I have not been able to record LP's. The instructions mention hooking up the cables to the receiver outputs down to the TDK deck. Which outputs? Tape, Aux,? I tried splitting off of my phono outputs with no luck.

You need a pre amp in between the turntable and the recorder. The turntable does not have sufficient output to go directly into a recorder.

Play or out goes to any in.

cassette decks have line OUTPUTS. If it records there may be line inputs. Connect the OUTPUTS to the appropriate INPUTs on ur amp. Select the correct input on the amp. If it doesn't work u will need to verify the amp inputs work and that the tape outputs r active.
If so chg the cables.

The equalizer I have seen have Line in, line out, tape in, tape out and that is how you utilize a unit like this. The line IN goes to the receivers tape record out. The line out goes to the receivers Tape play in or monitor, The tape deck hooks to the equalizer. The record or input of the tape deck hooks to the EQ record out, the Tape decks output hooks to the EQ's Tape in connectors. All these are stereo so there are left and right sides which you need to keep consistent. Red on a cable means Right, the white or black on cables mean Left or the top RCA connector on most equipment.
When playing back a tape the tape monitor is turned on with the receiver and left on. The way you record on tape from any source of the receiver is to select that source and it should go to the equalizer. Then the deck should record that source. To play a tape of the deck hooked to the equalizer then just press the tape monitor button on the EQ otherwise the Equalizer will just act as a loop and equalize any signal source that is coming from the receiver and the tape monitor on the receiver should stay on most of the time. Some equalizers have two tape inputs so you would hook another deck to that input and the owners manual of the equalizer should say how to select buttons to transfer tape signals from one to the other. If you master the concept of inputs and output of audio equipment then this hookup becomes another easy thing to do.

your receiver has (or should have) input and output connections,, your turntable needs to be hooked to the receiver,, then with the output cables that feed your cassette player you need to go, in to out and out to in ( receiver output to the input of the tape player, and out of the tape player to the in on the receiver, while playing a record if you hit record on the tape player it will record the record, depending on the receiver it will show you the meter readings for either the in or out,, they vary

Hi wpless43!
The TDK-3826 supports analog input/output, digital coaxail input/output, and digital optical input/output. To connect a PA system, you'll have to determine what type of connection it uses. If your PA system uses an analog connection, it will have two audio cables, one for the left sound channel and one for the right channel. These are color coded and can be connected to analog connections on the back of recorder. Coaxail and optical connections are both single cable connections, and can be connected to their respective locations on the back of the recorder.

Regardless of the connection used, you'll want to connect one of the outputs of the PA system to the recorder if you want record. If you want to use the recorder to play back audio over the PA, you'll want to connect the output of the recorder to the input of your PA. Most PAs support multiple outputs and inputs, so you should be able to connect the recorder input and output at the same time.

You'll want to use CD-R/RW discs to record, but make sure they are audio discs (See image).
You can find a copy of the manual for the TDK-3826 at http://audio.manualsonline.com/mdownloads/bd4c0d62-6f82-4bfb-bf83-8d832f3fe222.pdf. Hope that helps!

It could be that the amp's overload protection circuit is being triggered by a feedback loop or other problem, such as a shorted or bad cable connection. Turn off the power and unplug the receiver. Look for problems, starting with shorted speaker wires or cables. Then make sure the receiver's not still hot (wait 5-10 minutes to let it cool), and remove obstructions or anything blocking the top vents. Plug it back in and power up again. Immediately change the Source selector to something unconnected, and turn the Volume DOWN just in case there's a feedback loop (hum/squeal/noise that can overload things and cause the protection circuit to trip again). If you can see the display, go to a low level (around -50dB should be fine) before the delayed speaker amp output clicks on. Then carefully switch back to the problem source -- if that's the problem, switch off again immediately and re-check all of the cable connections at both ends, the receiver and the source component.
Make sure you don't have a feedback loop due to a recording device feeding back a signal. All VCRs and CD/DVD-recorders should be hooked up to the VCR, DVR or TAPE/CD-R "IN/OUT" jacks with IN being connected to the cables marked OUT on the deck and vice versa. (That confuses even us experienced guys sometimes!)
Also, no MONITOR video or audio outputs should be connected to the recording decks, nor should the TV outputs be fed back to the recorders. The same goes for the digital IN/OUT jacks for CD recorders; use only the same number IN as OUT for each component (For example, Optical IN/OUT #4 and #5 are the two digital IN/OUT pairs on the Denon AVR-380X series.)

This comes to mind:
Did you perhaps connect the rca jacks to the record in instead of the play out?
Maybe the rca cable is not plugged in at all on either the receiver end or tape deck end.
Have you tried using a different rca cable?
Did you select the right input on the receiver?
You may try using a different input on the receiver.

I know these sound obvious, but they may fix the problem.

the line out of a tape deck is about 1 volt peak, the output of a turntable is about 3-5mV on average.
Not sure what issue you are having but the turntable cannot be directly plugged into the cassette deck for recording LP to cassette. it would have to go through the receiver.

You need to use an audio CDr, data or computer CDr's will not work in this machine. I don't know this specific machine, but usually you select the input, then 'rec type' eg manual,1 track or 1 disc,then press record to get into record pause,start your source,then press play on the unit to start recording. To finalize, you press finalize then either the play or rec button to start the finalize process.