Hi, it's vintage tear down time and you've seen this before. I did an unboxing of this on my uh EV blog 2 channel. so I'll link that in. Check it out if you want to see it.

I've had it for quite some time. Not only is this a vintage 1980s Boombox this is the Vintage 1980s Boombox When you think Boombox is in the 1980s, you think the big gaudy ones with the massive speakers and the Dual tape decks and the big Vu meters and you know everything else. But they're not the iconic ones. This, this bad boy is the iconic Boombox It's the Sharp GF 7600 and the reason this is Iconic is because this is the one that John Cusack held above his head famously in the Cameron Crow movie say Anything from 1989.

it's a personally it's a rather forgettable movie. but anyway, he iconically held this above his hand and as he was serenading his girl I forget her name um, and he was playing uh Peter Gabriel's in your eyes and this is like an iconic moment in movie history and it's so iconic you might have seen Ready Player one for example, the scene when they're invading the orb of Osavox or whatever it is and uh, he holds a Boombox above his head and it's an exact 3D replica of this the Sharp GF 7600. So if you ever see the meme of somebody holding a Boombox above their heads, eh, you know you're talking about the 1980s and B you know you're talking about the Sharp GF 7600. So we're going to tear this down in glorious 4K A resolution for those playing along at home.

In fact, there's nothing special about this. uh Boombox apart from the fact that it is absolutely iconic. it wasn't even a popular Boombox I Could guess they just figured oh, we get any Boombox But the thing is, this isn't actually not the boombox that is used on the movie poster for the movie. that's actually the Toshiba RT Rsx1.

and people think that that's the one he held up in the movie. but it's not. It's this is the actual one that he held up in the movie. So that's just a continuity thing.

You know a market in continuity thing. They shot the movie. they had this Boombox it was just a random boom box I Don't know if it was sharp product placement or whatever, but like I don't even think you could see the Sharp logo on the thing if you're in the movie. But so they just picked a random boom box and then for when they needed the promotional material later they just went oh Boombox and add Boombox him hold it.

So they shot additional promotional material later of him holding up. not the same one it was in the movies. he was holding up the RT sx1 in the promos but this is the one. This is the one and I've got it and it's in beautiful condition.

Uh for its age of course. Absolutely stunning. Look at this bad boy. it's got the battery compartment still in a reasonable Nick sponge is starting to go in there and you know it looks like we have had some battery corrosion issues there, but this actually still works.

We've got line in and line out Rcas. We've got our external microphone left and right and also our external speaker as well and a Beat cancel thing because you used to be able to do mix in things in boom boxes in the 1980s. So there it is. GF 7600z I Believe the Zed stood for the international Uh version.

So this is like the 240 volt International uh one. but it's made in Japan All the best stuffs made in Japan And as was common with boomboxes in the 80s, they were powered from D cells and this one uses eight of them. I Don't know how long it would have uh, lasted. What is the power consumption normally? 35 Watts You know you'd get your dodgy Nikad rechargeables back then.

So as I said, this is actually in rather fine condition. There's the handle on it. We've got uh tuning on the top. I Think it has changed color.

Somebody mentioned that they did have one of these in the 1980s and it's kind of yellowed a little bit. The colors on this video should be accurate. so I do color balance. Uh, my videos got a few scuff marks and stuff.

Anyway, it looks like it does actually have real tweeters inside I can see the uh diaphragm in there. but uh, because a lot of uh boom boxes in the 80s they had fake uh tweeters and that was just that was just a thing. or they just like Piezo I think this is probably just like Piezo transducer. Check it out.

They've got the Glorious frequency response here. It's got a Vu meter, a lead V u meter, another needle. rubbish. uh, mechanical tape counter and this one actually had um, shortwave radio.

so you know it. hands up. You've still listen to your short waves. um but yeah, that was you know that was a bonus back then and it supports uh Chrome and normal tapes and metal as well.

just different formulations of tapes a mono, FM and AM AM stereo wasn't around back then. of course that came. you know mid 90s was AMC area was it I can't remember. Anyway, we've got a volume control that'll be Itchy and Scratchy uh and we've got a balanced left and right if a little tiny indent there.

And yes, all the best. Boom boxes had a graphic equalizer, five channel not too shabby and this had an auto program search system where it would detect silence and try and find like the next uh track so you could like skip forward. Um so there you go. It pops out it didn't didn't you know? it's just the spring.

It doesn't have a soft ejector mechanism so you know? only the fancy pantsy ones had that. But we can see down in here that it actually is in really good neck. This thing's actually cleaned and it does work. Played a cassette on it on it.

It sounds just fine. Um, yeah. but yeah, those pots are a bit dodgy. but you know, like for the age of it, sounds terrific.

Anyway, you know, say you're on the EV blog. Don't turn it on. Take it apart with the comically long screwdriver. Let's go.

So looks like we've got a bunch of Phillips here. it'll be into plastic, metal, threaded insert, rubbish. look at that long as anyway. uh yeah, some of them wouldn't wouldn't fall out.

so gotta be careful here. plastic might be a bit brittle after all these decades. I Think it might be the top that actually lifts off so got the knobs off? Yeah no. I think I think this knob has to come off.

That's what she said. Here we go. Oh that looks in good. Nick I'm gonna have to disconnect the speakers I'll get back to you in a sec, but oh it looks good.

It looks pretty clean and here we go. Ta-da that is inside. Look at that ah thing of beauty. Joy Forever Classic 1980s construction we've got right off the bat here.

We've got the big Ass Uh Transformer over here. It's all on its own board. Very nice. We've got a discreet uh Diode Bridge here with uh caps there just to take off the Um Edge there.

Very nice and nice attention to detail. They've cable tied down this wire going off here. That's pretty neat it. Sharps upside down there so all the electrons are going to fall out.

but yeah, the Vu meter's got its own uh board there with its own wiring loom going off. None of that flat. Flex cable. rubbish in here.

There's the pulleys. there you go. Isn't that neat? That's actually a dual pot. there's one on the top and check it out.

It had not only course tuning, but that's the fine tune in in there so you could. You could really can't You can hardly see it, in fact, can't see it move at all, can you? It's really super duper fine, but that is a nice touch anyway. I Really like that. And then of course the classic staple, the ferrite.

Rod There you go. That's for the Am antenna there. Now that FM rubbish. That's what you got your uh, your old telescopic rod on the back there for is your Fm.

So we've got our single-sided PCB there. Check it out. And of course you've got your classic Um wax down there so you can see the see the wax. That's uh, very common.

There you go that wax sealing. Not uncommon to hold down up the components for vibration, but also uh for filling in. Um, like just wound inductors even though we have a nice inductor there on a former so it's not going to move. But it was very common to have like just like Loosely wound inductors just you know, standing off.

uh, the board like that so you know they don't really need the wax in this one. Got a carbon trimmer in there I've got a few uh trimmers in the back there, but uh, that's all very common. There's our tuning cap of course, so that's what all of the pulley mechanism is over here and it goes all the way over here. Then it goes to a gigantic knob on the bottom.

Oh whoa. Gigantic wheel on the bottom. Wow. look at that double-sided load.

Oh beautiful. Look at that selfish. MILF MILF We have mouth. you know, I'm a MILF Fanboy and all the milk resistors look at that.

But anyway, we have the Giant Wheel in there. Oh so I can I can adjust that? There you go. so that goes into the trimmer on the other side. Beautiful.

Ah, brings a tear to the eye, doesn't it? But uh yeah. Reflow soldered uh board on the bottom with MILF resistors. Fantastic mouth resistors. were you know, the Ducks guts in the 80s like everyone was using them? So this actually has quite significant attention to detail.

I'm actually really liking this and look like even this, uh, this is the speaker interface boards and this is the cable that goes off to the speaker. They've like put in this interface board here just to like. Here's the wires, right? They come up to it and they've got I don't know is that oh, they're tape those together that's fallen off and it's been pinched there anyway. So they had that coming over there just so that they could have a really nice production interface.

So when you assembled this thing, you know you didn't have to have this long gangly wire that could actually get, uh, pinched. It went over here. um, even though you know I don't know how that actually got pinched. but anyway, it did.

um and yeah, it's to prevent the wires being pinched when you assemble this thing just to make it easier. so you know they went to all that effort there. And then we've got the volume pot and the mixer. uh pot.

That's all on the front panel like this. so all the analog is, uh, running over this cable Loom Here, you know it's uh, good enough for Australia good enough for Japan Good enough for the 1980s. And there's our tape transport mechanism and that looks very clean. I Mean this whole thing is incredibly clean.

There's a little bit of dust in there, but geez, you can't complain at all. The heads are great, the capstone's fine, the belts look okay, and as I said, this thing actually, uh, plays all the Springs look good. Um yeah, this looks like in very good Nick. It doesn't really need a a service at all.

Really? All right, let's turn this bad boy on. Here you go Vu meter but we have a cassette Smash Hits 1987 even though this is before the movie um this is all I can find melon Kim Shantoos is the party boys Samantha Fox mental is anything Kylie Minogue Europe the Angels Bananarama um The Bangles noise works and pseudo Echo and Angry Anderson Ah awesome. This is like Aussie yeah, some like Aussie related stuff. All right, let's whack our tape in and see if she plays.

Now the interesting thing about uh, these uh, cassette decks or you know, boom boxes back in the 80s. there were also yes, they were also called ghetto Blasters um Boombox ghetto Blaster and leave it in the comments down below which one was used in your own area they were ghetto Blasters here but I've sort of later in life I've come to call them boom boxes So but when I was a kid it was a ghetto Blaster here in Australia So anyway the interesting thing is is that of course you could turn it on but that was the radio so normally when it when it was turned off it'd be ready to go and it'd actually be on. Well it's no, it's off but when you pressed play Let's press play see if it works. There you go the heads went up and it starts playing even though it's actually in the off position because the off position is the tape position.

Get it. It's a really great design, so unfortunately we can't hear it because well, I'd probably get copyright struck anyway. All right. I Bodged it in I budged in one speaker Final Countdown Oh yeah, let's see if the auto tape search still works so we're in play.

Well yeah, It's the final countdown. That's enough. Copyright struck. Fader works.

Graphic Equalizer works. Yeah. face heavy, whoa bit scratchy bit Itchy and Scratchy Yeah, fine. Final Countdown So let's have a squeeze at the main.

PCB And here let me get that wire. Common stuff we see in here is like this multi-gang switch right along here. You can see that Armature coming up there, so when you do some of the functions, it physically pushes the lever over and a multi-way contact in there. Big custom.

Joby Oh, look at that diode up there. look at that. It's supposed to go across there, but it's got a it's got insulation on it and it's looped out like that. What the heck? Anyway, another common thing you saw uh in the 1980s single in line packages.

Highly, uh, underrated the old single in line. Uh, got a dip over here that's actually a sharp part and Ir2e01 of course Sharp manufactured a lot of their own. uh, parts of course. And of course This is a single sided board.

and uh, phenolic bass. Now that Fr4 rubbish. And you can see that they're silk screened on all of the tracers from the from the bottom side and that's just like that is really appreciated. like really nice touch.

anyway. um, it looks like we've got our power amp under there. um I don't know. I'm not going to take this apart any further, but yeah, we've got some caps.

I Don't know what brand got our microphone some more wax there to hold it down. Are there nichikons? Niche Cons for win, Then you've got the bottom of the PCB and oh, look at all those MILFs oh MILF MILF MILF and you can see how they're glued down there. So they glued them down of course before they put them through the wave soldering process. That's just ah thing of beauty.

Joy Forever brings a tear to the eye, but they should take counter going off there. It's got its own belt, so you know you get a bit of slippage in that your tape counter might not be that accurate. but you know, once again, good enough for the 1980s. and I Just love the custom uh plastic.

It's spacer here, really nice. but there you go. That's the Uh interface board for all the uh, graphic equalizer and the pots. Beautiful.

It's all you know. it's all Sharp branded. they love to Brand All this stuff. and there's the main board down in there that would be the graphic equalizer.

There you go. and uh, they're L463324s Are they just three two fours? Yeah, they could just be uh, three, two four op amps. But there you go. So I don't think there's another board lower than that, but that has you know there's a volume and graphic equalizer.

and pretty much, um, Bob's your uncle that uh, completes the teardown? I think so. Yeah, it's not much else to it. Yeah, but they were fond of. like all their separate Pcbs, they weren't afraid to do their own custom wiring looms and they're all grouped nicely and you know it is.

You know, it's rather nice. uh. design. For the 1980s.

a lot of manual work goes into actually, uh, manufacturing these, but they're a product of their time and well, you know it's like tear apart any Boombox from the 80s or even the 90s and it'll look. It'll look practically exactly like this. I Mean that's just yeah. they're all the same.

Who remembers Stereo simulcast back? When on your Telly you'd watch a concert and you would turn down the volume on your Telly and you'd tune in to the FM station and you'd actually get FM simulcast. So it actually gets stereo. Uh, TV And that was just oh my Beautiful. That was.

that was magical. Leave it in the comments and the speakers will take a look. Of course they're Sharp branded. 8 watts maximum.

None of that. Peak Music power output rubbish. Um, max 8 watts. So four Watts uh, three ohms, uh 112cm is 120 mil.

And yes, as was common back in the day, as I said a Piezo uh transducer for the high frequency stuff like that, so you know it's like there's better than nothing. Yeah, But like I said, there were a lot of fakies back in the 1980s. They would physically have the grill and everything. They'd even put like a fake metal in there to make it look like that.

You had a tweeter in there, but it was actually a full range jobby. Yeah. but the uh, the speakers are still in very good nick. so and it sounds terrific.

It sounds like a bought one really, so can't really complain. But yeah, lots of, uh, a real lot of molding. that's all you know. Single piece mold and everything.

although the you know separate things for the move-in uh, drawer of course. But yeah, apart from that, a lot of efforts gone into that bowl. Jeez, there's the markers there for those curious, Hopefully you can see those you want to know what, the type of plastics, whatever is used and the date code and whatever. So once all that's assembled in there, the production effort is just.

And you've assembled these speakers on the front. You just connect in the front speakers like that and other one down in here is a bit tricky, but they didn't. they really kept those cables short. There you go, it's on and then that would all just lower.

Gotta make sure you line up the the pots and the uh, the switches and stuff. Make sure they go through in the front. Give it a bit of a wiggle wiggle wiggle Yeah and yeah I think she's going to go in. Yeah, there you go.

Let's make sure the switch is a few yeah knobs take counter. Yeah yeah, it's good to go look at that. I think I Bought one. So there you have it.

The classic Boombox from the 1980s. Oh thing of beauty is a joy forever. So leave your thoughts and comments down below give it a big thumbs up if you liked the video and if you don't mind I'm gonna head back to the 1980s. Catch you next time.