Remember that the official "Type" designations didn't exist until 1981. Before then there was an especially large variation in the quality and specifications of standard ferric tapes as tape formulations kept changing and improving every year -- to such an extent that some decks, like those from BIC, had separate settings for Low Bias and Normal Bias, to better cover this wide range. On a deck like that, a lot of what you call "Type 0" tapes would probably perform better using the Low Bias setting.
In addition, I got another ONN brand cassettes which is a 2-pack I bought for $3 at Walmart. And it was utter trash than all of the “Type 0’s” from the past. The J-Card is different than the previous J-Card that used a TDK knock-off, but it was yellow, with no brand name, and no mentioned of “Type 1” or Normal Bias, and no length. Just a standard 90-minute cassette with no “C-90” on there, and no Compact Cassette logo. ONN never made a 60-minute version. The shell is clear, but you can clearly see it says “A side” and “B side”. No index, no brand, no mention of “Normal Bias” or “Low Noise”, and no length that says “C-90” and no Compact Cassette logo, and there’s no label. What is up with ONN these days.
I recall in Finland they talked about Japanese and European setting for the bias TDK D was one and AD the other. I assume that European would be the low bias.
@@Musicradio77Network I have their usb flash drive. Its feels cheap but works well (and is probably more reliable then that shitty 2 pack of "16gib" usb drives that ended up being 32gib with one failing).
On the Sonya case, I love how the wrapper pull tab covers the "a" in Sonya, so it reads "Manufactured to Sony Standards." I'm sure that's purely coincidental.
One of the “Type 0” cassettes plays fine, and I am recording “Light’s Out”, a radio horror show on a Certron C60 cassette from the 1990’s, and it was a 1940’s radio show created by Arch Oboler, and I have 14 of them in my collection that I got at a thrift store last year.
Thank you so much for this show, I grew up in the 60’s taping off the radio with a cheap shoebox tape recorder on clearance. I never lost my enjoyment of tapes and the ability to record onto a physical medium that didn’t cost an arm and a leg!
@@Popart-xh2fd One should examine a Yoko tape closer (hibs etc..), they might be Saehan or SKC made? These even look Japanese made (TDK?) www.ebay.com/p/Yoko-90-Vintage-Audio-Cassette-Tape/1532697266
9:28 I can’t help but notice that where it says ‘manufactured to Sonya standards’ on the J-card, the red tear-off strip conveniently covers the A of Sonya... probably a coincidence but still...
I really suspect something is off with the calibration facilities on the Denon deck. I suggest that all the tapes deserve a rematch using the Dragon, in the interest of science.
A video of me spending 20 minutes trying to dial them in. That would be boring, although I think a follow up using the Revox auto cal might be in order.
@@CassetteComeback Yeah, I'd definately check 'em out on a different deck. The tapes are, probably, still gonna sound crap, but'll at least it'll be worth it just to see if the Denon's working OK. Did you get much crap off the head, pinch-roller etc, after this?
I was bought 3 of those Hi Tech tapes by my parents. Two were wound into the case the wrong way, so I was recording on to the rear of the tape, and one had faint traces of someone else's recording on the tape that had not been fully erased!
My goodness this was exactly the same for me in the mid 90s. My dad got me the hi tech tapes and when I played them there was faint music fading in and out like it had been bulk erased. Then another had the tape backwards. So this must have been a known thing with them. If only I had kept them and used Shazam to recognise the tunes!
I'm pretty sure the factory pumping out these "Type-0" cassettes was sourcing all kinds of tape to salvage which is why it seems to be luck of the draw. Some look surprisingly good and others look like sandpaper and yet others are cut strips of videocassette tape.
Also is another sign of it that says clear sound instead of saying low noise? I remember Poundland doing decent type 1 cassettes under their signalex brand but I was quite disappointed when they stopped doing it and replaced them with the hot cassette which is terrible even in a cassette deck. I’m also doing a video of the difference between cheapo cassettes vs more expensive better quality type one. The memorex dbs from either 85/87 is really good sound quality even if you’ve recorded music from a shoebox cassette recorder with a line out going into the mic input of the cassette recorder. As i used it he signalex to make mix tapes from cds in a. Cd/cassette player in one. But I was young at the time so I didn’t know about quality of tapes I was like if it sounded good then I was impressed now I know about quality I now want to buy more expensive good quality good sounding tapes instead of paying a £1 for tapes , especially now I have a cassette deck with cr02 type 1 and type 4.
For years as a kid, these "Type 0" tapes were prevalent in my life. I didn't become a tape snob until I was in my teens and had better tape decks and Walkmans.
These “Type 0” cassettes can be used for 1980’s computers like Tandy and Commodore 64 where you can save data and information on there which is a great idea if you want to get a Commodore 64 and a data cassette recorder.
One more thing, it's audio related. I love the sound of my Mazda V6 engine, a good sound system is nearly pointless. Every piece of my exhaust was chosen carefully not to interfere with the sound. Engine sound was a part of the design. Similarly Ford spent millions on the sound engineering in the modular V8 in the Mustang 4.6l 2v all the way up to the 5.0l, 5.2l, 5.4l V8s. 5 and 10 cyl. engines are where it's at though. Exotic, musical sounds.
As of now, I have a bunch of “Type 0” cassettes that I got off of eBay. Mostly Certron’s, Quality Tape, Master Sound, Sterling, CVS, Gemini, and others. Plus a bunch from the 1970’s that were after market brands like Kmart and others. I also have a bunch of Gemini MP 60-minute cassettes and they were “Type 0”. I got it at a Red Hook Yard Sale a few months ago, and it belongs to my collection. These were commonly used for saving data on a computer like Tandy and Commodore 64 back in the 1980’s if you have a data cassette recorder, you can save some data for playing a video game.
The older Acme "type 1" tapes with the red, green or blue arrows printed on must be some of the worst type 0 tapes ever. They were also sold under the brand "Mark" ”Meltronic” and a few other brands here in Sweden. They were High Noise Low Output sandpaper tapes in a 45 degree flexible shell 😁
Btw the Maxim looks suspiciously like the terribly bad Acme MS-400. Same shell. Other paper label. Same with ITN. Btw the ITN is trying to mimic BASF (chrome from 70:s) and not TDK 😄
I bought one of these unknown tape brands once and recorded over it. It sounded so awful I threw it away. And I don't throw tapes away I collect them as much as I could. It was that bad.
You actually found a semi-usable Maxim tape? Something seriously wrong there! They were usually far worse. The Yoko is more representative of a lot of market stall tapes... She'll is not moulded right so the tape comes off the hubs and gets itself in a right old mess. Often this would happen after half an hour and the tape would end up wound all over the recorder's mechanism and sorting that out would be next to impossible without taking the recorder to bits. I've had a couple of the Incas tapes, they're later than most of the ones you have there and mine were fairly usable. Pyral were quite respected, and I had some Sprint tapes back in the day. I think they were just standard 70s LN tapes, voice grade but OK for what they were. They were priced between the real type zeroes and say a Sony CHF, and they perform to the price. Pretty good for computer games and reliable. The clear-shell tape was made by Swire Magnetic rather than the usual HK tapes that I think were made by 100 different small factories, usually by hand. Swire were a more professional outfit, they made a range of tapes from crap to quite decent. I have some Cambra tapes from the same maker and although the tape is sandpaper they sound OK. One thing to note with these type zeroes is they usually had 1/8", rather than the slightly wider cassette standard. This meant that the right channel was usually down on the left. I think this was because they were slitting computer tape that was 1/2" into fours.
Swire also made Laser brand cassettes which was “Type 0”, and also Laser XL and UHDII cassettes, and also made Scotch BX cassettes from the 1980’s that aren’t “Type 0’s” Scotch did put out BX back in the mid to late 1980’s and the early 1990’s when they switched it to a clear shell using SKC hubs.
@@Musicradio77Network Swire also made "DSC" cassettes for Dixons in the early 1980s, these were a clear plastic case containing five C60s with different-coloured clear shells (yellow, blue, red, magenta and green) but no J-cards. These were decent enough as well.
Ahh, I think you just solved an old mystery for me: I had a hitachi boom box with twin vu meters, the left was often higher than the right after recording..
@@nigelbarrett4936 I also have a couple of Scotch BX cassettes including the 1987 and 1988 versions that had "Type 0" shells and hubs that looks like a "Type 0", and the tape looks perfect on the inside, and it was not a "Type 0". I tried it on my deck and it plays great without any distortion when it reached at +5 on the level meter.
And now, the “Type 0” madness continues. I remember back in the 1980’s and 1990’s, I had many of the cassettes that were “Type 0’s” like ToneMaster, Silver Shadow, Newnational, Melsonic, Muratape, Royal Sound, Martronic, Quality Tape, Certron, Professional Quality, Star, Hoyin, Nippon, Hi-Tek, Astrosonic, Recoton, CVS, Sentry, Concertape from Radio Shack, Sim, and just to name a few. I had recordings of Old Time Radio shows on cassettes that were “Type 0’s” and they were fine, but I don’t think it can cause “Dropout City” whatever Tony says all the time. ONN is a Walmart brand that I am aware of. I have a batch of “Type 0’s” In my collection, a few of them are from the 1970’s. Some of them are rare like Capitol and Columbia which were the two major record companies made “Type 0” cassettes. I usually buy “Type 0’” tapes at cheap dollar stores back in the 1980’s and 1990’s like Woolworth’s, grocery stores, Winn’s Discount, $0.99 stores, Odd-Lot, and others in Brooklyn, NY back in the days, but I missed buying “Type 0” cassettes. That TAC branded cassettes that I have not seen had the same label layout than the early TDK cassette did back in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s, and the Big Ben “Type 0” cassette from the 1980’s.
I had a few Melsonics. The cassette labels all fell off of them, as well as sounding rather dodgy, but hey... they were only 20p at my local "cheap" shop.
I think your auto calibration has gone a bit wonky. I stopped using my Denon of the same model because it was making a lot of good tapes sound awful. That might account for why it was calibrating all those type 0 cassettes rather than saying "reference". It is probably just calibrating everything in some arbitrary way.
I also remember Melsonic and HH cassettes at 50p a sleeve, they didn't have cases at all which meant they could be easily damaged and before recording on them had to have the slack wound with a pencil or hexagonal biro pen.
@@RoughJustice2k18 And of course, Gemini, one of the many cassettes here in the US that classified a “Type 0”. It was made by Gemini Industries in Clifton, NJ where it can be found in department stores like Caldor, Jamesway, Ames, and Bradlees for years. Now I can record “Hallmark Playhouse” on my Gemini MP60 “Type 0” cassettes, and I have a bunch of them.
Cool channel. Just discovered it. I am of the cassette generation starting in the early mid 80s, when some of my friends and I would only insist on using BASF Chrome and the like. My main interest in cassettes going to the present time is as a musician. Did a lot of home recording on Tascam 4 track cassette recorders which are biased for Type II and often run at double speed, or have the option of running at half/normal/double speeds. I still have my Tascam 424 machine which I bought ca. 1995. Beautiful machine, well looked after, still use it!
I must agree with the fellow that had the comment below this one that a rematch should be done with all of these tapes with the Nakamichi Dragon. Like the man said in the name of science you should try that, Tony! I have a few tapes that I got over the last few months that I'm assuming are going to be type 0 tapes and I haven't gotten the chance to try them yet. They're all attractive tapes and shells. One of them just says Audio Tape on it. I have no idea where it's from or who makes it because there is literally nothing else on it. There's another one called Gemini. Clear shell not too bad looking but I have a bad feeling about that one. There is also two Onn that I grabbed at Walmart just because to be honest, I didn't know Walmart carried any kind of blank cassette tapes and they just happened to catch to catch my eye and I said I've got to try these because they are actually to me a very attractive looking tape. The shells are a little shabby but other than that they look really clean. Once again I haven't tried any of these out yet. So far out of all the tapes I acquired in the last year that I assumed we're going to be type O cassette tapes, I purchased a Scotch Highlander in a really cool cassette case that you just slide the tape out of the right side. Similar to the really cool Memorex MRX 2 or Memorex MRX 3 shells where you just slide the tape in and out of the case. I have a Yamaha KX 390 cassette deck and also a Nakamich CR-2A cassette deck and one of the really cool things that's on the Yamaha KX 390 is a play trim feature. Even after you bias a cassette tape and record on it you can still adjust the frequency during playback with the play trim which I think is bloody brilliant! This Scotch Highlander cassette tape recorded So dull on the Nakamichi cassette deck but using the Yamaha cassette deck which I prefer over the Nakamichi any day, the Yamaha actually made this Highlander tape sound listenable. If I were you Tony, I crack this down to two choices: a rematch with all those tapes in your Nakamichi Dragon or use them for spare parts. And if that doesn't suit find a nice little Cliff nearby your home and throw them over the cliff and have some fun! This was a really fun video, Tony! Thanks!
Tony that Hi Tech type brought back memories! When I was 10 years old in the mid 90s I purchased some off the local market. Believe it or not when I put one in my deck there was music already recorded on them but I had been erased (badly) you could hear music fading faintly in and out. I always wonder if it was the market store owner who had used them and wrapped them back up?! A mystery.... and confess I still have one with some childhood memories on it along with another cheapo brand ' :Power makes sense' .... brilliant video mate
Hey Tony @8:15 you said something interesting I wondered before.. about reuse of VHS Stock tape to audio cassette.. do you have evidence this was actually done? It makes sense to me as that tape can be high quality..but wondering what the cross over implication could be. Is there a forum discussion about this somewhere.. i looked but couldn't find it. are you on Tapeheads?
I have a few "type 0", the only use I found for them is creative music production: record on them an already distorted guitar riff or ostinato, or synth pads or drones, the more high frequencies the better and use them in a pinch with other good sounding tracks for contrast, Nine Inch Nails style. Or make a loop and record it playing and dying away like William Basinski did with The Disintegration Loops. Here in Italy I went into a local family owned tech shop, very old, one of those with the granny behind the counter and the nephews serving the clients. I spotted chrome tapes in the internal windows, custom made, with the name of the shop as the brand! They looked a bit like my (actually my fater's) old Denon and TDK with non trasparent case. I thought "they look kinda good, chrome tapes are rare... let's buy 10 of them!". I went home and tried one. It crapped on my GX-75! Wobbly, drop outs and low signal, of course, and particles all aver the place. I went straight to the shop for a refund. Of course they put the other 9 tapes still sealed in the window again O_o. They offered me to scout around for some Sony HF... I said "no thanks, I already have a stash of TDK D and Maxell UR fresh and sealed (bought them for cheap some 10+ years ago before the frenzy), I just wanted chrome..." Lessons learned: - old chrome tapes decay like milk out of the fridge in a hot summer day. - don't trust no name brands. - be happy with nice modern type 1 and a good deck. - forget about chrome and metal tapes (I have some, but not as much as I would :-P).
These “Type 0” cassettes can be used for computer data via Commodore 64, or it can be used to record voice on a shoebox cassette recorder with a built-in microphone.
I just ordered two Scotch BX cassettes from eBay today, and they are the later versions from about 1988, but I have a couple of 1986 BX and they had cheap “Type 0” shells and the tape itself looks good and sound pretty darn good.
This Video was very satisfying for me because even I could hear the SONYa drop out at -20 :D That gives me hope that I, as a non "audiophile", will still be able to make decent recordings on decent quality tapes. But at the same time I'm shocked that tapes of that bad of a quality existed and were allowed to be sold. A waste of resources and an insult to any persons ears. Lucky are we present day Tapeheads that we have somebody who tests those tapes for us so we know which ones are bad. Thanks a lot for another great video!
Hi-Tech went all out on the front cover trying to be one of the old The Hits Album compilations. We have a few of them on tape the rare locked shells without screws look lovely but when you give it a flick yeah the shells feels really brittle like you can break a hole into it with your thumb and the tape very stiff to fast forward with your fingers.
Yesterday, I got 80+ cassettes off of eBay, including a bunch of “Type 0’s” from the 1970’s like Certron, Universal, InterMagnetics, and Ampex. The Ampex 530 which is the one I got, but I got two of them has a groovy looking design which is blue and it’s the 90-minute version. The 60-minute version of the Ampex 530 has a red label with the same groovy design which is a typical 1970’s “Type 0” cassette. Ampex made a bunch of “Type 0” cassettes during the 1970’s outside of its reel-to-reel tape production.
I hv 3 Nak 582Z and Denon DRM44. I AGREE with the observation on the superiority of a manual cal system, as long as they work and affect individually in each channel, so that you can compensate for minute manufscturing inconsistency in the tape and the mating surfaces along the tape heads being used. Another fine example of such a deck is the Alpine AL-300, albeit with a much narrower range of adjustment that on the Nak 580 series, 6 dB range on the AL300 versus almost 20 dB on the 580 series. None of my type 0 tapes made no exact sensitivity match on my Nak.
Fascinating look at the dark side of cassettes and the weird knock offs out there. Love it. Side Note: Took a drink every time you said "crap" in this video. I may regret that later. LOL
I have a few Soundex C-90 tapes that looks like Type-0, also have a ribbed tape, but sounds very closer to Sony EF. Also I have ACME\VENUS MS-400 in cheap black shell that sounds very bad for music, maybe good for voice recordings, and ACME MS-800 in clear True-Mechanism-like shell that sounds good. So sometimes they have levels of "quality" that actually have a difference.
I have a few T-series cassettes which were fine 10 years ago, but have become dropout city (or maybe even dropout country) now. But if we forget about the dropout, they still sound fine, no distortion at 0 dB and good high frequency response. By the way, these type 0s are on another level, didn't expect that.
Found out I've got a couple of type 0s - never knew they existed. It's a Keybee C60. Cig packet covering, Low Noise. Clear leader. Paper label. Compact Cassette. Flimsy. Can't smell anything though
Most of them were definitely a type "Negative 1", but 2 were ok. I remember a knockoff name Memex, (for an imitation of Memorex of course.) My dad got a Panasonic LTD amp with AM/FM tuner in the 70's, and some of the type zero tapes actually sounded good on it. But, they did look a bit like light brown sandpaper. Sandpaper tape..... hmmm, sounds like a song.
Why do the capstans keep spinning even after the tape is stopped and the door is open? I've never seen that in any deck (not my Denon DRM-800 or any other).
In addition this, I got a very old Sentry “Type 0” cassette from the 1970’s and it looks great, and it’s over 50 years old. The label looks like an early Certron cassette. It’s rare and very hard to find, and it was an early “Type 0”. Sentry was based in Mt. Vernon, NY, and it was known for their cheap “Type 0” cassettes.
One video I would like to see in future (you're in charge of course!) is TDK D through the years, and how each one biases up on the Aiwa. The early ones will likely need negative bias, but when did they stop needing that negative bias and become the truly trustworthy cassette? Was it the 88, the 90, the 92 or the 95? I am curious....
I've got french Pyral ATA151 reel to reel tape, is quite good. Maybe not good like BASF DP26, but with 19.5 cm/s sound is acceptable. There was no Alme tape, the real trash.
So the basf biases up good on the Sony but not the pyral,that means that the biasing circuit is giving out a weak bias(not to magnetise the tapestack) printtrough, then none of the 50u tapes would work with the deck but i tired it on a teac a4010s and a tascam 32 and it works excellent, studio quality tape for sure,and the basf,well it sheds oxide sadly and needs low bias
@@denesbesenyi2729 Thank you for this information. I will check the service manual regarding the BIAS current value. Unfortunately, data old-time reel-to-reel tapes is often not available. I also have a Polish tape recorder ZRK ZK146S by Unitra and this equipment records AGFA and ORWO tapes quite well (especially black-brown ORWO CPS 35 tape) because BIAS level is very low. But the tape recorder's parameters are quite poor, so I don't use it for good tapes (Fq 40Hz-10kHz -3dB). ZK is a souvenir from childhood.
Wow, I never thought I would see a Leda again. I remember my Dad had a few of them in the late 70s, and I recorded some Radio 4 comedy and Chart hits on them - on my prized Tensai Radio Cassette player.
When I was younger, I didn't know any better and recorded a lot of radio airchecks using these type-0 cassettes, mostly purchased from the local dollar store. Among the "brands" sold in American dollar stores in the late 90s and early 2000s were Sterling, Volt Master, Longway, Sound & Image, Sentry, and Contek. Sterling tapes were literally a scam. Sterling tapes labeled as C60 were really C30s, while Sterling C90s were just C60s. Sentry tapes never worked properly so I ended up avoiding them, and I had to literally re-shell older recordings on Sentry tapes in common Maxell UR shells just to get them to play without jamming up. Nowadays, I stick with well known and trusted brands like Maxell or TDK.
I still have some type zeros I had as a kid that I recorded from the radio as a teen in the 80s. I don't remember them sounding as bad as they do and I had much, much better hearing at the time. Point is, if they sounded alright in the 80s, they degraded way more than any other tape from that time that I have and they were all stored together. So even if you get a type zero that sounds half decent, what will it sound like in 5 years?
Reminds me of the Ingersoll, Audiosonic and Viva cheapo 90-minute tapes I bought when I was a teenager. Horrid jammers they were; the expensive high-end deck I used at the time (owned by a friend I was staying with) wrecked a bunch of those due to their flimsy design (but it played/recorded premium branded tapes perfectly). I had less hassle with G-Tape and MFP despite those being cheap as well.
the only purpose for these i could maybe think of is if someone was making ambient music or something and they wanted that super warm fuzzy very lofi tape sound. they’d be excellent for that, not something i’d want to listen to all my music on though lmao
When you talk about the cassettes loaded with re-slit video tape. I thought that video tape was not ferric type. Maybe more like a Chrome. What am I missing here?
yup! i remember the "low noise" cassettes mom used to get them for me at the grocery store when the sound got loud, it muffled it badly they were cheap and easy to find there so.....
Ive got some irish brand tapes from 83 but the housing bit the dust long ago the tape plays as good as the day i recorded it from the radio. Im sure it was a type 0 one is on ebay now for $28 where can u buy quality shells or housings
poundland had some cassettes a while back, i got 2 , havent tried them yet, but heard you sometimes find there are 'joins' in them, so not filled with a full single length!! and the colour can vary within one cassette!!
I've been dudded by VHS tapes with 2 or 3 splices in them in the mid 90's Waltham, Stereo Club, Finex, all from Cuntinghams Warehouse stores Australia, I lined up all the splices to the tape opening on the Finex tapes and got my refund on them, splices are totally unacceptable on video tapes because the dropouts are extremely annoying, lines through the picture and chopped up HiFi audio, 2012 I used a PVR to catch old re-runs of Neighbours and dub to VHS, a splice was found near end of tape and I smashed it in anger, then burned it in the wood stove, I had to re-do the recording before deleting off the Humax 9200T PVR (No USB copy)
I picked up unrecognizable brand sealed cassettes that may be considered "Type 0" today. These were super cheap 3-packs that had no shells. If you don't mind (and maybe if you do mind) I will credit you with the "type 0" designation when I reference them in my thrift haul vid.
When I was a kid I was told to avoid using those Type 0 cassettes on decent decks because they supposedly ruin the deck, making it dirty. Not sure if it's true, but those dull tapes do make me wonder...
Dog doo cassettes that aren’t worth playing on a hurdy gurdy! It was fun watching the tape trials. I’m surprised you didn’t throw them against the wall! Oh well trash is trash and you can’t put sugar on it and make it taste sweet! 🤬🤢🤣🥴
Hello Cassette Comeback. I know its off topic but I bought 3 TDK FE Ferric 90 cassettes from a local record shop (Ireland), and I recorded on them, but there seems to be a problem with them. There's little to no output on the left channel. Do you know why that could be, because TDK cassettes in my opinion are usually very good quality.
@@CassetteComeback I'd say its bad storage in the shop I bought them from, because I put in a Maxell UR90 cassette into the deck and there was no problems at all. I store my cassettes in my wardrobe on a shelf for easy access and to keep them safe from dust, dampness and heat. I had the Maxells for nearly 2 years and I only bought the TDKs about 2 weeks ago. Thanks for the reply. LONG LIVE THE CASSETTE TAPE!
@ 10:05 Yoko forgot to put one of the screws in the corner of the shell. Buy Japanese (or European) (or USA if you can find them) tapes people. I would rather use pre-owned, pre-recorded, high quality tapes than any of these. You can find good used tapes all over the place. Cases and J cards can always be replaced. Lately I've been buying new old stock, brand name, type 1 tapes off eBay. The eBay crowd is generally only interested in type 2 tapes. Good type 1 tapes can still be had for reasonable prices, but you have to shop around and be ready to pull the trigger when you spot a good deal. I use the Fox C-60 as the benchmark. Here in the U.S. I can get a box of 10 for $35. So I generally won't pay more than $3.50 per tape off eBay. Why buy a decades old type 1, when you can get fresh tapes for the same or less? Of course there are exceptions, and tape length has to be taken into consideration as well.
I recall other cheap brands that has the Compact Cassette logo including Hoyin, Star, Martronic, Melody, Melsonic, Sim, Astrosonic, and others. Except for a handful of brands from the 1970’s like Realistic and Concertape which were made by Radio Shack, Universal, Recoton, Pic Pac which was a brand that were sold by Two Guys, a defunct department store in New Jersey, and lots more.
In South Korea, most "Gilboards" used TYPE 0 blank tapes in 1990s. Example, GOLDEN STAR CT(Fake model of GoldStar DJ), and HIFI SR, SMART SD-X, HAPPY MUSIC NT(NOT Type 2), TBK(Fake brand of TDK and NOT Type 2)
The INT brought me back memories of our first stereo, an "all in one" Pilot (Goldstar) that came with one Sony CHF60 and two International 90min. These INT were terrible and the deck chewed them in every pass (even as a new, clean deck), the Sony played flawless. anyway, great collection of "0"!
i think the tokaido chrome was just a normal type 0 ferro with a bit darker tape that was marketed as a type 2, probably because they thought they could get away selling cheap fake type 2
A characteristic of "Type 0" cassettes is that there are no 4 Phillips screws in the 4 corners so that you can fix them if they jam up. Another characteristic of them is that they are 40 minutes long, or only 20 or 10 or 9 minutes long. You have to put a crumpled piece of paper in the anti-record "tab" corner to record over the crappy music which is recorded at the factory. Most of these pre-recorded cassettes are recorded on a very wide multi-track tape, and then the tape is sliced by a crappy (probably magnetized) blade, and put into the cassettes and GLUED shut !!!
Back in the early days of Cassettes where I grew up the cheaper tapes were sold as 'voice' tapes, meant for office use or verbal note taking. Then there were various levels of quality available depending on how much you wanted to pay for a tape. At first we had 30, 45, 60, and 120 minute tapes then 90 min started to show up, and by the 80's TDK even had a 180 min tape, but it had notes on it that it was not for music, and not for use in car tape players. The earliest tapes I remember were white body/green label tapes branded Ampex, they were around in the early 70's and they sold several levels of them with the super cheap tapes coming in a three pack with no case, in fact, not many came in a plastic case early on. My oldest tape holder, a red velvet lined, fake alligator skin box likely made of plastic and pressed paper or Masonite, would not hold tapes in plastic cases. Many tapes came with a slider cover that capped the exposed areas of the tape, similar to the covers that came with 8-track tapes. Ampex tapes then also came with a bar that snapped into the drive wheels to lock the tape in position. They were marketed as standard and 'High Frequency'. by the mid 70's they offered a silver and gold label version as their best quality tape, and Chromium Dioxide tapes started to appear but were super expensive and billed mostly as being for 'Live Music Recordings'. My first decent tape deck was from Panasonic, then I moved up to a Realistic, then a Pioneer, all of which were flat, lay down type decks, then I got a Harman Kardon 3500, and then an Pioneer CT-F950 which I had for a decade or more. I don't recall even seeing Metal or High Bias tapes until the very late 70's or early 80's, and for the most part we didn't bother with them for just mixing our own tapes because the source material, store bought cassette albums weren't recorded on anything all that great to start with. Being a kid in the 60's and 70's vinyl was already 'old school' and most of us started with 8 track tapes, and moved to cassette. I didn't have my first decent turn table until 1980, and at that it saw little use. Most of the old tapes I copied in the 80's are still around, most sound as good as the originals I copied them from. Even in the early days of CD's, we were recording custom playlists on 100 min. tapes off CD's. For that we used Maxell XLII most of the time, if not we bought either Memorex or Radio Shack brand tapes. In the 80's we started to see Fuji tapes, but they were hit or miss back then. They seemed to fail pretty often compared to other brands. Scotch brand tapes were big here in the mid to late 80's and likely well into the early 90's. They were one of my favorites because they lasted forever and held up well in the car. TDK made a great quality recording but they used to break a lot, so I avoided them, especially the more expensive tapes. TDK broke so often in car tape players I almost never recorded anything on one, even though I had a really good source for them super cheap at the time. (My dad drove a truck and picked up at a place that either packaged them or used them for some sort of demo, and he would bring home bags of them. They were black shells marked Hi Bias Super Avilyn Tape. What ever they were they had good volume and decent audio quality but they would sound off speed at times, as if the tape was stretching or speeding up and slowing down. Back around 1989 or so i stumbled on a deal for a pallet of Scotch XS II tapes, they were black with silver labels and those were fantastic. They were on par with the Maxell tapes and seemed to hold up as well or better after lots of use. I probably had and recorded on a few thousand of them back in the day. I likely still have a few around here and there. The worse tapes I remember were from Sony, regardless of type, they didn't last and seemed to degrade every time you played them. It seemed like they would always end up twisted or broken after very little use. The sound was okay, nothing great but I couldn't really tell the difference between their cheap tapes and their UX-S series. I don't think anything I recorded on Sony tapes survived through the years but nearly every one of my Scotch, Realistic, and Maxell tapes are just fine.
That’s great! Earlier today, I went to a place called Free to Thrift, and I found these cassettes, many of these were Sony HF’s which were used, many of these were mismatch cassettes, and there were a few “Type 0’s”, including the ones I got, along with the two cassettes are from the 1970’s which were considered as “Type 0” at the time, and there were unbranded cassettes, and these were under Pic Pac which were sold at Two Guys back in the 1970’s.
@@Musicradio77Network One tape brand I couldn't think of before was Dyna Sound, they were sold by Two Guys, KIngs, and a few electronics stores that sold mostly off brand electronics in what was basically an old feed store or barn. They were sold in single blister packs and were a cream colored case with a bright orange and yellow label. They were made in USA. At the time, they were the most expensive tapes a kid could afford at about $0.39 each. The PicPac tapes, Certron tapes came later, the three packs were mostly green label Ampex, Recoton, or Concertape from Radio Shack. The three pack tapes were really just for kids music and voice, but they were robust if nothing else. The few I've got around here still work as they should. The off brand electronics place had a bonus points system, where you would gain points each time you bought something and after 10 points you either got a free tape or a discount of a better item. I bought a Precor branded Portable AM/FM Cass. radio and with I got to pic either one package of tapes, so I took one of the Dyna Sound tapes, which they kept up front behind the counter. The three packs of Ampex 42 min. tapes were $0.59 for the pack vs $0.39 for the Dyna Sound. I still have that tape but I've got no idea what ever happened to the Precor radio. Looking back and trying to find the model of that radio, I draw a blank online but it closely resembled one sold by Sears at the time. A larger speaker, round tuning dial, and a single cassette door with some cheap looking brushed metal trim. Thinking back, it had to be around 1973 or '74 at the latest because I remember buying a new Sears radio in 1975 that got its antenna broken on a class trip to Philly for the bicentennial . (Had the extra long antenna sticking out the window when it caught a tree branch as the bus turned a corner. I still have it, it still works but with an antenna robbed from a junk portable TV I found in the trash that no longer folds down quite right.
Cassette Comeback That’s why I got a bunch of “Type 0’s” off of eBay yesterday, including a bunch of Certron, Universal, and Ampex cassettes from the 1970’s which were “Type 0” back then, and they’re all US made, not China, or Hong Kong, except the two Certron “Type 0’s” where it says “Made in Hong Kong with USA Certron Tape”, and the other Certron’s that says “USA materials, Made in Mexico”, and that considered as a “Type 0”, and it has a cool looking design that screams 80’s. The Ampex one was a “Type 0” and it was from the 1970’s that has a groovy design, and it was an Ampex 350 cassette which was a model number. Ampex has other models in the “Type 0” line like the 350, 370, 363, and other models in the cassette lineup.
The main trouble with those sort of cassettes is not only that they sound terrible but after using them you will have to give your heads a good clean because there is so much rubbish on them
That said... I did buy other budget cassettes such as Sim Cassette, Cloud 7, Justine (pack 3 without cases), Kaytape. Didn't have much pocket money in the 80's when at school (gotta keep some for sweets). But, when I bought a BASF cassette, it blow those out of the water and never looked back.
Andrew Coulson I also got a ton of Certron cassettes from the 80’s off of eBay along with many “Type 0’s” from the 70’s like Universal and Ampex. Ampex was a hit or miss brand where they put out cassette tapes in the 1970’s outside of its reel-to-reel tape division. They usually made a series of pre-recorded cassettes including albums from labels such as MGM, Warner Bros., Reprise, London, Parrot, Atlantic, Motown, United Artists, Kapp, and more where it was manufactured from 1967 through the 1970’s. They also put out “Type 0” cassette tapes including the model lineup like the 350, 358, 361, 362, 363, and 370. I got two Ampex 350’s and doesn’t sound too bad for a “Type 0”. It has a cool looking groovy design which makes it look so cool.
Oh, Tony you always make me laugh with your snarky comments. I'm definitely getting some of these for the novelty and aesthetic but not without swapping them with a UR or TDK D. hearing the "aluminum foil" (as my friends call it) distortion made me writhe and die a little inside. It reminds me of when I used to record on a shitty lil shoebox player. Oh, the horror. But hey, we all start somewhere..I'm so glad I have a nice lil technics now:,)
Yes, I remember TONY, KDK and BASK very well. Here in Portugal we had a lousy brand Sonovox that used to shed oxide on the heads until the recording was inaudible :) Also Roadstar, Berec, and a few others :) All type -1 actually :)
@@DeltaFox1970 O logotipo era 'inspirado' no da BASF :) As primeiras eram verdes escuras e mais tarde apareceram umas laranja, e a caixa era tal e qual as das BASF :) A única diferença era mesmo o logo e a marca :P :)
Remember that the official "Type" designations didn't exist until 1981. Before then there was an especially large variation in the quality and specifications of standard ferric tapes as tape formulations kept changing and improving every year -- to such an extent that some decks, like those from BIC, had separate settings for Low Bias and Normal Bias, to better cover this wide range. On a deck like that, a lot of what you call "Type 0" tapes would probably perform better using the Low Bias setting.
Insightful as always sir!
In addition, I got another ONN brand cassettes which is a 2-pack I bought for $3 at Walmart. And it was utter trash than all of the “Type 0’s” from the past. The J-Card is different than the previous J-Card that used a TDK knock-off, but it was yellow, with no brand name, and no mentioned of “Type 1” or Normal Bias, and no length. Just a standard 90-minute cassette with no “C-90” on there, and no Compact Cassette logo. ONN never made a 60-minute version. The shell is clear, but you can clearly see it says “A side” and “B side”. No index, no brand, no mention of “Normal Bias” or “Low Noise”, and no length that says “C-90” and no Compact Cassette logo, and there’s no label. What is up with ONN these days.
I recall in Finland they talked about Japanese and European setting for the bias TDK D was one and AD the other. I assume that European would be the low bias.
I saw a cassette deck from 70's, which had tape type switcher: LN, LH, CrO² and FeCr.
@@Musicradio77Network I have their usb flash drive. Its feels cheap but works well (and is probably more reliable then that shitty 2 pack of "16gib" usb drives that ended up being 32gib with one failing).
On the Sonya case, I love how the wrapper pull tab covers the "a" in Sonya, so it reads "Manufactured to Sony Standards." I'm sure that's purely coincidental.
Good spot 😁
I saw that too 😂
@13:16 it's a cumpact cassette :D
37:08 it wasn't a mistake
it was a warning from the tapedeck to stop putting garbage tape inside it
One of the “Type 0” cassettes plays fine, and I am recording “Light’s Out”, a radio horror show on a Certron C60 cassette from the 1990’s, and it was a 1940’s radio show created by Arch Oboler, and I have 14 of them in my collection that I got at a thrift store last year.
Thank you so much for this show, I grew up in the 60’s taping off the radio with a cheap shoebox tape recorder on clearance. I never lost my enjoyment of tapes and the ability to record onto a physical medium that didn’t cost an arm and a leg!
YOKO CASSETTE... GUARANTEED TO MAKE YOUR RECORDING SOUND LIKE A TURKEY WARBLER....
But that was a known manufacturer.in that time..
'tape squeal' :))))
@@Popart-xh2fd Yes Yoko had TV sets, Stereo components and car radios, I think they were a Korean or Taiwan made brand
@@Schlipperschlopper But being Korean is surprising how bad their tapes are!
@@Popart-xh2fd One should examine a Yoko tape closer (hibs etc..), they might be Saehan or SKC made? These even look Japanese made (TDK?) www.ebay.com/p/Yoko-90-Vintage-Audio-Cassette-Tape/1532697266
9:28 I can’t help but notice that where it says ‘manufactured to Sonya standards’ on the J-card, the red tear-off strip conveniently covers the A of Sonya... probably a coincidence but still...
Well spotted!
I really suspect something is off with the calibration facilities on the Denon deck. I suggest that all the tapes deserve a rematch using the Dragon, in the interest of science.
A video of me spending 20 minutes trying to dial them in. That would be boring, although I think a follow up using the Revox auto cal might be in order.
@@CassetteComeback not all of them. only 2-3 of them, just to see the difference.
@@CassetteComeback it will make an interesting video to see, for all of us
@@CassetteComeback Yeah, I'd definately check 'em out on a different deck. The tapes are, probably, still gonna sound crap, but'll at least it'll be worth it just to see if the Denon's working OK. Did you get much crap off the head, pinch-roller etc, after this?
There's something on the way...
I was bought 3 of those Hi Tech tapes by my parents. Two were wound into the case the wrong way, so I was recording on to the rear of the tape, and one had faint traces of someone else's recording on the tape that had not been fully erased!
My goodness this was exactly the same for me in the mid 90s. My dad got me the hi tech tapes and when I played them there was faint music fading in and out like it had been bulk erased. Then another had the tape backwards. So this must have been a known thing with them. If only I had kept them and used Shazam to recognise the tunes!
@@matthewrichards88 I never thought of that. I kept the cases and used them for other tapes
I'm pretty sure the factory pumping out these "Type-0" cassettes was sourcing all kinds of tape to salvage which is why it seems to be luck of the draw. Some look surprisingly good and others look like sandpaper and yet others are cut strips of videocassette tape.
where did you get that tape winder? would love to get my hands on one of those! Cheers
Also is another sign of it that says clear sound instead of saying low noise?
I remember Poundland doing decent type 1 cassettes under their signalex brand but I was quite disappointed when they stopped doing it and replaced them with the hot cassette which is terrible even in a cassette deck. I’m also doing a video of the difference between cheapo cassettes vs more expensive better quality type one. The memorex dbs from either 85/87 is really good sound quality even if you’ve recorded music from a shoebox cassette recorder with a line out going into the mic input of the cassette recorder. As i used it he signalex to make mix tapes from cds in a. Cd/cassette player in one. But I was young at the time so I didn’t know about quality of tapes I was like if it sounded good then I was impressed now I know about quality I now want to buy more expensive good quality good sounding tapes instead of paying a £1 for tapes , especially now I have a cassette deck with cr02 type 1 and type 4.
For some reason I really, really like the aesthetics of "type 0" cassettes, especially those in clear shells like the TAC.
remember being given some of this hi-tech tapes back in the 90s and thought my deck had gone wrong it sounded so bad! great video
For years as a kid, these "Type 0" tapes were prevalent in my life. I didn't become a tape snob until I was in my teens and had better tape decks and Walkmans.
These “Type 0” cassettes can be used for 1980’s computers like Tandy and Commodore 64 where you can save data and information on there which is a great idea if you want to get a Commodore 64 and a data cassette recorder.
They'll be very unhealthy to the heads and should be avoided though.
Is the Yoko missing a screw??
Yeah. Proper crap them...
The most interesting thing is that Maxim logo: while you were claiming it was a Maxell soundalike, it uses the same exact font as the Mazda logo!
Good spot.
Ironically, there was a vacuum tube manufacturer in the 30’s and 40’s named Mazda. No relation as far as I know.
I love how cool maxim cassettes look,used to have one back in the 90's.
Mazda decent cars, middle of the road, some analog and fun, the best models came with a tape deck option. Not sure on the vacuum tubes
One more thing, it's audio related. I love the sound of my Mazda V6 engine, a good sound system is nearly pointless. Every piece of my exhaust was chosen carefully not to interfere with the sound. Engine sound was a part of the design. Similarly Ford spent millions on the sound engineering in the modular V8 in the Mustang 4.6l 2v all the way up to the 5.0l, 5.2l, 5.4l V8s. 5 and 10 cyl. engines are where it's at though. Exotic, musical sounds.
As of now, I have a bunch of “Type 0” cassettes that I got off of eBay. Mostly Certron’s, Quality Tape, Master Sound, Sterling, CVS, Gemini, and others. Plus a bunch from the 1970’s that were after market brands like Kmart and others.
I also have a bunch of Gemini MP 60-minute cassettes and they were “Type 0”. I got it at a Red Hook Yard Sale a few months ago, and it belongs to my collection.
These were commonly used for saving data on a computer like Tandy and Commodore 64 back in the 1980’s if you have a data cassette recorder, you can save some data for playing a video game.
Huh, id expect most computers would fail reading those tapes.
@@qwertykeyboard5901it’s terrible for music but decent for data storage
@@qwertykeyboard5901 You'd be surprised
What is the winding machine you’re using? Are they still available anywhere?
I did have some, but they sold quickly. Keep checking eBay.
The older Acme "type 1" tapes with the red, green or blue arrows printed on must be some of the worst type 0 tapes ever. They were also sold under the brand "Mark" ”Meltronic” and a few other brands here in Sweden. They were High Noise Low Output sandpaper tapes in a 45 degree flexible shell 😁
Btw the Maxim looks suspiciously like the terribly bad Acme MS-400. Same shell. Other paper label. Same with ITN. Btw the ITN is trying to mimic BASF (chrome from 70:s) and not TDK 😄
I suggest you keep these cassettes for spare parts (apart from the tape inside them) :-)
The tape housing and parts are often so bad that there’s no point saving parts as spares. You will only end up scrapping the useful donar tape
That YOKO even had a screw missing from the shell. 9:23
Very interesting video.
Never heard TYPE 0 mentioned before.
Look like the sort of tapes your mum would bring home when you asked her.
They're not a real Type, just slang for cheap cassettes that were barely usable
I bought one of these unknown tape brands once and recorded over it. It sounded so awful I threw it away. And I don't throw tapes away I collect them as much as I could. It was that bad.
You actually found a semi-usable Maxim tape? Something seriously wrong there! They were usually far worse.
The Yoko is more representative of a lot of market stall tapes... She'll is not moulded right so the tape comes off the hubs and gets itself in a right old mess. Often this would happen after half an hour and the tape would end up wound all over the recorder's mechanism and sorting that out would be next to impossible without taking the recorder to bits.
I've had a couple of the Incas tapes, they're later than most of the ones you have there and mine were fairly usable.
Pyral were quite respected, and I had some Sprint tapes back in the day. I think they were just standard 70s LN tapes, voice grade but OK for what they were. They were priced between the real type zeroes and say a Sony CHF, and they perform to the price. Pretty good for computer games and reliable.
The clear-shell tape was made by Swire Magnetic rather than the usual HK tapes that I think were made by 100 different small factories, usually by hand. Swire were a more professional outfit, they made a range of tapes from crap to quite decent. I have some Cambra tapes from the same maker and although the tape is sandpaper they sound OK.
One thing to note with these type zeroes is they usually had 1/8", rather than the slightly wider cassette standard. This meant that the right channel was usually down on the left. I think this was because they were slitting computer tape that was 1/2" into fours.
Swire also made Laser brand cassettes which was “Type 0”, and also Laser XL and UHDII cassettes, and also made Scotch BX cassettes from the 1980’s that aren’t “Type 0’s” Scotch did put out BX back in the mid to late 1980’s and the early 1990’s when they switched it to a clear shell using SKC hubs.
@@Musicradio77Network Swire also made "DSC" cassettes for Dixons in the early 1980s, these were a clear plastic case containing five C60s with different-coloured clear shells (yellow, blue, red, magenta and green) but no J-cards. These were decent enough as well.
Ahh, I think you just solved an old mystery for me: I had a hitachi boom box with twin vu meters, the left was often higher than the right after recording..
@@nigelbarrett4936 I also have a couple of Scotch BX cassettes including the 1987 and 1988 versions that had "Type 0" shells and hubs that looks like a "Type 0", and the tape looks perfect on the inside, and it was not a "Type 0". I tried it on my deck and it plays great without any distortion when it reached at +5 on the level meter.
And now, the “Type 0” madness continues. I remember back in the 1980’s and 1990’s, I had many of the cassettes that were “Type 0’s” like ToneMaster, Silver Shadow, Newnational, Melsonic, Muratape, Royal Sound, Martronic, Quality Tape, Certron, Professional Quality, Star, Hoyin, Nippon, Hi-Tek, Astrosonic, Recoton, CVS, Sentry, Concertape from Radio Shack, Sim, and just to name a few.
I had recordings of Old Time Radio shows on cassettes that were “Type 0’s” and they were fine, but I don’t think it can cause “Dropout City” whatever Tony says all the time. ONN is a Walmart brand that I am aware of. I have a batch of “Type 0’s” In my collection, a few of them are from the 1970’s. Some of them are rare like Capitol and Columbia which were the two major record companies made “Type 0” cassettes.
I usually buy “Type 0’” tapes at cheap dollar stores back in the 1980’s and 1990’s like Woolworth’s, grocery stores, Winn’s Discount, $0.99 stores, Odd-Lot, and others in Brooklyn, NY back in the days, but I missed buying “Type 0” cassettes.
That TAC branded cassettes that I have not seen had the same label layout than the early TDK cassette did back in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s, and the Big Ben “Type 0” cassette from the 1980’s.
I had a few Melsonics. The cassette labels all fell off of them, as well as sounding rather dodgy, but hey... they were only 20p at my local "cheap" shop.
I think your auto calibration has gone a bit wonky. I stopped using my Denon of the same model because it was making a lot of good tapes sound awful. That might account for why it was calibrating all those type 0 cassettes rather than saying "reference". It is probably just calibrating everything in some arbitrary way.
Yeah. I was surprised. Something went awry there.
I love how you made videos out of your friends blank tapes he couldn’t sell. Keep them coming! I’ve enjoyed every videos you’ve made
YOKO Have even one screw missing.
I also remember Melsonic and HH cassettes at 50p a sleeve, they didn't have cases at all which meant they could be easily damaged and before recording on them had to have the slack wound with a pencil or hexagonal biro pen.
I tried to record some Beatles music on a Yoko tape, but it kept breaking up.... 😀
5Rounds Rapid hehe I get it
Can confirm the Hi Techs were indeed absolute rubbish....
So were the International/Silver Shadow/Silver Sound/Amtec branded ones and G-Tape as well.
The only good thing about the Hi Techs was the cases came in handy for other cassettes!
@@RoughJustice2k18 And of course, Gemini, one of the many cassettes here in the US that classified a “Type 0”. It was made by Gemini Industries in Clifton, NJ where it can be found in department stores like Caldor, Jamesway, Ames, and Bradlees for years.
Now I can record “Hallmark Playhouse” on my Gemini MP60 “Type 0” cassettes, and I have a bunch of them.
Cool channel. Just discovered it. I am of the cassette generation starting in the early mid 80s, when some of my friends and I would only insist on using BASF Chrome and the like.
My main interest in cassettes going to the present time is as a musician. Did a lot of home recording on Tascam 4 track cassette recorders
which are biased for Type II and often run at double speed, or have the option of running at half/normal/double speeds.
I still have my Tascam 424 machine which I bought ca. 1995. Beautiful machine, well looked after, still use it!
I must agree with the fellow that had the comment below this one that a rematch should be done with all of these tapes with the Nakamichi Dragon. Like the man said in the name of science you should try that, Tony! I have a few tapes that I got over the last few months that I'm assuming are going to be type 0 tapes and I haven't gotten the chance to try them yet. They're all attractive tapes and shells. One of them just says Audio Tape on it. I have no idea where it's from or who makes it because there is literally nothing else on it. There's another one called Gemini. Clear shell not too bad looking but I have a bad feeling about that one. There is also two Onn that I grabbed at Walmart just because to be honest, I didn't know Walmart carried any kind of blank cassette tapes and they just happened to catch to catch my eye and I said I've got to try these because they are actually to me a very attractive looking tape. The shells are a little shabby but other than that they look really clean. Once again I haven't tried any of these out yet. So far out of all the tapes I acquired in the last year that I assumed we're going to be type O cassette tapes, I purchased a Scotch Highlander in a really cool cassette case that you just slide the tape out of the right side. Similar to the really cool Memorex MRX 2 or Memorex MRX 3 shells where you just slide the tape in and out of the case. I have a Yamaha KX 390 cassette deck and also a Nakamich CR-2A cassette deck and one of the really cool things that's on the Yamaha KX 390 is a play trim feature. Even after you bias a cassette tape and record on it you can still adjust the frequency during playback with the play trim which I think is bloody brilliant! This Scotch Highlander cassette tape recorded So dull on the Nakamichi cassette deck but using the Yamaha cassette deck which I prefer over the Nakamichi any day, the Yamaha actually made this Highlander tape sound listenable. If I were you Tony, I crack this down to two choices: a rematch with all those tapes in your Nakamichi Dragon or use them for spare parts. And if that doesn't suit find a nice little Cliff nearby your home and throw them over the cliff and have some fun! This was a really fun video, Tony! Thanks!
Maxim has a stolen font from mazda ?
Tony that Hi Tech type brought back memories! When I was 10 years old in the mid 90s I purchased some off the local market. Believe it or not when I put one in my deck there was music already recorded on them but I had been erased (badly) you could hear music fading faintly in and out. I always wonder if it was the market store owner who had used them and wrapped them back up?! A mystery.... and confess I still have one with some childhood memories on it along with another cheapo brand ' :Power makes sense' .... brilliant video mate
Nostalgia is the main reason to buy these.
Hey Tony @8:15 you said something interesting I wondered before.. about reuse of VHS Stock tape to audio cassette.. do you have evidence this was actually done? It makes sense to me as that tape can be high quality..but wondering what the cross over implication could be. Is there a forum discussion about this somewhere.. i looked but couldn't find it. are you on Tapeheads?
I don't remember exactly, but in this thread someone else mentions it, but I've no proof. It's just a theory.
www.tapeheads.net/showthread.php?t=17956
@@CassetteComebackIt was re-slit video tape where they used for cheap “Type 0” cassettes like Certron, Sentry, Gemini, Quality Tape, and others.
Omg Tony I did send you some crap didn't I ??? :-O
Yeah, but they made 2 great videos, so thanks so much for them 👍
That Yoko joke made me chuckle, good one you earned a sub from me
The Tokaido Ferro Low Noise C90 is actually made with with reject video tape. That's why it sounds so bad and wrinkled.
Yeah, I'd heard this was happening...
I have a few "type 0", the only use I found for them is creative music production: record on them an already distorted guitar riff or ostinato, or synth pads or drones, the more high frequencies the better and use them in a pinch with other good sounding tracks for contrast, Nine Inch Nails style. Or make a loop and record it playing and dying away like William Basinski did with The Disintegration Loops.
Here in Italy I went into a local family owned tech shop, very old, one of those with the granny behind the counter and the nephews serving the clients. I spotted chrome tapes in the internal windows, custom made, with the name of the shop as the brand! They looked a bit like my (actually my fater's) old Denon and TDK with non trasparent case. I thought "they look kinda good, chrome tapes are rare... let's buy 10 of them!". I went home and tried one. It crapped on my GX-75! Wobbly, drop outs and low signal, of course, and particles all aver the place. I went straight to the shop for a refund. Of course they put the other 9 tapes still sealed in the window again O_o. They offered me to scout around for some Sony HF... I said "no thanks, I already have a stash of TDK D and Maxell UR fresh and sealed (bought them for cheap some 10+ years ago before the frenzy), I just wanted chrome..."
Lessons learned:
- old chrome tapes decay like milk out of the fridge in a hot summer day.
- don't trust no name brands.
- be happy with nice modern type 1 and a good deck.
- forget about chrome and metal tapes (I have some, but not as much as I would :-P).
These “Type 0” cassettes can be used for computer data via Commodore 64, or it can be used to record voice on a shoebox cassette recorder with a built-in microphone.
I just ordered two Scotch BX cassettes from eBay today, and they are the later versions from about 1988, but I have a couple of 1986 BX and they had cheap “Type 0” shells and the tape itself looks good and sound pretty darn good.
This Video was very satisfying for me because even I could hear the SONYa drop out at -20 :D That gives me hope that I, as a non "audiophile", will still be able to make decent recordings on decent quality tapes.
But at the same time I'm shocked that tapes of that bad of a quality existed and were allowed to be sold. A waste of resources and an insult to any persons ears.
Lucky are we present day Tapeheads that we have somebody who tests those tapes for us so we know which ones are bad.
Thanks a lot for another great video!
Hi-Tech went all out on the front cover trying to be one of the old The Hits Album compilations.
We have a few of them on tape the rare locked shells without screws look lovely but when you give it a flick yeah the shells feels really brittle like you can break a hole into it with your thumb and the tape very stiff to fast forward with your fingers.
Yesterday, I got 80+ cassettes off of eBay, including a bunch of “Type 0’s” from the 1970’s like Certron, Universal, InterMagnetics, and Ampex. The Ampex 530 which is the one I got, but I got two of them has a groovy looking design which is blue and it’s the 90-minute version. The 60-minute version of the Ampex 530 has a red label with the same groovy design which is a typical 1970’s “Type 0” cassette. Ampex made a bunch of “Type 0” cassettes during the 1970’s outside of its reel-to-reel tape production.
The Denon deck has unreliable self calibration... that's obvious with the level differences.
Yeah. Don't know why. Worked perfectly when I used it a month or so ago....
I hv 3 Nak 582Z and Denon DRM44. I AGREE with the observation on the superiority of a manual cal system, as long as they work and affect individually in each channel, so that you can compensate for minute manufscturing inconsistency in the tape and the mating surfaces along the tape heads being used.
Another fine example of such a deck is the Alpine AL-300, albeit with a much narrower range of adjustment that on the Nak 580 series, 6 dB range on the AL300 versus almost 20 dB on the 580 series. None of my type 0 tapes made no exact sensitivity match on my Nak.
Fascinating look at the dark side of cassettes and the weird knock offs out there. Love it. Side Note: Took a drink every time you said "crap" in this video. I may regret that later. LOL
😂
I have a few Soundex C-90 tapes that looks like Type-0, also have a ribbed tape, but sounds very closer to Sony EF. Also I have ACME\VENUS MS-400 in cheap black shell that sounds very bad for music, maybe good for voice recordings, and ACME MS-800 in clear True-Mechanism-like shell that sounds good. So sometimes they have levels of "quality" that actually have a difference.
I have a few T-series cassettes which were fine 10 years ago, but have become dropout city (or maybe even dropout country) now. But if we forget about the dropout, they still sound fine, no distortion at 0 dB and good high frequency response.
By the way, these type 0s are on another level, didn't expect that.
They had to pay royalties to use the CC logo?
Found out I've got a couple of type 0s - never knew they existed. It's a Keybee C60. Cig packet covering, Low Noise. Clear leader. Paper label. Compact Cassette. Flimsy. Can't smell anything though
Most of them were definitely a type "Negative 1", but 2 were ok. I remember a knockoff name Memex, (for an imitation of Memorex of course.) My dad got a Panasonic LTD amp with AM/FM tuner in the 70's, and some of the type zero tapes actually sounded good on it. But, they did look a bit like light brown sandpaper. Sandpaper tape..... hmmm, sounds like a song.
Memex... That "brand" name would sell very well these days....
Why do the capstans keep spinning even after the tape is stopped and the door is open? I've never seen that in any deck (not my Denon DRM-800 or any other).
In addition this, I got a very old Sentry “Type 0” cassette from the 1970’s and it looks great, and it’s over 50 years old. The label looks like an early Certron cassette. It’s rare and very hard to find, and it was an early “Type 0”. Sentry was based in Mt. Vernon, NY, and it was known for their cheap “Type 0” cassettes.
Used to see tapes like these for sale in the old exchange and mart in the early eighties
One video I would like to see in future (you're in charge of course!) is TDK D through the years, and how each one biases up on the Aiwa. The early ones will likely need negative bias, but when did they stop needing that negative bias and become the truly trustworthy cassette? Was it the 88, the 90, the 92 or the 95? I am curious....
Yeah, I guess that would be do-able
I love the TDK D. My go-to cassette all through the 1990s. I still have a few unused wrapped ones knocking about.
I've got french Pyral ATA151 reel to reel tape, is quite good. Maybe not good like BASF DP26, but with 19.5 cm/s sound is acceptable. There was no Alme tape, the real trash.
I have the same tape and it sounds really good even on 9.5 cm/s on an Akai deck
@@denesbesenyi2729 I have Sony TC280, maybe Bias is wrong or head is used up, but I like Pyral tape sound.
So the basf biases up good on the Sony but not the pyral,that means that the biasing circuit is giving out a weak bias(not to magnetise the tapestack) printtrough, then none of the 50u tapes would work with the deck but i tired it on a teac a4010s and a tascam 32 and it works excellent, studio quality tape for sure,and the basf,well it sheds oxide sadly and needs low bias
@@denesbesenyi2729 Thank you for this information. I will check the service manual regarding the BIAS current value. Unfortunately, data old-time reel-to-reel tapes is often not available. I also have a Polish tape recorder ZRK ZK146S by Unitra and this equipment records AGFA and ORWO tapes quite well (especially black-brown ORWO CPS 35 tape) because BIAS level is very low. But the tape recorder's parameters are quite poor, so I don't use it for good tapes (Fq 40Hz-10kHz -3dB). ZK is a souvenir from childhood.
Wow, I never thought I would see a Leda again. I remember my Dad had a few of them in the late 70s, and I recorded some Radio 4 comedy and Chart hits on them - on my prized Tensai Radio Cassette player.
When I was younger, I didn't know any better and recorded a lot of radio airchecks using these type-0 cassettes, mostly purchased from the local dollar store. Among the "brands" sold in American dollar stores in the late 90s and early 2000s were Sterling, Volt Master, Longway, Sound & Image, Sentry, and Contek. Sterling tapes were literally a scam. Sterling tapes labeled as C60 were really C30s, while Sterling C90s were just C60s. Sentry tapes never worked properly so I ended up avoiding them, and I had to literally re-shell older recordings on Sentry tapes in common Maxell UR shells just to get them to play without jamming up. Nowadays, I stick with well known and trusted brands like Maxell or TDK.
I wouldn't try to record any Beatles albums onto that Yoko tape. Guaranteed dropouts.
Donor shells that inconveniently have tape already in them.
😁
I used to have this Maxim back in a days 😁
I still have some type zeros I had as a kid that I recorded from the radio as a teen in the 80s. I don't remember them sounding as bad as they do and I had much, much better hearing at the time. Point is, if they sounded alright in the 80s, they degraded way more than any other tape from that time that I have and they were all stored together.
So even if you get a type zero that sounds half decent, what will it sound like in 5 years?
Reminds me of the Ingersoll, Audiosonic and Viva cheapo 90-minute tapes I bought when I was a teenager. Horrid jammers they were; the expensive high-end deck I used at the time (owned by a friend I was staying with) wrecked a bunch of those due to their flimsy design (but it played/recorded premium branded tapes perfectly). I had less hassle with G-Tape and MFP despite those being cheap as well.
the only purpose for these i could maybe think of is if someone was making ambient music or something and they wanted that super warm fuzzy very lofi tape sound. they’d be excellent for that, not something i’d want to listen to all my music on though lmao
When you talk about the cassettes loaded with re-slit video tape. I thought that video tape was not ferric type. Maybe more like a Chrome. What am I missing here?
Damn. Bog roll issue cassettes. I’ve got a few of those. Good as beer coasters or stabilizing a wobbly chair.
Poundland used to sell them!
which ones specifically...?
I got unsubscribed but I am back, keep up the good work !
2:55 I cried from laughter here :'D
yup! i remember the "low noise" cassettes mom used to get them for me at the grocery store when the sound got loud, it muffled it badly they were cheap and easy to find there so.....
Ive got some irish brand tapes from 83 but the housing bit the dust long ago the tape plays as good as the day i recorded it from the radio. Im sure it was a type 0 one is on ebay now for $28 where can u buy quality shells or housings
poundland had some cassettes a while back, i got 2 , havent tried them yet, but heard you sometimes find there are 'joins' in them, so not filled with a full single length!! and the colour can vary within one cassette!!
I've been dudded by VHS tapes with 2 or 3 splices in them in the mid 90's Waltham, Stereo Club, Finex, all from Cuntinghams Warehouse stores Australia, I lined up all the splices to the tape opening on the Finex tapes and got my refund on them, splices are totally unacceptable on video tapes because the dropouts are extremely annoying, lines through the picture and chopped up HiFi audio, 2012 I used a PVR to catch old re-runs of Neighbours and dub to VHS, a splice was found near end of tape and I smashed it in anger, then burned it in the wood stove, I had to re-do the recording before deleting off the Humax 9200T PVR (No USB copy)
I picked up unrecognizable brand sealed cassettes that may be considered "Type 0" today. These were super cheap 3-packs that had no shells. If you don't mind (and maybe if you do mind) I will credit you with the "type 0" designation when I reference them in my thrift haul vid.
They are endearing, but I'm sure I heard the term Type 0 on tapeheads.net first
@@CassetteComeback I ended up saying that you used the term, not that you coined it... Thank you for the link. I will join that forum.
TAC. You know - the affordable Teac. 😂
I love how you say "wrapped like a pack of fags"
In the US, that's a #TriggerWarning 😂😂
That's like here in the UK the word "fanny" refers to a lady garden...
A head cleaning between each K7 would certainly have improved the test. 🤨
When I was a kid I was told to avoid using those Type 0 cassettes on decent decks because they supposedly ruin the deck, making it dirty. Not sure if it's true, but those dull tapes do make me wonder...
could you pleae name the device that you have used to rewind the tape?
Dog doo cassettes that aren’t worth playing on a hurdy gurdy! It was fun watching the tape trials. I’m surprised you didn’t throw them against the wall! Oh well trash is trash and you can’t put sugar on it and make it taste sweet! 🤬🤢🤣🥴
Hello Cassette Comeback. I know its off topic but I bought 3 TDK FE Ferric 90 cassettes from a local record shop (Ireland), and I recorded on them, but there seems to be a problem with them. There's little to no output on the left channel. Do you know why that could be, because TDK cassettes in my opinion are usually very good quality.
Could be bad storage, could be a problem with your deck.
@@CassetteComeback I'd say its bad storage in the shop I bought them from, because I put in a Maxell UR90 cassette into the deck and there was no problems at all. I store my cassettes in my wardrobe on a shelf for easy access and to keep them safe from dust, dampness and heat. I had the Maxells for nearly 2 years and I only bought the TDKs about 2 weeks ago. Thanks for the reply.
LONG LIVE THE CASSETTE TAPE!
@ 10:05 Yoko forgot to put one of the screws in the corner of the shell.
Buy Japanese (or European) (or USA if you can find them) tapes people. I would rather use pre-owned, pre-recorded, high quality tapes than any of these. You can find good used tapes all over the place. Cases and J cards can always be replaced.
Lately I've been buying new old stock, brand name, type 1 tapes off eBay. The eBay crowd is generally only interested in type 2 tapes. Good type 1 tapes can still be had for reasonable prices, but you have to shop around and be ready to pull the trigger when you spot a good deal.
I use the Fox C-60 as the benchmark. Here in the U.S. I can get a box of 10 for $35. So I generally won't pay more than $3.50 per tape off eBay. Why buy a decades old type 1, when you can get fresh tapes for the same or less? Of course there are exceptions, and tape length has to be taken into consideration as well.
Ironically I don't recall too many cheap cassettes using the "Compact Cassette" logo stateside in the 90's.
I recall other cheap brands that has the Compact Cassette logo including Hoyin, Star, Martronic, Melody, Melsonic, Sim, Astrosonic, and others. Except for a handful of brands from the 1970’s like Realistic and Concertape which were made by Radio Shack, Universal, Recoton, Pic Pac which was a brand that were sold by Two Guys, a defunct department store in New Jersey, and lots more.
In South Korea, most "Gilboards" used TYPE 0 blank tapes in 1990s. Example, GOLDEN STAR CT(Fake model of GoldStar DJ), and HIFI SR, SMART SD-X, HAPPY MUSIC NT(NOT Type 2), TBK(Fake brand of TDK and NOT Type 2)
The INT brought me back memories of our first stereo, an "all in one" Pilot (Goldstar) that came with one Sony CHF60 and two International 90min. These INT were terrible and the deck chewed them in every pass (even as a new, clean deck), the Sony played flawless. anyway, great collection of "0"!
Does the sniff test work reliably for you? Some people swear by the lick/taste test.
i think the tokaido chrome was just a normal type 0 ferro with a bit darker tape that was marketed as a type 2, probably because they thought they could get away selling cheap fake type 2
Tried calibrating this on my Revox as Type 1 - 120 Ms / Type 2 -120 Ms / Type 2 - 70 Ms...no dice.
A characteristic of "Type 0" cassettes is that there are no 4 Phillips screws in the 4 corners so that you can fix them if they jam up. Another characteristic of them is that they are 40 minutes long, or only 20 or 10 or 9 minutes long. You have to put a crumpled piece of paper in the anti-record "tab" corner to record over the crappy music which is recorded at the factory. Most of these pre-recorded cassettes are recorded on a very wide multi-track tape, and then the tape is sliced by a crappy (probably magnetized) blade, and put into the cassettes and GLUED shut !!!
Back in the early days of Cassettes where I grew up the cheaper tapes were sold as 'voice' tapes, meant for office use or verbal note taking. Then there were various levels of quality available depending on how much you wanted to pay for a tape. At first we had 30, 45, 60, and 120 minute tapes then 90 min started to show up, and by the 80's TDK even had a 180 min tape, but it had notes on it that it was not for music, and not for use in car tape players.
The earliest tapes I remember were white body/green label tapes branded Ampex, they were around in the early 70's and they sold several levels of them with the super cheap tapes coming in a three pack with no case, in fact, not many came in a plastic case early on.
My oldest tape holder, a red velvet lined, fake alligator skin box likely made of plastic and pressed paper or Masonite, would not hold tapes in plastic cases. Many tapes came with a slider cover that capped the exposed areas of the tape, similar to the covers that came with 8-track tapes. Ampex tapes then also came with a bar that snapped into the drive wheels to lock the tape in position. They were marketed as standard and 'High Frequency'. by the mid 70's they offered a silver and gold label version as their best quality tape, and Chromium Dioxide tapes started to appear but were super expensive and billed mostly as being for 'Live Music Recordings'.
My first decent tape deck was from Panasonic, then I moved up to a Realistic, then a Pioneer, all of which were flat, lay down type decks, then I got a Harman Kardon 3500, and then an Pioneer CT-F950 which I had for a decade or more. I don't recall even seeing Metal or High Bias tapes until the very late 70's or early 80's, and for the most part we didn't bother with them for just mixing our own tapes because the source material, store bought cassette albums weren't recorded on anything all that great to start with.
Being a kid in the 60's and 70's vinyl was already 'old school' and most of us started with 8 track tapes, and moved to cassette. I didn't have my first decent turn table until 1980, and at that it saw little use.
Most of the old tapes I copied in the 80's are still around, most sound as good as the originals I copied them from. Even in the early days of CD's, we were recording custom playlists on 100 min. tapes off CD's. For that we used Maxell XLII most of the time, if not we bought either Memorex or Radio Shack brand tapes.
In the 80's we started to see Fuji tapes, but they were hit or miss back then. They seemed to fail pretty often compared to other brands.
Scotch brand tapes were big here in the mid to late 80's and likely well into the early 90's. They were one of my favorites because they lasted forever and held up well in the car.
TDK made a great quality recording but they used to break a lot, so I avoided them, especially the more expensive tapes. TDK broke so often in car tape players I almost never recorded anything on one, even though I had a really good source for them super cheap at the time.
(My dad drove a truck and picked up at a place that either packaged them or used them for some sort of demo, and he would bring home bags of them. They were black shells marked Hi Bias Super Avilyn Tape. What ever they were they had good volume and decent audio quality but they would sound off speed at times, as if the tape was stretching or speeding up and slowing down.
Back around 1989 or so i stumbled on a deal for a pallet of Scotch XS II tapes, they were black with silver labels and those were fantastic. They were on par with the Maxell tapes and seemed to hold up as well or better after lots of use. I probably had and recorded on a few thousand of them back in the day. I likely still have a few around here and there.
The worse tapes I remember were from Sony, regardless of type, they didn't last and seemed to degrade every time you played them. It seemed like they would always end up twisted or broken after very little use. The sound was okay, nothing great but I couldn't really tell the difference between their cheap tapes and their UX-S series. I don't think anything I recorded on Sony tapes survived through the years but nearly every one of my Scotch, Realistic, and Maxell tapes are just fine.
That’s great! Earlier today, I went to a place called Free to Thrift, and I found these cassettes, many of these were Sony HF’s which were used, many of these were mismatch cassettes, and there were a few “Type 0’s”, including the ones I got, along with the two cassettes are from the 1970’s which were considered as “Type 0” at the time, and there were unbranded cassettes, and these were under Pic Pac which were sold at Two Guys back in the 1970’s.
@@Musicradio77Network One tape brand I couldn't think of before was Dyna Sound, they were sold by Two Guys, KIngs, and a few electronics stores that sold mostly off brand electronics in what was basically an old feed store or barn.
They were sold in single blister packs and were a cream colored case with a bright orange and yellow label. They were made in USA. At the time, they were the most expensive tapes a kid could afford at about $0.39 each. The PicPac tapes, Certron tapes came later, the three packs were mostly green label Ampex, Recoton, or Concertape from Radio Shack.
The three pack tapes were really just for kids music and voice, but they were robust if nothing else. The few I've got around here still work as they should.
The off brand electronics place had a bonus points system, where you would gain points each time you bought something and after 10 points you either got a free tape or a discount of a better item.
I bought a Precor branded Portable AM/FM Cass. radio and with I got to pic either one package of tapes, so I took one of the Dyna Sound tapes, which they kept up front behind the counter. The three packs of Ampex 42 min. tapes were $0.59 for the pack vs $0.39 for the Dyna Sound. I still have that tape but I've got no idea what ever happened to the Precor radio. Looking back and trying to find the model of that radio, I draw a blank online but it closely resembled one sold by Sears at the time. A larger speaker, round tuning dial, and a single cassette door with some cheap looking brushed metal trim. Thinking back, it had to be around 1973 or '74 at the latest because I remember buying a new Sears radio in 1975 that got its antenna broken on a class trip to Philly for the bicentennial . (Had the extra long antenna sticking out the window when it caught a tree branch as the bus turned a corner. I still have it, it still works but with an antenna robbed from a junk portable TV I found in the trash that no longer folds down quite right.
By the way - that tune you used to test is brilliant!
These are really like tapes your grandma gives you on your birthday when you got a tape recorder as a 7 year old and quality didn't matter!
Indeed. As a child you didn't care about quality, you just cared that they worked.
Cassette Comeback That’s why I got a bunch of “Type 0’s” off of eBay yesterday, including a bunch of Certron, Universal, and Ampex cassettes from the 1970’s which were “Type 0” back then, and they’re all US made, not China, or Hong Kong, except the two Certron “Type 0’s” where it says “Made in Hong Kong with USA Certron Tape”, and the other Certron’s that says “USA materials, Made in Mexico”, and that considered as a “Type 0”, and it has a cool looking design that screams 80’s.
The Ampex one was a “Type 0” and it was from the 1970’s that has a groovy design, and it was an Ampex 350 cassette which was a model number. Ampex has other models in the “Type 0” line like the 350, 370, 363, and other models in the cassette lineup.
Does my dead Radio Shack realistic 90 minute low noise blank cassette count?
Most Radio Shack cassettes were good...except for the bottom rung Concertapes.
Interesting. Mine may just be old. Mine has a late 70s and early 80s art.
Haven’t seen a cassette since I was a teen in the 90s
Hell yes I’m watching 45 minutes of bad cassettes.
The main trouble with those sort of cassettes is not only that they sound terrible but after using them you will have to give your heads a good clean because there is so much rubbish on them
They look kitch cool now, but yeah, you don't want to try and record on them.
Type O cassette? Finally, a tape worthy to copy my OG Bloody Kisses album to!
Or it can be used for voice recording, dictation, and for saving computer data when using Commodore 64 or a Tandy computer.
Why is a supposedly German tape named Tokaido? That's like a Japanese tape named Klampenberger.
I bought some of those Maxim cassettes in the 90's... straight in the bin. The tape wasn't even the correct size, too thin. Recordings were rubbish.
That said... I did buy other budget cassettes such as Sim Cassette, Cloud 7, Justine (pack 3 without cases), Kaytape. Didn't have much pocket money in the 80's when at school (gotta keep some for sweets). But, when I bought a BASF cassette, it blow those out of the water and never looked back.
When you're a kid, you're not bothered about quality, you just wanted them to work. Your imagination and enthusiasm filled in the blanks.
Andrew Coulson I also got a ton of Certron cassettes from the 80’s off of eBay along with many “Type 0’s” from the 70’s like Universal and Ampex. Ampex was a hit or miss brand where they put out cassette tapes in the 1970’s outside of its reel-to-reel tape division. They usually made a series of pre-recorded cassettes including albums from labels such as MGM, Warner Bros., Reprise, London, Parrot, Atlantic, Motown, United Artists, Kapp, and more where it was manufactured from 1967 through the 1970’s. They also put out “Type 0” cassette tapes including the model lineup like the 350, 358, 361, 362, 363, and 370. I got two Ampex 350’s and doesn’t sound too bad for a “Type 0”. It has a cool looking groovy design which makes it look so cool.
Was the Yoko missing a screw? Did you do that on purpose? Bravo.
How could I? You see me unwrap it...
@@CassetteComeback Yoko always had a screw loose.
Had hi-tech tapes before. They are really bad!
Most entertaining video 😁
Oh, Tony you always make me laugh with your snarky comments. I'm definitely getting some of these for the novelty and aesthetic but not without swapping them with a UR or TDK D. hearing the "aluminum foil" (as my friends call it) distortion made me writhe and die a little inside. It reminds me of when I used to record on a shitty lil shoebox player. Oh, the horror. But hey, we all start somewhere..I'm so glad I have a nice lil technics now:,)
what type of cassettes will the new 2020 music albums be on
Depends who duplicates them...
Yes, I remember TONY, KDK and BASK very well. Here in Portugal we had a lousy brand Sonovox that used to shed oxide on the heads until the recording was inaudible :) Also Roadstar, Berec, and a few others :) All type -1 actually :)
as versoes identicas, pelo menos de aspecto, ás BASF até eram boas, mas as primeiras eram horriveis !!
@@DeltaFox1970 As verdes eram péssimas :)
@@miguelnglopes nunca tive dessas, falo de umas a imitar as BASF LH
@@DeltaFox1970 O logotipo era 'inspirado' no da BASF :) As primeiras eram verdes escuras e mais tarde apareceram umas laranja, e a caixa era tal e qual as das BASF :) A única diferença era mesmo o logo e a marca :P :)