Why do people still buy vinyl but not cassette tapes?

Question

Cassette tapes are mobile just like CDs and have better sound quality than vinyl. So why is it that people still buy vinyl but not cassette tapes?

Answer 1

People buy vinyl today believing the sound quality is superior to CD in truth it's not put an album recorded and pressed in the last year on a decent turntable and speaker set up alongside the CD version and you wont notice much if any difference however pit an original analogue recording LP against a digitally remastered CD and you will hear a difference



cassette tapes have never had brilliant sound quality they get chewed up break and snap very easily but they were portable and more flexible than an 8-track cartridge you can pause record fast forward and rewind a tape you can play them in the car or use them on the train you could take them anywhere or record anything on them with a little bit of knowledge you could even record on to a pre-recorded tape. As soon as digital downloads came along tapes were dead for a little while there was a format called the Mini-disc which really came out at the wrong time they did what tapes did but with a disc inside i don't recall ever seeing pre-recorded mini-dics for sale

Answer 2

Cassettes are NOT better at anything. Technologically, they were a bridge between vinyl and CD's. They do NOT sound better than vinyl because of their inherent hiss. Cassettes are portable, but CD's do it better. Ever try to fast-forward or rewind to find your favorite song? Vinyl has a bigger space for cover art. Cassettes come in a flimsy plastic case that always breaks and just has a tiny insert for art. Cassettes jam and make a tangled mess.



Frankly, I'm amazed at the comeback of vinyl.....which can only be explained by nostalgia. In pristine condition, vinyl sounds good....but the quality can only be heard on expensive stereo equipment. When played on cheap "record players", nobody can tell the difference.....and after a few plays, the vinyl starts to get scratched.

Answer 3

People are discovering that vinyl sounds better than digital. It certainly has been a well know fact analog and vinyl is superior in sound, digital has just never done it for those who know good sound. Even as digital has made improvements with higher resolution digital content it still falls short. Also you are completely wrong that cassette tapes sound better than vinyl. Cassette tapes fall well short in sound quality even digital sounds better. It was fine in its day, but the format has far to much limitations in both bandwidth, and signal to noise ratio as tape has a very high noise floor. That's why they had all kinds of different noise reductions to reduce the noise from tape. Its a issue with analog tape too, but it has much better signal to noise ratio, and dynamic range and doesn't have the bandwidth limitation cassettes do. So anyway, dont let others say its simply because of nostalgia, people are discovering it because it simply sounds better.



Kevin

40 years high end audio video specialist

Answer 4

it was a fad for about a week but I believe it has much to do with MP3 players are so much smaller than the old walkman cassette player and so much less messy when they wear out.

I also think the answers about sound quality not better and the art is not as impressive are true too.

Also there are those crazy people who intentionally scratch vinyl albums.



Did I mention what a terrible mess it is when the tape sticks in the player?

Answer 5

Standard Phillips Cassette tapes in general do not have better S/N, or bandwidth than vinyl records. That said, some people do use cassettes still.

Answer 6

Cassette tapes have better sound quality than vinyl? Sorry, you lost it there. Cassettes are about the worst sound quality of any sound source. 4 tracks carried on 1/8th inch tape. It's awful sound quality.

Answer 7

Cassette tapes are fragile. They stretch, shrink, get dirt in them, and so on. Some vinyl records from the 50's are still playable.

Answer 8

High End Cassette decks are very complex in its electronic circuitry. I have a Japan made High End Cassette deck 25 years ago, but was damaged by lightning strike*. Sent to the manufacture's sale and service center but they are unable to repair it.

I wanted to buy a new high-end cassette deck but no one selling it now. Audio equipment manufacturer is not producing high-end cassette deck now anymore.

Note: * the cassette tape deck was connected to a VHS tape recorder and the VHS tape recorder was connected to an outdoor TV antenna, Lightning strike the TV antenna and damage both VHS recorder and tape deck..

Answer 9

Tape in any form has the problem of inconvenience

in the selection of a specific section.



LP sides are commonly divided into "bands",

each containing one song or other short portion.



CDs typically have "tracks" that correspond to bands on LPs.



Tapes don't have any equivalent for bands and tracks.

They are best suited for playing an entire program in its recorded sequence,

which many people don't want.





I have Never heard Any cassette that sounded

better than a record of the same material.



I have made many of my own cassettes that are Almost as good

as the records from which I copied them.



Most pre-recorded cassettes suffer

(or, if you please, they make the Listener suffer)

from poorer high-frequency response than the record would have.



A well-recorded open-reel tape running at 7.5 IPS (9,5 cm)

might have better high-frequency response than a record ---

provided that the machine it is played on is good enough.

Many aren't.



A very, Very few home cassette decks could record and reproduce

frequencies closely approaching or even a little above 20 kHz,

but failure to keep the heads clean will rapidly diminish such performance

to no better than that of a lesser deck.



Additionally, head wear will reduce performance over time,

and head replacement requires not only obtaining the correct part,

which after many years may not even be possible,

but also good technical skill to properly install it.



Replacing a phono cartridge is, by comparison, quite an easy process,

although care must be taken to insure the best results.



The main plus of prerecorded tape over records is lack of "pops and ticks".

That, to me, isn't enough to make up for its minuses.





And then, as another answerer mentioned,

there are various problems with the mechanical aspects of running tape.

I have experienced fairly little of that, but it has happened to me.

Answer 10

Vinyl is collector items, cassette is much less so, besides scratching DJ would require records like that.

Answer 11

Vinyl is vintage, almost like a collectors item. Cassette tapes are outdated. There is a difference.

Answer 12

Do they even make pre-recorded cassettes anymore? Anyway, the sound quality of them is not better than vinyl, it's quite a lot worse.

Answer 13

because all though CD sound is closer to the original people get used to a certain small amount of distortion and get to like it . (same reason applies to "tube sound") Vinyl can give a better dynamic and frequency range than standard cassettes. Though vinyl has more hiss and crackle.

Answer 14

the used market for stereo & hifi is out there,local outfits whom advertise local,a lot of used electronics vintage equipment is in thrift shops really in the cheap,,money,costs,, in advertising as in state of the art stuff on the various website, are unnecessary for used stuff buyers

Answer 15

Okay, here is the strategy: (and I've gotten heckled for this before)

Use tapes (audio cassettes) to save your vinyl. Here's how you do it: You'll need a decent record player, and a decent line feed stereo tape recorder. You possibly could hold a dictation tape recorder (ONN model ONA13AV504 from walmart for example) up to a portable record player, but the results would be laughable, but perceptible. Since ordinary vinyl L.P.'s are about twenty-two minutes to a side, both sides of a record can fit on one side of a ninety minute tape, so you can make a two album tape where each side of the tape is one whole record. In this way you can use the vinyl as the archiving medium and expose the tape to all the hardships of life on earth. Get a recorder with a good equalizer and a limiter, and the results will be good enough to ride around in a noisy car, or public transportation. I wouldn't try to dub Andreas Vollenweider, Classical Gas, Vangelis, or even The Outlaws onto audiotape, just hard rock or classical thunder, taped and screwed etc. A tape that is a copy, can bake in a hot car, get dropped in a mud puddle, or accidentally left on the bus, and it's no big deal. (twenty years ago I would have included "get stolen in the ghetto". After a few years when it finally wears out and the audio gets muddy, (and I know a lot of you are going to say that audio cassette is already muddy, but a lot of low-fi hard rock would mostly be there even on a wax cylinder, to wit:



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hg1iB_MOKto ) ...you just record another tape from your virgin vinyl, and leave the old one sitting on the bench at the bus stop. You probably expect that someone would probably just throw it away, and you're probably right, but there is the odd chance that some old freak would pick it up and love it.

Meanwhile, I've got vinyl that I got in '92 that's still pristine. You just

shouldn't handle your vinyl when you're drunk and/or stoned.

I've never broken a tape. I don't know what these other guys are doing wrong. Maybe they stick the bare cassette in their hip pocket then sit down on them and fault the cassette for cracking, or step on them in the middle of the night on the way to the bathroom, then again almost every ghetto phone screen I've seen is cracked up, yet I haven't cracked up mine. Most of the broken cassettes I've seen over the years were broken because they were thrown out the window of a speeding Chevy

Caprice and smashed against a telephone pole, usually in a fit of

emotional pique: "I hate that %@$&@ song!!!" Now if you really have the skills, you can reel that sucker onto an emptied barney and friends cassette. People just can't live with adequate, too many poor people have been sold on that "the best or nothing" ethic, and I'd just have to go with "nothing" given that choice, since I can't afford the best, but as long as you're just listening to the likes of Plain Jane and the Jokes, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QthXaK9uDac it doesn't really matter does it?

Answer 16

ok

Answer 17

Anyone who would say that that cassette tape audio is superior to vinyl audio doesn't know what he's talking about.

Answer 18

For the sound for one. And because those who do are interested in all that comes with vinyl records....the album cover, the sleevenotes...

Chances are, those like myself who ( still ) buy vinyl do it for nostalgic reasons.

Answer 19

To be honest, I haven't seen cassettes for sale in any retail shops for years. That could be why.

Answer 20

Vinyl has way better tone quality. Tapes are just tapes and they break easily.

Answer 21

Bored again Jake? Credibility was low anyway, but saying cassette quality is better than vinyl just make you look like *bleep*ing stupid, or just ignorant.

Answer 22

Cassette tapes provide dreadful sound quality - limited dynamic range and frequency response, hiss, wow and flutter) shed oxide, the tape stretches and snaps and of course they jam and get tangled up in the mechanism of the player. The only way to access a particular part of a recording is to wind the tape until the correct part is found. Anyone who wishes to hear the same side again has to wait while the tape is rewound. Cassette machine heads need fo be regularly cleaned, demagnetised and adjusted. The only advantages they had were that they could easily be recorded on (the only practical alternatives were reel to reel tape machines) and that they could be played back in places records couldn't (in a car, whilst walking etc.).



For many years records provided the vast majority of people with the best format for listening to recordings. however, records were limited in several ways. They too wore out and were easily damaged. The amount of recording time was limited (for reasonable quality to about 20 minites per side), records were too often warped or pressed off-centre and, most importantly, surface noise was an issue (I remember when I first heard a CD - the thing I noticed most was the complete lack of noise between tracks). Various attempts were made to market "higher-quality" records pressed on better-quality, "virgin" vinyl to produce a record that was thicker and noticeably heavier than "ordinary" records. I never heard any of these records but apparently they really did sound better but they were more expensive and, to notice the difference, needed to be played on expensive, really top-end equipment.



When CDs appeared, I would guess that in excess of 95% of people accepted without question that the were almost unbelievably superior to records. For many people (me included) price was an issue (CDs were a LOT more expensive than records). Record sleeves were works of art - you "read the sleeve" whilst listening to the record. There was also something "good" about lowering the stylus onto the surface of the record and watching the record revolve and actually produce the sound. There was even something comforting about the surface noice before the music started.



Now, almost immediately a few people claimed to dislike the sound of CDs. They claimed they sounded cold and clinical and just lacked body and depth when compared to records. These people were real "audiophiles" though, experts who spent as much on their hifi equipment as most of us did on our car. Also, many early CDs were vastly inferior compared to later ones. Most of us though couldn't really say as we counldn't afford a CD player or £16 a time for CDs!



As digital technology spread, more and more people began to complain that "something was missing". They weren't comparing CDs with records though but analoge with digital - DAT recorders with reel to reel recorders, digital reverb as opposed tothe old "echo chamber" etc. Neverthless, technology is relentless and records, more or less, died - replaced by CDs.



I don't think people ARE "still buying" records. Mainly, it's young kids who, frankly, have been well and truly conned into buying records which - guess what - now cost MORE than CDs! The majority of modern records are DIGITAL recordings pressed onto vinyl rather than burned onto a CD or downloaded from the internet. The record actually produes sound in a mechanical, "analogue" way, but it is a DIGITAL sound that's being heard.



Most people do NOT think that records sound better than CDs; they think the opposite. The fact is that many young kids have never heard even reasonable-quality sound. They buy their cheap record player from Amazon and a few records (or "vinyls" as they like to call them), and listen to the horrible tinny, distorted sound of a record being played more or less at the correct speed and think, "Wow - this is COOL. It sounds better than "listening" to a poor-quality digital download played on my phone with a $7 set of ear-buds that don't work properly whilst I come home from school on the bus!". Yeah it probably does. Now go and listen to a CD played on a decent stereo system with maybe a 50 watt per channel stereo amp and a couple of full-size speakers.



It hurts me to say this but probably the reason that people don't still buy cassette tapes is because they are not really available. I have a horrible feeling that there are enough kids dumb enough to want to!

Answer 23

....the marketeers make those decisions. They put the squeeze play on the consumers and push them around...and we are forced to go along with their money making fits that flare up every 3 to 4 years....look at the fashion, hair, make up and shoe industries.....what a racket. When they decide to change it up you will know without a doubt.

Answer 24

Nostagia.

Answer 25

They still do.



https://www.bloomberg.com/news/videos/2015-09-01/the-last-audio-cassette-factory

Answer 26

you can anything by I phone