I might have been interested.

For those outside the U.K. or the youngsters, from the 1950s through to the 90s GEC was the U.K.s largest engineering company, equivalent to Siemens in Germany or GE in America (which despite the similar name they weren't related to). They made everything from power stations to the trains that run through the Channel Tunnel. In typical British fashion, a new managing director sold off all the historically profitable divisions and invested all the money in Telecoms start-ups just in time for the Dot Com crash in 1999.

 

ha, that‘s a Cloneman-movement. far to expensive, as you say...

 

ebay-local is full of those, here some examples of units for sale close to me:


https://www.ebay-kleinanzeigen.de/s...buttons&utm_medium=social&utm_content=app_ios


https://www.ebay-kleinanzeigen.de/s...buttons&utm_medium=social&utm_content=app_ios


https://www.ebay-kleinanzeigen.de/s...buttons&utm_medium=social&utm_content=app_ios

 

Being Dixons own brand I would expect this to be cheaply made but I do like the styling.
Unlike any other box I have seen, and trying to look so modern with those square speakers that are most likely just cosmetic
Another benefit is both Aux in and out.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Saisho-8...n&brand=Saisho&_trksid=p2047675.c101198.m1985

If this is 1980s it would be very late 1980s.

 

Dixon's (the company Best Buy couldn't compete with in the UK) have had at least three own brands.

In the 1970s Prinz (when German cameras were the ones to buy) / PrinzSound / Prinztronic

This super cool AKA Weltron is worth adding the link
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/WHITE-WE...135384?hash=item2f57c732d8:g:mZEAAOSwHclgaX06

In the 1980s Saisho (when they realised that people thought Japanese equipment was better than German)
The red dot on the i was supposed to evoke the Japanese flag
although most of it was probably made in Hong Kong, Taiwan, or Korea (like this low end Radio Cassette)



Another Japanese themed brand Matsui. Looking on Ebay far more commonly used on VCRs

You can read all about Dixon's brand engineering here
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dixons_Retail#saisho

 

All explained in a Marketing Journal along with a link to the actual "Firips" radio advert
https://www.campaignlive.co.uk/arti...roved-timeless-advertising-principles/1466338

 

Found one for sale in the U.S. for $33 shipping included. White is very unforgiving to inconsistent gaps. Buttons on different hight, the stop button is angled as if it is about to break.

Found a review of the same mecha, but the cover is hinged differently, and it has no radio. Well, silver is even less forgiving than white: flashing on plastic parts, uneven edges. The sound quality is atrocious: wow and crackle (skip to 1:06). He was generous enough to not call it garbage outright, instead suggesting trying it to "walk down the memory lane". Thanks, but no. Maybe the one sold now on eBay has improved quality, but I don't feel like trying it out. I prefer my cheap plastic Sonys from 1990s.

Interesting that his silver version is branded "DigitNow!". I have another item with the same branding, an analog-to-digital video converter, and just like the cassette player, the converter worked only half-way, deinterlacing the video into 30p instead of keeping it in 30i. So, a half-baked product. Why bothering making it at all?

 

Matsui was actually sold by Currys, Dixons main competitor

 

Sony EX1 immediately comes to mind. This one is in pristine cosmetic condition. Of course, all the mechanical details made with a totally different level of precision and care.



The EX1 from the video above seems to have tons of wow, on another hand it is hard to figure out is it really wow or is it how the guitar is played. The guy should have chosen another track to showcase his walkman.

 

I hope @nickeccles doesn't see that comment seeing he is such a fan of Curry's own brand which was Triumph.
Since 1984 Curry's and Dixons have been owned by the same parent company company DSG. Gradually, and more so when the shops moved out of town, they were branded Curry's. Dixons now only exists as a few Airport shops selling cameras etc (which was Dixon's original speciality). There isn't much call for a washing machine or lounge TV in an airport shop which are things Curry's have sold since the 1950s.

A very old thread about retailers
http://www.stereo2go.com/topic/index.php?content_oid=494451095096640630&board_oid=193392314111653340

Is suspect that, with the demise of Comet, Maplin, and many department stores, if you wanted to go and look at then buy a Bluetooth speaker these days Curry's would be the only national chain where you could do that. We do have a pretty good independent retailer just a mile from here, but having had a few concessions in Department stores etc they are down to just one large out of town shop specialising in personal service and quick local deliveries.
https://purewell.co.uk/about-us-i1