23rd Dec 2022, 10:55 pm | #181 | |||
Nonode
Join Date: Sep 2017
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Re: What's good about tape?
Quote:
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24th Dec 2022, 5:54 am | #182 |
Dekatron
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Re: What's good about tape?
I am pretty sure Tandy sold blank 8 track cartridges at one time. The format was a lot more popular in the States than over here of course.
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24th Dec 2022, 11:21 am | #183 | ||
Dekatron
Join Date: Apr 2019
Location: Worthing, West Sussex, UK.
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Re: What's good about tape?
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The default speed of 300 baud was dismally slow so I upgraded the tape interface to a Cottis/Blandford high speed interface (basically copying a construction article in Wireless World I think). Getting it to run reliably at 2,400 baud was tricky, found it ran best using my only Hi -Fi deck at the time a Aiwa 1250, on a good day could get it to run at its max speed of 4,800 baud. Many years ago I sold the Aiwa which I really regret now, it was only a budget deck, but I loved the styling and it gave really good results. David |
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25th Dec 2022, 12:03 am | #184 |
Octode
Join Date: May 2007
Location: Liss, Hampshire, UK.
Posts: 1,875
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Re: What's good about tape?
When I started as a Saturday assistant in a Radio and TV shop they had one BASF blank 8 track in stock. I don't think I ever saw anyone interested in buying it and somehow I ended up with it. I think I probably extracted the tape to use with my reel to reel recorder.
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25th Dec 2022, 1:59 am | #185 |
Dekatron
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Re: What's good about tape?
The KJ Enterprises catalogue for 1971 has a double-page spread of 8 track machines, but all are players only except for the Akai CR80 recorder (rrp = £152.02, but yours for only £103 50 cash). Blank cartridges (brand unspecified) were available. Quoting from the catalogue:
" Single 35 minutes playing time, Normal Quality £1.00 Professional quality £ 1.15. Double 70 minutes playing time Normal Quality £1.40 Professional Quality £1.65. " Something I hadn't noticed before is that the reel-to-reel tape recorder section has the Akai X 1800 SD, a combination 4 track, 3 speed, 7" spool, tape recorder and 8 track recorder, able to record and play back both media, as well as copying from one to the other. List price £199.42, yours for £174.90. Nor did I notice that it also describes, but does not illustrate, the Akai 2000SD, capable of recording and playback of all three systems ( R to R , compact cassette, 8 track), list price £300.00, KJ price £264.00 cash. I wonder how many were sold? £300 was a lot of money in 1971. Last edited by emeritus; 25th Dec 2022 at 2:16 am. Reason: typos 2000 SD info added |
25th Dec 2022, 2:29 am | #186 |
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Re: What's good about tape?
In that period the biggest selling Akai was probably the 4000D/4000DS and the price I paid new in 1972/1973 was £46 for a DS. So that's a very expensive 8-track machine
David
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25th Dec 2022, 3:10 am | #187 |
Heptode
Join Date: Aug 2009
Location: High Wycombe, Bucks. UK.
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Re: What's good about tape?
I have a number of 'blank' recordable 8 track tapes from Memorex, Scotch, Realistic (Tandy / Radio Shack), Fuji Film and a British-made one branded Metrosound. Picture here: https://web.archive.org/web/20070206...k/blank_b2.jpg
And some of my recordable 8 track tape systems: https://web.archive.org/web/20080723...k/8trakdex.htm (I no longer have the Kyoto Supreme car player) I also have a Lloytron music centre with turntable, radio and 8 track recorder not shown on that website. It can record from radio or turntable to 8 track tape. There were a few stereo systems that had both cassette and 8 track so you could choose your preference or copy from tape to tape. Tesco sold a 4-in-1 music centre called Winthrop President for around £175 in the late 1970s (hi-fi was a lot more expensive back then - even a basic mono cassette recorder cost £20). The Winthrop President music centre had stereo turntable, radio, cassette and 8 track although I think it was only possible to record to cassette; the 8 track unit was play-only. 8 track cartridge recorders were never as popular as cassette recorders. Recording on a cassette is a lot easier. You can see how much tape is remaining and you can fast forward or rewind to the exact point where you want to start from. Some 8 track decks had fast-forward but you couldn't easily tell where you were on the tape and going backwards on an 8 track cartridge is impossible by design. In theory, the higher tape speed should have made the 8 track system better quality than cassette. However, as noted, cassette quality improved dramatically while 8 track stagnated. Very few 8 track machines had Dolby noise reduction. I never saw any chrome 8 track tapes either. The manufacturers didn't seem interested in improving 8 track quality. Presumably there wasn't enough demand from the buying public. |
25th Dec 2022, 9:34 am | #188 | |
Hexode
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Re: What's good about tape?
Quote:
Ken G6HZG.
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25th Dec 2022, 4:08 pm | #189 | |
Dekatron
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Re: What's good about tape?
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There were lots of circuits for these published in "Byte" nagazine back then, using variable degrees of PLL-style decoding and raw bit-banging in the processor. I remember building one that used the 1200-baud Bell-202 modem tones, which subsequently resurfaced in VHF/UHF AX25 packet-radio service - indeed I demonstrated AX25 packet-radio to someone using off-air recordings stored on cassette!
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25th Dec 2022, 6:05 pm | #190 |
Octode
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Location: London, UK.
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Re: What's good about tape?
If we're including digital tape formats, we should give a mention to Exabyte. They were a de-facto archive format for early digital audio:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exabyte_Corporation |
25th Dec 2022, 6:43 pm | #191 | |
Dekatron
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Re: What's good about tape?
Quote:
http://www.hifiengine.com/library/akai/x-2000sd.shtml David |
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26th Dec 2022, 9:28 pm | #192 | |
Pentode
Join Date: Sep 2018
Location: Devon, UK.
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Re: What's good about tape?
Quote:
The carts were impressively durable, both in terms of playback and general ruggedness. The tape is made to rub against itself on every play, as well as the run through the machine. Yet tape jams were rare. A cart would usually carry on in service until the playback audio had gradually deteriorated too much! The machines certainly improved over the years. The Harris models we bought became smaller and quieter in operation; we invested in Sonifex kit later on and they were quieter still. |
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28th Dec 2022, 11:31 pm | #193 | ||
Hexode
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Re: What's good about tape?
Quote:
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29th Dec 2022, 10:15 am | #194 |
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Re: What's good about tape?
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2nd Jan 2023, 3:37 pm | #195 |
Rest in Peace
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Re: What's good about tape?
What's good about tape?
* It's a physical storage medium. When enjoying recorded content, I think there is additional enjoyment to be gained from handling the media and operating the player. It anchors the listening / viewing experience to a sequence of very specific and deliberate actions, preparing the mind for the reward of hearing the music, more so than a few mouse clicks. I don't know whether people who grew up without physical media experience this, or whether they get the same satisfaction from the mouse clicks. * It's fairly robust. Each different recording format makes its own demands and imposes its own limitations on the handling experience. LP records inspire a kind of reverence, because they need to be handled vary carefully and reward that care with HiFi results. In the context of say a non-valuable mixtape and boombox, cassette can be enjoyed in a much less formal way that adds its own character to the handling experience. * Even with cassette, there's a high-end version of the experience available. In contrast to the mixtape+boombox version, the experience of using a top-quality cassette with a top-quality deck is rewarding, because you get to handle things that feel and look classy, and the sonic reward can surpass expectations. I enjoy interacting with the Pioneer SX-1250, which is one of the decks that doesn't have a cassette well or drawer, the cassette clips onto the front of the mech and remains exposed during play. This can be pushed to esoteric extremes with the TEAC O'Casse system, where two open reels are held in a skeleton shell. You could reach out and touch the moving reels as it plays, kind-of like open-reel but in beautiful miniature. * Open-reel tape is exceptionally tactile. Handling it and using it in its various applications can involve complex and dexterous interactions. Editing, especially, gets you physically very close to the both the recording medium and its content. When I first started putting show FX reels together on 1/4" I gained an intense satisfaction from the 'coming together' and the finished product. The simple act of lifting a reel of 1" 8-track master off a machine after a really good recording session is exciting, because you've watched the machine 'soaking up' the music and it's now all there in your hand, not as a tabulation of millions of cryptic numbers but as a direct, literal capture of every vibration of the strings and vocal chords that you just heard. * Nagra. I think that's enough for now! |
7th Jan 2023, 8:19 pm | #196 | |
Hexode
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Location: Ceredigion, Wales, UK.
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Re: What's good about tape?
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11th Jan 2023, 6:43 pm | #197 |
Octode
Join Date: Jun 2006
Location: St Osyth, Nr Clacton, Essex, UK.
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Re: What's good about tape?
The smell.
I well remember the pleasure from opening up a 7" box of International or Lafayette tape on Christmas morning and the glorious aroma when taking the reel out of the plastic bag. Graham
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11th Jan 2023, 6:50 pm | #198 |
Dekatron
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Re: What's good about tape?
One other use for tape: back in the70s when I was trying [and failing - I'm utterly lacking in any sense of rhythm and am tone-deaf!] to learn Morse, I used an old R2R recorder to tape off-air Morse, at 15IPS, then played it back at lower speeds in the hope that I would somehow 'get it'.
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15th Jan 2023, 8:40 pm | #199 | |
Hexode
Join Date: Aug 2011
Location: Luton, Bedfordshire, UK.
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Re: What's good about tape?
Quote:
Having lived stateside in the late 90s, I grew to understand just how popular that format was over there. It barely made any impact here but was hugely popular in cars in the USA with a fair number of home machines used both to play pre-recorded material and to record mix tapes for the car. My local Tandy did have a few blank 8-track cassettes and one 8-track recorder on display, if memory serves they sat there for some time. What I've noted about magnetic tape is it's resilience. They're from before my time but I have some RTR tapes recorded off-air of the BBC radio series of Steptoe and Son in the 60s....pretty much perfect. I have B&W RTR video tapes from the late 70s that still play. VHS 40 years old. Cassettes 45 years old. My 8-bit computer tapes which date back to 1981-1987 still load into my Sinclair computers. Cassettes, for a format that was designed to be a dictation medium, really did become ubiquitous for all kinds of recording and some of us still use them today. |
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