[touch me i'm sick]

i've started buying albums on cassette cause they're so cheap. the problem is their terrible quality and they get wrecked really easily.

is their anything you can do to fix a tape that makes the sound all warped and slow?

[shentov]

throw it off the window and get the vinyl

[touch me i'm sick]

yeah yeah. i've been buying vinyl too. cassettes are far cheaper though.

[shentov]

i love cassettes. recently bought a pretty beat up though good player. some sanyo. it doesn't eat my tapes, yay!

PS i'm posing, i only have 1 (one) vinyl. but it's an SST. beat on the brat/mater=dik

[touch me i'm sick]

sweet i want it. yeah i've only recently started buying vinyl . i only have like 14 or so. it's a huge investment especially cause i don't make my own money yet so i have to collect it here and there.

[shentov]

i need to get my hands on a turntable. but im unemployed right now. it sucks.

vinyl is dope.

[max]

this is what i really don't like about it all when it comes to this place.

vinyl is a trend and i can't understand hipsters.

Due to the nature of the medium, playback of "hard" records, eg: LPs, causes gradual degradation of the recording. The recordings are best preserved by transferring them onto more stable media and playing the records as rarely as possible. They need to be stored on edge, and do best under environmental conditions that most humans would find comfortable.

A further limitation of the record is that with a constant rotational speed, the quality of the sound may differ across the width of the record because the inner groove modulations are more compressed than those of the outer tracks. The result is that inner tracks have distortion that can be noticeable at higher recording levels.

At the time of the introduction of the compact disc (CD) in the mid-1980s, the stereo LP pressed in vinyl was at the high point of its development. Still, it suffered from a variety of limitations:

• The stereo image was not made up of fully discrete Left and Right channels; each channel's signal coming out of the magnetic cartridge contained approximately 20% of the signal from the other channel. The lack of pure channel separation made for a sense of diminished soundstage.
• Thin, closely-spaced spiral groove walls that allowed for increased playing time on a 33 rpm microgroove LP led to a tinny pre-echo warning of upcoming loud sounds. The hot tip of the cutting lathe unintentionally transferred some of the subsequent groove wall's impulse signal into the previous groove wall. It was discernable by some listeners throughout certain recordings but a quiet passage followed by a loud sound would allow anyone to hear a faint pre-echo of the loud sound occurring 1.8 seconds ahead of time.[6] This problem could also appear as "post"-echo, with a tinny ghost of the sound arriving 1.8 seconds after its main impulse.
• Fidelity steadily dropped as the recording progressed; there was more vinyl per second available for fine reproduction of high frequencies at the large-diameter beginning of the music groove than on the smaller diameter inner grooves closer to the center. The beginning of the music groove on an LP gave 510 mm of vinyl per second traveling past the stylus while the ending of the music groove gave 200-210 mm of vinyl per second—less than half the linear resolution.[7]
• Factory problems involving incomplete hot vinyl flow within the stamper could fail to accurately recreate a small section of one side of the groove, a problem called non-fill. It usually appeared on the first song of a side if it was present at all. Non-fill made itself known as a tearing, grating or ripping sound.
• Poor vinyl quality control could put bits of foreign material in the path of the stylus, creating a permanent 'pop' or 'tick'.
• The user setting the stylus down in the middle of a recording could cut into the groove and create a permanent 'pop' or 'tick'.
• Dust or foreign matter collected on the record, making for multiple 'pops' and 'ticks' if not carefully cleaned.
• A static electric charge could build up on the surface of the spinning record and discharge into the stylus, making a loud 'pop'. In very dry climates, this could happen several times per minute. Subsequent plays of the same record would not have pops in the same places in the music as the static buildup wasn't tied to variations in the groove.
• An off-center stamping applied a slow 0.56 Hz modulation to the playback, affecting pitch due to a greater amount of vinyl per second on one side of the record than the other. It also affected tonality because the stylus is pressed alternately into one groove wall and then the other, making the frequency response change in each channel. This problem is often called "wow", though turntable and motor problems can also cause pitch-only "wow".
• Motor problems or belt slippage could cause momentary pitch changes. If these repeated regularly, they could be called "flutter"; if they happened slowly they could be called "wow".
• Turntable surface slickness, or the slickness of a stack of LPs could allow the top record to slip, causing momentary lowering of pitch in the playback.
• Tracking force of the stylus was not always the same from beginning to end of the groove. Stereo balance could shift as the recording progressed.
• Outside electrical interference could be amplified by the magnetic cartridge. Common household wallplate SCR dimmers sharing AC lines could put noise into the playback, as could poorly shielded electronics and strong radio transmitters.
• Loud sounds in the environment could be transmitted mechanically from the turntable's sympathetic vibration into the stylus. Heavy footfalls could bounce the needle out of the groove.
• Heat could warp the disk, causing pitch and tone problems if minor; tracking problems if major. Badly warped records would be rendered unplayable.
• The LP was delicate. Any accidental fumbling with the stylus or dropping of the record onto a sharp corner could scratch the record permanently, creating a series of 'ticks' and 'pops' heard at subsequent playback. Heavier accidents could cause the stylus to break through the groove wall as it was playing, creating a permanent skip that would cause the stylus to either skip ahead to the next groove or skip back to the previous groove. A skip going to the previous groove was called a broken record, as the same section of 1.8 seconds of LP music would repeat over and over until the stylus was lifted off the record.

[max]

so what I ask is - is it really worth it, to spend hardly earned money on such a lousy format?

[touch me i'm sick]

i think it is. the artwork and other shit that comes with it makes it far more personal than cds. you've got more shit to hold in your hand, and as a right tactile, i love it.

[max]

well, that is a point. and a good one too, being a tactile myself. still - why can't we get a bigger box for just cds? that'd be cool.

[atsonicpark]

max, really? THAT's what you don't like about this place? i can think of a lot worse things on this board than hipster elitism.

me, i don't care either way -- sound is sound, i buy music to hear music, not "oh the preserved frequency from the vinyl mastering and the warm fuzzies i get in my balls from the vinyl crackle." it's the same fucking album, regardless, and the "atmosphere" of the vinyl/casette RARELY enhances the recording enough for me to care. (except casette ambient/casette noise groups) so, whatever people prefer, i guess........

[touch me i'm sick]

i mean i don't really have a preference when it comes to what it sounds like. i buy cassettes vinyl and cds alike. but if vinyl were cheaper and came with the same cool shit, i'd probably always buy vinyl

[max]

Originally Posted by atsonicpark

max, really? THAT's what you don't like about this place? i can think of a lot worse things on this board than hipster elitism.

what could be worse than elitism? seriously?
yeah i don't like occasional stirs of propaganda, and some fanboy-isms. but really, the elitist attitude always ruined it all for me, throughout my life. it spoils the fun.

[StevOK]

recently I've been using cassettes to record natural ambient sounds. The problem I get is that I get heavy tape hiss. Hopefully I can fix that by running it through my car's tape player with noise reduction. Tomorrow I'm going to record a test of my town's tornado sirens.

[gmku]

Originally Posted by max

so what I ask is - is it really worth it, to spend hardly earned money on such a lousy format?

Oh, grow up.

[touch me i'm sick]

tell em gmku!

[gmku]

The guy has nothing better to do than start a format fight? Seriously, we don't need this in here.

[touch me i'm sick]

right on man. i jsut wanna know how to fix my fuckin tapes!

[Everyneurotic]

mp3s and cds are lousy formats too.

i get what i get.

[gmku]

As for your question about cassettes, it's all relative, isn't it? I mean, they don't win accolades from audiophiles, it's true, and they do tend to break easily. But they do have a certain "cool" factor.

My advice: Play them on decent equipment and they'll sound better and last longer. Don't leave them in the sun, etc. etc.

And enjoy them!