Sanyo MR-929
A 28.6-pound reel deck that promised "sound-with-sound" and stereo playback from a machine Sanyo billed as a stereo/monaural tape recorder.
Overview
The MR-929 is one of those late-Sixties Sanyo decks that turns up in old British hi-fi shop ads more often than it turns up on a collector's bench — which tells you something about how it was sold. It's a 4-track machine with a genuinely odd feature set: Sanyo's own literature describes it as offering "4-track Monaural Recording and Playback" alongside "2-channel 4 track full-frequency recording and playback with true-to-life stereo sound effect." Read that carefully. The MR-929 is a stereo *playback* machine that records monaurally in the 4-track format, with a "sound-with-sound" system for layering a second pass onto an existing track. It is not a stereo recorder in the sense a Revox owner would mean. That distinction matters enormously for anyone considering one today, and it's buried in the marketing copy rather than shouted from the headline.
What the deck does have going for it is honest mid-century construction. The all-transistor OTL (output-transformerless) circuitry was a talking point in 1968–69, and Sanyo fitted a professional-type VU meter to *each* of the two channels rather than splitting a single meter between them — a small thing that speaks to how the machine was pitched. A built-in tape counter helps you find material without guessing, and the deck runs either vertically or horizontally, which was a real convenience in the cramped listening rooms of the period.
The transport is a two-speed affair: 7½ in/sec (19 cm/sec) and 3¾ in/sec (9.5 cm/sec), with a 7-inch reel capacity and AC bias/AC erase. Rewind time is quoted at 3 minutes for a 7-inch, 1,200 ft. reel. Frequency response is where the numbers get interesting — and where owners should temper expectations. Sanyo's spec sheet claims 20–19,000 c/s at 7½ ips, but the parenthetical tells the real story: 30–15,000 c/s ±3 dB. At 3¾ ips the figure drops to 30–12,000 c/s. Those are respectable numbers for a consumer deck of the era, but they are not studio numbers, and the ±3 dB window is doing a lot of work in that headline claim.
Power output is modest by any standard: maximum 4W per channel, with "music" power quoted at 6.5W per channel. The deck shipped with two 4-inch free-edge permanent speaker boxes — detachable, but hardly the stuff of serious monitoring. Voice coil impedance is listed at 10K ohms and line outputs at 1K ohms, figures that will matter to anyone trying to interface the MR-929 with modern gear.
Physically, it's a substantial piece: 14¼ inches wide, 12¾ inches deep, and 11 inches high (350 × 330 × 280 mm), weighing 28.6 lbs. (13 kg). That weight is mostly transport and power supply, and it's the reason these decks survive as well as they do — there's real metal in there. The multi-voltage power supply (AC 100V, 117V, 125V, 220V, 240V) marks it as an export-market machine, which explains its presence in British dealer ads.
On price, the period record is unusually clear. Studio-Sound (May 1969) carried the MR-929 at a cash price of £96 0s. 0d., with a £24 deposit and twelve monthly payments of £6. That put it squarely in the middle of the 4-track stereo/mono field — above the Philips EL3312 at £66 19s. 10d. and the Ferguson 3232 at £91 13s., but below the Sony TC260 at £116 5s. and well below the Tandberg 12/21/41 at £126. A later Studio-Sound listing (May 1969) quoted it at 79 guineas, consistent with the same positioning. Sanyo's own advertising in Studio-Sound (September 1968, p.24) ran the tagline "Sanyo puts you in the world class" over a photo of the MR929 — marketing copy, not a verdict, and worth reading as such.
Where the MR-929 gets awkward is in the details a buyer in 2026 needs to know. The "sound-with-sound" system is a sound-on-sound facility, not sel-sync, and it depends on the deck's monaural record path working correctly — a chain of switches and bias settings that age poorly. The 4-inch speakers are period-correct but sonically limited, and most surviving units will need their belts, idlers, and head assemblies inspected before any serious use. The fact sheet carries no current market data, no documented failure modes, and no service history, so anyone shopping one should treat the £96 1969 price as historical context rather than a guide to today's value.
What the MR-929 represents, honestly, is a snapshot of the moment when Japanese manufacturers were pushing 4-track formats into the British home market at prices that undercut the European establishment. It is not a Revox, and Sanyo never claimed it was. It is a well-built, feature-dense consumer deck with a confusing feature set, a modest power section, and a spec sheet that rewards careful reading. Collectors who understand what it is — and what it isn't — will find it a fascinating document of late-Sixties format wars. Those expecting a stereo recorder will be disappointed.
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