A leap of faith with an old tape deck

[alwayslogo]

Greetings @Jayant_S for your purchase of the deck. Being a cassette lover, it gives me pleasure when I see someone is buying a good cassette deck in this era primarily of streaming music. Take good care of your nice player. I suggest you acquire a Head Demagnetiser, either in cassette or wand format. It will help to reduce the magnetism build up in the tape path after long playing. Magnetism severely affects the recording of the tape by reducing the high-frequency response, and the damage is permanent. And also, keep good quality Iso-Propyl Alcohol and absorbing cotton handy for frequent cleaning of head, capstan, pinch roller and associated tape path. These are heavily needed after a long gap of cassette listening. Once you get the habit of playing your cassettes regularly, frequent cleaning might not be needed. However, thorough service in regular interval is recommended. Storage of cassettes in a dry environment is equally important to somewhat prevent the fungus buildup.

I am using cassettes to date from my childhood alongside the digital format of music. I have a small collection of cassettes, decks and Walkmans. Well-preserved cassette sounds good when it is played back in a good system. The SQ is somewhat different and incomparable with a digital source, but both are enjoyable in their own way.

I strongly recommend listening cassette for those specific albums which are troublesome to get in other formats. There are many albums whose CD or record are rare, hence pricey. Also, there are albums that are only available in cassette format and not available in any other format, not even on streaming. Since used cassette is somewhat cheap than other physical mediums, also it is easily available, at least in my hometown Kolkata, it can be utilised for the purpose of cassette-specific album listening.

Where to buy head demagnetiser ?

 

[anirban420]

Where to buy head demagnetiser ?

I bought from ebay USA

 

[Gerry_the_Merry]

Congrats on the purchase. The are various views on Cassettes, some are generic while some are personal. What is important is how you feel about them

A lot of opinions about tapes are based on basic type-1 tapes played on Decks of varying quality. Most of the decks dominating the market were mass market ones with varied quality standards (both mechanical and musical). if you listen to well recorded metal tapes (not the music genre but tape type ) on a good deck like a NAK 1000, you'll be transported to another world. However as you drop down the value tree, the short comings of tape will become more and more relevant.

One key factor with tapes is noise (or tape hiss). With various noise limiting options like the Dolby, DNL, etc you can curb the noise, however some like to listen to tapes with noise (albeit listening to records with ticks and pops ). Tapes aren't that bad for they were good enough to be the most preferred medium for a long time.

While playing those old tapes (on a newish deck), beware of fungus and tapes with dry oxide layers (the squeaky types). Prefer to use new tapes and before playing older ones, check them thoroughly (old tapes are real killers of rubber pinch rollers)

Now to quality, if you have the honour of owning a NAK 1000, NAK Dragon and other big league machines like the Tandberg TCD3014 (lovingly called the Dragon Slayer) or the Grundig CF5500-2 (the best ever German deck), your listening experience will be different. However the fact is that the lesser regarded (and lesser expensive) NAK models are more or less as good or perhaps a wee bit better than mass market decks. Akai, Sony, Technics, Pioneer, Aiwa, Sansui, Marantz, Yamaha, etc made some great sounding decks.

You may have noted the mention of the Sony TC-S1 deck in this thread. I have experience with this deck. It is actually one of the components of the famed Sony La Scala mini hi-fi system which in its day, cost about $1000 and won the What-HiFi Best Mini System award in 1995. Though small, this deck packs a punch and offers record and playback with Dolby B, C and S options. This is the highlight of this deck. It also comes with auto calibration which though I did not use, appears to be a useful feature. The recordings and playback with Dolby S is very good.

Cassettes may be dumb but they are fun, if you are serious about the format, you can achieve some heights with it, but again it all comes down to personal choice and preferences.

Check out this video by Youtuber Techmoan. The Sony TC-S1 features here, also he shares some good info on cassette tapes and how they can be made to sound better.

My recent discovery - I am stlll sorting out a VU meter issue in my BX300: The recording is not 95% but 100%. There is no tape hiss. The deck was calibrated for TDK type I and Maxell XL type ii. For these I dont need to make any bias current adjustments.

Even on the type I, the recording is absolutely astounding. I am quite staggered. The transfer of some LPs to tape beats my Marantz SA 10 on all parameters. The most astonishing part of it is the attack.

 

[reubensm]

Lovely Gerry, do you still have the GXC39 and have you made any comparisons with the GXC39?
Naks record beautifully on type-1s, that's what make them so special.

 

[Gerry_the_Merry]

Hi Reuben. No I have not used the GXC39 for a long time. I needed that to transfer old Indian Classical music to digital, but of late some of the producers have started digitizing and putting up on their website so this may not be needed. Plus that is a reasonably new but not brand new deck. The BX300 has absolutely unused heads and motor, and after a replacement of belts and pulleys etc., is as good as new. The main use seems to be to transfer those LPs to tape where 1) the piece is difficult to find or 2) where the previous owner has used a heavy stylus and the annoying rain drops falling like sound accompanies the music, which I can control in the recorded sound by using the bias current and NR in combination. I am also using entry level Transparent Link ICs (despite which it is surprisingly good), and can upgrade to better ICs. And then the Type iis. So several upsides left.

There is no analog warmth/lushness/glow etc. either in my record player nor in the recorded sound in the cassette deck. The sound is similar to my CD player's. This whole "analog" sound business is a myth.

On the recording fidelity, till now I have only tried with LPs where I knew they were better than the digital version I had. Now to try in cases where the same recording is in LP and digital. Like some of the new 24-192 releases which I also have on LP.

The last I remember, the GXC39 was nowhere in this league. And a 2 head deck too.

I had a large collection of old Type iis, mostly Maxells, on which various Rock tracks had been recorded. Some by me and some by others. Those tapes play nicely but show the limitations of the source and recorders used then. If I record on them now they sound brilliant. Sadly only in patches and not right through the length of the tape, so I have had to discard all of them.

 

[reubensm]

Great inference, the problem with old tapes is that as you rightly mentioned, consistency of recording quality across the length of the tape, is quite a problem. The modern type-1s may not be as good as the type-1s from those times but as they are new, consistency tends to be better. In my opinion, the definition of the 'warmth' of analogue audio is quite subjective (as perception is involved) but per my understanding, records and tapes tend to play with a more pronounced mid frequency range with marginal tapering off at the lower and higher ends. This makes the sound warm and fluid but at the same time, not dull. This also happens to be the apt frequency range for music to seem to come out of the speakers and spread across the plane where the speakers are positions giving the listener very good stereo imagery. It also sounds quite pleasant and does not tire one even after long listening sessions. I have always found this rich mid range missing in even the best of CDs making them sound relatively different. This is my understanding of what I hear. Of course, there are lots of variables in the mix from an equipment perspective but what intrigues me the most is the listener perception. Thanks to portable audio devices, digital cinema sound, smart phone media playing and of course, our friendly neighbourhood FM channels, a lot of the more mainstream listeners are into the thinner sounding presentation (referred to as boom boom chick chick in another thread), my wife for example says that records lack the "punch" (she is into trance music )

 

[Gerry_the_Merry]

Well, someday visit Bombay and do me the honor of a visit and I will try to demonstrate what I am saying!

 

[bikerharis]

I got into this stuff pretty late compared to you guys - this is my first DIY setup i assembled - I found this scrap mechanism lying in a box of junk in our college electronics lab (and since i was on pretty good terms with our lab attender he let me have it)
Turned out to be a sony auto reverse with a nice head - it turned out nice after some new belts and lube. I added a preamp and had it hooked up to my PC!
View attachment 45730

Nice job, I am new to this forum. I have a very old locally assembled cassette player. I'm looking forward to restoring it. However, all the boards are heavily damaged and need replacement. I do have a LA4440 IC amp board with tone controls at home. I was wondering if I can connect the head directly to the amp input or should I need a separate head preamp. If yes, from where we can get this preamp? Would the new preamp boards work?

 

[reubensm]

Nice job, I am new to this forum. I have a very old locally assembled cassette player. I'm looking forward to restoring it. However, all the boards are heavily damaged and need replacement. I do have a LA4440 IC amp board with tone controls at home. I was wondering if I can connect the head directly to the amp input or should I need a separate head preamp. If yes, from where we can get this preamp? Would the new preamp boards work?

You’ll definitely need a tape head preamp. Not sure that these can be purchased but you can definitely build one. The bar IC upc1032 was a favourite for tape head preamps in the early times.

 

[bikerharis]

You’ll definitely need a tape head preamp. Not sure that these can be purchased but you can definitely build one. The bar IC upc1032 was a favourite for tape head preamps in the early times.

Thank you for the info. This particular one had a LA3161 IC based head preamp, but the amp board is broken and half of it is missing. If I can't find a new one, I might salvage the old IC from the broken board and make new one with it.

 

[reubensm]

Thank you for the info. This particular one had a LA3161 IC based head preamp, but the amp board is broken and half of it is missing. If I can't find a new one, I might salvage the old IC from the broken board and make new one with it.

yes, there are many resources online like this one for example

 

[quad]

Came across an interesting/nostalgic doc from Radio Electronics covering various
LM381/382/387 circuits.

http://www.n5dux.com/ham/files/pdf/Audio PreAmp ICs.pdf

The tiny LA3161 based tape head preamp boards appeared in the Indian
market by the mid 80s, if I remember right.

 

[bikerharis]

yes, there are many resources online like this one for example

Yea, I've already gone through this. If I'm making one I will go for this.
Meanwhile, I found something on AliExpress TA7668 Tape Recording + Playback Preamplifier
This one looks interesting. Unfortunately, they don't ship to India at the moment.

Came across an interesting/nostalgic doc from Radio Electronics covering various
LM381/382/387 circuits.

http://www.n5dux.com/ham/files/pdf/Audio PreAmp ICs.pdf

The tiny LA3161 based tape head preamp boards appeared in the Indian
market by the mid 80s, if I remember right.

Thank you for sharing.

 

[reubensm]

Yea, I've already gone through this. If I'm making one I will go for this.
Meanwhile, I found something on AliExpress TA7668 Tape Recording + Playback Preamplifier
This one looks interesting. Unfortunately, they don't ship to India at the moment.
Thank you for sharing.

OMG, what technology, an entire cassette deck literally, on that small board
in my times, to achieve something like that even at basic level, would have needed more complex circuitry and then there were those bias calibration headaches
I wonder how this small board will sound (especially when used for recording). Scary actually

 

[bikerharis]

OMG, what technology, an entire cassette deck literally, on that small board
in my times, to achieve something like that even at basic level, would have needed more complex circuitry and then there were those bias calibration headaches
I wonder how this small board will sound (especially when used for recording). Scary actually

Even I am thinking the same. I messaged the seller if there is any chance to ship to India.

 

[Hari Iyer]

I have 3 sources at home -
Marantz UD7007, Thorens- 145mk2, Awai Ad-F660.
The Awai can put both the Marantz and Thorens- to shame provided the tape is well mastered. Issue is it's difficult to get a well recorded tape now and you are stuck up with what you have and this probably won't change.

 

[Hari Iyer]

OMG, what technology, an entire cassette deck literally, on that small board
in my times, to achieve something like that even at basic level, would have needed more complex circuitry and then there were those bias calibration headaches
I wonder how this small board will sound (especially when used for recording). Scary actually

Calibration of tape head azimuth is very easy in a three head tape deck. You need a two channel oscilloscope and feed the output of both channels to the oscilloscope. Feed a 1 khz signal to record input on both left + right channel. Select source monitor. Adjust the tape head azimuth for a Lissajous pattern for a 45 deg phase angle and you will be done.

Lissajous curve - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org