Are Cassettes Making a Comeback??

[Victor]

Noticed this in the current edition of Stereophile....

http://www.popmatters.com/pm/feature/116282-reconsidering-the-revival-of-cassette-tape-culture/

Strangely enough, it's timing is perfect, as several weeks ago I suddenly realised that the shelf life of my large library of pre-recorded Classical tapes was rapidly approaching it's limit with many of them being at/over 30 years of age. If rumours were to be believed these tapes should be delaminating and completely overwhelmed by print-through!

So I set about the task of trying to obtain the CD equivalents (already itself an obsolete format - story of my life ) and currently have managed to acquire about 80% of them (90% of the important ones) despite the couplings being different. :music:

Haven't tested my Nakamichi for quite a while now but it was working the last time I checked (purchased 1976 ) and still has all the original mechanicals. Perhaps I need to dust it down

Victor.

 

[Satch]

Hey Victor,

Didn't see anything from Stereophile on that link. Lotta yak, yak about style.

The Nakamichi Dragon is supposed to be a really good cassette deck. Take your deck out of the closet, clean it, hook it up and play some of your tapes. What do you have to loose?

I've had a lot of fun rediscovering analog the last few years.

Satch

 

[tonepub]

cassettes aren't making a comeback, but they are cool nonetheless...

 

[amey01]

I tried to have a mini little cassette revival about five years ago when I found a Marantz cassette recorder during a council cleanup. It had too much wrong with it for me to get it working, so that was the end of that. I put it back out the front of my house and within an hour it was gone.

I wonder who is enjoying themselves with it?

 

[risabet]

Only among the deaf:ROFL:

 

[Victor]

Only among the deaf

There speaks a man who uses a Linn Sondek ! (Sorry Risabet - you walked into that one !) Seriously though, it's cruel to mock the afflicted
It is an interesting point however about the relative sound quality of cassette.
True the musicassettes had limited frequency response (curtailed at both top and bottom ends) & dynamic range, while the home recorded ones could boast 70db+ dynamic range and a frequency response of 20Hz - 20KHz.

A couple of weeks ago I decided to test one or two of the oldest tapes e.g. EMI's famous Sir John Barbirolli/Halle Orchestra Sibelius series from the 60s - again recorded to cassette in the mid 70s. Although I was playing them on my daughter's "ghetto blaster" I was surprised that print through was inaudible, well below noise level, impressive considering the tapes hadn't been moved or rewound for over 20 years. The real surprise was how musical the Barbirolli recording was. The music just flowed! It was easy to understand what the orchestra was doing, get a sense of the venue and the sense that a real musical event was occurring. Later in what was an unfair comparison, I dug out the full Barbirolli EMI CD collection of Sibelius and gave it a thrash on my main system to see if it could similarly "stir the soul". Inexplicably, I was mildly disappointed and found less pleasure in it !!! Something was missing. Perhaps it was because the low level atmosphere and minor detail which characterised that recording was somehow less evident with the CD? Perhaps the reduced dynamic range of the tape emphasized those elements? Who knows, but it was clear that tapes could still offer a surprising degree of musical reward against all the odds.....
Cheers............Victor.

 

[Victor]

Hey Victor,

Didn't see anything from Stereophile on that link. Lotta yak, yak about style.

The Nakamichi Dragon is supposed to be a really good cassette deck. Take your deck out of the closet, clean it, hook it up and play some of your tapes. What do you have to loose?

I've had a lot of fun rediscovering analog the last few years.

Satch

Hi Satch,
Yes it was headlined with a different link - "popmatters" was nested inside it. It is a lengthy read but nice to see the Author recognises the inherent superiority of vinyl

All the best...............Victor

 

[amey01]

There speaks a man who uses a Linn Sondek ! (Sorry Risabet - you walked into that one !) Seriously though, it's cruel to mock the afflicted
It is an interesting point however about the relative sound quality of cassette.
True the musicassettes had limited frequency response (curtailed at both top and bottom ends) & dynamic range, while the home recorded ones could boast 70db+ dynamic range and a frequency response of 20Hz - 20KHz.

A couple of weeks ago I decided to test one or two of the oldest tapes e.g. EMI's famous Sir John Barbirolli/Halle Orchestra Sibelius series from the 60s - again recorded to cassette in the mid 70s. Although I was playing them on my daughter's "ghetto blaster" I was surprised that print through was inaudible, well below noise level, impressive considering the tapes hadn't been moved or rewound for over 20 years. The real surprise was how musical the Barbirolli recording was. The music just flowed! It was easy to understand what the orchestra was doing, get a sense of the venue and the sense that a real musical event was occurring. Later in what was an unfair comparison, I dug out the full Barbirolli EMI CD collection of Sibelius and gave it a thrash on my main system to see if it could similarly "stir the soul". Inexplicably, I was mildly disappointed and found less pleasure in it !!! Something was missing. Perhaps it was because the low level atmosphere and minor detail which characterised that recording was somehow less evident with the CD? Perhaps the reduced dynamic range of the tape emphasized those elements? Who knows, but it was clear that tapes could still offer a surprising degree of musical reward against all the odds.....
Cheers............Victor.

Funny this. One of my most musically enjoyable experiences from a recording comes from an unlikely source too - an old 1960s portable record player. Pye brand or something. Yuk. It even looked awful. It belonged to my grandmother and I was helping her move house. At the end of a long day, I sat down to and started fiddling with it. The music that came out of those horrid little plastic speakers (from a plastic stylus no doubt) that afternoon was like magic!

Goes to show - we all have very advanced high-end systems - it's just that they are in our head, not in the form of equipment.

 

[timm]

oh boy.....

here is my history with cassette.... At about the age of 11 - I took all the pennies I saved and bought an ampex cassete deck which came with speakers w/the 1/4" jacks... added a realistic 10wpc amp and added 2 more speakers... this is all prior to dolby/dolby b / or dolby c.... Lots of tape hiss.

Moved on to a pioneer cassette deck with dolby b - and had options for chromium dioxide tape etc....

After that went to an Akai - which had dolby b/ dolby c/ w-metal tape capability as well.

They never sounded as good as my turntable... almost as good - but not quite... Always fighting the hiss and always fighting the high end the noise reduction systems eliminated.

In 1970 went into a store as a young lad - and asked about cassettes. The guy says 'Cassettes? Everybody knows 8 track is where everything is headed!' And that - is a true story.

 

[Tj Bassi]

Cassettes, along with 8-tracks, were disappointing formats. Both were designed to be brought to market cheaply, sort of mediocre music for the masses. Tape speeds were too slow, and track widths were much smaller than necessary for proper hi-fidelity magnetic recording, done on the cheapest grade of tape, usually the thinner of the acetates.

Even much of what was available on open reel could have been implemented better.

Tj

 

[risabet]

There speaks a man who uses a Linn Sondek ! (Sorry Risabet - you walked into that one !) Seriously though, it's cruel to mock the afflicted

The LP12 makes music, unlike many of the other tables about!

Home recorded cassettes can sound very good. When I was in high school our choir recorded some concerts direct to cassette and they did sound very good, at least at the time, but the cassette was designed to record spoken word and not high bandwidth signals, thus all the "fixes" like Dolby and DBX the pumping champ.

 

[RichTeer]

I agree that cassettes aren't making a comeback, but I still have my Sony Walkman Pro here somewhere. Metal tape capability and Dolby B & C noise reduction on a pocket-sized cassette deck--great stuff!

 

[Victor]

The LP12 makes music, unlike many of the other tables about!

Home recorded cassettes can sound very good. When I was in high school our choir recorded some concerts direct to cassette and they did sound very good, at least at the time, but the cassette was designed to record spoken word and not high bandwidth signals, thus all the "fixes" like Dolby and DBX the pumping champ.

Hi Risabet,
Please forgive the typical Brit humour
One would think that being near the home of the LP12 would make me more respectful! Having been an LP12 user and Flat-Earther for more than 25 yrs I know the sound of the LP12 well, with various arms - among them Syrinx Pu2 and Linn Ittok (over 20 yrs). It does have it's flaws (even in it's latest guise) hence my migration to another platform. I'd finally seen the light and managed to purge almost all Linn/Naim associations from my system (although the Ittok still remains).
I strongly agree with your sentiments concerning active filters such as Dolby/Dbx which is why I always avoided their use by applying Time Constants that minimise tape noise e.g. high energy cobalt doped ferrics, which provided approx 5 db improvement.
(Sadly musicassettes were seldom allowed this advantage...but a few were made without noise reduction)

Like the occasional surface noise on an LP...I never considered a little bit of tape hiss a nuisance - in fact I feel it's almost a vindication of LP when you can hear the original tape hiss from the Master tape coming off the vinyl !
Although I should add that a well set up LP12 - or any good turntable for that matter, barely registers scratches and noise at all provided the vinyl is in half-decent condition
Kind regards....................Victor.

 

[risabet]

Hi Risabet,
Please forgive the typical Brit humour

No offense taken, it's all good.

I've modded the s$%t out of my LP12 and though it maintains all of the strengths of the Linn sound, it minimizes the weaknesses to a great extent.

Back to cassettes. Some company, MFSL? maybe, made real time duplicated cassettes which were excellent, though they cost the proverbial arm and a leg.

 

[stuwee]

I got this Teac last year, and I love it. It makes exact copies of any Lp I record, as a bonus I swear it makes harsh CDs sound warmer and more analog. Here's the specs; http://www.vintagecassette.com/Teac/V-8000S

Most of my high dollar metal TDK tapes from the 80's still sound fantastic!

Sorry for the crappy pic, I use the Marantz as a preamp.

 

[amey01]

I got this Teac last year, and I love it. It makes exact copies of any Lp I record, as a bonus I swear it makes harsh CDs sound warmer and more analog. Here's the specs; http://www.vintagecassette.com/Teac/V-8000S

Most of my high dollar metal TDK tapes from the 80's still sound fantastic!

Sorry for the crappy pic, I use the Marantz as a preamp.

That's a bit nostalgic actually.

 

[JonFo]

Cassettes, vinyl, good god, what's next next? Tube amps?

:devil::devil::devil:

 

[amey01]

Cassettes, vinyl, good god, what's next next? Tube amps?

:devil::devil::devil:

Yep tube amps next Jon. And after that we'll talk old, crusty electrostatic speakers.

You know, those funny, ugly, oversized things that are so archaic they need 240v connection, constant cleaning and regular panel replacement. How could anyone use these things when you can buy a nice, neat box speaker with dynamic drivers and no maintenance?

 

[spectral]

Believe it or not I am still big on tape; sold a Nak 682ZX cassette player just a couple of years ago - sweet machine, everything worked down to the transport ambiance light. Still own a Technics AZ-7 with that fabulous Amorphous Z play head, and of course the big Revox B77 MkII.

 

[tonepub]

Well, if anyone would like a very clean, recently tuned up Nakamichi ZX-7, I've got one for sale, just PM me!