Without the box, I would have never known the model number, WM-0202B. It’s not on the device or the User Manual. The box is rather informative, adding manufacturer information on the back.
The box opens from the end and so it was a task pulling out the tightly foam enclosed device from the box, but I coaxed it out.
Included are the Cassette/Radio, warranty card, User Manual, earbuds, USB cable and stereo audio cable with 3.5mm phone plugs on each end. The USB cable is unusual because one end is terminated with a USB-A plug and the other is a round, cylindrical plug that fits in the jack labeled “DC 5V.” That cable is important to hang onto since the batteries cannot be removed for external charging.
One surprise is that there was no MicroSD socket on the device, although there is a USB-A jack suitable for a flash drive. In addition there is an earphone jack, a telescopic antenna about 38 cm long, a small digital display and some controls.
But let’s skip over the BS and get to the real question:
Is It Stereo?
This is what it displayed when I plugged in the USB flash drive, actually indicating no USB flash drive. When I plugged it in a little more firmly, it began playing my Right/Left audio file, which through headphones proved to be stereo!
The purpose of buying the device was to digitize stereo cassette tapes. Unfortunately I don’t have a cassette version of my Right/Left audio file. Even though I have cassette tapes labeled “Stereo,” that is no absolute assurance that they are stereo. If I detect stereo, the question is answered, but if I don’t the question might still be open.
The cassette selected for the first test is a Windham Hill release, titled A Winter’s Solstice, catalog number WT-1045 dated 1985. It’s labeled stereo on the liner, but not the cassette. Phase 1 is just listening through monitor headphones (Audio Technica ATH-M50), noting that my hearing isn’t equal between my two ears. The first selection on the cassette was a guitar solo where one might not expect much channel separation. It sounded OK, but I couldn’t say it was stereo.
I tried a different tape, something less intimate. Midnight in Moscow, Musikfest, 413257-4, a large choral recording. Maybe stereo? The way to be sure there are separate channels is to record it to the USB drive and then examine the waveforms.
In Phase 2 I imported the MP3 file created by the WM-0202B into the Audacity software where I can actually look at the waveforms. When I tried this before on another converter that was not stereo, the waveforms were absolutely the same.
It looks like this one isn’t stereo either.
The tape head is divided into an upper and lower section, but I think that it to handle the auto reverse.
How about FM? No, FM is not stereo. That’s not a surprise after my SM-126 multimedia player with stereo everything else didn’t have FM stereo.
Mysteries
So what’s the audio cable for? There is no AUX jack, only one labeled with a headphone symbol. My best guess would be to play a cassette connected to some other audio device, perhaps even as input to some audio processing software on the computer.
And what is PHON? When pressed, the Mode button cycles through what the manual calls:
- CASS (Cassette Mode)
- PHON (Recording Mode)
- rAd (FM radio Mode
- —- (USB Mode)
There is a separate REC button for recording. The manual explains how to use the PHON mode:
- Switch to Recording mode and insert the U disk into the USB port
- Long press the Rec button to start recording and long press to stop recording.
- After the recording is completed, the recording file will be stored in the form of an MP3 fil on the U disk. (The player supports play the recording file, please switch the mode of the player to the USB mode.)
The diagram doesn’t show anything plugged into the radio. The product description doesn’t mention an internal microphone.
The answer is that there is an internal microphone hidden somewhere, since it picked up my speech and recorded it, albeit into the CASS folder, and not one named PHON. It does not record a signal from the earphone jack, nor from the FM radio.