Realistic 42-2108 Analog Stereo Reverb System (Actually Delay) Effect Unit 1980s - Walnut

Here’s a quirky piece of gear from a bygone era; A little Radio Shack delay box!

This “Stereo Reverb System” is really more of a bucket-brigade delay than a reverb unit. It was originally intended for people to add delay to their stereo systems for some reason? But really the thing to do with it is plug an electric guitar into the mic input and run out into something to get a trashy boost and lo-fi delay sound!

It features one 1/4 microphone level input and RCA jacks on the back, so I’m including two Hosa female 1/4 to RCA male adapters for plugging in instruments, amps, etc.

“Delay” knob controls delay time, it’s a pretty small range of slapback delay that it offers up to around 100ms of delay time. “Depth” is the mix of the wet signal. “Mic Mixing” is the level for the microphone input, with a guitar or other instrument it starts out distorted a bit at the minimum and only gets more distorted as you turn it up! The delay feedback is preset to about 8-10 repeats, and can be doubled with the “Reverb Expand” button. As expected with old analog delays, you will get some noise as you turn up any of the knobs. I cleaned the pots and jacks when I rediscovered this before listing it, so there’s no loud scratchy noises or dead spots, though there can be some small static-y noises when turning the knobs, probably from its cheap build quality back in the day.

Not really sure what the ”Tape Mon” button and jacks are for. The “Tape Out“ jacks can be switched on with the “Reverb Record” button, those outputs won’t work otherwise.