Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

Like most people considering this unit, I have loads of old vinyl LP's I want to record to CD. Prior to buying this unit I bought a Phillips CD recording deck for my stereo that has yet to record a single sound. I should have known - all the reviews on that unit mentioned the first units being returned due to not working - my mistake. This unit is far different in that respect - it arrived late yesterday afternoon vis UPS and I'm using it this morning successfully. As mentioned in other reviews, the sound quality out of the speakers is terrible - thin and tinny, no bass response. I did a lot of online poking around before buying - most info states it uses CD-R's, it doesn't - it requires audio CD-R's, often harder to find and not as cheap as a CD-R for your PC. A valid comment is that it would be better to have a built-in tape player instead of an unneeded radio tuner, but do you really still use your tape deck on your stereo much? I don't, and it's being moved to be connected to this unit permanently via the input jacks. It records to standard audio CD format so if, like me, you want to get MP3's off your records you'll need to rip the CD on your PC. I'd recommend ripping to WAV format so you can use a WAV editing program to clean up the sound a bit and maybe restore a bit of bass (depending on the ability of the WAV editor you use). All told, this is an effective and intuitive all-in-one unit that gets the job done. The CD recorder is a bit slow in reaction times. You can't hit pause betwen tracks on most records to create individual tracks because the pause function is too slow in its reaction time to stop/restart quickly enough to keep up with the LP. Also finalizing isn't terrifically intuitive. You must stop, switch from Phono to CD mode, reload the CD and start the finalizing process which gives no indication of when it's complete. With a bit of use and practice you'll "get it" pretty quickly - stock up on audio CD-R's - you'll go through a lot during the learning phase. I'd recommend this to most who, like me, are tired of trying to re-build their LP collection by buying a CD. For the same or less money than a component CD recording deck, this is pretty darned good. Do not think it can become the turntable for your primary stereo - no output jacks and not the planet's greatest turntable. TEAC is definitely not who they used to be back in the day. It's not totally crummy junk but distinctly not true "component quality" anymore.