Sony 666-D (c. 1969)
Not much information on the Sony 666-D has survived. The period record shows a four-track stereo tape deck with automatic reverse, pitched near the top of Sony's late-1960s line and listed at under $575 in late 1969 (HI-Fi-Stereo-Buyers, Nov 1969, p.49).
Sony's own advertising that year placed the 666-D as the automatic-reverse deck offering top-level quality and performance. The ads pushed three things: a proprietary noise-reduction circuit that reduced playback gain during quiet passages to mask background noise, a three-motor transport (two high-torque spooling motors plus a two-speed hysteresis-synchronous capstan motor), and feather-touch push-button controls (Audio, Dec 1969, p.19). The same campaign ran through much of 1969.
An instrumented test in Audio (Feb 1969, p.44) gives the most useful independent numbers on the 666-D:
- Wow and flutter: 0.075% at 7½ ips, 0.14% at 3¾ ips
- Signal-to-noise: 54 dB without the noise-reduction circuit, 59 dB with it engaged
- Channel separation: better than 45 dB
After that, the record goes quiet. There is no service literature, there are no production figures, and there is little contemporary commentary outside the ads and that one set of measurements.
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