I recently saw a professional Akai reel-to-reel tape recorder for sale on eBay–about $550 for a super-looking setup.
I thought I read hear on the MB that reel-to-reel tapes provide better sound reproduction that both CDs and casette tapes–and almost rival the sound of an LP in great condition.
Any ideas?
I recall reading an interview with Dr. Demento where he stated that the media in a reel-to-reel is of different stock than a casette, and will last longer. Something about how the glue in casette tapes separates over time or something.
I don’t have Golden Ears, but when the State of Michigan sent my college radio station a reel to use for their underwriting spot, the audio on it was of very nice quality. The cool thing about reel-to-reel is that it is dead easy to play it at different speeds or backwards. I am just speeking out of my ass at this point, but seeing as the machine I saw contacted the tape a ~6 different points, playing a reel over and over will probably dirty and fatigue it.
Sorry for not having any concrete info, but if you’re looking for something to use in a hobby studio, you can definetly do a lot worse than reel-to-reel.
askol
Until rather recently, reel-to-reel offered the best medium the average audiophile could use to record his own audio. You can also edit audio fairly easily with it.
Compact disc has offered superior playback for almost twenty years, not to mention incomparably superior convenience. CD recorders and digital editing equipment have pretty much relegated r2r to the scrap heap of outdated technology.
Considering that reel-to-reel is still used in very many studios you can be sure that it is a very good medium.
There is another new format. DVD-audio is exactly what it sounds like–it uses a DVD for storing audio information. The key advantage is a greatly increased sampling rate–up to 196k hertz compared to 44.1k hertz on a cd. Right now, only a few classical dvd-audios have been released, but more variety is on the way. Another big advantage is that it is backwards compatable with cd’s, so there is no need to replace old cd’s to upgrade to the new technology.
One disadvantage of reel to reel is long-term storage of the material. Over time you get “print through” which is the migration of magnetic information across the layers of tape. This results in degraded recordings .The BBC were so concerned about this problem that they would not keep any of their archive material on tape but would transfer it to good old vinyl and (I suppose) now to CDs. So good for recording and studio work but not for long-term storage.