Only pro cassette recorder that I know about, which also had consumer applications, was not a compact cassette model but a DAT Recorder, Sony PCM-7010 w/IEC 958 option.
NO Audio Cassette analog machine was truly professional beyond news actualities, PA/Church Sermons, education, surveillance, law enforcement, background music, training tapes, AV use, etc.
I used to produce radio commercials. Radio stations would not even accept commercials on compact cassettes. The only use of cassettes was as a hand out to the customer. Here's a pic of a real professional cassette tape recorder, DAT of course.
I have heard the Nakamichi 1000 DAT deck is the best DAT deck around. But it was too little, too late ...
Just got my CR7 back from Willy Herman. The custom made shipping case ($263.00) was worth every penny. Next up are my Dragon and CR5. M~
The case is for shipping cross country to Perry in VA. He just doesn't know it yet When he gets all settle in, in his new digs I am going to touch bases with him. Also, there is Nakman in the Chicago area who does good work. M~
The Sony PCM-7010F was a SMPTE Time-Code DAT Recorder. XLR Digital I/O, Time-Code Reader/Generator, and Memory Start for 3 frame digital editing accuracy with shuttle wheel on unit or editor when a pair of units were connected to the Sony RM-D7200 Digital Editor. With all options the PCM-7010's cost about $7200 each and normally would be used in pairs with the editor for a cool $17,000. Although these recorders could be used in consumer hi-fi systems using IEC 958 digital connection or analog balanced connection, analog output compatibility was suspect with +4db going to -10db preamp. I do not have any experience with the Nak, just Sony, Panasonic, and Fostex DAT; but, the Nak looks like a very fine piece of equipment.
I d0. But Perry and some others are using a different repair approach to these machines. They change the caps and other electronic components. I would like to try him on the repair of CR5 first so that I listen to it and get a first hand experience of his work. I also think that it is smart to have more than one place to get my machines fixed. M~
I would have thought Willy Herman would have to do the same given the age of these Nak decks - recap and replace many electronic components. I had Stephen Sank of Albuquerque did an overhaul on my 700ZXE and that was exactly what he did back in 2005 or 06. It cost me close to $1K but he told me I should be all set with the deck for the next 30 years. He even returned a whole bag of components he had replaced in the deck.
It's a long time ago and not something I ever wish to repeat, but I did some frame by frame editing using a Tascam DA-30 and as far as I recall you could edit down to individual frames on the Tascam, I never saw a Nak, Sony DAT machines could have reliability issues, although to be fair a lot of people I dealt with were using domestic Sonys, Panasonic and Fostex were both nice in my limited experience, but expensive, personally I liked Tascams, flexible, reliable, sounded good and didn't cost insane money. I always assumed the few machines capable of double speed 96kHz recording were the potentially best sounding, I think Pioneer and Denon both made at least one.
It wasn't that it was too little, too late. DAT simply happened to be almost stillborn as a consumer format from day one because it was in competition with DCC shortly following its introduction. Also, since CDs were naturally portable, DAT didn't enjoy the portability advantage over CDs that cassettes had enjoyed over LPs. Plus the tapes were annoying slow to wind. And lastly, by the time that DCC had exited from the market, recordable CD-ROMs had already begun to appear, and they completely finished-off DAT. I was one of those early adopters who couldn't wait for DAT to come out. It was a great format. And while it completely failed as a consumer format, it gained widespread professional usage for sending masters to each other. And it persisted in that role until recording onto hard-drives became the norm, and burnable CDs had become widespread.
DAT is like a scaled down audio only video machine with a revolving head and cassette based tapes, the failure to perfect a fixed head DAT machine with it's potentially much lower cost was one of the things that kept it mostly a pro format and eventually killed it, another was SCMS, (Serial Copyright Management System), copy control, although that wasn't on pro machines, then there was lack of software, DCC didn't come along until towards the end of DATs life and had little impact, Minidisc was a greater threat and also killed DCC, I'd agree that sub £1,000 CD recorders were the final nail in the coffin although by then the DAT tape reliability issues were becoming well known as well.
IIRC, recording engineers who reconstruct/remaster recordings from shellac (i.e. 78 RPM) record the source materials on DAT, then clean up the music before creating a master tape ...
I don't understand your question. There is no such thing as a "modern DAT" machine. DAT was just DAT. They were basically miniature video cassettes. Years before DAT there were a few different proprietary formats of studio open-reel digital recorders. The resurgence at the extreme high-end of open reel tape decks in recent years has been only for the analog machines. Nobody wants any of the old digital recorders anymore, unless perhaps they are remastering a recording which was made on one of those beasts. Your description is more accurate than mine. It was indeed unreliable. I can't even play my DAT tapes anymore. I really wish that I had transferred the contents years ago.
DAT was awesome in broadcast post production usage, for awhile. In my business (radio commercial production) DATs were the preferred product to send to radio stations for copying to cart. Then mp3 came out along with the means to email spots to radio stations. That was a godsend, good for everybody except Federal Express. This was what brought DAT history to a close. I still, use DAT, mostly for sound effects recording in the field with a Sony D8 connected to a Sony SBM unit. These tapes are then edited with studio DAT recorders. At any rate, perhaps I'm nostalgic but I still enjoy DAT for both recording, as well as playback.
Reliable as a 1960's British Sports car, temperamental, often tapes made on one machine would not play in the machine in the studio across from the one where it was made. Had to be sent of to a specialist to repair. Professional, but not reliable or dependable either. Sounded nice when it worked. Not broadcast reliable.
The only issues I have had were a time code locate failure and, right now, one recorder needs about an hour to warm up to play without bad condition light coming on indicating a bad tape. Thing is, the distortion, which I don't need the light to hear, is not from bad tape. Sony LA repaired the time code issue for a flat rate to restore the unit to specification, $950. I have not addressed the bad cond. issue but fear it's some bad caps, solder, or dried up lube. As long as it's working when warmed up that will do. At any rate, I did not see these units needing any more or less service/repair than a typical Sony professional video recorder would require pursuant to similar engagement. Also, my units have never broadcast anything. Only folks I know who used these machines for that are the National Public Radio folks. My usage was broadcast post production.
I've seen brand new DAT machines in the day who's tapes would not play on the machine across the hall. And DAT was too delicate, too temperamental for real world AM/FM station use. And real world radio for me is smaller markets, where equipment has to be longer lived, and gear gets less than coddled. I am the poor sod who has to deal with the aftermath, being the engineer. And those machines lived in racks, used heavily, by less than meticulous hands. And those machines didn't like being around racks of often hot electronics in a control room. Radio needs more bombproof than Sony professional video reliability. Panasonic's SV 3500 was far and away the best DAT I dealt with in Radio, the next best being Tascam's DA series. Both of those were very high maintenance when they were in service. The first two piece Sony Pro DAT machine was far and away their finest model.
DAT came out in 1987. DCC didn't hit the market until 1993. DCC had zip to do with the failure of DAT as a consumer format - it was already completely dead by the time DCC rolled out. (DCC flopped also.) DAT failed because it was expensive, unreliable and consumers couldn't easily clone their CDs. Also because by the late '80s a tape deck that cost less than half as much as the cheapest DAT deck - and whose tapes were compatible with millions of cassette decks already in use in homes, cars and as portables - could easily rival the performance of DAT thanks to Dolby C, metal tape and HX Pro. I think if DCC had somehow come out in 1988 or 89 it might have been able to establish itself as a viable format, thanks to its backward compatibility with cassette, simpler mechanism and less damage-prone tapes. Finicky DAT never stood a chance for home use.