Cassettes still in use.

[reelguy]

Paid a visit to the local De la Warr pavilion to see the Andy Warhol exhibition. Must admit I wasn't impressed, Not my cup of tea really.

However, I was surprised to see Cassette recorders still being used to play excerpts from interviews from the past. Sounded quite good and I am sure the M/cs had been overhauled as they appeared in very good order. I have to admit I was more impressed by the use of the recorders than I was by the exhibition.
I took a couple of pics in case anyone was interested.
Peter W........Reelguy

[ben]

excellent, thanks for posting. Right up my street.
Wonder how many of the tapes will still be there by the end of the expo, though? Then again, with the masses into mp3, chances are people will leave 'em alone.

I have to admit, for one sound project I did a couple of years back I used car stereos with the eject de-activated. Auto-reverse meant the tapes could be left running.

[ricard]

Chances are that in this day and age, people won't even know what 'eject' does.

Although it is appearent from the pictures above that someone has pressed the eject button on a couple of machines.

[richrussell]

My 2004 Vauxhall Vectra has a cassette deck (as well as 4-CD changer) in the radio. I was quite surprised that such a new car would have one, given my previous mid-1990s cars only had CD. So I've rediscovered all my music cassettes from when I was at university and can happily listen to them in the car.

[yesnaby]

Hello,

I go for a regular five-yearly ex-civil-service health check up (aka 'senility test') in London. One of the tests is to play back a tape (on a cassette player) with a list of fifty words chosen at random and write down what you can remember afterwards - I can usually recall about two! I can't see these players being replaced for many years.

Michael

[ianj]

Lots of big aircraft still use cassettes loaded up with safety messages etc.. for the passengers.

[zooterman]

There is a good following in the US for cassettes, more than R2R going by some of the forums I visit.

[johnlees]

Most of my music from the past is on cassettes so I play them in my car via a Walkman into the Auxiliary socket near the radio. Fantastic results !

[dave walsh]

Hello Peter. Nice of you to put up some DLWP shots I can view from the frozen north. I don't know but it may be that the choice of audio medium is, in itself, a part of the exhibition! I'm surprised you're not impressed. Warhol is establishment these days not bafflingly exotic. As for concerns re public ignorance of the cassette medium, it's quite the opposite! There is currently a major revival going on-especially re nostalgia for the days of home made mix tapes common in the eighties and nineties. My daughter [21] was delighted when I was able to source an original Sony boom box and matching walkman from a forum member. It's a bit like the tendency of each generation of young bands [ie beat groups] to revert to vinyl singles!
Dave W

[ricard]

I wonder if the younger generation are getting tired of media-less audio. With mp3 files etc there's no tangible media, and as humans I think we're not as abstract as we sometimes imagine ourselves to be. Hence, we seek satisfaction in some form media we can hold, touch and experience.

For me, the whole image of a tape recorder or record player spinning something while the music is playing is very satisfying, not to mention the slow movement of the tone arm as the music plays on, or the varying size of tape the tape pack as it moves from one reel to another.

[camtechman]

How about a competition?

How many of the cassette machines can we identify?

[ben]

You're on!

For ease I've numbered the machines. I think a lot are of US origin though.

1. Philips D6350. the one you can't really see to its left is almost certainly a Sony.

4. National-panasonic?

7. might be a Sanyo

10. Sanyo.

....over to you guys and gals.

[newlite4]

Three looks like a Ferguson/Thorn clone from the early '80s. Five is a Decca "legato" made by Hitachi from the early '70s, lovely machine - would reccomend.
Neil

[camtechman]

Makes are easy, what we need are model numbers............I'll get me coat?

[julie_m]

I'm surprised not to see a Ferguson 3T07 in that collection; that was a very popular model.

[reelguy]

Hi All,
Can't promise anything but I will try and check the different makes/models if I get a chance. In the meantime keep thinking.
Babysitting duties and Flu jab tomorrow so may not get time for a day or so..
It was interesting when I took the pic's, to see people {Me included } trying to remember which button to push for play...
Anyway, I will see what I can do. The A /W Exhibition is on until February by the way.
Peter W........Reelguy

[jenkinsrichard]

No.7 is a Hitachi TRQ-295R.
I bought mine with redundancy money in 1977 for about £40.
Regards, Richard.

[robjkmannering]

I had one similar to number 3 as a christmas present in 1978. Can't remember the make (I was 6!) but remember it being used to record the top 40, on its side, direct from a Sony music system speaker.
It later served as tape storage for my ZX81. Load, rewind, clean head, adjust head and try again!
It was worse with the Spectrum, Manic Miner would almost load before crashing and then there would be the 20 minute wait whilst you had annother go....
Rob

[reelguy]

Pic Update......

[reelguy]

Having a bit of bother uploading pics.