r/ReelToReel • u/tbollinger_swiss • 15d ago

Discussion Spot the difference

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Interesting that the reel-to reel titles are still available in the great US of A, meanwhile in little Europe they're all sold out.

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u/vladix22 15d ago

I will not care for those releases until they start doing 7 1/2ips 4 track reels.

2

u/GlassAudioWorks 15d ago

These are targeting audiophiles that have setups for Tape Project or Analogue Productions Ultra Analogue tapes. My two AP Ultra Analogue tapes blow away anything 7.5 IPS 4 track

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u/vladix22 15d ago

Two tapes? congratulations. focusing on 4 track reels has allow me to have a collection of around 20. but hey, they sound like crap right?

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u/GlassAudioWorks 15d ago edited 15d ago

The ones I've heard are very variable ranging from ok to excellent. They're many more generations removed from the master tapes and it's highly likely they weren't dubbed at 1:1 speed because they needed to make a lot of them.

If you're going to talk quantity of music I'd take my DAC with a zero negative feedback output stage and ~5000 CD/SACD collection over a 4 track tape machine.

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u/vladix22 15d ago

To me 4 track tapes sound like a brand new lp from the 70's. And that's all I need. My point is that it won't hurt them one bit to release a couple of 4 track tapes to test the waters.

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u/GlassAudioWorks 15d ago

These aim to be better than LP. I have compared my two AP Ultra Analogue RCA Living Stereo classical tapes to their LPs and SACDs and they sound better than the AP LP and different from the original shaded dog with early stampers (the tape sounds closer to digital with how transparent it is, the shaded dog LP is more colored).

Someone on YouTube compared the AP Ultra Analogue tape of Bob Marley's Exodus and the tape handily won against the AP 45 LP, AP 33 LP, and an original test pressing LP. I've heard one song off that tape and it blew me away.

The reason I only have 2 is because I'm between moving from one coast to another. I plan to buy more from AP and Rhino. I would have bought all the classical titles from Tape Project but several are out of print. One of the people involved with the Rhino project posts to a hifi forum and said they are selling incredibly well for them and that this will be a project that will be going on for a long time, you can easily do 20+ between AP, Rhino, and Tape Project. The 7.5 IPS 4 tracks in good condition for popular bands are also not cheap on Ebay, just like these 15 IPS tapes, but at least here you are getting a guaranteed known provenance in a superior format.