TDK gets new lease on life

Among the casualties of digitization—where practically any type of analog files had been rendered into digital format—were the cassette tapes.

The popular medium, which consumers used to store music back then, went the sure path to extinction.

But the cassette tape brand TDK, from the Japanese company that invented the material used for compact magnetic tapes in the 1950s, recently got a new lease on life, producing speakers, headsets and earphones.

TDK, which is now owned by storage company Imation, officially debuts in the country through the Boombox, a top-of-the-line audio equipment designed like the iconic music player of the 1980s. In those years, hip-hop enthusiasts would carry the player on their shoulders while swaying to the beat of the music.

The new Boombox speakers belong to TDK’s premium TDK Life on Record audio equipment, which aims to bring together the “authentic experience and warmth of listening to music on vinyl with the precision and flexibility of digital technology,” said Kathrina Llamas, country manager for Imation.

At a hefty 26 pounds, the Three Speaker Boombox is a 2.1 speaker system that features left and right chambers, boasting of six-inch coaxial drivers with woven fiberglass cone and edge-driven textile dome tweeters. To amp up the sound pleasure, the Boombox also has a 15-watt sealed subwoofer in between.

The device features a 2.6-inch full color LCD display with capacitive touch keys for input selection and equalizer adjustment. The display allows consumers to customize their listening experience through bass and treble controls. They can even control playback of music from a USB drive or hard drive, or mix audio sources using the instrument input.

Apart from being a dock system for MP3 players such as iPod, the Boombox also functions as a digital amplifier for analog devices like electric powered acoustic guitar or practically any music instrument with an RCA jack.

Priced at a little over P30,000, the Boombox speaks volumes in terms of premium quality—the padded handle is made of aluminum, the front face is acrylic, while the controls are made of anodized champagne aluminum.

“The TDK Life on Record audio products are big in order to produce big sound,” Llamas said.

The Boombox is also designed to be portable, as it can be powered by 12 D cells batteries, providing six hours of listening pleasure.

TDK also previewed its other products, which included headsets that feature big drivers (40 mm to 50 mm) and the Clep-P Series in-ear tangle-free stereo headphones with megabass tuning. Headsets range from P5,000 up, while in-ear earphones range from P300 to P2,700.—Raquel P. Gomez