Tape Trail

Posted by kingseiko (A) on January 01, 2007 at 18:01:54

In Reply to: questions regarding bias and eq posted by Vinnie on January 1, 2007 at 14:30:12:

Hi:
There is in general three types of pre-recorded cassette tapes in the market. One of the three is Type-I( or normal ) with 120uS equalization. This is the most common seen one. The second one is Type-II ( or Chrome ) with 120uS equalization and the third one is Type-II ( or Chrome ) with 70uS equatlization. Seldom will you get Type-IV ( or Metal ) with 70uS equalization.

The first two will need to be played under Type-I and 120uS equalization during playback while the thire one will need to be played under Type-II and 70uS equalization during playback.

I have no idea whether when you play a Type-II with 120uS equalization tape on a deck which allow you to select the tape type plus bias manual you have to select normal and 120uS or CrO2 and 120uS even though the J-insert in the pre-recorded casssette tape will tell you to use normal and 120uS during playback. The type-tab on the shell for Type-II with 120uS equalization is the same as the Type-I shell ( one single tab ). This probably is to ensure that normal and 120uS equalization will be selected on those decks that automatically select the type of tapes for you.

In general, pre-recorded commerical cassettes will have much better playback performance when recorded using TYPE-II/70uS equalization. They are not produced as many as the TYPE-II/120uS though.

Pre-recorded commerical cassettes using TYPE-IV/70uS are very rare and as far as I know only the Reference Recordings by Nakamichi series exist. Let me know if there is more brands than this one.

Hope this will help.

Happy Hunting,
Mike