Was at an antiques mall today where there were a couple Akai and Sony R2R decks available. One really intriguing Sony from the mid-60s, all tubed circuitry.
I have a late-40s tubed RCA R2R deck. Works. I never use it, for anything, but it's all bakelite knobs and maroon enameled steel. Anybody want a gorgeous paperweight?
@MackReed R2R fans are a smaller, tighter underground than vinyl album fans, but they're out there. Some people still prefer making home recordings to decks rather than to a computer.
There are also things like The Tape Project
http://www.tapeproject.com It's not worth subscribing to unless you have a TOTL deck and serious he-man audio gear behind it, and also extra money to burn, too. But if you do, there's some great music at really fantastic sound quality available -- the prices are high mostly because they're making manual copies direct from the stereo masters onto a small bank of R2R decks. Nearly all the pricetag is going into labor, license fees, and equipment costs.
It's really crazy, but I can picture myself subscribing to this if I had money to burn.
There are also things like The Tape Project
http://www.tapeproject.com
It's not worth subscribing to unless you have a TOTL deck and serious he-man audio gear behind it, and also extra money to burn, too. But if you do, there's some great music at really fantastic sound quality available -- the prices are high mostly because they're making manual copies direct from the stereo masters onto a small bank of R2R decks. Nearly all the pricetag is going into labor, license fees, and equipment costs.
It's really crazy, but I can picture myself subscribing to this if I had money to burn.