What a shame–Dave found this defaced Helix for cheap, but will require great effort to restore. We’re guessing this was modified for some sort of theatrical production, as the lower cassette has been covered and painted. The Helix name is a well-known one for boomboxes, but we have yet to find the brand on anything except portable stereo.
Vintage Electronics Have Soul – The Pocket Calculator Show Website
This looks like the Helix HX-4633N, a dual-cassette-desk, dual-shortwave-band boombox. I was fortunate enough to get a “new old stock” unit (left over from the 1980s or the early 1990s in new, unopened-box condition) in a store in the northeastern U.S. several months before 9/11. The Helix replaced the slightly bigger and somewhat better-equipped Cougar J-8383-K, a unit refurbished in New York City. I remember having the Cougar for years before it suddenly “conked out,” just before we moved and maybe five months before I found the Helix (after a frustrating attempt to get the Cougar repaired). I don’t even know if the Helix works at all nowadays or if the cassette desks work relatively well instead of “eating” (tangling) audiocassette tape during playback. (Which is what I remember the boombox doing when last I tried playing a relatively obscure audiocassette with home-recorded, presumably FM-recorded music some years ago, an audiotape I was sure that we wouldn’t miss if SOMETHING went wrong.)
Did I actually post a message that misspelled the words “deck” and “decks” as the words “desk” and “desks”? Sure looks like I did! And it sure looks like I can’t edit that original post of mine. So it looks like any misspelled message stays up on this webpage of this website permanently. Yes, indeed: “SOMETHING” did go wrong. Ah, gotta get good rest when it’s time …