Posted by Wayne Parham [ 64.216.179.54 ] on December 03, 2004 at 13:37:03:
In Reply to: Cassette ramblings... posted by hurdy_gurdyman on December 03, 2004 at 09:56:50:
Hi Dave,
Man, that's great that you're finding such good prices!
I still like tape too. I've been a long time user of Hi-Fi cassette. Some might consider cassette Mid-Fi, especially since most cassette equipment was. But there were some very high end tape decks made in the seventies and eighties. Your Tascams were a great example.
I stayed with cassette because I used them in cars. Back in the eighties, I ran Concorde cassette decks in my cars, which sound better than most CD players I've heard. These things were statement products. So I wanted to make good quality tapes for them, and found an Onkyo deck that had a bias adjustment. Not just the switch for tape type, but a variable knob for fine adjustment. I found that certain tapes worked best at certain settings, and without an adjustment, you really couldn't get the best sound from any given tape. That bias adsjustment knob has been a mandatory option on all tape decks I've purchased ever since.
Now days I still maintain tape for the same reason. My Cutlass uses a cassette deck, and I wanted to keep the stock dash trim which precludes my upgrading to a CD unit. Later models mount a CD player, and it's really a simple matter of using trim that had a larger cutout. But I wanted to stay stock, so I have a cassette deck in the car. Most thieves aren't old enough to remember cassette, so it thwarts them too.
Naturally, with a cassette deck in my car, I needed a good home deck to record with. So a few years back, I went on a search for a good unit. Most of the new units are of the old mid-fi variety anymore; I guess the thinking is that most people aren't using them. That's made availability of high quality decks even scarcer than it was two decades ago. But I did find the Sony KA1ESA. It's a great sounding high-quality deck and it has the requisite bias adjustment knob.
I guess if I had thought about it, I could have searched for a good cassette deck on eBay. What stopped me from trying was that I purchased a used Tascam cassette deck, thinking it was the old studio deck like you're undoubtedly talking about. I really like the pro decks made for doing four track recording. Great sounding decks, durable and nice sounding.
But what I mistakenly bought was the Taskam 202 MKII, thinking it would be more like the "real" pro units. It's not. The 202 is Tascam in name only, and is like a $59.95 discount store special. Terrible. So I didn't try the used deal again, and instead decided to search for a good new deck. If I hadn't been successful, I would have most certainly gone back to Tascam and purchased a good professional deck.
Anyway, I'm with you on this Dan. The sound quality of a good high-quality tape formula in a good tape deck is surprising. At 1.875ips, it's pushing the edge of magnetic media technologies, but it's convenient and good sounding.
Wayne
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