Is the cassette tape making a return?
 

Reading through the topics on this forum, I noticed the reference to an album being on cassette. Are we seeing a revival of the audio cassettes, like we have done with vinyl?

Re: Is the cassette tape making a return?
 

Nope.

Re: Is the cassette tape making a return?
 

let me expand on that a moment


nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooope

Re: Is the cassette tape making a return?
 

Dude would disagree, but then he's a bit nuts on things he likes. lol

Re: Is the cassette tape making a return?
 

And might there be any chance of a revival of the cassette tape? You can still get blank cassette tapes in some shops and I think that you can still get cassette decks as part of a music centre/hifi equipment.

Re: Is the cassette tape making a return?
 

Tapes are the worst format of all, Rillington. Always getting screwed up in the machine.

I don’t know why you like all this old, space-consuming stuff. I stream all my music these days. It’s much cheaper, you can hear just about every album going and you don’t have to find room to store the music.

Re: Is the cassette tape making a return?
 

As I well remember. I was not sorry to see the cassette tape be replaced by CD.

Thank you........ I love anything analogue :)

Re: Is the cassette tape making a return?
 

It is only making a return because people are nostalgic and they like to go back to the old times.


It is the same with vinyl.



Sound quality is a lot better on digital formats.

Re: Is the cassette tape making a return?
 

We threw out lots of cassettes recently but still have lots of stuff that was only ever released on tape. Some I have managed to get on CD or download but much is really small artists that sold tapes when they performed and aren't around any more.

Re: Is the cassette tape making a return?
 

It's not quite the same though. For Vinyl people are still making good quality turntables so the playback now is not far off the best that used to be available. That's not to say a lot aren't cheap rubbish though.

For tape however, no-one is making good mechanism. Techmoan has a good video on that - https://youtu.be/90-gIAMvQNs

Also one on how good tape could be at its peak - https://youtu.be/jVoSQP2yUYA

Re: Is the cassette tape making a return?
 

Yes there are some amazing quality turntables these days but everytime you are playing vinyl you are damaging it.
And unless you can afford a laser vinyl player (yes they do exist) then it will still wear out the vinyl.



One thing people like with vinyl is often the warmer sound. Or I would argue a bit more muffled sound. Digital mixing can often be a little too strict and harsh.
Equally you also get older recordings with more highlighted instruments whilst when processing music for digital mediums everything is often flattened out evenely so your slightly higher volume of drums in the band that you hear on vinyl may not be as loud on a ditgital recording.

Re: Is the cassette tape making a return?
 

To avoid playing and damaging my vinyl albums I used to tape them on an open reel-to-reel recorder (Akai DS4000) with Dolby at 7 1/2 inches per second. That would capture the full fidelity of the record.

Re: Is the cassette tape making a return?
 

And also with teletext as teletext art seems to be riding this old format nostalgia wave.

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And people don't always want that so-called 'perfect' digital sound.

At the peak of the cassette tape, which had the better sound quality - vinyl or cassette tape?

Re: Is the cassette tape making a return?
 

There was always a hiss on tapes and the tape oxidises too over time.
You could argue there were lots of pops on vinyl due to dust though.
And both types will wear down over each time they are played.
Vinyl can suffer from heat damage too.




Give me an uncompressed digital Wav version anyday.




So many things to factor in when listening to music. The layout of the speakers and the way the room is built has a massive influence too.