1970s Design Indulgence

While writing these "line stage" pages I've also been doing unscientific "market research". It's called looking at the viewing counter - the (x Viewing) thing that pops up after each forum subject heading.

While writing about the RIAA EQ, there were a few takers, and I recall seeing it reach 5.

The line-level usage of this first preamp stage hit an incredible 13!

The tape head EQ postings managed 2, but most of the time it's 1, or no show.

I told Stu about it, and he was going to link to it on his Reel2Reel Facebook page, but perhaps he hasn't, and now he's told me he no longer has any tapes or machines, huh.

But peterb has so far been the champion of the tape head EQ dialogue! He sent me his old Sony reel to reel manual .pdf by email - all 5Mb of it - and that helped me understand that I may have got the tape head EQ right.

Prior to me working through this tape head EQ stage, I had a classical-music record producer emailing me on a related subject to do with remastering old tapes. That didn't get far either.

So I'm getting the feeling that tape head EQ is on a hiding to nowhere - is that right?

Both Sylvain's and patientot's cassette machines are catered for by the tape-loop (rec out and "3rd head" in).

Comment: anything can be made no matter how complex, but only if it suits the narrative.

They've now got a one inch loudspeaker that can be driven by a microscopic class D amplifier, fed by algorithms that make it sound like a much larger speaker, and they gave it a name, to which it answers to, and talks back to you, and plays your Phil Collins'.

Orwell's telescreen is now in every modern home. The mark of the beast is on its way.

Old fashioned analogue isn't old fashioned, it simply doesn't work in the internet of things, it cannot tell big brother what you're doing.

I haven't had or used a reel to reel machine in the last 50 years. I used to have both portable and rack cassette machines, which I and mostly my children used into the late 80s. Both failed at some time and never got repaired as we had all given up using them. I now can't justify owning either R2R or Cassette, as I have no need to make live recordings or use them as playback machines. What R2R source material I have, recordings of the last offshore Pirate radio broadcasts, are not really worth listening to, quality wise, assuming the tape is still playable. What few cassettes I have are of poor quality compared to the vinyl versions I have or are of music I wish I hadn't bought!

In that regard the tape playback and recording facilities are a matter of interest rather than need.

I can't speak for others, but tape is not a medium I can foresee being of use to me now.

Sorry if that dampens the enthusiam for tape.

Just my 2d worth.

Ian

So, should we do as John C suggested yesterday, and make the switching modular?

So far we've got inputs for:

MM Cartridge

Various line-levels (for items with flat frequency responses)

Tape Head EQ

To which could easily be added:

Ceramic Cartridge EQ

...and what else?