Cassette vs. CD?

Time for the big gun, ceramic shell Sony Metal Master:

 

I know what it is, and actually acquired a Pioneer deck and a collection a few years ago. I just can't believe you would prefer it to cassette, basically any properly functioning tape deck will beat it.

 

CD anyday for me. Tape hiss, even with TDK SA, was always an issue. Tape fragility too. Sound quality wise, CD again. The tapes went a long time ago.

 

Those who insist on claiming that pre-recorded tapes suck ought to try these decks:

Nakamichi 480
Technics RSAZ-7

 

Ever try Dolby S, hiss is non existent and the highs actually are extended using it.

 

Cassettes were and are an inferior format compared to cd. They had a few advantages (they don't skip if you bump the player or have the music loud enough to vibrate things, are easy to record on) but for playback, no contest. The days of cassettes were endless fast forwarding and rewinding to find songs and hearing the high end response fade away, little by little, the more they were played (and your player becomes magnetized). Cds kicked their ass for a reason...

 

My last deck was an Aiwa ADF-850. It was very good, no Dolby S, but HX Pro. Nice deck but I'd passed on tapes by then. CD was in all the way with me and this was about twenty years ago. The sound quality was excellent and CD usage hassle free. Tapes were relegated to third after CD and vinyl at the time.

Gave up the tape deck to my mum who used it for a while for compilations. Gave it away when she died a few years ago.

http://www.vintagecassette.com/aiwa/ad_f850

 

Without ever using Dolby S, I really have to say you have no factual input as to tape hiss on cassettes in their best, possible form. You would be shocked as to the dead black, quiet background of Dolby S. Amazing, but sadly late to show for cassette.

That Aiwa ADF-850 deck was decent, but far from having the ability to show what a cassette tape really could do under the best of conditions. I know, I had one and sold it.

 

My far from the best, but still one of my top 5.

A kick butt Dolby S deck I use on a regular basis.

Several years and not one chewed tape.

In the last few days I've played a few dozen tapes of mine made back into the late 1970's, all they needed were their pressure pads replaced. I guess the "fragile format" BS spewed out by a few folks here falls flat on it's face, when just simple common sense storage and maintenance of the tape is done.

Teac's best ever IMO, myV8030 S:

 

I know, and realize at some point my decks will not be able to be serviced and play perfect, or at all. I do all my own service on them currently.

I've been transferring all my library of critical tapes to CD.

But, I'm fairly certain with the several decks I have, I'll most likely have at least one or more well functioning decks until the day I die. That's good enough for me, and my tapes.

 

I'm comfortable with my choices, decisions, and conclusions with regards to tape. Whether or not I had a deck with Dolby S on it was of no relevance to me really. Dolby S was too late on the scene to count.

The Aiwa ADF 750 was so equipped, but reviewed modestly; I passed. I stuck with good quality chrome tapes (TDK SA) and that was enough. By this time, tapes were being made for the car. I didn't need a TOTL model or need to go out and buy another model for Dolby S alone.

The 850 was fine for my needs and sounded good, reviewed well, low wow and flutter and as a third option after CD and vinyl, was ample provision in my setup. It might even have won a What Hi Fi award when the magazine was still good.

There were other choices too - DCC, that petered out, or DAT which did likewise but fared better in amateur recording circles. Both of those offered arguably better choices. I passed on those too.

Dolby S came along too late in the day really and didn't impact the physical shortcomings of the medium already identified by others in this thread.

Ultimately, I had no dog in the hunt. Tape had too many shortcomings to be a viable medium for me in the long term and Dolby S arrived too late for the mass market to bother with it.

By then portable CD players were taking off, digital recording in the home was arriving and cassette was seeing the beginning of the end.

 

I can appreciate your post, but again, to comment on tape hiss on cassette format without ever using Dolby S is a bit silly.

FWIW, I have an Aiwa AD-S950 deck, and although nice, it is probably my "worst" Dolby S deck. The 750 was a far cry even from that.

 

How so? Of course people can.

Moist people wouldn't have used Dolby S. Hardly any, relative to the number of decks already sold. By the time it rolled out, CD was into its second decade. Portable CD was maturing and cheaper too.

The What Hi Fi review didn't give a glowing appraisal of the ADS-750. A three star review if memory serves. The 850 was the better machine.

So, I made a series of decisions, as a consumer, that led me to the choice I made.

So, you can talk about hiss but you can talk about the limitations of availability of Dolby S at the time and a dying format. And as CD dealt with hiss in one fell swoop and provided a better and near instantaneous track access capability that serial tape couldn't provide, I'm not sure how you can get to your conclusion easily.

Dolby S didn't deliver to the mass market in time, it wasn't communicated well enough, the consumer had moved on to a better format and most had tape decks that were good enough. That's not "silly" (and please don't use unsubstantiated belittling terms with me, especially when you're only in person of a few facts), and neither are references to the limitations of tape as a medium where hiss is concerned

 

Again, you originally spoke in blanket terms of cassette's format of hiss issues, I offered the better answer that was available that you yourself have admitted to never have used.

Even late to the game, S still gives cassette greater credibility. To not include it for the format's overall ability is foolish, as it was widely available for quite some time. We are trying to compare what a format was possible of offering, right?

 

Aye, whatever. You carry on.

 

Here's a blog from someone who's covered elements of Dolby S: http://cassette-tapes-in-the-attic.blogspot.co.uk/2013/06/dolby-s-noise-reduction-system-savior.html

Note, he refers to some of the issues already covered off. As ever, it's the typical audiophile thing to do. "Dolby S just makes everything so much better!". Not so great though if the wow and flutter performance isn't so hot. Or if another deck is less "musically convincing" as this blogger puts it. Thinking about it, twenty years on. I still say I made the right decision - Chrome tapes on an Aiwa ADF-850 were fine, very good in fact. Hiss was minimal. And no, I never heard a Dolby S deck, but at the price level I was working at, then the Denons, Aiwas and Sonys were ahead of the pack.

So, one can say that it's "foolish" to overlook Dolby S, fair enough. But if there are shortcomings elsewhere, as now suggested in at least three consumer level machines (Aiwa ADS750 and the two this guy states in his blog) then what would be the right thing to do?

As ever, there is no one answer with audio. What would be foolish, would have been to have run out and bought one of these Dolby S decks, by virtue of it being Dolby S. Much like SACD, DVD-A and so on, provision of a new feature is no guarantee of success. For Dolby S, other issues are readily apparent.

What GuildX700 is saying is correct, but only if the other issues prevalent in tape are also addressed, otherwise you're then buying a tape deck for one thing that falls down in other areas. Or you buy a near perfect tape deck. Unlikely. So, we're talking about theories then, or you need to go to Guild and get the deck he bought, (but then that's only his opinion). That to my mind is pretty close to point scoring on an internet forum.

In the real world, where most don't have the time, the inclination, the money or the patience to go round and hear several different decks (assuming that you had a dealer close enough to give you the selection) or all of the above, the drawbacks in quality issues, as well as the lack of understanding in perceived quality gains, would be enough for Dolby S not to have been the success the manufacturers hoped for. On paper, nice idea, in execution, not so hot across the board. That's not Dolby's fault - see Aiwa, Kenwood or Sony to name but three, but it's all part of the deal.

In my case it was inclination. I was never going to run out and buy a tape deck with Dolby S for the sake of it. Not when availability locally was limited, the perceived gains were few and the reviews mixed at best. Right decision (for me). Others might well disagree, but foolish? Oh no. Not in the real world.

 

I want to make sure when comparisons are made to cassette, all the facts are presented, not just folks limited personal experiences.

The title of the thread is Cassette vs. CD, thus it should include the best ever each format has to offer.

That is only reasonable at the very least.

A best ever top of the line cassette deck with the best ever available tape properly calibrated should be the one put in the ring against CD, and the best ever CD representative should also be in the ring.

Both formats should have their best ever proper representation.

When that fair comparison happens, cassette does not fall flat on it's face as some pitiful format.

Yes...we all know it could be poor, when poor tapes and cheap decks are used. The same could be said for vinyl/turntable/cartridges and early CD players and early poor CD transfers. Lets talk best ever of each or drop it.

End of the day, cassette is capable of impressive hi fidelity sound, even in this day's comparisons. If you want to find it's low fidelity sound, it can do that too, but that is not the discussion here, it is........Cassette vs. CD, that simple.

 

The real world is what anyone who had the money could buy for the best of a format.

Again, thread title is Cassette vs. CD, in the real world cassette decks and tapes were available that could with proper use rival CD sound quality.

You have admittedly not used/heard the best decks cassette has to offer, but yet you want to comment on them?

 

The OP asked how Cassette compares to CD. Period.

The extension to "best of" is your addition (and perhaps others, I didn't read the full six pages). So it's only reasonable to question that logic now. "Best tape deck"? One of the Naks, or a Pioneer TOTL maybe? Even the ADF850 sounded good at £230 with Chrome tapes and good LPs. But that's not the question the OP asked.

But we're not talking "best ever". That's your reach. Sorry, but that's the way of it. Best ever is another discussion, another debate and niche in the context of what the OP asked back in 2009.

 

The OP asked how Cassette compares to CD. Period.

So, we compare them. A comparison calls for the best of each, otherwise it's a waste of time. What would one otherwise compare, the kind of best, the sort of good???

comparison= the act of looking at things to see how they are similar or different, no constraints are put as to the best or worst of each.

 

Back in the 80s and 90s, people bought what was shown in the magazines, or had a good relationship with a dealer. The internet had barely rolled out to anywhere near a wider demographic, never mind places like this that we now take for granted. Reviewers like Alvin Gold, Noel Keywood and Andrew Everard in the UK were the go-to guys for authoratative opinion. The What Hi Fi Buying Guide gave you the skinny on everything out there that they'd reviewed. So you took the list, decided your budget and looked at the reviews (if you still had the mags) or chatted to the guy in the hifi shop, then handed your money over.

The shop might've had half a dozen tape decks. Chances are, it was by Denon, Sony or Aiwa. Maybe not even that many. I had previously had a Sony and a Pioneer. A mate had a Denon. Nobody had a Nak. Nobody had a TOTL Pioneer. "Best in show" didn't happen for most people with tape. "The money" had gone to CD years before.

TDK SA Chrome tapes were great value. I never used the D, had used the ADs for a while when I was at school, but when I was earning, I had TDK SA a couple of Metal cassettes.

Tape was capable of very good sound. It was of its time though. Could it stack up audibly? Yes, but you had to get your ducks in a row. They all took work - tape, vinyl, CD, R2R, computer based audio, radio....take your pick. Real world, tape was of its time, had wow and flutter issues, a serial interface and the world moved on. Whether or not it sounded good misses the point. A Quad FM4 sounded great, a Magnum Dynalab even better, but online radio gives us access to thousands of stations categorised to just about whichever genre you want as well as News/Sports and other talk based radio and quality these days has improved. Time moved on and the technology gives us all that tape ever did and more. These days, it's for hobbyists and is a backward looking technology we rightly left behind.

 

Your reach.

Most people don't have access to the best of each. Are you narrowing the conversation down to one or two people on this forum then? The old "oh you've not heard tape until you've heard..." line?

A comparison calls for a range. Especially when the OP hasn't defined that range. So why are you trying to narrow the discussion to "best of" when the OP isn't asking for just that?

You've already said in your definition of comparison that no constraints are made to the best or worst of each, but you're trying to force any discussion down to "best of" only? I don't see that at all in and of itself. You need to look at the wider perspective, else your own perspective is limited.

(Edited for clarity)

 

Nice speech, but again, in the end.... cassette not only measured very well in it's best state, but sounds very good. There is no getting around the fact of it's performance under proper conditions. Is it a best format, certainly not, is it the trash some folks would say, certainly not.

Used properly with the best tools available it can and does deliver amazing sound quality.

Again, sadly, few folks have found that out, the same could be said for vinyl. I have great CD, vinyl, and cassette sources, none let me down.

 

I never said it didn't sound good or very good and I certainly never called it trash. But to get good sound out of it, you need to work on it under "proper conditions" with "the best tools available"? You're writing the reasons yourself why it didn't survive much beyond the mid-2000s if that.

That's unfair of me, the technology brought us greater storage space in smaller packages. As the quality improved, so people moved on from portable tape machines to portable digital players. Why carry 10 cassettes around when you could have 20 albums on a small player? Time and technology moved on.

 

I can only guess who you're responding to by the fact that I can't see what you're responding to. I only have one person on my ignore list. Nevertheless, I agree with your responses.