Ever try recording Quad on a Pro Multitrack cassette deck?

[dean de furia]

A buddy has a nice Tascam 424 MKIII that records 4 tracks at 3 3/4 ips with DBX noise reduction with standard type II cassettes. I can get it cheap as he is going digital. Seems like it might work nicely to record some quad stuff. What do you think?

 

[Q-Eight]

A buddy has a nice Tascam 424 MKIII that records 4 tracks at 3 3/4 ips with DBX noise reduction with standard type II cassettes. I can get it cheap as he is going digital. Seems like it might work nicely to record some quad stuff. What do you think?

I'd say: "Cool!!! Give it a shot!"

 

[john e. bogus]

Using 3 3/4 IPS, you can probably expect an upper limit to the frequency response somewhere around 16-18khz, which would come close to the performance of a reel deck.....the advantages would be price and availability (and price) of blank tape, and price of the deck itself compared to a reel deck offering equal or better performance....the disadvantage (aside from performance not being quite as good as a good reel to reel deck) would be that you'll only get 22 1/2 minutes out of an entire cassette, but that's still enough time to record an album side's worth of 4 discrete channels if that is your intended application. If you use the regular 1 7/8 tape speed, expect an upper frequency response limit of 12-14khz, but in some applications you may still find this acceptable. I've been using such a deck for live quad recordings, see my other postings in this same section of this forum for further details on that....

Yours Truly,
john e. bogus

 

[JonUrban]

I would also say "Go For It!"

 

[quadtrade]

A buddy has a nice Tascam 424 MKIII that records 4 tracks at 3 3/4 ips with DBX noise reduction with standard type II cassettes. I can get it cheap as he is going digital. Seems like it might work nicely to record some quad stuff. What do you think?

You can usually hear the flatlined high end from the decks i have heard. I tried it and found it ok for Q8s, still confining, but reels and records- nope.

 

[bizmopeen]

This worked for me back in the 90's when I wanted to make compilations of my favorite quad material to play without wearing out my source tapes; I used a Tascam PortaTwo. John's right in that the short tape length became a bit of an issue, but still a good way to handily listen to some of my Q8s...

 

[john e. bogus]

"You can usually hear the flatlined high end from the decks i have heard"

I can readily notice the falloff in frequency response as well....but not everyone has such good hearing, some people may notice the difference, some may not....

"I tried it and found it ok for Q8s"

The frequency response of a GOOD Q8 deck will be more comperable to a GOOD 4 channel cassette than a GOOD reel, that's for sure! A GOOD 4 channel cassette will probably outperform a mediocre Q8 deck. For this application, it should work just fine, but you'll have to end up splitting the recording among two cassettes at the faster tape speed....

"but reels and records- nope"

You probably won't notice any loss of quality other than generation loss if you're dubbing from a mediocre reel deck, but quality loss when dubbing from a GOOD reel deck will most certainly be noticed if your ears can hear those highest frequencies, and they're even on the source tape in the first place....

As far as records, a loss in quality *should* be much less apparent with CD-4 sourced material compared to SQ or QS, due to the 15khz lowpass filtering used in CD-4 demodulators. For an SQ or QS source, you might have a stereo cassette (or reel) deck which offers better frequency response and fidelity than a 4 channel job, or even better, a DAT deck....the decoding would have to be derived upon playback, of course.....

Also, keep in mind that overall fidelity and accuracy can mean just as much if not more than ultimate frequency response....the bottom line is that using a 4 channel cassette deck is a compromise and a tradeoff between the advantages and disadvantages.....record something from the best source that you have, then let your own ears be the judge, your own ears will tell you if the tradeoff is acceptable or not.....

Yours Truly,
john e. bogus