So, after taking a look at those links, first of all, they all utilize a standard 9VDC wall wart power supply or battery…just like any standard stompbox. And the circuits are NOTHING like your Porta 02 or MF-P01 machines, or the 244. Completely different circuits. I’m not sure how they correlate that the circuit designs create over-driven cassette portastudio preamp fuzz…I think its not a deliberate design, but something somebody did, and when they listened to the result somebody said, subjectively, it sounds like an overdriven cassette 4-track. But I’m not even sure how you could get any kind of substantial distortion on any of the above Tascam inputs unless you cranked the trim, and fed the input with a high level input like a +4dBu line level source, also boosted. My point is, with a source connected to the Tascam that is within the design parameters (like a passive electric guitar, for instance), you’re not going to achieve substantial distortion…not some kind of yummy fuzz. Maybe if you cranked every stage and had a mix of electronic clipping and some tape saturation you might get something interesting, but that involves all stages of the Tascam machine…input stages, record stages, playback and mix stages. So maybe the stompbox is trying to emulate that. I don’t know how that would sound. That’s not how I’ve ever used a Tascam 4-track cassette machine. The low headroom of the power supply of the stompbox and the fact the circuits are designed for boost is how the stompbox creates drive and distortion to the signal. You can’t get that just by taking the input preamp of either of your machines (and definitely not the 244 TAPE CUE circuit you mentioned). So your best option if you want to have something like that stompbox in your signal path is to buy one of the kits. That’s my opinion.
