WHat did Audiophiles hear during Tape deck era?

asvjerry,

"....then discovered one could use a VCR to make seriously good recordings, near CD quality..."


Yes, I always wondered whether VCR with a bit of tech tweaking could have matched reel to reel quality audio.

Nice wide tape and up to four hours of it in standard mode! Sounds good.

According to the following article Ethan Winer didn’t seem convinced, but it’s not a direct quote. In any case I’m not so sure. After all tape speed was fairly similar (cassette 1.87 inches per sec and VHS ran at 1.31 ips). What if VHS speed had been doubled? Twice the thrills? Alas, we’ll never know now.

The future must be all about getting digital to live up to all its extravagant promise, and to do that expectations amongst the non audiophile consumers first need to rise.


How VHS belatedly re-entered music’s format war

https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2015/nov/13/vhs-music-format-war-ty...

Once Dolby B and other exotic tech came out in the mid 80s tape hiss virtually became a thing of the past. Digalog, Dolby B, HX PRO, HiQ, etc. Look for them. 👀 Blow your mind. 🤯 not to mention the plastic cassette cases evolved AND the TAPE formulation itself. Hel-loo! Cassettes are the only Medium that escaped the Loudness Wars. There is no substitute for Dynamic Range. 🤗

@tweak1   Let us not forget to mourn WTMI, please.

tweak1 - I grew up in the 305 and I found FM radio starting in the early to mid-70s to be pretty good with WSHE and Zeta 4.  For awhile, even WBUS (The Magic Bus) broadcasting from the Beach was pretty strong too.  

I was not into High End back then but had good mid-fi gear.  Good RR's and early cassette players had Tape Hiss and later came Dolby Noise Reduction.  That reduced the hiss but slightly affected the high frequencies.  Some older people may have a better take on it, I was in my late teen back then.  BTW, I hated Dolby and wouldn't use it.