u/RetroDave79

Technics M-260 cos you know.... everybody needs a 3 head recorder if you are going to make lots of mix tapes.

Sansui D-300M cos... looks great and I love the tape mechanism (after a complete dissasembly to clean it still love it... but not that much).

I've serviced and calibrated both and they sound great, Im not sure if I preffer the Sansui sound over the Technics, but Sansui transport is incredibly silent, and much easier to work on!!

I think the D-300M is the first tape deck I enjoyed servicing, its designed with mainteinance and repairs in mind 😃

Guys, I know cleaning the tape path and heads is part of the experience... but as a guy how uses lots of old tapes, I will need to go to Financial Audit and explain why half of my cash goes to alcohol and cotton swabs xD

I was listening to a nice tape and thinking, "why nobody had the idea to put a cloth "tape" in a reel, and use it to clean all the tape path and the heads??", then after a google search I've found that I will not be rich thanks to my idea... it already exists, but... IS IT ANY GOOD??

Thinking about pros and cons, the only cons I see are that, if you don't clean the cloth tape often, after a number of uses it will be full of residue from old tapes and grim and will not work properly, and that I think it will not clean the pinch rollers...

Do you guys use it?, some parts of the path are very hard to reach and keep clean, so the idea of cleaning the entire path just "playing a tape" is very tempting....

Hello guys!

I'm playing around with my "new to me" Olympus 004 recorder. I've already figured out what all the buttons do and got used to how it works. Its design philosophy is slightly different from AKAI recorders, but not that much.

Using 5din to 2RCA adaptors I managed to connect it to my amp for playback and recording, but I'm having problems with the REC in connector, I think cold solder joints are the culprint.

Do you think I can use another connector from the back for recording while I find time to fix the problem? one of the connectors also works as an input, but it does not allow to adjust the levels, its fixed.

If you know what means every symbol I will print labels for them, and it will also help future owners.

Thanks in advance :D

I already have a clear preference, slotted reels, easier to use, I don't destroy the leader tape twisting it, and I can thread the tape in seconds with just one hand....

For me is a no-brainer.

But now that I need to buy a couple of empty reels for my new R2R, I've noticed that most of the ones available are solid reels, why???

Which do you guys preffer and why?

PD: pardon the pun and the AI picture, I'm going to hell, I know it.

First of all, sorry for the stupidly long text, but if anyone will understand me, I think its you guys :D

A small but heavy AF guy came into my house about a month ago, a lovely Akai GX-210D, and nothing is the same after that.

I already have about 70 tapes, ask me why I know what WPS, BF and SBS means, I also know what smell I should expect when I open an old reel depending on the brand.... and Im hating myself for trying to adjust the azimuth of an autoreverse player.... less than 30 days guys...

Things that I love about this universe:

I spend a lot of my free time listening to old mixtapes from strangers, trying to imagine what they were thinking 40 years ago when they put a lot of effort into recording 2 hours of songs from 20 different records into a tape...

Im discovering lots of artists and sounds that makes my feel ALIVE again, I loved music so much! but I think streaming and internet in general killed it for me, UNTIL NOW.

The feeling when just looking at the remaining tape you are able to fit one last great song into the mix, the song ends... silence..... CLANK!, end of the tape :D

Things that Im not sure if I love, but at least doesnt feel "bad".

All my music universe is now around R2R, I only use my record players when I make a new mixtape and I need songs from my vinyl collection.

Im not buying any pre-recorded media anymore, no vinyl, no CD, no cassette, all my cash goes into reels, 99.7% pure alcohol and cotton swabs...

You know what guys, right now Im recording a tape from my FLAC collection (using a tube DAC), and I 100% know I will listen to that tape a lot, and I will never use the FLACs again, I just modified the last 3 songs 4 times to get a good fit, and its part of the fun...

So what? what do you mean?.... I was feeling like shit today, now seated in front of the laptop while I write this stupid post, Im listening to the last seconds of the Fisherman's Blues, the sound is coming from the Tape monitor and the recording is about to finish... AND I FEEL AWESOME!

R2R brought back the joy of music to my life, and Im thankful.

Oh BTW, my lovely GX-210D is feeling sad on that chair right now, but soon its going to be at my best friends house, he doesnt know, but I gifted it to him with a bunch of mixtapes I made, so I will not suffer this joy alone anymore hahahahha

Now I have a AKAI GX-266D that only records using the autoreverse side, and soon a black beauty with bigger reels 👀

I've got a bunch of nice sounding TDK LX-35/90, sadly I think its my first contact with what you call White Powder Syndrome (WPS).

3 of them leave a small amount of this powder after playing them, but the one from the picture must be a Pablo Escobar Limited Edition, all around the Akai is covered in the white powder, and I had to deep clean the poor guy.

Can I/should I save those tapes?

I made a test, I did a direct reel to reel loop, and using a microfiber cloth I FF and then RW the entire tape, cloth is full of white powder, so I think I took a big part of it from the tape...

Will you try to save them? or the powder will cause problems on my Akai? its everywhere!!! Im not sure if it can damage other tapes or the heads :/

Hi guys, I've got a bunch of nice Basf reels, in the original plastic boxes.

Reels are in great shape, they are inside a round plastic case inside the rigid plastic boxes of th e pictures.

As you can see the lids look gross, but is not grime, I've tried to clean them using alcohol, degreaser and a lot of elbow grease, but the rag cames clean, I think the plastic is sufferering some kid of chemical reaction.

Some are very white, others are tan, others are full of spots.... I've tried sanding the first one from the left, but results are not the best.

Any ideas? would you sand them and the spray the lids with paint? using the retrobright method from videogames consoles?....

Hi guys! honeymoon is over, time to deal with part of the fun of having a R2R, tech problems :D

I'm enjoying the Akai A LOT, recorded many tapes, discovered some interesting mixes recorded during the 70s by the last owner of the tape... the world you know and love.

BUT, now I'm noticing problems with the left channel on my AKAI GX-210D.

Since the beggining I noticed the left channel rec level was lower than the right, but I was able to record many tapes with great sound quality and correct levels, just adjusting the REC before recording.

I think something is getting worse now.

I've got many used tapes to do my own mixes, some of them are great, some are trash, some are rotten, nothing new here, BUT after marking some of them as "bad left channel", different brands, different batches, I got suspicious of my Akai.

Got some old stock sealed tapes, I know "sealed" is no warranty at all, but I wanted to compare.

Using a tone generator at different freqs, and the new tapes, I've got interesting results.

Monitoring TAPE recording:

. Right channel needle is steady at any freq.

. Left channel needle is moving constantly, small amounts at some freqs, a lot on others.

. Left channel REC level needs to be a tad higher than the right one to record at same volume.

If I play a blank tape, I get a noticeable hissss and a cyclical high-pitched sound from the left channel, and the needle moves into the 20 mark constantly:

. I can push in the head slightly, and the sound fades away 80%.

. If I use the autoreverse, the left needle stops moving almost completely, I have much less hiss and the high pitched sound is still there but much less noticeable, also the right needle very very slightly moves, almost nothing.

As a note, playback still sounds very good, but the reversed sound from the other side of the tape is audible in the background during quiet parts.

Do you guys think I have a mechanical problem here? or do you think I need to check electronics, bad caps, transistors....

UPDATE:

REC level difference solved, thanks to u/Yolomaeus1 for the tip about the knobs, the problem was that L&R Rec knobs are not installed in the correct position.

High pitch noise on left channel, after cleaning the autoreverse switch and the speed switch sound is gone, also the hiss noise is a lot better. thanks to u/Resprom for the suggestion.

Left channel recording quality is pretty much solved too, with a test tone both vumeters are steady at the same levels now, I don't know if this was solved just by cleaning the switches.

TODO 1: replace blown capacitors.
TODO 2: investigate why the sound from the other side in reverse bleeds in during playback.

2nd day as a proud R2R player owner, what a journey is gonna be :D

I bought NOS Basf tapes and already recorded 2 mix tapes, from FLAC files using a tube DAC Fiio R2R, perfect name isnt it?, very happy with the results already.

I came back from work and a box full of tapes was waiting for me, guys, I'm on the first tape of many and I already need to find more hahahaha, this tape is an awesome mix made of 70s country songs, Tammy Wynette, Cash, David Wills..... even not being country my go to genre, Im really enjoying the tape.

The feeling of being listening to a mix that somebody put a lot of time and care to make more than 40 years ago is... warming? a bit sad? I don't know, but Im diggin it, and the best part, the next tape was recorded using the same exact R2R model I just bought, an Akai GX-210D during the first day of the year 1982 :D

Finally, my first ever R2R is here, first machine and first contact with the Reel to Reel tecnology itself.

As you can see in the 2nd pic, it came with the right spindle bent and the plastic holder broken, during transport they put a lot of weight over the front of the AKAI or hit it hard, both spindles went through 3 layers of cardboard :/

I've managed to reinstall the broken plastic holder (until I get 3D printed replacement) and straightened the spindle a bit... IT WORKS!!!!

It came with an Eric Clapson mix tape, well used, but sounds AMAIZING, I'm floating, love the tone, the detail... what a lovely format :D

After the first hour of use a squicking sound appeared, very loud.... it came from the big pinch roller, tried to put a drop of oil in it, but it did nothing... then I found out you can dissasemble it just removing the metalic cover, cleaned everything with alcohol and put a new thin layer of Singer oil... BRAND NEW :D

Guys, Im already in love with my Akai, now my eyes are wide open, and I can see why do you keep using R2R in 2026.

My journey into this universe has just begun, and I can already tell it's going to be delightful.

Thanks to the community for being so welcoming, for your help and for keeping this alive :D

Yes, It has not a place to stay, so on a chair it is, and yes, Im using CD cases to level it, sorry guys, Im not use to this kind of strange turntables xD

Today found this Denon DP-35F in the wild... is not a linear, but I saw the strange Dynamic Servo Tracer tonearm and I said... why not... lets give it a try.

Still learning about that tonearm technology, but after adjusting it (zeroing?) I have to say it works very smothly, and it is also a DD so the speed is spot on.

Original DL-60 cart with a slightly fatiged stylus (low rider) but the sound is great, I wonder if that cart is any good, the good point is that I can try a lot of different carts here, linears are more limited.

Im not sure if I will keep it, its bulky but looks nice and its in very good shape.

What do you guys think about this TT? Will you keep it? Will you try a better cart or just go for a new stylus?

EDIT: I just found that both the antiskate and the tracking force are controlled electronically, NICE :D
EDIT 2: I don't know if the info is correct, is the tonearm tracking cpu controlled?

I'm officially an R2R head!!!

Thank you guys for the nice posts you wrote when I was asking about the sense of having a R2R in 2026, you really helped me to jump into it.

I just paid an Akai GX-210D, fully serviced and working great, next week I will have it here :D

Im really excited to learn about this new universe, I never had or used a R2R, so I have LOTS of things to read about.

See you here guys :D

Hi guys, for some time Im feeling tempted to get into the reeltoreel world, I had 0 experience, I never saw one in person, but somethig calls me.

Im really enjoy my vinyl and tape cassette setups, but Im already looking at local market for a nice unit to buy... Im gravitating around the Akai GX-4000D and the Teac X3...

What do you do with your decks? I know some guys use them to record their vinyl and then listen to the tapes, to keep the vinyl fresh, but I'm not that guy, I will play my vinyl, making mix tapes is an option too, but compact cassette is easier and cheaper to use for that idea.... so... what other ways to enjoy a reeltoreel I have?

Are the Akai GX-4000D and the Teac X3 good choices for a first setup?

I know I'm not using the correct words... is a deck? a tape deck? a recorder? hahaha sorry guys.

Vinyl, Streaming, CD, FLAC... Tapes... why? did you ever ask yourself that question?

Dunno why but today I said, time to wake up the Luxman. I went directly for one of my original tapes, still plays ok, sounds.... okish.. then I realized, the only reason I still have a tape deck is because nostalgia, I wanted to play my old mix tapes, my radio recordings.

What are your reasons for coming back to such a format in 2026?

Do you buy new releases? I've tried, but most of them are just a gimmick, bad quality, just for showing, and I had enough, no more.

Phono users beware, I had to return 2 RCA cables from Amazon, both are the nylon braided type.

I've been chasing a ziiiiiinggg electric noise in my vinyl setup for days, finally those cables were the culprits.

I had to do a lot of try and error to finally find the problem, I'm sharing an amp phono stage with two turntables, one of the bad cables was connected to one of the turntables, the other one to the amp, so the noise was present on both players, as you can imagine, replacing only one of the cables was makig no difference, luckily finally I decided to replace all the cables at once.

RIKSOIN with ferrite antimagnetic rings was the worse by far, even using it for Line levels is not possible, when your hand gets close to it the noise begins, and if you touch it gets very loud.

Kabeldirect is not that bad, touching them won't make the noise worse, but noise is there all the time.

Replaced them with a Kabeldirect and a deleyCon, both made of thick rubber , and 0 problems.

I hope this saves some hours of troubleshooting to somebody ;)

Im having fun and learning about this hobby thanks to my SL-7, Im already happy with the sound I get from the original P202C cart with an elliptical stylus, but I would like to see how far can it go :D

After lot of reading, I have 2 routes to go:

. Keep the P202C and install a Jico Super Analog Stylus (SAS).

. Replace the cart with a Technics P205CMK3.

Buying the P205 with a new boron nude stylus, will cost about 2 times the price of the Jico SAS stylus for the original cart, but people think it is a next level upgrade.

What do you think guys? spent 380€ in a SAS stylus, or about 700€ for a P205+stylus :)

Im not and audiophile, I just love tinkering and learning, of course I enjoy a nice sounding setup, but I'm not a "purists", I already have tried an AT85EP cart, but I preffer the sound of the original one.

Im in love with both the SL-V5 and the SL-7, they are sharing the SU-V7 phono because it sounds so good I don't want to add an external preamp :)

Problem is.... why not to add a SU-V9 under the SL-7?

I've been back into the hobby for about 1 year now, what started with an Audiotecnica BT turntable and a 2.1 Edifier speaker system became what you see now....

The system on the floor awaiting for a place to stay, is a Binatone CD 500, a cheap plastic system that I was forced to buy because it has a Linear Tracking "Disc" player :D

Living room:

. Technics SU-V7 amp + Technics SL-V5 and SL-7 (sharing the amp phono)

. Mitsubishi DA-U630 + Mitsubishi LT-10V (Fosi Box 2 tube, Box 5, and amp phono)

Yamaha A-S501 is for digital sources only using a R2R DAC (Wiim Ultra streamer, Onkyo CD player and TV for movies and videogames)

Old games room:

. Compact Sharp system with RP-103 front loading double sided turntable.

Bedroom:

. Pioneer mini 3000 system, the PL-3000 turntable is not working now, so Im using a Technics SL-7 silver.

.......... help