Realistic Stereo Reverb System
Realistic 42-2108 Stereo Reverb
Tuesday, March 23, 2021
While scrounging in the closet, I came across this Radio Shack Realistic Stereo Reverb System. It’s kind of cool in a retro ‘80s way. It’s based on an analog bucket brigade chip, which is a bit like dynamic RAM, but the voltage stored in the capacitors of the delay line is analog instead of 1s and 0s. The stored signal is moved one capacitor farther down the delay line with each clock pulse, so the delay time varies with the clock frequency. Fast clock, short delay, slow clock, long delay.
It has a mic input for karaoke or recording to your Realistic cassette tape recorder with reverb. It would normally be hooked to your stereo receiver through the tape in & tape out jacks, so it has pass through jacks to hook the tape deck to.
The side panels are molded plastic with a wood grain print to complement the rest of your equipment. The brushed and anodized front panel is a good match for any Pioneer, Kenwood, or Realistic component in your glass- front stereo rack.
The delay or echo time ranges from a few milliseconds for a doubling or flanging effect, to 1/10 second, for a distinct echo. Twisting the delay knob while recording creates weird effects, because sound is clocked out of the delay line at a different rate than it went in, causing pitch to drop when
delay is increasing, and rise when delay is decreasing. These are also sought after as guitar effects. The mic input distorts and sustains with a guitar, and the delay adds its own goodness and body.
So whet does it sound like? You’ll recognize the sound from some of your favorite 1980s pop songs. I hooked it to my interface and recorded a quick DX7-ish synth tune.
It’s a surprise it still works, since it’s been in the closet for 25 years at least. I was going to use the box to house a new project, but the old gadget works, and has a different range of effects from the “in the box” range of reverbs on hand. So it escaped being cannibalized this time.
Besides, if I hadn’t put the new amplifier in a Spam can, what would I have called it?
