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In Reply to: RE: AKAI best tape posted by DaveInVA on June 28, 2009 at 08:37:58
Like Dave said, the tapes labeled "Irish", "Shamrock", "Concertape" etc are just the name on the boxes. They can be 3M/Scotch or Ampex. These vary in quality since it was a "lowest bid" tape that the distributors sourced from whoever and are quite often seconds. This doesn't mean that there is some awful thing wrong with the tape since it's very often a slitting problem that will make it rub on guides a little more and this will effect high frequency response a bit. Whether you can hear it or not depends on the recording and your playback electronics (very often masked by distortions in the electronics,.. very subtle).
If you're looking for absolute fidelity, you should have your machine biased for a new production tape and use only that tape.
Like Dave mentioned, you can buy NOS tape but you have to roll the dice when you buy anything claimed to be NOS. Poor storage practices can ruin a tape and the seller almost certainly won't know about it's condition (if exposed to high heat or unsealed, high humidity for any length of time). I remember a local used record store that had shelves of Maxell UD. It was stored in room where I personally experienced temps close to 100F. I often wonder who bought those since they are almost certainly ruined (badly cupped). There's a very good chance that some of those are still being sold and resold as sealed NOS for prices near to RMGI and ATR magnetics tapes.
Finally, there are only two makers of reel to reel tape left in the world. They've both just started production to fill the void left by Quantegy/Ampex. I feel that it's in our best interest as tape enthusiasts to support these companies or before long, NOS will be the ONLY tape available to us.
Both of these tapes are available at the below distributor.
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