Useless DA-20MkII?

[al_dave]

I attempted to trade in my TASCAM DA-20MkII DAT machine for a 688 MIDIStudio today only to find out that my DA-20 didn't work. I bought the DAT back in December of 1997 with the intention of using it to mixdown and archive. After I bought the machine, a change of residence and the acquisition of a computer rendered the DA-20 of no use to me. I never plugged it in, never used it. My question is: Could the long time in storage have adversely affected the unit? It was always kept in a temperature-controlled environment except for about 4 months of storage resulting from a move back to the states from overseas. Other studio electronics have functioned well, in particular my TASCAM 488MkII and rack gear. For anyone having had a similar experience, I'd appreciate your advice. I really need to unload this thing but it looks like I'll have to have it repaired before I can get rid of it. Thanks in advance.

 

[bvaleria]

Hmmm...

I hadn't powered up my DA-40 in quite a few months, until I read this thread. The Masterlink kinda made it less necessary!

Anyways - no problems at all with it - works great. There's no inherent reason for the unit not to work after a long squat, but if it was always plugged into an electrical socket (especially without any sort of power conditioner), there is always the possibility that a power surge or even a brown-out fried a critical component.

Good luck with it....
Bruce Valeriani
Blue Bear Sound

[Edited by bvaleria on 01-27-2001 at 04:57]

 

[Tim Brown]

I attempted to trade in my TASCAM DA-20MkII DAT machine for a 688 MIDIStudio today only to find out that my DA-20 didn't work. I bought the DAT back in December of 1997 with the intention of using it to mixdown and archive. After I bought the machine, a change of residence and the acquisition of a computer rendered the DA-20 of no use to me. I never plugged it in, never used it. My question is: Could the long time in storage have adversely affected the unit? It was always kept in a temperature-controlled environment except for about 4 months of storage resulting from a move back to the states from overseas. Other studio electronics have functioned well, in particular my TASCAM 488MkII and rack gear. For anyone having had a similar experience, I'd appreciate your advice. I really need to unload this thing but it looks like I'll have to have it repaired before I can get rid of it. Thanks in advance.

Tascam had problems with those units from the Start.
I bought a DA-302 when it came out. It was $1,600.00....it didn't work right out of the Box!
I sent it back and they promptly replaced it with one that DID work.

there were some Chips that were faulty that had been installed, and this carried over to the other DAT lines.
A friend of mine bought the exact same model you have, and his was dead right out of the box as well.

Well, if you never used it-You can prove how many Hours are on the heads (tthey keep track), so it's a new machine basically.

If you don't need it, get it fixed, put it up for sale, and hold out until you get an offer that you find acceptable.

Tim

 

[al_dave]

Thanks, Tim. I should have at least turned the thing on when I got it. Paying to have it repaired will put me even further in the hole. I guess I'll be lucky just to recoup the repair costs since the blue book on a used DA-20MkII is less than $200. Again, thanks for the info.

 

[Tim Brown]

Thanks, Tim. I should have at least turned the thing on when I got it. Paying to have it repaired will put me even further in the hole. I guess I'll be lucky just to recoup the repair costs since the blue book on a used DA-20MkII is less than $200. Again, thanks for the info.

You said the magic term, "used", technically, yours isn't used! It has zero hours on it, so you should be able to get more out of it, than what Orion Blue Book list's as the value.

Tim