Nakamichi 400 (1973–1975)

Name: Nakamichi 400
Brand: Nakamichi

The Nakamichi 400 is a serious portable cassette recorder, introduced in 1973 at $675. That was real money for a cassette deck in those days, let alone a portable one. It has a handle, runs on six 1.5V batteries, and includes a built-in amplifier and two loudspeakers. It is a self-contained recording setup, not just a transport you had to dock with a home system. The documentation on it is thin.

It used Dolby B noise reduction and supported CrO2 tape, which put it in the "professional portable" class that Nakamichi was carving out for itself in the early 1970s. The 600 Series ads of the period - for the 600 Cassette Console, 620 Power Amplifier and 630 FM Tuner Preamplifier - pushed the same message of "high standards of excellence," as High Fidelity (July 1977, p.57) put it. The 400 was an important step toward that reputation.

The technical details are where the record gets frustrating. Sources conflict on whether the 400 was a two-head or three-head design. hifiengine lists it as two heads (record/playback plus erase), which seems plausible for a portable of this vintage, but some listings hint at three. Given the conflict, two heads is the safer claim. The other specs from hifiengine: 4-track, 2-channel stereo at 1⅞ ips, frequency response of 40Hz to 15kHz, signal-to-noise ratio of 58dB with Dolby, wow and flutter of 0.15% WRMS, and a DC servo motor. Dimensions were 400 x 100 x 280mm, and it weighed 7.5kg. That is heavy for something you carry, but it suggests serious transport and electronics inside.

Production ran from 1973 to roughly 1975, though at least one source lists only 1973. The vintagecassette.com entry describes it as a "professional portable cassette recorder," which fits the price point and the built-in mic preamps. Beyond that, the record goes quiet. No detailed period reviews of the 400 itself have surfaced in the usual archives, and there are no common repair notes and no collector market data.