[LAU] OT, but IMO really interesting living history: They still produce cassette tapes in Germany

[Ralf Mardorf]

On Tue, 2013-12-03 at 18:49 -0700, Bob van der Poel wrote:
> On Tue, Dec 3, 2013 at 6:38 PM, Gene Heskett <gheskett at wdtv.com> wrote:
> 
> > Studer/Revox?  I spent 2 years, about 1980, keeping 3 of those spinning 14"
> > NAB reels running in an automation system feeding our FM station at KSUE.
> > Not a particularly friendly machine to work on, but sure worked nice.  And
> > no, I wouldn't want to do it again since I don't have the manuals.
> 
> Manuals? You need manuals? Real men don't need manuals ... well, they
> certainly don't use them :)

JFTR Gene seems not to talk about an user manual, but a service manual.
The reason that most consumer 4 track cassette recorders did sound that
disgusting, wasn't the quality of the 4 track tape decks, it was missing
maintenance. From the many musicians I know, I'm the only one who bought
a service manual for the 4 track cassette recorder. It indeed seems to
be uncommon to take a look at a service manual when something doesn't
sound ok. This might be ok for home recording, since most people anyway
couldn't use a service manual, but for professional recording a service
manual is needed. You at least want an exploded diagram of the drive.
No service manuals needed for computer CD/DVD drives, they will go to
http://lmgtfy.com/?q=agbogbloshie+images :(, that was different for
consumer and studio analog gear.