u/No-Sleep1981

Audio-Technica 1989 catalog. They called it "crystal copper" - OCC wire grown using the Ohno Continuous Casting method, with almost no crystal grain boundaries. The idea: fewer boundaries means cleaner signal.

Gold-plated connectors to match. A single RCA plug ran ¥4,400 (~$32 then, ~$80 today).

You know where this goes. Half the room says the electrons don't care. The other half has directional arrows on their cables.

Japanese catalog, April 1989.

Sony called it the Elcaset. The idea was simple: take everything that made open-reel tape great, and put it in a cassette shell.

The tape inside was 6.3mm wide - double the compact cassette. The transport speed was 9.5 cm/s - also double. The deck used a three-motor drive with closed-loop dual capstan, same approach as professional reel-to-reel machines. Two models: EL-7 at ¥198,000 (~$3,700 current) and EL-5 at ¥128,000 (~$2,400 todays money)

The format wasn't just Sony:
Panasonic, Technics, TEAC and JVC all made Elcaset decks too, as I know per licence.

Problem was, by 1976 the compact cassette had already grown up. Dolby killed the noise problem. Nobody wanted a bigger, heavier, more expensive cassette when the small one was getting good enough.

Sony pulled the plug in 1980. Four years, then gone.

The SV-P100 was a PCM processor - it converted analog audio to digital, then wrote it to a standard VHS tape using your home VCR. No dedicated digital recorder existed yet. This was the workaround.

¥600,000 in 1981 Japan. The catalog lists it first, before any turntable or amplifier. Technics were clearly proud of it.

From Technics’ October 1981 catalog, aptly titled "Digital Sensation"

at leas Saori Yagi seems more happy with new logo :)

Four Pioneer catalogs, 17 years apart. In 1970 it's just a turntable on red background, no people. 1976 - RT-701 reel-to-reel on black, chrome and VU meters, still pure gear. Then 1984 hits and there's a guy in a kimono on a beach with a water gun and a shelf of cassettes. By 1987 they hired a European model in a pinstripe suit to stand next to a CD player. Somewhere between the reel-to-reel and the pinstripe suit, Pioneer discovered marketing.

Matsushita had two hi-fi brands - Technics and Panasonic - two brothers from another mothers :)

Sometimes they couldn't decide who is who, so in January 1989 they put both in one 16-page catalog. First half is Technics (Intelligent Compo D-series, DIGITAL LINK CD players, the EXE Spirits at 1.6 million yen), second half is Panasonic (cheaper compo systems starting at 29,800 yen, early AV setups). Same Hi-bit DIGITAL tech inside both.

Lucas at the cover seems to think - Who are you, Robot? Human or Technics?

Vote or comment your options :)

1 — getting ready to go out

2 — not going anywhere

3 — don't talk to me

4 — jazz on the roof

This Japanese leaflet (WD‑540/541/545, Nov 1987) calls it “the first professional personal word processor with an AI dictionary.”

“AI here” (AI辞書) meant predictive kanji input — it guessed characters from context, not quite a large language model. Still, Sharp was already using the buzzword and charging ¥165,000 (~$1,100 then, ~$3,000 today).

Bonus: it had a built‑in graphics editor — the front of the leaflet shows a logo design made directly on the machine.

The only one brand which had the wildest range of catalog cover styles of any Japanese audio brand. Police motorcycles, desert trucks, jumping teenagers, a guy chilling with a vinyl record — all within two years. And somehow almost every one of them just worked.

It's 1983. You walk into a Japanese electronics store with cash for one portable cassette player. In the left corner - Sony's Walkman WM-20, cassette-case thin, engineering perfection. In the right - AIWA's CassetteBoy HS-P5, the world's smallest active-size player, comes in 10 colors.

Both cost about the same. Both sound great. But you can only pick one.

Vote: Sony or AIWA?

Flipping through Japanese hi-fi catalogs from the 70s and 80s, you start noticing patterns. Sony put models in swimsuits. Aiwa went full glam. Pioneer had wholesome couples. And then there's TEAC — decade after decade, not a single girl on the cover. Just the machines. Metal, knobs, VU meters. Every single time.

Four catalogs spanning 1972 to 1985. Open-reel decks, cassette decks, the works. The design language barely changed — because why would you mess with it?

Or did I miss some and you can share some TEAC girls with me? 🤔

40 years ago these days, yep!

Who's the best one? Vote!

1 - Lo-D

2 - Sharp

3 - Technics

4 - Sanyo

Hey everyone!

I'm u/No-Sleep1981, a founding moderator of r/ShowaAudio. This is a community for anyone interested in Japanese audio equipment from the Showa era - 1970s through 1990s.

What belongs here:

- Original catalog scans and cover art from Japanese audio brands;

- Vintage ads, brochures, and promotional materials;

- Equipment photos, collections, setups;

- Questions about specific models, brands, or eras;

- Comparisons, discussions, discoveries.

Brands we cover: Pioneer, Sony, Denon, Technics, Nakamichi, AIWA, Lo-D\Hitachi, Trio\Kenwood, Yamaha, TEAC, Sansui, AKAI (just a little, looking for more), Sharp, Sanyo, Toshiba and others.

Most (okay, some) of this material comes from physical catalogs that were never digitized before, I did these scans myself.

If you have your own scans, photos, or knowledge to share - post away.