Things you bought for yourself as an adult that you couldn't get as a kid

[Henry]

My Denon DRS-610 cassette deck, which I've had since 1992, is still hooked up to the main stereo downstairs, although I haven't used it in several years. When I was in college, visitors to my apartment were confounded when they saw it because they wanted to know why there were "two CD players." The cassette loads in a horizontal drawer (see image below found on eBay via a Google search) and when the drawer was closed, they thought it looked like a CD player.

That certainly is weird! Also, what kind of cassette is that? It certainly doesn't look like anything I've ever seen before.

[1995hoo]

My Denon DRS-610 cassette deck, which I've had since 1992, is still hooked up to the main stereo downstairs, although I haven't used it in several years. When I was in college, visitors to my apartment were confounded when they saw it because they wanted to know why there were "two CD players." The cassette loads in a horizontal drawer (see image below found on eBay via a Google search) and when the drawer was closed, they thought it looked like a CD player.

That certainly is weird! Also, what kind of cassette is that? It certainly doesn't look like anything I've ever seen before.

I have no idea what sort of cassette it is because, as I noted, I found the picture online rather than going downstairs and taking a picture myself.

[Dirt Roads]

My Denon DRS-610 cassette deck, which I've had since 1992, is still hooked up to the main stereo downstairs, although I haven't used it in several years. When I was in college, visitors to my apartment were confounded when they saw it because they wanted to know why there were "two CD players." The cassette loads in a horizontal drawer (see image below found on eBay via a Google search) and when the drawer was closed, they thought it looked like a CD player.

That certainly is weird! Also, what kind of cassette is that? It certainly doesn't look like anything I've ever seen before.

I have no idea what sort of cassette it is because, as I noted, I found the picture online rather than going downstairs and taking a picture myself.

If it "real", it is a TEAC Cobalt 52X from the mid-1980s that was considered a throwback back then.  The reels came in several different colors.  Nowadays, the used ones are highly sought after, demanding as much as $500 a pop.  Buyer beware!  There are actually brand new reel-to-reel cassette tapes being sold today (cheap!) that look similar, including one sold under the Pioneer brand (not sure if it is licensed or a knock-off).  Might be worth buying the knock-off for about $10 each just to have something that looks old-fashioned in an empty tapedeck as a decoration.

[Road Hog]

Through the 1990s I had a Pioneer cassette deck that I was really proud of. The sound was close enough to CD-quality for non-discerning listeners, and I used Dolby C which cut the tape hiss to zero.

I used it several times in the process of DJ'ing parties (I catalogued all my songs by BPM and I got good at cueing it up) and it worked like a champ. Sadly, it eventually bit the dust and nobody could figure out how to fix it.