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Blank cassettes

Electone

Electone

Well-Known Member
How long will unopened blank cassettes last for? Looking through some old boxes today and stumbled upon some thirty or so unopened cassettes that date from the late 1970's to the early 90's. They've been stored in a closet, never exposed to extreme heat or cold. The boxes consisted of:

- 6 Scotch XS-I
- 6 Scotch XS-II
- 2 Scotch XSM-IV
- 3 Scotch BX
- 4 Denon HD-6
- 1 Sony UX
- 1 Maxell XLII
- 5 Scotch Master III Ferri-Chrome (these were the real surprise!)

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I dug out some of my old cassettes (TDK, Maxell) I recorded on in the late
80's, early 90's. They had been stored in an old garage since the mid 90's when I got a vehicle with a CD player. I played them all on a deck I just got and much to my surprise they all sounded fine. :yes:

When I say old garage, I mean an OLD dilapidated storage type where you throw things and forget about them.
 
They are all very likely like new inside. FWIW, those Scotch Type IVs are worth quite a bit to collectors. Probably better than $30 each.
 
perryinva said:
They are all very likely like new inside. FWIW, those Scotch Type IVs are worth quite a bit to collectors. Probably better than $30 each.
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If anything, I would have thought the Scotch Master IIIs would be a collectible. Never really liked the XSM-IVs. They never matched up well with any of my decks.
 
cool stash :thmbsp: i have a few scotch xsII that i bought used..They are great sounding tapes :yes:
 
I'm sorry to say, they are no longer any good and require special measures to dispose of. Mail them to me and shall dispose of them for you safely and properly :D

Seriously though, they should be just fine. Nice stash of tapes I must say. Rock on. :music:

A_L
 
Nice find and be sure to send in that rebate sticker on the top of those Scotch Master III tapes. Call ahead just to make sure and say "yeah, can I still send in the rebate on a set of Ferri-Chrome cassettes". I think you will have to talk to Imation nowadays rather than Scotch.

Nice collection, enjoy.
 
So where does one find good high-bias tapes these days? I really like Maxell II 90-minute, but all sources seem to have dried up?

Suggestions?
 
TAGO MAGO said:
Nice find and be sure to send in that rebate sticker on the top of those Scotch Master III tapes. Call ahead just to make sure and say "yeah, can I still send in the rebate on a set of Ferri-Chrome cassettes". I think you will have to talk to Imation nowadays rather than Scotch.

Nice collection, enjoy.
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I just checked the package and there is no expiry date on the rebate coupon. 3M Canada has it's headquarters here in London, Ontario. Hmmm... :scratch2:
 
well, J & R Audio seems to be the place. No Maxell high bias, but I did find plenty of TDK high bias. That'll do, I guess.
 
Electone said:
I just checked the package and there is no expiry date on the rebate coupon. 3M Canada has it's headquarters here in London, Ontario. Hmmm... :scratch2:
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I am curious how long before they yell "SECURITY" if you were to actually try to pull that stunt. Come to think of it, I have some Scotch tapes from 1973 that also have a rebate card attached to the J-Card you can take with you.
 
My Experience With Old Cassette Tape

I've had great, and awful, experience buying and using vintage cassette tape. My experience is almost exclusively Maxell, and at the "higher" end (XLII, XLII-S, MX). Most have been fine, I had one large batch of new old stock (25) XLII-S's from the "golden age" (around mid-80's) that were totally unplayable. Shrink wrapped, they looked great, but would not play. I gave them to a guy who said he thought he had the gear and the expertise to make them work; he had no luck, either. I've also had some failures with a couple of MX90's. My theory is what really matters is where and how they were stored. The bad XLII-S's came from Florida, and I'm guessing they were exposed to heat and humidity (the cases had some internal cloudiness, another reason I think humidity and heat were involved). Otherwise, a high quality tape should still be good. I recommend putting each one through a fast forward and rewind cycle before trying to record. If the tape has stuck together, you'll know when your deck starts to slow down on FF/RW (and I've had that happen). Good luck.
 
gearlover said:
I've had great, and awful, experience buying and using vintage cassette tape. My experience is almost exclusively Maxell, and at the "higher" end (XLII, XLII-S, MX). Most have been fine, I had one large batch of new old stock (25) XLII-S's from the "golden age" (around mid-80's) that were totally unplayable. Shrink wrapped, they looked great, but would not play. I gave them to a guy who said he thought he had the gear and the expertise to make them work; he had no luck, either. I've also had some failures with a couple of MX90's. My theory is what really matters is where and how they were stored. The bad XLII-S's came from Florida, and I'm guessing they were exposed to heat and humidity (the cases had some internal cloudiness, another reason I think humidity and heat were involved). Otherwise, a high quality tape should still be good. I recommend putting each one through a fast forward and rewind cycle before trying to record. If the tape has stuck together, you'll know when your deck starts to slow down on FF/RW (and I've had that happen). Good luck.
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I'm wondering if baking cassettes would work ~ala SSS w/RtR:scratch2:
 
CoogarXR said:
I bet they are fine. Tapes are more durable that people think.
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Yeah, I really don't get it either. My old cassettes are as good as when they were recorded in the 70's. Well, pretty much. And I have several hundred NOS tapes that I figure will do just fine.

What I don't get is that the opposite is true with open reel. I sold all four of my open reel decks and over 200 tapes because I got tired of them hopelessly shedding. Sure, some seemed ok, but also the "best" backcoated tapes were the worst. And even the NOS tapes had the problem. With many of them, you could not play ten seconds of music before a completely clean head would become so gummed up that the motors could not pull the tape through, or it made a terrible whining sound.

Oh, and baking fixes them for a week or two. So unless you have something that you absolutely have to have on an open reel tape and you can't get it off torrent (maybe your wedding vows) it's irrelevant.

Maybe someone can explain why this seems to be a serious issue with open reel but cassette appears to be immune.
 
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I would think the tape speed would be 1 reason. The tape is also more exposed to the environment. And a typical reel deck has some groove wear in the heads/transport, which would exacerbate shedding.
 
Jonny Ramone said:
I would think the tape speed would be 1 reason. The tape is also more exposed to the environment. And a typical reel deck has some groove wear in the heads/transport, which would exacerbate shedding.
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IOW, the devlil's in the details. I actually wondered about the tape speed thing.
 
gmku said:
Thanks for the suggestions, everyone.
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My guess is you would have had some responses if you'd start your own thread instead of hijacking this one.

No back to the OT;

Those Scotch tapes (no pun) are really something, you sure you don't want to sell 'em? :D
 
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