Well, the m3D thing was weird.
I was in LA in the late 90's for a couple of months and bought them the week they came out (just by luck, went to the store and they had them). They were originally only available for the US market (they didn't have the little power selector switch under the metal platter) as apparently mk2 sales were beginning to flatten out and some other companies like vestax had launched the PDX range.
So technics, worried about competition did a market test with the M3D's for the USA and they sold well. They did eventually release them in the UK but they were short lived as by the time they got around to making them, shipping them getting them in to distribution, Technics already had the mk4's on sale in Japan, and had already announced the Mk5's. They sold through the stock of M3D's which did well but didn't continue production, instead just continuing to make Mk2's and then Mk5g's. It was strange because by the time they had made them, the discontinued them and replaced them with another two models.
I really liked my M3D's but I had to use them with a step down transformer, which fucked with the voltage and they didn't keep time perfectly. Years later I flogged them to a guy who had a better power transformer and they apparently worked fine.
Got my Mk5G's 6 years ago and have never looked back.
I know some think they're cheesey but I would love a pair of these:
(1210 MK5G Gold GrandMaster Edition).
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