BW- Thanks for posting the link. As I mentioned before, I really like analog open reel recorders, and I do own a Tascam 48 1/2" 8 track which is a pro machine. (as well as a Teac A-3440, Tascam 32, and Teac X-300R)
The thing is, a huge, and very heavy 1/2" machine is just not a viable option for many people. Not to mention, the expenditure required to buy blank reels of recording tape which arent exactly cheap. And these anlog machines do require periodic cleaning & maintenance.
For most people, its a matter of covenience. There's no way to get direct access to a song on analog tape, you have to either sequentially FF or RW to get to a specific location, as opposed to hitting a button on a cd player, or programming any listening order you want on a cd player. Actually, you can make a cd player even more convenient by acquiring a model like the Yamaha CDR-HD1300 which I have that has an 80G hard drive to transfer songs onto.
I feel both formats have their +'s & -'s, thats why I utilize both of them as need be for my purposes.
B/F