Magnavox D8443

The Magnavox D8443 is from the early 1980s. The service manual is dated 1983, so that's probably when it was introduced. It must have been a very strong selling boombox, because you can still find one on Ebay every single week. It looks great with the big 8" woofer in the middle.....but unfortunately it doesn't make much bass. The amp isn't very powerful. According to the service manual, it puts out 2x2 watts to the outer speakers, and 3.2 watts to the center woofer. So that's a total of only 7.2 watts. And if you open it up and look at the speakers, you'll see how cheap they look, with their small magnets. I have several boomboxes with only two speakers that put out more bass than this D8443 does.

It's identical to the Philips D8444, because Magnavox was acquired by Philips. And this means it has the same brittle plastic gear inside the tape deck that many Philips have, which is unfortunate because that gear often crumbles into pieces. It this happens to you, you will need to find someone who makes a replacement gear. 3D printed replacements are available at Shapeways. You can purchase them here: Magnavox D8443 replacement Gear

I can't get the Line inputs to work right. The signal strength is all distorted. I even tried using a phono attenuator, but it still didn't sound right. So in summary, this boombox is recommended for its good looks only.