This is a great deck save for the mode or reel gear. When this gear starts slipping it will act erratically and reverse spool the tape often resulting in a tape that gets eaten. Replace that gear and it's one of the best dual well decks out there. Considering Dolby S as well as auto calibration it's full of features and sounds really good.

White mode gear failure and is a bit noisy upon reversing.

This is no doubt is extremely under-rated deck, I am convinced that this is due to the fact that it is a double cassette deck. Well let me tell you that it has that high-end sound, musical images emerging from a very quiet background(I can see many of you rolling your eyes, some even laughing hard), don't believe me?, See if you can find someone who has it, you should be able to find one used dirt cheap, bring it home plug it in and fire it up. The 5 outta 5 is strictly based on pre-recorded tapes, which simply sound amazing. I have had many decks, including Nakamichi, Dragon, BX300, 100, 550, 480, some Yamaha and Denon. This is the only deck to convinced me to hold on to my tapes. I will certainly do some recordings aswell on this, but I am sure that would be worth the time and effort.

The Tape deck deserve the credits for : great mechanism, design & appearance, features and quality. however it completely fails in providing high output tapes, especially with the "auto record level control" feature which keeps lowering the input signal.

Model is good for general use , but not for professional purposes.

This deck is easy to use, has a variable speed on deck A, and for an inexpensive dual record deck, performs like much higher priced decks.

The 635 lacks a real time counter, and is very noisy during the reverse or deck switching mode, which is expected in a deck costing well under $200. Quality wise, it uses analog tapes, so, if you need CD quality, use a CD recorder! That being said, I have made high quality tape masters and also dubs from CD masters that are quite good.

I was hired to record a series of lectures at a conference, and was using a Sony TC-WE835, but when that froze up during the end of a session, I bought a pair of TC-WE635's hoping that the recording quality would be comparable. Unfortunately, the 635's lack the real time counter of the 835's, but the overall quality is comparable. I've been very pleased with the 635's, and use one in my home system now as well. My 835 apparently had a temporary problem, and I could not replicate the trouble again! I have outfitted all of my Sony dual cassette decks with rack ears, and have mounted them in portable rack cabinets.

Customer Service

I purchased my Sony decks from internet sellers, either Muscians Friend, or American Musical Supply, and both companies have excellent customer service!

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Sony TC-WE835

Dual playback/record deck Dolby HX Pro B&C Multi-Automatic Music Sensor up to 30 tracks Pitch control on Deck A Very good frequency response(sound quality)

No dolby S (available on model above TC-WE835S)

I was set on buying a Yamaha deck with the same essential features and slightly better specifications but it would have cost me over double the price.The Sony TC-WE635 is an excellent tape deck. It has great playback and recording quality sound. I like the automatic bias calibration advanced feature used during recording which sets the appropiate equalization characteristics for each tape. It also has an auto record level for recording but I have found that the recording level is too low when using this feature. Pre-recorded casssettes, which my wife and I have many, sound great when played on this deck. Overall I am very satisfied with this Sony cassette deck, especially considering the price.

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Technics Cassette decks Considered Yamaha and Denon

A number of nice features.

Too noisy.

The tape deck is pretty noisy when changing playing direction, start, stop etc. When using the Receiver remote you can only address one of the two build-in players. However, contrary what a previous reviewer wrote, I found the difference between the soundquality of a CD and tape-deck to be striking and ultimately unbearable. I decided to return the tape-deck and will probably buy a mini-disk recorder now. Even for a non-audiophile like me this is clearly techonology of the 70s. Nevertheless, as far as tape decks go, and viewed within the technical limitations inherent to analog tape recording technology this is overall a very nice tape deck.

Dolby B & C, dual recording, pitch control, auto record level, easy to use, excellent manual, price

No headphone volume level adjustments, no remote

This is the middle Sony tape deck. I like having the pitch control option. The dual tape recording is very nice. A down side is it has no Dolby S filter option (available with the 835 at an additional $40) or separate headphone volume control. It is a little loud when it switches sides but nothing which is out of the ordinary. Very well built. Excellent manual, giving step by step instructions. For under $200 it is well worth the money. For my purposes this will do fantastic. I mainly will be using this to record from CD's to tapes. I love the dual record options as well. The main difference between this and the 835 was the Dolby S filter option. For the additional costs I did not think it was that important. 5 stars for value and performance.

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Compared Technics RS-TR272, RS-TR575, Sony TC-WE435, TC-WE835

I recently bought this tape deck, and I was amased by the sound quality. When I recorded from cd to tape I could barely tell the difference between the two. The tape scan feature helps you find songs with out having to stop and play every few seconds. The motors are also very quiet.