Audio cassette tape inventor dies

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Audio cassette tape inventor dies

2021-03-11 09:23:40

Audio cassette tape inventor Lou Ottens dies aged 94

Lived to a good age.

Re: Audio cassette tape inventor dies

Reply #1 – 2021-03-11 09:40:39

http://vintagecassettes.com/index.htm

Good old times. I was using them and walkman until year 2000 or so.

Re: Audio cassette tape inventor dies

Reply #2 – 2021-03-11 13:06:06

I'm still ripping cassettes; so many local bands in my area put out cassettes for years and these cassettes are part of the local music scene history that is being preserved via digitalization at http://www.calgarycassettes.org/

Re: Audio cassette tape inventor dies

Reply #3 – 2021-03-11 15:05:07

Stowed away up in the attic I still got that tape deck (with dbx!), bias-adjusted to a certain specific tape that I bought a biiig pile of. Somewhere. I don't know where.

But I know where I have my collection of demo tapes, typically with black/white xeroxed covers cut with scissors. Last played ... uh, don't ask :-)

Re: Audio cassette tape inventor dies

Reply #4 – 2021-03-11 18:39:00

I was at FYE the other day and was surprised to see new cassettes for sale.

Re: Audio cassette tape inventor dies

Reply #5 – 2021-03-11 19:50:25

Sad news. Great legacy though.

I still use my tape deck to transfer/digitise FM recorded DJ mixes. It's actually currently with my bro-in-law who's been transferring a load of his bands demo tapes etc for archival purposes.

Re: Audio cassette tape inventor dies

Reply #6 – 2021-03-12 07:46:26

R Tape loading error, 0:1

Re: Audio cassette tape inventor dies

Reply #7 – 2021-04-13 18:42:57

Quote from: shadowking on 2021-03-11 09:40:39

I was using them [cassette] and walkman until year 2000 or so.

I used those portable cassette players (that run on two AA's) a bit to. I am not exactly sure what year I stopped using them but I want to say mid-to-late 1990's as far as portable cassette players go. although I know a vehicle I had back around those days used cassette tapes so I used those into the early 2000's on some level, but only because of occasional vehicle use, but general portable use etc would have been pretty much CD's.

I would guesstimate I was using portable cassette player from about 1992-1993 (it could not have been earlier than 1992-1993 because 'Dr. Dre - The Chronic (1992)' was when I first got into music, which would have pretty much put me about 13 years old at that time) til mid-to-late 1990's as I was using portable CD players before the year 2000. although the first good portable CD player I got (with good battery life/anti-skip protection) was likely in the year 2000, given it's (Sony D-EJ611) got a Dec 1999 mfg date on it, which I still have, as it's still a decent option for portable music (given it gets good battery life and one can use NiMh battery(Eneloops etc) in it nowadays which basically means you will easily get for years of use out of a single pair of NiMh AA's) even though it's most obvious flaw is it's not as convenient like a portable/MP3 player since you have to change out CD's due to it being limited to 80min audio MAX per CD where as a MP3 player can pretty much fit ones entire collection in it (currently using AGPTEK-U3(8GB) with 16GB MicroSD card as of March 2021). so I don't really use it much anymore even though I have a little here and there over the last handful of years or so (although putting that aside it's been collecting dust since I think 2008 when I got a Sansa e250. so prior to that e250 unit, that Sony player (the mfg date of 1999 one) probably got about 8 years of use out of it). it would have been even better had it been able to read CD-RW discs so one would cut back on waste. because as is, I got to burn CD-R's, so I tend to stick to MP3 players.

but anyways, the first portable CD players I used (which are the only two I recall having before the good one I mentioned above), which would have been probably 1993-1994 or so, are battery hogs/no skip protection as I remember one of those two (which was the newer of the two) did not even have the usual center hub where you click the CD into place and came with sort of a tray it sit on when say in a vehicle to help prevent skipping etc but I don't think I really ever used that much from memory as I just held the CD player in hand being careful to keep it as steady as I could and it worked well enough as that one, while I don't recall the exact battery life of that, it was on the weaker but still usable side unlike the first one we had which seemed to be pretty much useless running from two AA's from what I recall. so from those days to a maybe 5 years or so later, the battery life etc improved dramatically on those portable players along with the added bonus of anti-skip technology which worked quite well to where I can't even recall that Sony one with the mfg date of 1999 ever skipping even when having it in a little holster type thing near my waste walking around quickly back in the day.

but if I recall correctly I was still using portable cassette players back around that mid-1990's range because I want to say they ended up being overall better back then due to crap battery life on portable CD players, at least the two I used did back around those days to where the CD players were not outright superior like they were by near the very end of the 1990's or so as by then, say early 2000's or so, I would say cassettes were pretty much dead as I remember one could get blank cassette tapes for a while but eventually local stores stopped carrying them but I don't know about what year that was from memory but my best guess off the top of my head was probably sometime in the early-to-mid 2000's.

ill stop babbling now, but it's a nice trip down memory lane talking about this stuff a bit

Re: Audio cassette tape inventor dies

Reply #8 – 2021-04-14 04:32:56

@ThaCrip I had various portable tape players throughout the 90's and none of them lasted me long. I had my 1st portable CD player as early as 2001 and that thing was for the most part was awesome (40 second anti-skip, 24-battery life on 2 AAs, could read CD-RWs, wired remote, could use rechargeable batteries and it could also recharge them), it lasted a very long time for me. The 1st MP3 player I received from my parents ran off a single AAA battery and could store an hour of music at 128 kbps per file (big waste of money on their part and I also didn't ask for it either). My first iPod (5th Gen 80GB) was a game changer in many ways for me but still had the limitation of needing to use iTunes to manually manage it. For portable music these days, my smartphone does it better than anything else I had before.

Re: Audio cassette tape inventor dies

Reply #9 – 2021-04-14 15:32:26

Quote from: Chibisteven on 2021-04-14 04:32:56

The 1st MP3 player I received from my parents ran off a single AAA battery and could store an hour of music at 128 kbps per file (big waste of money on their part and I also didn't ask for it either).

Yeah, I can imagine and totally get what you mean. like even in the earlier days of that stuff it would have been bad because only 1hr of music @ 128kbps is a joke as it's less than a standard AUDIO CD and for the cost one would be better off using portable CD player at that point overall.

I had a RCA Lyra (don't remember exact model) MP3 player years ago and while it was nice in the sense it ran on a single AA battery, storage space was a bit weak but at least it was better than only 1 hour as at least I could store some music on it but even then it was limited. I want to say I either had a 256MB or 512MB SD card in it (I don't remember the max on that but my guess is probably 512MB or 1GB), which was usable, but still a bit weak for storage space.

that's one thing I like about AGPTEK-U3(8GB) I got last month (for $25) is it runs on a single AAA battery (I use a 800mAh NiMh battery which is actually 800mAh according to my Powerex C9000) and seems to last around 12 hours (probably at least 10 hours or so as the device officially claims 'up to 10 hours'), which I always like NiMh AA/AAA tech over rechargeable lithium since it will always be easy enough to find quality batteries for the foreseeable future unlike rechargeable lithium batteries which eventually will be hard to come by for a random device and then the device is pretty much junk because of that. NOTE: I am not the type of person who always upgrades tech as if something works well enough I plan on using it for the foreseeable future.

with that said, while that AGPTEK-U3 MP3 player works fine so far, I do wonder about it's longevity since it's cheap china made, so quality might be suspect. but who knows, maybe it will last many years or it could be dead in the not too distant future. but that AGPTEK-U3(8GB) (of which I am currently using a 16GB MicroSD card in it (the device claims it can use up to 128GB MicroSD card)) is like those older MP3 players from the 2000's except it's got plenty of storage space which was the primary flaw of those older/good brand name players of the 2000's that used regular batteries. hopefully it lasts at least 3-5 years, but on the bright side at least I only paid $25 for it so I took a chance on it as, assume it stays working, it was a good buy for the price and ill never have to worry about lack of storage space or lack of quality batteries for it.

but it's a shame you can't find quality/name brand MP3 players that run on regular AA/AAA batteries though as while one could always opt for AAA/AA powered MP3 players from quite a few years ago, the problem with those is lack of storage space as I would imagine many of those were probably 512MB to 1GB of storage space at most and I am of the mindset I would want at least 4-8GB of storage at minimum since any less than that is too limiting for anyone with a decent sized music collection and don't want to be swapping music in-and-out of it here and there.

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