Uher CR 134
Uher's own advertising called it the world's smallest portable hi-fi stereo cassette machine. The pitch was built around a photo-sensitive tape-drive control and automatic reverse.
Overview
The manufacturer's own copy billed the CR 134 as the world's smallest portable hi-fi stereo cassette machine. Uher hung that claim on two engineering tricks: a photo-sensitive electronic control for the tape-drive mechanism, and automatic tape reversal made possible by a newly developed special head design. Whether it really held the size crown is another question. Either way, this is a cassette deck built to be carried, not shelved.
Uher's promotional material is candid about what the machine was for. It pitches the CR 134 as flexible enough to slot into a component hi-fi system, to serve for film dubbing or "sound hunting," to travel as a vacation partner, and to run as a "non-stop entertainer" or a car companion. A built-in condenser microphone means it can capture sound without accessories. Uher also touted smooth operation in any position and "unique wow and flutter characteristics in a machine of this size," which is the phrasing of a company admitting a portable has compromises and claiming this one dodges them.
Power flexibility fit the same portable idea. The deck runs from AC mains, an accumulator, dry cells, or an automobile battery. That is four ways to power it, which counts for a lot on location or on the road. The introductory price was $35000, with accessories optional. It was not a cheap pocket recorder, and Uher clearly positioned the CR 134 as serious gear for someone who needed stereo hi-fi away from the wall outlet.
Contemporary testing backs up part of the wow-and-flutter boast. High Fidelity (January 1975, p.52) measured playback wow and flutter at 0.10% and speed accuracy at 0.6% fast across 105, 120, and 127 VAC. Those are respectable figures for any cassette transport of the period, let alone a portable. The same review's DIN playback response data shows the two channels behaving differently. The left channel ran +1, 3½ dB from 31.5 Hz to 8 kHz, while the right channel spanned 31.5 Hz to 10 kHz.
The same High Fidelity report (January 1975, p.51) also covers the car-audio angle. The unit could be powered from an automobile battery and its sound fed to the car radio, provided the radio had the appropriate mating connector. Uher of America planned to offer an automobile mounting bracket for the CR 134.
The record gives no production span. No start or end year for the CR 134 appears in the available documentation. The 1975 period reviews place it in that year, but nothing here confirms how long it stayed in the catalog. Collectors chasing one should expect to hunt, and should expect the accessories - brackets, connectors, power options - to be at least as scarce as the deck itself.
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