Why no interest in reel to reel if you're looking for the ultimate sound?

R-T-R has another annoying limitation -the rarity of machines with TWO playback heads, one for 1/4 track tapes, and one for half-track. My excitement over the Tape Project was diminished due to the prices for fancy boxes and 15ips-only IEC-only half-track tape. I was able to get a hold of one issue someone wanted to sell. The entire 40 minute album was on TWO
reels which of course had to be rewound first and played back for 20 minutes each. I even ASKED them if they would "consider a consumer-line" cutting back on the packaging and offer 7.5IPS-NAB on ONE reel which still would have sounded excellent and would have cost much less money. For the less-fussy folks with a good machine at home. They were very "put off" by my suggestion, never mind thinking about all the qtr-track TEACS on the market. There's a word for that attitude which I will refrain from using here. If you're completely devoted to 15- even 30 IPS tapes- 1/2 inch and ONE-INCH tapes and outboard preamps, then you are either a technician or an engineer- or your best friend is. David Wilson had a superb Studer at his studio with all-custom built electronics; Mark Levinson customized a Studer-A80  which you can find for sale every few years, and with the proper ancillaries make mind-blowing live recordings if you can hire musicians to come and perform. OR...
you can have a nice Teac, Technics, or a Revox which will do a lot of things but not what certain companies will support. 
It seems like people are actually trying to discourage you from enjoying using your (well-cared for) deck. It really is a shame. 
P.S.- I have an Otari MX-55N WITH two playback heads. And I believe there exists somewhere a Studer A-810 with two playback heads. BUT try to find one...!  

There are really three different important reel to reel tape eras. The first one consists of the prerecorded stereo tapes from the 1950s and 60s. The best were the 7.5 inch per second (ips) two track tapes produced by RCA, Mercury and Capital and other lesser labels. They were expensive at the time costing as much as 5 times more than an LP. Some reel to reel machines at the time were made by German and Swiss companies. I remember that one audiophile machine was sold under the Fisher label. Of course Ampex was the gold standard, but it was really a commercial unit with tube electronics. Ampex machines were often used to produce 30ips master tapes, particularly the RCA Living Stereo line. Mercury modified a commercial movie projector and used 35mm film coated with magnetic particles to record masters for their prerecorded Living Presence tapes. 

In the 1960s, the Swiss-German Revox brand became popular with its transistor electronics. However, early transistor products were rather harsh sounding compared to tubed ones. Later, when cheaper 4 track 3.75 ips tapes became the norm, solid state Japanese machines like Technics and Pioneer were in vogue. Still, I feel that Revox made some of the best sounding transistor decks with their A77 and B77 lineup. While they may have been among the best, none of these decks were really high end because I have bypassed their playback electronics with outboard tape head preamps. This elevates the sound of prerecorded tapes, in particular those old 2 track, 7.5 ips ones, to audiophile levels which rival or surpass LPs. A few commercial 15 ips prerecorded tapes were made which are particuarly spectacular.

The next revolution came when people realized that the studios sent what they called recording master tapes to their LP stamping plants. These were 15 ips, 2 track tapes which sometimes used Dolby A encoding and decoding to reduce tape hiss. While the studios wanted the LP plants to destroy these tapes after pressing the records, some did not and they started showing up for sale for more than $1000 per reel and an LP would usually require 2 reels per album. These tapes sounded their best on the vintage Ampex machines, but by that time in the 70s and 80s, the tube electronics in the Ampex units had deteriorated to the point where they had to be rebuilt or bypassed with outboard playback preamps and the tape heads needed to be replaced. David Manley was particularly involved in demonstrating these tapes at hifi shows using his own rebuilt Ampex tape deck.

The third revolution started a few years ago. There are now a few companies rebuilding Technics and other tape decks with state of the art heads and electronics. These decks are expensive, costing in the thousands. While they can play the best prerecorded tapes from the 50s and 60s, those tapes are rare and many have deteriorated by shedding their metal oxide coatings and they have weakened tape substrates which can stretch and break. So, a new industry has begun to make what would have been called LP recording masters. They are second generations of real time copies of the original recordings. Since the irreplaceable originals from 50s and 60s are so fragile and valuable, a copy is made to use for subsequent copies made in real time, usually at 15ips. This process is so time consuming and expensive that the tapes sell for $300 and up per reel. There are also some prerecorded commercial tapes of contemporary artists. So, the audiophile tape saga which began in the 1950s is being repeated with better solid state decks and higher quality prerecorded tapes. Try to hear some of these systems at hifi shows. I think you will be impressed.

Or you could skip all the hassle and expense and go with a portable cassette player and some good headphones. Nothing wrong with them apples 🍎 in these stressful, cash strapped times. Just about the time cassettes stopped production they had figured out how to make fantastic sounding cassettes. Tape is a natural medium. It breathes. 

I would like to state a few facts for R2R, firstly just like anything else it cost a little to get started. Once you have gotten your foot in the door it gets better. Ok you have your machine it’s tuned up and ready to go, you buy a few tapes to get started. You start to meet others who are into tape and you begin to swap tape copies with each other, this is how you get around having to buy all the tapes you like at high dollar prices. Before you know it you have 30 or so really nice sounding tapes, now truthfully how many of you listen to more than about 30 of your LP collection on a regular basis??? I have 1000 albums but find myself for the most part listening to the same 20-30 all the time. So why not have those 20-30 albums on tape? This is how I have gone down that road and the more of us that do this the better it gets for all, just my opinion...

Howdy, I recently scored a beautiful SonoruS Audio modified ReVox PR99 MKI R2R deck. It is a 2-track machine and runs at 15 ips. I am absolutely floored by its sound. So quiet and so beefy and full sounding music from tapes. I also own a nice vinyl rig and the Sheffield Lab D2D of Dave Grusin - Discovered Again which to me is a damn fine sounding slab of vinyl! R2R still beats it though. Tapes are out there and yes a little more expensive, but darn well worth it. I play people my Steely Dan - Gaucho 15 ips Sonorus Holographic Imaging tape and their jaw literally drops. Highly recommended!