I don't have a cd recorder (yet). But I can offer this comparisan.
I have a theta data II with a pro prime IIa. (outdated but take this for what it is). I can easily make a recording on a cassette from a vinyl source that sounds better than the cd of the same record.
So while I think problably I would be able to uprade my redbook rig to where this was not true, I could then uprade my vinyl rig. I am not sure where I would hit the wall where the cassette could not extract enough to not be better than the cd. I don't know why a cd recording would sound better than than a commercailly pressed cd, unless it was made from a vinyl source and I eliminated errors from the cd mastering process. (there is always loss when recording, evan as my cassettes lose quite a bit, but still not enough to outweigh in my opinion what the cd doesn't have in the first place, although I am aware that the cd has still some advantages over the cassette).
As the cd format is changing this is becoming not true. What is fast becoming not the case is the cassette at all. While I can easily make a cassette the plays better in the car with a cassette player than a cd player in the car, quality car cassette players are really hard to find. With cd recorders becoming more available and computers having this capacity as well, cassette decks are disappearing from poeples systems, which is making recording cassettes fer other's shared enjoyment pointless, as they can't evan play them, regardless of the quality. The best cassettes for recording are no longer manufactured, further making it less worthwhile, so the whole 'hobby' and art of cassette recording has changed, and will soon disappear. The same with magnetic tape all around eventually.
Reel to reels in studio's, while still in use and state of the art still has a use because of its superior sound quality, but because of the digital format becoming better, and the digital formats flexability, tape is becoming less popular and available as a format.
The whole knowledge base and skill of using magnetic tape is sadly, disappearing. While I can still make a cassette that is vastly superior than what I can make on my computer or what anyone else has ever presented me, be it from a studio demo, a home cd recorder, or from the record store, it doesn't really have much use with nothing to play them on.I have been very long winded, but to be specific, My local mass market stereo stores where you go to buy a stereo system for your car no longer has upper-end cassette players, tdk no longer makes max formulation tapes, ma formulation tapes and below are more expensive, studios around here no longer make tapes for distribution. How is there to be a comparism?
