I started off on a hunt to buy metal tapes. My weapon of choice in my youth was TDK SA-90, still available from Amazon... https://www.amazon.co.uk/TDK-SA90-Audio-Tapes-Pack/dp/B002TUF73O/ref=sr_1_11 I started off on a hunt of metal tapes and ended up with the only reasonable source I can find, being Bluz Broz http://www.adelcom.net/ctape.htm but they're in the USA. Metal tapes on Ebay are going for silly money. Some of those sellers owe me a new keyboard as I spat hot tea over mine. So I started to think.... are metal tapes going to be worth it, or should I return to my trusted TDK SA-90? Anyone got any opinions on this please?
Metal tapes are worth it if your equipment is up to the job else not worth the extra expense. You still go after your TDK SA’s or if you can find at a good price try the TDK AR. For me my standard tapes are TDK MA-XG and I use Nakamichi CR-7 and lucky for me I have a stockpile of new unopened TDK MA-XG and don’t have to pay nor would I pay the stupid today’s prices. I think your best bet is to look for TDK AR, even the price of the TDK SA’a you linked to are high and I would not pay that either but then again it’s easy for me to say that as I have a pile of new unopened SA’s AR and more. I don’t envy people like you trying to get new tapes, the odds are stacked against you and at those prices it’s undo-able.
Good answer. - So... a straw poll here... what would you class as the highest you'd pay for any of these tapes? New, unopened. Pack of 10-ish. I know everyone's going to have different ideas here. Individual values on things are different.
Hi I am not sure I can give a price as the price I am willing to pay is not the price people are willing to sell for. The problem is someone is always willing to pay more. If people stop paying those silly prices the price will come down. For this to happen everyone needs to stop, the other day a guy on one of the other sites I go to came on very proud to say he paid €140 for a sealed Maxell Vertex or Sony Super Metal Master or something. Well I think if he has the money and he is happy to pay it no problem with that, but for people that want to use the tapes this makes it impossible for them. Such is life.
boot sales / markets / junk shops are still the best if you're on a tight budget ;-) Igot 8 x Maxell XL-II (sealed) for £2 a couple of weeks ago - plus I don't mind recycling old tapes. Some of my favourites are the BASF Chrome II. I got a load of these for a coupel of quid that were used but in great condition - really happy with them
If you want i have loads of prerecorded tapes on some quality tapes, i can sell them and you can re record them. Will be much cheaper than epay to
Hi T-ster, sounds interesting. I'd be grateful if you can PM me some details when you have a chance. No rush, as I've spent so much on repair gear and other stuff that I'm broke until January
That's a good question: where to find good tapes today. I totallt agree with Toocool: metal tapes are worth if you have a enough good deck. No need to have a TOTL model, but at least a reasonably good 3-head, like a Denon DRM-740 or a SONY TC-K615... I have a big pile of sealed tapes... that I save to use only on good moments. For the rest of time, I tend to pick yet used good chrome or metal tapes that I got 2nd hand. Most of them are in excellent condition, recorded on good decks and played just a few times. The performance is like new, and better than latest generation sealed tapes, like that TDK SA (which was made on very late 90s). Early 90s and late 80s are the best tapes in terms of performance, because that was before manufacturers started to cut corners and costs on everything. And also they look more vintage; another reason I also prefer those. In my case, I got in the last two years a good pile of type II and V tapes in excellent condition from audiophiles that had them. They look like new and some even had very slight notes on pencil -very easy to delete- so the J-card then becomes totally blank. A curiosity: many of them are labelled as "XX album by XX" (replace XX by author and album), and then: "Dolby C Nakamichi".
That's a nice little haul. And good advice. Having been away from tape for so long, I'm going to have trouble identifying tapes by sight, but I suspect I'll get used to it. I'm in touch with NAC, and they've given me a quote for 10 and 20 of the new C90's to the UK, and I've just returned from A&E after suffering heart failure. As my credit card has already taken a hammering (from tape equipment as much as presents) it will be January before I order anything... and in that time I have to make a decision as to how many tapes I will use/need for the next twenty years. It is interesting to see how tape quality died off in the 90's, but that there are still companies out there who are making new tapes... with quality that might surpass that of the 80's... new formulations and technologies... who knows what will happen?! It makes sense that they will improve type I and II, rather than resurrect type IV. We will see.
The best value-for-performance in Type IV tapes, that I have experience with, is the Sony XR Metal. However, all the ones I own are C-60 length. I recently used three in mix tape recordings in the past month, or so. Nando.
Funny you should say that. I came across three of these on ebay, effectively £12 a tape (including postage) so I jumped at them. Also, 60.
Nice move. I bulked up on them about three years ago when they were selling at about $2-$3 a tape. I may have about 40 of them left. It's my go-to-tape for most mix tape recordings when I want to use a Type IV cassette. When it comes to Type II tape, Sony UX-Pro is also very good. Nando.
That's a cool suggestion. It's on the very short list of tapes to target. At the moment, I'm going to test the metal tapes when they come, and I'm committed to the 799 Studio Masters in January. If neither of those strike a chord, then I'll try the UX-Pro. Something inside me, however, thinks that newer tape formulations will be the better bet/value for money, than hunting down the vintage formulations. But this whole thing is a subjective journey. For the moment, however, I think I've committed my credit card to enough punishment for the next couple of months :-D and I want to travel to Chichester sometime in Jan/Feb.
The quality is undoubtely higher in old good tapes. The amount of money spent on R&D by the big makers is galaxies beyond what the few actual makers are doing nowadays. Not only that: the amount of facilities and big machinery requires huge investments, something that only very big corporations can afford. Of course, that old R&D is well protected under patents, so probably actual magnetic tape formulations are way behind good old tapes. And that's something I could measure myself while comparing a few modern tapes. I still have to test NAC tapes. Reason why I always recommended old good tapes for quality recordings. * Correction: What I believe is that quality is higher in older formulations, but value/money is another story. A few years before anyone can find quite good tapes for cheap but nowadays it's quite different. I suggest to stay away from eBay and look in local 2nd hand websites and stores. Anyway, I can still find sometimes old good tapes in old stores. Some still have few stock of old tapes stored in a lost corner of their facilities. You just have to ask for them...
There are so many good tapes from the old days, I really doubt any of the manufacturers of new tape can match the quality of the big names of the 70's -90's. And there is nothing more satisfying than unsealing a 30-year old tape and laying down a memorable recording. Nando.
Those XL-II are super cool, Nando. I have one of them that I’ve bought myself back in the 80s and always loved the look and the J-card. Great stack of sealed tapes indeed
I was lucky enough to buy six of these Maxell UD XLII C-90 tapes earlier this year. I used two of them for the Tapeheads 12" Vinyl Singles Travelling Tape project that's currently underway. Hopefully, with a bit of time between now and New Year's Day, I can begin recording from 12" vinyl singles for a tape for you. I will be making at least two copies - one for Shaun on open-reel and the other on a C-90 compact cassette for you. Nando.
Nice album Elite-ist! I think that Stones Album was the second record I bought as a youngster, the first was a 45 from Parliament, Flashlight. I always thought the Stones Disco Version was extremely rare until ebay came around but I did have a friend give me a second copy a few years ago. So I won't be a thread bandit, I'd go Maxell UDXL II's for everyday, box to car to mostly out of it's case and move up to the metal for high quality recordings played on a decent machine. I've got Hysteria recorded on a Maxell I had my buddy at a Hi-Fi Store make for me a few days after the album came out. I still have that cassette (one of my most borrowed tapes back in the day) and it sounds great! and it's been beat on and thrashed like no other, I think that album had seven singles, it was played for close to two years on the radio....
Thanks, Mister X, I have been lucking into a number of good 12" singles at my local record store. I picked up another good one, yesterday. There are a few brands of tapes that some people might not know are good. Take for instance this Hitachi UD 90EX. It is a Maxell in disguise, but gets overlooked. And there are a few Radio Shack cassettes which are Maxells, as well. Another good tape is the Radio Shack Supertape. Nando.
