----- Original Message -----
From: "David Lennick" <[log in to unmask]>
> Pretty well covered by recent posters. Incidentally, we had a similar
> problem with tapes made on our ancient Utah tape recorder (full track,
> bought in 1950). When we began copying the tapes made on that machine over
> to the Wollensak in 1959, anything recorded prior to 1955 had to be copied
> from another Wollensak because repeated repairs to the Utah had resulted
> in its running fast (about 8 IPS) and the tapes were noisy and cruddy
> sounding after a certain point, probably because of head wear. We didn't
> have a quarter-track machine yet so we were too dumb to know that we'd get
> better results from the right channel or down the middle of the tape
> track.
> dl
>
Which reminded me of another problem which is/was fairly common on "home-
use grade" cassettes...! While these machines usually run close enough to
the
standard 1-7/8 speed that cassettes don't sound noticeably "off-speed"..
nevertheless, they DON'T all run at exactly the same speed! I found this out
when usingt a different "dubbing" deck to copy a cassette originally
recorded
on a different tape deck; the reason I notice the "accumulated" speed
difference
(tape recorded on deck A, then dub-copied on deck B, and that tape played
back on deck A again...!), is because I tried playing harmonica along with
the
resulting tape, and found it was no longer in the key of E (A harmonica, 2nd
position) as the LP I had originally taped had been...?!
Steven C. Barr
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