Aiwa AD-F800 cassette deck and are decks worth it?*

Hey guys. This year I bought a TT which is a dream because I listen to needledrops since 15, and I am almost 30 now. I was amazed that the old technics cart married the amp straight away the first LP I got and played got me crying like a little b... So I dig analogue.
So of course I am hooked on machines now (I knew this hobby is a rabbit hole but the hell with it).
So I got a friend who is hooked on R2R and some people who claim digital can sound better than a high end R2R never listened to one. We make recordings from LP and cds, hirez needledrops, doesnt matter what source these teac, akais, and revoxes are CLEAN. But its kinda not my thing.
The same friend has an Akai deck, which really dissapoints for some reason. My dad had an Aiwa f800 back in the day I remember it made crazy good recordings on metal tape listening to this deck was all I did. So I found one. But they get a bad rep. "plasticky, bad mechanics, so on". Maybe my memory is skewed, but I remember it made the hair on my back stand and never malfunctioned.
So is it good or not?
Maybe decks are inherently bad? Because that same friend gifted me a Revox R2R from early 70's which slays, but I didnt accept, because I dont take presents from patients (he is also one, principle).
So is this aiwa and decks worth it in general or should I join the big boys league?
Because I am spoiled with great sound already and in the 90s that deck was all I heard maybe my memory is playing tricks, and of course I know the limitations of a cassete but still...

 

How are people to know what a 'deck' is? Could be anything from a cassette player to a stack of cards. I suggest:

"Aiwa AD-F800 R2R deck and are R2R decks worth it?"

****moderator note: fixed thread title.****

 

I still use an Aiwa AD-F850 that I bought new in the 90s; excellent cassette deck for the money & still going strong.

 

I recall back in the late 80's; A friend recorded some Tom Petty for me, from vinyl to TDK cassettes.
She had all Akai; Turntable, receiver and cassette deck.
I don't remember the actual model numbers of each.
These recorded cassettes were the BEST sounding cassettes in my collection!
They put to shame any of my ( red book?) cassettes; they also outlasted the rest by far!
Akai, in that era of time were excellent.
Then, before they disappeared; they were Walmart grade.
I'm not sure what happened to them.

 

English may not be their first language.

 

As far as I recall that Aiwa was high up their range and a good, decent sounding deck, although it definitely isn't better than modern digital, DSD or high res PCM, but if you like the cassette sound then you could do a lot worse and to do a much better will probably cost lots of money, my only concern would be that a thirty year old cassette deck may require a service and a new belt kit sooner rather than later. If you are going down the cassette route and have been using noise reduction try and find a slightly later deck with Dolby S from Sony or Yamaha for example, Dolby S works much better than B or C, if you prefer no noise reduction then stick with the Aiwa you could do a lot worse.

 

The Aiwa ADF 800, 810, 850 and 910 are well respected decent machines, no not a Nakamichi or a Tandberg but capable of making very good recordings for rather less money.

 

Sorry for confusing you. The aiwa in question is a cassette deck.

 

I had an Aiwa AD-F650 Cassette Deck in the 80s. Kept it for many years, then tried some of my tapes in it and they had deteriorated.

I remember it being a nice and good deck at the time. But I couldn’t afford a Nakamichi then.

 

Maybe cheaper L40 lasted for many years without a problem.

 

I might be getting confused and I can't check now but that looks suspiciously similar to a Denon I had.

 

Speaking about Sony, Im tempted to get one with dolby S from the peak of the technology. I saw a Sony with dolby S at the blog of the guy I got my TT from (he is very reputable), but someone got it before me, still not sure if Dolby S is worth it if you dont get metal tapes. New TDK SA-60 - theres plenty, and although they made great recordins, the sound was still much more "mushed" than on metal. Metal tapes are really hard to find and very expensive (Im in Europe).

 

At least some Aiwa decks had a very nice feature: they read the tape to trigger autoreverse instead of relying on tension at the end of the side. If you were, say, recording a radio broadcast that ran longer than your tape, the Aiwa would sense the end of the oxide, rapidly flip the head, and start back in the other direction, whereas the typical autoreverse deck would plug on through the leader at the end, flip the head only when it stalled out, then run through the leader again before reaching the side 2 oxide. As a result, you'd lose a split second with the Aiwa, several or maybe many seconds (depending on the length of the leader and the sensitivity of the tension sensor) with most other brands. I never saw a Nakamichi autoreverse deck (the sort that flipped the cassette around instead of the record head) in action, so I can't speak to how those stacked up.

 

yes I remember that

 

I used Sony decks with Dolby S and Chrome tapes, TDK SAs, Maxell XL IIs and some pro blanks, I thought the combination was excellent, I didn't buy many metals, but tended to use them without noise reduction and record them hot as the metal tapes could really handle higher recording levels, not sure I ever tried Dolby S with a metal tape, but I imagine it would have been equally good. Some of those 1990s Sonys are really good decks even without using the Dolby S, but I'd recommend doing research online and getting the highest model you can, also the youngest, late 1990s likely being less used than early 1990s.