30 year old tape deck, and my rediscovered old chrome and metal tapes.

Admetos

Admetos

Admetos

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Many many years ago long before we had cd writers and mp3, I use to record CD's onto chrome or metal tapes, I would have been about 13 year old. I had quite a good separates tape deck with good heads, and also a good Pioneer CD player. I remember the retail was over £200 each separate that was a lot of money for the time. Anyway I would spend quite some time recording to tape and getting the dubbing levels correct to maximise the dynamic range of the tape.

Fast forward to today, I have a good separates system (pioneer amp with DAC in) almost £1000 retail of Yamaha speakers, it's not studio but it's high-end compared to most regular home hi-fi. I have a HTPC connected via the DAC etc.

So I find some of my old chrome and metal tapes that were recorded many years ago. As it happens I still own the same separate tape deck I used to record on them. So I connect the tape deck, and play some of these metal tapes.

The two albums I'm listening are Chris Rea Road to Hell, and Dira Straights On The Night. Anyway I'm blown away from the sound, there is a slight bit of noise on quiet sections of tape if you listen with volume loud, but otherwise sound quality is outstanding, would say sound quality is better then whats compressed on youtube. It's so good I would like to produce a youtube back to back video switching sources between these tapes and the original CD.

Anyway the whole point of this thread.... 1) Tape was far more capable than most realised, 2) despite the age, there is no degrading on the tapes, they sound like fresh recordings.

I'm not suggesting tape is superior to lossless digital, but providing the equipment was good and you took care in the recording it was far better than the average person ever realised.
 
There was something special about tape recordings. Even on decks with 2x it took effort.

Making mix tapes for your lass...ahh good times! Now it's, "look at dis on youtube innit bbz"

I had a top end Walkman that cost something like 160 quid, went around the world with me and had me in tears when it finally stopped working. I used Metal tapes too. :(
 
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I've always liked tapes, still got an old Yamaha tapedeck in the attic, doubt I'll ever get rid of it. I've still got some unopened tapes somewhere too.

Brings back memories of sitting listening to the charts on a Sunday night with my finger on the record trigger, waiting for a song I wanted. That and the pesky DJs insisting on talking over the end of songs and then frantically rewinding to get rid of as much of the talking as possible before the next song started.

Good stuff :)
 
There are many benefits to tape but given your gear and knowledge you'll realise that tape introduces tremendous limitations.

Don't get me started on compression and CDs though :mad:
 
I remember recording over cassette tapes when I was kid when I didn't have any spare, It'll be a good song and and have the label on it, later on I come to find one and I think yeah I'll stick that on! only to realise it's a recording of a radio station or something else.

You used to have to stick tissue in the holes of the top of the cassette or cover it with selotape to allow you to record on it lol.

I remember ****ing a few people off doing it too.
 
Tapes I remember very well. ;)

I hacked a bush twin tape deck with potentiometers to adjust speed and used to mix Stu Allen recordings from key 103. :D

Nail varnish was a blessing for snapped tapes.

I still have a box full in the loft of Key 103 house mixes from the late 80s to early 90s. :p

Tapes had background noise but they also had a good boom sound in bass.
 
I remember some arse hats I knew would borrow tapes, unscrew the little screws and take out the original tape. They'd then make a copy and put that back in the original cassette.
 
JasonM said:
Anyway the whole point of this thread.... 1) Tape was far more capable than most realised, 2) despite the age, there is no degrading on the tapes, they sound like fresh recordings.
Click to expand...

well yeah high quality tapes on decent kit weren't quite as bad as people would think when remembering 'tapes' in general

but there is probably a fair bit of nostalgia and subjectivity thrown in here too - CDs, as a format, completely wipe the floor with tapes, even high quality ones. In fact even a lossy digital format (mp3) would be objectively much better - yet there are no doubt some audio loons out there who'd stick their noses up at lossy formats like mp3s but perhaps claim some subjective 'warmth' from whatever distortion/artifacts get added (thanks to Dolby B etc..) to their even more lossy analog tape.

for some reason there is a thing at the moment for artists to release stuff on cassette tapes, some hipsters seem to have gotten into them again for whatever reason
 
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^Yep, an artist I like has just released their latest album on vinyl and cassette but not on CD. It's also available as a digital download but only from itunes/amazon mp3 so no lossless copy. Damn hipsters... :mad::p
 
dowie said:
for some reason there is a thing at the moment for artists to release stuff on cassette tapes, some hipsters seem to have gotten into them again for whatever reason
Click to expand...

Hipsters will be releasing stuff on Edison wax cylinders next.
 
well they've got portable record players at least...

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I diched all of our cassettes and hifi player a long time ago. Still got a box of reel tapes in the attic and there is a AKAI reel recorder somewhere in the house. One day I will let go of it.
 
dowie said:
well they've got portable record players at least...

fK0nLzh.png
Click to expand...

Please tell me that isn't a thing... I say riding my push scooter down the road, iced chai latte in one hand, iPhone 6 in the other (impressive on a scooter tbf) with the wind flapping my man bun
 
dowie said:
well yeah high quality tapes on decent kit weren't quite as bad as people would think when remembering 'tapes' in general

but there is probably a fair bit of nostalgia and subjectivity thrown in here too - CDs, as a format, completely wipe the floor with tapes, even high quality ones. In fact even a lossy digital format (mp3) would be objectively much better - yet there are no doubt some audio loons out there who'd stick their noses up at lossy formats like mp3s but perhaps claim some subjective 'warmth' from whatever distortion/artifacts get added (thanks to Dolby B etc..) to their even more lossy analog tape.

for some reason there is a thing at the moment for artists to release stuff on cassette tapes, some hipsters seem to have gotten into them again for whatever reason
Click to expand...

Ah, but the wow, flutter, and if it's battery powered, or the tape's been left in the warm too long distortion from the sound being played back that little bit slow (either due to stretching or low battery) is so much more authentic ;)

If people want the "authenticity" of tape I'm fairly sure they could get an app for their mobile to introduce a bit of hiss over the top of the mp3 or FLAC during playback.
 
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