The March issue of The Absolute Sound includes the US audio magazine latest round of Editors’ Choice Awards. Last year the Awards featured 7 tape decks – and this year’s list of 8 features the same line-up, but with the addition of the Metaxas Papillon at the top end of the price range.
As ever, the reviewer is R2R devotee Jonathan Valin. Most of the entries look to have been directly replicated from last-year’s – but in case you missed those, I’ve summarized them again here – ordered by price (low to high).
J-Corder Technics 1500
$7,495
A “completely rebuilt, highly reliable prosumer deck” that comes with “a wide range of options that make customization a breeze.” You’ll need to add external electronics (EQ) to play pre-recorded CCIR-compatible tapes. The article says there’s a fuller review forthcoming (but it also said that last year!). https://j-corder.com
Analog Audio Design TP-1000 playback-only deck
$27,000
Valin reviewed this deck in issue 350 (Jul/Aug 2024). If you missed it, I posted a summary here. Valin restates his comment from last year’s Awards that this is “the best sounding quasi-affordable tape player [he has] ever heard, challenging the sonics of the Big Boys in every regard and exceeding them in the bass.” I guess much depends on your definition of ‘affordable’. www.analogaudiodesign.com
Sonorus Audio ATR10 MkII
$35,000
A modern “virtual plug-and-play” deck that’s based on the Revox PR99 chassis and uses the same mechanical parts as the Studer/Revox pro machines, but with entirely new electronics. It’s “a virtual plug-and-play device” that’s tube/valve amplified and is “warm and beautiful sounding”, says Valin. Like last year, the listing is based on the original version of the deck and not the latest MkII edition, which is again noted as ‘yet to be reviewed’. https://sonorusaudio.com
United Home Audio Ultima 5
$35,000
Valin’s review, which reads pretty much as per last year, enthuses that “the Ultima 5 OPS-DC simply beats [Greg Beron’s] previous wunderkind [the Ultima 4] out in every possible way, approaching (though not quite equalizing) the glories of his SuperDeck (from which it borrows some of its technology).” Which is saying something, since Valin previously reviewed the Ultima 4 as being “one of the highest-fidelity source components he had heard”. To boot, he previously gave the Ultima 5 both a Golden Ear Award and a Product of the Year Award in 2023. https://unitedhomeaudio.com/the-new-uha-ultima5-tape-deck
Metaxas & Sins Tourbillon T-RX
$51,000
This deck – a new (as in not refurbed) component that’s an updated version of the Stellavox SM8 – won The Absolute Sound’s Product of the Year Award in 2022 and Valin describes it as “the most compact, coolest-looking, best-sounding portable tape deck [I have] heard” – “the very model of highest fidelity” and the literal definition of “the absolute sound”. If you haven’t already, you can read his earlier full review at www.theabsolutesound.com/articles/kostas-metaxas-t-rx-tape-deck. www.metaxas.com
United Home Audio Ultima Apollo
$55,000
The second of three Greg Beron decks to be awarded, UHA’s Ultima Apollo brings “a plethora of technical improvements and an all-new high-quality EQ system.” As result, it sounds “better than any Ultima deck I’ve heard”, writes Valin – to the degree that it comes “very, very close” to the sonics of the SuperDeck – for about half the price. https://unitedhomeaudio.com/the-uha-ultima-apollo-tape-deck/
United Home Audio SuperDeck
$89,998
UHA’s Tascam-based SuperDeck is “the best effort yet” from Beron, says Valin, and “one of the two most lifelike source components [he] has yet heard in his home.” (The other being DS Audio’s Grand Master EX optical cartridge which “has pushed vinyl playback considerably closer to the sound of tape”). It won’t be for everyone’s budget “but if you have the dough… it will be tough to find a better full-sized tape player.” https://unitedhomeaudio.com/the-new-uha-superdeck-and-superrecorddeck
Metaxas Papillon
$94,000 +
“It’s big, it’s complex and it’s expensive,” says Valin. But it’s also the best tape deck Valin has heard in his home – “the truest to the mastertape and the intentions of the engineers, producers and artists who created it.” I guess that supersedes the ‘best’ reference for the SuperDeck above then (TAS must have missed editing that)? Valin recently gave the Papillon a Product of the Year Award 2026, enthusing “it is one of those components that doesn’t just change the game, it changes the playing field.” Unless my fortunes change and I win the lotto, I’ll have to wait for a nearby hi-fi show to have any chance of hearing one. Fingers crossed! www.metaxas.com
The full list of all Award winners across all audio categories is in the March 2026 issue of The Absolute Sound. They’re not published online yet, but they usually get added to the website in a various blog articles from around April.
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