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Old 28th Feb 2019, 6:37 pm   #1
Biggles
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Default Cassette tapes making a comeback?

I read in the newspaper the other day that along with vinyl becoming popular again, cassette tapes are coming back into favour in the form of pre recorded albums. Does this mean that all those old cassette decks gathering dust in the back of the shed are to become sought after items? We will have to wait and see.

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Old 28th Feb 2019, 6:47 pm   #2
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Default Re: Cassette tapes making a comeback?

Must get my three head Sony TC-K71 out of storage. I "uncovered" it only yesterday and remembered seeing something on BBC news about the cassette revival a few days ago. It was expensive in its day, must be worth a lot more now!
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Old 28th Feb 2019, 7:31 pm   #3
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Default Re: Cassette tapes making a comeback?

It's just a fad which has been going on for a couple of years. It's certainly not a mainstream revival.
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Old 28th Feb 2019, 7:35 pm   #4
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Default Re: Cassette tapes making a comeback?

Never ever stopped using them here - still have a selection to play out in the shed on the boombox when the radio is boring - seems always to be talkback nowadays or the local Christian station so an AC/DC tape goes down nicely etc. Managed to get quite a few new ones when they sold them all off years ago so will be set for some time.
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Old 28th Feb 2019, 7:38 pm   #5
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Default Re: Cassette tapes making a comeback?

There is certainly more cassette related material around at the moment, I've seen lots of blank tapes for sale in various shops and Tescos sell a retro cassette tape Walkman style player.
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Old 28th Feb 2019, 7:38 pm   #6
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Default Re: Cassette tapes making a comeback?

Youngsters today don't want to 'have' anything, cassettes or otherwise. They just want it all in some virtual mode. ��
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Old 28th Feb 2019, 7:42 pm   #7
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Default Re: Cassette tapes making a comeback?

I've bought two or three small-run cassettes from independent artists in the past couple of years, after buying precisely none through the previous thirty. Not something I'd choose in preference to other physical media, the disadvantages are too many, but I've a Pioneer CT-F1250 sitting there and it's nice to give it employment now and again: it used to be much used for recording LPs on purchase so they would only have to suffer the stylus once.

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Old 28th Feb 2019, 7:42 pm   #8
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Default Re: Cassette tapes making a comeback?

I was reminded of this when I saw something a few weeks ago that I had not seen in many years- an unfeasibly long dark brown ribbon of tape in the road, twinkling in the sunshine. This 'tinsel' used to adorn the central reservation of all our dual carriageways of course, along with the ubiquitous (lone) glove or shoe, and the stripped lorry tyre tread.

There is a (temporary?) resurgence with the compact audio cassette that I would not expect to see with VHS (mainly because of its bulky format)

Dave
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Old 1st Mar 2019, 4:00 am   #9
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Default Re: Cassette tapes making a comeback?

Some people like the big box VHS experience and collect them ,but I'm guessing that as time goes by and more and more will get junked then people will start to seek them out again.

I wonder if floppy discs will make a comeback?
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Old 1st Mar 2019, 8:42 am   #10
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Default Re: Cassette tapes making a comeback?

A novel repurposing of a cassette deck perhaps?

http://www.mp3tapelessdeck.pl/index.html

At least there's no lamp poking out the top!

Mark
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Old 1st Mar 2019, 10:03 am   #11
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Default Re: Cassette tapes making a comeback?

Years ago I used to record the dance band and big band programmes presented by Alan Dell. (FM stereo ); using a Revox B77 at 15ips. I would then edit down my choice onto cassette tape compilations. The cassette recorder was an Akai model; I think type F 770

The original equipment is long gone, but the cassettes still sound surprisingly good on an old, relatively in expensive, player.
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Old 1st Mar 2019, 10:41 am   #12
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Default Re: Cassette tapes making a comeback?

Quote:
The cassette recorder was an Akai model; I think type F 770
AD-F770? That was an Aiwa, not an Akai. Nice recorder though.
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Old 1st Mar 2019, 11:29 am   #13
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Default Re: Cassette tapes making a comeback?

Never went away for many. The 'revival' is recycled as new news every year or so. A much maligned format but a good, top quality machine is capable of results that rival R to R in music listening tests (not objective, lab results). There is a company in the US still making tapes.

https://www.nationalaudiocompany.com/
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Old 1st Mar 2019, 12:00 pm   #14
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Default Re: Cassette tapes making a comeback?

The Philpott-
On two occasions years ago I stopped and salvaged tapes . On both occasions I was amazed at what I found- the first was in Greece somewhere and I still have a recording of the unknown singer that makes my neck shiver. The second time was whilst working in Andorra and we spotted a truck upside down in a river in a ravine. We climbed down to check the cab, which was empty, so I ejected the tape from the radio and took it. My colleague called it 'The Dead Man's Tape' but it was lovely music. I still have it !
BC
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Old 1st Mar 2019, 12:10 pm   #15
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Default Re: Cassette tapes making a comeback?

Quote:
Originally Posted by rontech View Post
Years ago I used to record the dance band and big band programmes presented by Alan Dell.
It would be a delight to find such programming anywhere on the radio today. I have boxes of recordings from Radio 3 and 4 and some of the 70s offshore and early ILR stations all made on cassette. Back in the 70s I used to exchange cassettes with a friend in Canada - their radio (he sent Canadian and US station off-air recordings) seemed a world away from to ours. I played some of the offshore tapes that hadn't had an outing for decades and I was surprised how formal much of the presentation sounded. It also amazed me the reception conditions we used to put up with when listening to them. (Folks who moan about DAB don't know they're born!) I ought to convert the more interesting stuff to digital.

I only ever owned a couple of prerecorded cassettes. I used to play them in a car that had an aftermarket cassette player. I preferred to spend my hard-won pennies on vinyl as it was more durable. I think the player ended up donated to the NVCF bring and buy stand some years ago.

I was given a VHS-DVD combi player a few years ago and have picked up some interesting titles on VHS for pennies. The problem now, of course, is moving them on. The charity shops in my local town have trestle tables outside stacked with CDs and DVDs for pennies. It's my guess that they don't mind if a few get stolen. I haven't seen any cassettes in charity shops for years.

However, in Wilkos the other day for a big bag of bird seed I noticed that they had packs of blank cassettes for sale - first time I've seen any in perhaps a decade or more.
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Old 1st Mar 2019, 12:37 pm   #16
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Default Re: Cassette tapes making a comeback?

Kylie Minogue's latest album "GOLD" was recently released in the following formats:

Download, CD, LP &...……..Wait For It...…..On Limited CASSETTE

The latter cassette was sold out immediately and I've seen a few now sell in the range of £250 to £400 Each !

Perhaps those prices were because each cassette were personally signed by KM.
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Old 1st Mar 2019, 12:46 pm   #17
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Default Re: Cassette tapes making a comeback?

I'm still a regular cassette user. I've got an old Landrover so a CD is out (suspension) as is anything vaguely knickable so I hope this fad doesn't make my tape deck desirable!

I've been training my 4 year old daughter up - her favourite possession is her Whinnie the Pooh tape which she's learnt by heart.

I think there's something quite special about the cassette. It's not my preferred format for HiFi listening but there's something about the fact that there is a real artefact that is easily portable. I became quite sentimental when I found a box of tapes I'd made as a child yesterday that I thought had been lost. Early 80's Top 40 and TV theme tunes will be the order of the day on journeys for a while!

D
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Old 1st Mar 2019, 12:48 pm   #18
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Default Re: Cassette tapes making a comeback?

I service and repair audio equipment for a living, and have noticed a definite increase in cassette related work. Over the past couple of weeks I have had a Sony and a Philips music centre in, both wanting cassette decks to be repaired, and two Nakamichi cassette decks for service. Up until about a year ago it had been several years since I had been asked to repair a cassette.
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Old 1st Mar 2019, 1:01 pm   #19
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Post Re: Cassette tapes making a comeback?

Quote:
Originally Posted by avocollector View Post
Never ever stopped using them here.
Ditto here. I'm quite content to use cassette players / recorders (and vinyl) because the ones I have here a relatively old tech - so are easy to use.


When I look around my home, there are many 'modern' devices which have so many 'options' and 'configuration choices' that it's often necessary to read the manual before I can get them to do what I want - which is often simply to 'get it to work'! I'm certainly not a technophobe, but to me it does seem that product designers and the marketing tribe seem to believe that the more 'facilities and options' that are built into a product, the greater the chances are that the customer will buy that item and not one from their competitors - which, of course, is a never ending expanding spiral. So, yes - I am an advocate of the KISS principal.
Having said all that, at the end of the day, it's all a matter of personal choice, of course.

Al.
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Old 1st Mar 2019, 1:09 pm   #20
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Default Re: Cassette tapes making a comeback?

While a few people never stopped using cassettes, the current interest is just a teenage / fashion fad. As with the earlier vinyl record craze, there is little interest in the technology or sound quality.

You have to remember that cassettes are an exotic novelty for anyone under 30. They will never have owned a player and may never have seen a cassette in the flesh. They have heard nostalgic stories from their parents and grandparents about recording mixtapes for parties and want to experience a bit of that retro culture. It helps that they want something physical to photograph and share with their friends on Instagram.
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