'84 Emerson TV/radio/cassette boom box

[radiotvnut]

My flea market friend gave me this '84 Emerson portable B&W TV/radio/cassette recorder combination. The radio works, the TV suffers from what these portable TV's suffered from after the DTV transition, and the cassette recorder sounds like it needs belts. I have the missing knob; but, it's broken and needs to be glued back together. Also, I need to clean up the case and remove the stickers. For a signal, I clipped an aligator clip lead between the center pin of the TV cable and the rod antenna. There is an external antenna jack; but, I don't have the necessary adapter to enable it to accept a coax connector. This unit also has RCA audio input jacks as well as external speaker and microphone input jacks.

My Sister had this exact same TV and, to my knowledge, it never gave her a minutes trouble. I don't know what happened to it; but, I'm sure she donated it to the local overpriced church thrift store that she was involved with during the mid '90's.

Come to think of it, I don't remember seeing too many TV's with a cassette recorder. The TV/radio models were common; but, I guess most people didn't feel the need to spend the extra money for a cassette recorder.

[matt_s78mn]

I had this exact same model back when I was a kid. Got it from a relative who didn't want it anymore. On mine the radio and cassette worked great but the TV suffered the fate of someone jamming the antenna down into the case and shattering the TV's circuit board.

[aidynphoenix]

is it possible to record the audio being played on the television on the cassette?

idk why anybody would ever need to do that.. but its a thought.

[radiotvnut]

I'm sure you can. And, when I was a kid, I did record the audio from a few shows. Of course, that was before we owned a VCR.

[bgadow]

Really takes me back to when these were new. I can picture these on the shelf at Ames or Woolworths, way more money than I ever managed to save up. But every time I was in one of those stores I had to check the electronics dept out.

For some reason I had never thought of the convenience of recording the audio with one of these combos. I would have used it quite a bit for that. I was always standing by with my cheapo Emerson cassette deck, ready to hold it up close to the speaker on our GE console. I still have a couple of those tapes.

[rpm1200]

That's a real neat critter. I have a newer version with a TV that won't start up and a tape deck that needs belts - it's much less attractive than yours, BPC style. I'd guess mine's late 80s.

[jbivy]

i saw a few of these "boom boxes' in the 90s that had the tv built in and dang, they were cool.

[Sandy G]

Oh, yeah...You were REALLY "Shittin' in High Cotton" if you were 14 or so & had one of these...