slow speed tape

[Vintagepsych]

How do you feel about tapes recorded at a speed of 9.53 cm/sec and do you think such a speed has a right to life for reel-to-reel tape recorders?  I recently received some very old tapes recorded in this mode and I was amazed at how lively it sounded

[nigel]

No personal experience of reel-to-reel @ 9.53cm/s, but cassette tape runs at 4.75cm/s and that can sound great.
So, why not? If it sounds good, it's good 

[SteveM]

My experience begs to differ...

Enjoy your tapes!

[willbewill]

I think 3.37 inches per second was generally used for commercial tape releases? I used this speed on my reel to reel in my teenage years (1967-70) to eek out my expensive tapes by getting more music on a reel.

[Vintagepsych]

I want to do an experiment: record a cassette on a cassette deck, then take the tape out of it and play it on a reel-to-reel tape recorder at a speed of 4.75 cm/sec and compare the sound of tape recorder and the cassette recorder.

[tapepath]

Keep in mind the tape used in cassette decks is 3.81mm wide, while open reel machines are designed for use with tape that is 6.35mm wide. Tapes recorded on a cassette deck won't align with the head gaps of an open reel machine.

[pde2000]

I have a few r2r albums and some are 3 3/4ips others are 7.5ips.  Studios record at 15ips (and above).  3.75inch = 9.5 cm roughly so double the speed of cassette.  Some cassette recorders even recorded at half speed.

It would be easy enough to play cassette tape on a r2r machine if using mono and aligning the tape path, if you can match the speed.  The 4 track heads alternate blank, left, blank, right so that half track tapes will play.

Catagorically more fidelity can be had from a professional r2r machine with fresh tape and high quality microphones than from cassette but the limits of the format were stretched by nakamichi with their classic transport.   Funny to think it was formulated for dictation, answerphone and budget audio.

[Vintagepsych]

Thank you.   I forgot to mention that I have a Nagra SN tape recorder, which uses tape 3.81mm wide, like a compact cassette.   It has two speeds: 9.5 and 4.75.   So there won't be any problems.   As soon as I find some free time, I will do it and let you know.   If it works, I'll make a video

[Vintagepsych]

https://youtube.com/shorts/PbWBr9me_oc?si=7swJiX-zfOsGAkg1

This is what happened.  I first recorded the song on a cassette and made a video of how it sounds on a cassette recorder.  Then I rewound the tape onto a reel and recorded a video of how the same tape sounds on a reel-to-reel tape recorder.  Who has an opinion - where is the sound better?

https://youtube.com/shorts/PbU_-QU03AY?si=CEWvbacXkfl0o0v6

[Vintagepsych]

https://youtube.com/shorts/dco4sqpdKLA?si=sITkpVKLI6IcesjA

[Vintagepsych]

it turned out crooked, I couldn’t do it any other way, sorry

[wer]

Assuming the recording train of the cassette is the bottle neck, it is Game over - it is difficult to get something out from what is not there 
If, on the other hand, the cassette deck is limited by the playback section, an improvement should be possible.

[seiki-g]

How do you feel about tapes recorded at a speed of 9.53 cm/sec and do you think such a speed has a right to life for reel-to-reel tape recorders?  I recently received some very old tapes recorded in this mode and I was amazed at how lively it sounded

Hello Yuri, I used a Revox A700 and a B77 MK2 for a long time and was very happy with them (the A700 in particular made extremely good recordings). At the moment I only have my Revoex B215 and the recordings are still absolutely great. Of course no comparison with the A700 but still great.
Have fun with your experiments and don’t forget to enjoy the music  .

[Vintagepsych]

Hi Georg!   Unfortunately, I have never owned a B215, but I see very high ratings for it.  I have several top-of-the-line Swiss studio tape recorders and a decent library of mostly copies of master tapes.  I recently got my hands on two tube Revox G-36s and fell in love with them.  The sound is incredibly beautiful, very reminiscent of the Studer C-37.  Lately I’ve been recording and listening at low speed, it has its own unique magic of sound!  That's why I became interested in the specifics of recording at low speeds.

[Colin_EJJ]

The faster the recording speed, the better the high frequency content and signal to noise ratio and lower wow and flutter. To exploit this, Sony developed their Elcassette system in the 1980s which ran at 9.53 cm/sec. And there have been normal cassette machines which have been able to run at that speed, Tascam did at least one.

In the main, recording in analogue is a battle against noise and reduced bandwidth so the higher the speed the better, assuming the machines are aligned correctly and in good condition.