Harman Kardon HD7600

Little is documented about the Harman Kardon HD7600 beyond its technical specifications and a handful of period advertisements. What the record shows: it was a stereo cassette deck, part of Harman Kardon's "3D Bit Stream" CD player marketing campaign — though the HD7600 itself was a tape deck, not a CD player.

The HD7600 used a 2-motor, 2-head transport with a frequency response reaching 18 kHz on metal tape and a wow-and-flutter figure of 0.045%. It offered both Dolby B and C noise reduction, a pitch control, and automatic tape selection for normal, CrO₂, and metal formulations. Signal-to-noise ratio was rated at 72 dB with Dolby C on metal tape.

Period advertising in Audio (October 1990, p.401) quoted a Dutch publication, HTV Magazine, calling the HD7600 "a full member of our reference set" for testing speakers and amplifiers. The same ads promoted the sibling HD7500 CD player's "natural timbre" — the HD7600 itself received no dedicated review coverage in the sources that survive.

Type: Stereo cassette deck, 4-track / 2-channel
Transport: 2 motors (FG servo drive, separate reel motor), 2 heads
Frequency response: 30 Hz–16 kHz (normal), 30 Hz–17 kHz (CrO₂), 30 Hz–18 kHz (metal)
S/N ratio: 58 dB (normal), 68 dB (CrO₂ w/ Dolby B), 72 dB (metal w/ Dolby C)
Wow & flutter: 0.045%
THD: 0.9%
Dolby B and C noise reduction
Pitch control; auto tape selector
Dimensions: 440 × 145 × 262 mm; 6.2 kg

No production years, original price, or service documentation have surfaced in the usual collector channels. The HD7600 appears to have been a solidly-specified deck, but its story beyond the spec sheet remains largely unrecorded.