Re: [ARSCLIST] The worst cassette tape years

[Tom Fine <tflists@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hi Kopana:

3M and Scotch were basically different stews from the same pot. Scotch brand was owned by 3M Co. but 
3M marketed some tape under the corporate brand in the later days of cassettes. Scotch had various 
cassette iterations, from the low-priced totally crapola Highland or Highlander brand to Scotch 
brand CRO2 and metal tapes priced slightly under Maxell and TDK. 3M also had the drawer-type, 
lock-in cases which I always thought were pretty clever but I can't see how they ever made a penny 
on them since they had 3 pieces and a metal spring and did not sell at a premium for the standard 
plain-jane (no insult to Janes) Philips case.

Anyway, I've found that all 3M cassettes are particular susceptible to mechanical problems, they 
seem to have warp-prone plastic cases and perhaps not the most slippery slip pads. I've also had the 
felt pad that holds the tape flush to the head pop off. My brother started having Scotch chrome 
cassettes betray him within a couple years of recording them. Both mechanical failure and the tape 
warping and stretching (probably due to mechanical stress). I always counted myself lucky that I 
resisted the then-irresistable price of $2.50 for chrome C-90's and didn't buy a big pile of Scotch, 
opting to pay $2.85 and going with TDK SA, some of which still work 20 years later.

If someone sent me a Scotch cassette, particularly a Highlander type, I'd first transplant it into a 
new housing. Then I'd see how it played. As long as it didn't squeal or obviously wow because it was 
mechanically un-sound or stuck together, I'd make the transfer and count myself lucky. The good 
thing about cassettes is that it's pretty hard to argue that a halfway-decent transfer didn't grab 
all the fidelity there was to grab so if the cassette falls apart or renders itself unplayable in 
the future, it's not a world tragedy. This is especially true for things like interviews or personal 
rememberence recordings on cassettes -- it's not like those were super-fi the day they were made. 
But of course it's always preferable to keep the source material intact if at all possible.

The other bad cassette types from the 70's and 80's were the junkola "SuperTape" stuff sold at 
RadioCrack. I don't know if this was major manufacturers' reject stock or what, but these do not age 
well. And close to those in the hall of shame are Ampex brand cassettes. The best cassettes I've 
ever had as far as durability were 80's and early 90's Maxell UDXLII types. TDK SA's are almost as 
good, at least based on the hundreds of cassettes in my collection. No other brand I ever tried was 
tried in large enough numbers to speak definitively, but none of them have lasted like the Maxell 
and TDK tapes. I found that TDK got better in the 1990's as the cassette era wound down and Maxell 
quality slipped a bit. The biggest scourge on my cassette collection was my bad decision to switch 
to Dolby C, which does not age well as cassettes lose level. Cassettes I made in 1980 on a 
relatively low-end cassette deck with Dolby B sound better today than cassettes I made on a mid-line 
Yamaha deck in the early 1990's with Dolby C. But I've now replaced or transferred everything that 
was on cassette, so all these hundreds of tapes are just relics taking up space.

-- Tom Fine

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Terry, Kopana" <klterr0@xxxxxxx>
To: <ARSCLIST@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Monday, June 04, 2007 3:46 PM
Subject: [ARSCLIST] The worst cassette tape years


The 70's and 80's had a few years that weren't very kind in the world of
cassette tape manufacturing. Those crappy years have come back to haunt
more than one of us as time has gone on. If you had to pick the year(s)
that saw the most poorly manufactured cassette tape, what would it
(they) be?

In scouring the ARSC archives I've seen two brands mentioned in
particular that seem to be more prone to crappiness than others: 3M and
Scotch. Is one worse than the other? Are there other brands that are
even worse?

Many thanks for your opinions,
Kopana


Kopana Terry
Sr Image Management Specialist
Preservation & Digital Programs
University of Kentucky
M.I. King Library, rm 105
Lexington, KY 40506-0039
office (859) 257-3210; fax (859) 257-6311
klterr0@xxxxxxx ; http://kdl.kyvl.org