ssmith3046
Super Member
I haven't played an eight track in decades but still give my Nak Dragon a regular workout. I'll stick with the inferior cassette.
Cassette is an adequate but finicky medium. It has been amazingly good. Reliable under heavy use it is not, consistent it is not. It requires far more attention to maintenance just to function semi-reliably. Dropouts more an issue. Travelling in the car and field work it is good. At home, I prefer my open reel and will always do so. Because of it's lower dropouts, wider tracks, better response, and far superior reliability/
Tandberg is good, when you can get the spare parts needed to keep one functioning. Many Americans can't get parts. Knowhow on maintenance is not a problem. Studers I can keep running, ReVoxes I can keep running. I can get parts for those and they are easily maintainable. My wife has many Tandberg machines, and she worked for Tandberg as did her parents. In Norway, they are practical as daily drivers. In the USA, parts stocks never were at high levels even when these machines were new. Too many USA Tandberg owners ran their machines until they had a failure, instead of the Norwegian preventative maintenance mindset. Ultralyd, you and my wife have advantages many AK members do not. We know Tandberg machines and their maintenance and have means of getting parts for our own use or stocked spares on key maintenance items. But no Tandberg while they are superb, is as workhorse under American heavy use as say, a ReVox in the toughest environments like abusive users or broadcast automation. This perspective of mine comes from years of servicing and maintaining machines. ReVox spares with very rare exceptions can still be had and through easier channels. ReVox in the USA was a lot easier and friendlier to deal with to boot and would sell and ship an owner, broadcast engineer, or independent servicer spare parts. Tandberg USA was horrible to deal with, they only offered spare parts through their dealers, and many dealers would not sell parts or order parts outside their service departments. Growing up as a young repairman, I dealt with repairing and adapting equipment from Europe. I saw a lot of Tandberg gear. I got so flustered at the US branch of Tandberg when I needed any part, that I wrote to Tandberg in Norway. The Norwegian branch would sell me and ship me parts. So please understand why Tandberg has their US reputation with some people. In Tennessee, that US branch attitude was a major issue with customers.
Aage said:I mean, no FF or rewind (or maybe a FF that is geriatric) and the wonderful "klonk" between trax, what more could one want!?
Best recordings on cassette wil even be very hard to distinguish from ½-track 15ips open reel.
Agreed. Both "Money" and "Time" were cut onto different tracks if I remember. That said, I wish I had the Quad version in 8 track: its worth over $500!. And I got really tired of "Dark Side of The Moon" being played all the time, not to mention it sounded horrible.
As usual, and for no apparent reason.Dude, I just noticed you resurrected an old thread!
HTHMAN said:I sure miss the way the 8-tracks switched tracks in the middle of a song. You sure can not get that with modern media.
OK, I've noticed that 8 tracks tend to have a tonne of bass, and hardly any treble, as well as a general tone that just basically sounds like someone took a dump in the cartridge. The ones that sound good, sound REALLY good. But what's with the ones that sound like AM radio?
And cassettes. Why do they always seem to lack bass, but have enough treble to make your ears ring? Geez. Sure they sound very crisp and clear, but i think they over-did it on the treble.
These 2 formats are basically identical in terms of how they work, but they both have an entirely different sound to them.
When you compare one of the few 8 tracks that don't sound like AM radio, to a cassette, they blow cassettes right out the window. I don't care what anyone says, 8 tracks sound better than cassettes.
if you want a real analogue sound, go for 8 tracks. Cassettes basically sound like CDs.