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Demagnetizers aren't that hard to find anyway. I guess I was just thinking of accessory-type stuff to ask for if the seller happens to be getting out of reel-to-reels entirely and you happen to be getting into it from scratch. Wildly presumptive of me.

FWIW, I had to hunt ebay for months just to pay over $100 for my remote, so you can definitely feel good about getting that.

yeah, i'm convinced it's a good deal, and i'm definitely stoked on the remote, but i was originally looking at otari's, and when i googled the TSR-8 i saw a lot of mixed feedback about it in terms of sound quality.

as for MRL tapes, is it worth it to spring for a new one? i've read (i think on another thread here) that getting used MRL tapes can be risky. new ones are pricey little fuckers though. at least i can use my computer as an oscilloscope!

also, does anyone know how easy these things are to open up and clean/fix should anything go wrong?

i guess since the seller also has the service manual, i can answer my own question in the future? i'm hoping to have some insight before i purchase though.

I cheaped-out and got a used MRL off ebay. It has a few dropouts here and there, but what really concerns me is whether the high frequencies are lower on it than they would be on a brand new tape. But in practice, that just means I calibrate using a lower frequency like 10k (or whatever it actually is) instead of the one the manual says to use (15k or whatever it actually is). I'm not taking my tapes to any other studio anytime soon, nor am I going to use anyone else's, so I'm not worried about calibrating my machine to a 100% reliable reference. And I'm pleased enough with the sound I'm getting out of it.

I don't know how the TSR-8 compares to other 8-tracks for sound quality. I have read gripes about its build quality vs. other 8-tracks but I dunno there either. It would sorta be nice if it had XLRs instead of RCAs just for ease of connection, but that all depends on your board, etc. Probably the only aspect of its design that bums me out at all (and that I didn't know about/understand before buying it) is that it is a 2-head machine, so it's trickier to calibrate than the more-common (?) 3-head types, and I can't monitor off the reproduction head to get the 'tape sound' straight to digital, which might be handy vs. syncing to the computer and dumping to digital after recording. Yadda yadda.

It's easy enough to screw-off the bottom panel and get to the cards to calibrate, and easy to get to the heads for alignment and cleaning. Calibration took me awhile to wrap my head around, but the manual does tell it all. Don't get a cheapo multimeter or it might not register the bias frequency. I made that mistake a few times before finding a used Fluke multimeter. Oh, and I got a used oscilloscope for like $20 too, which is much more funner than an o-scope plug-in.

Again, I'm no expert though.

oyrgawd wrote:It would sorta be nice if it had XLRs instead of RCAs

Aw fuck, the inputs are unbalanced??

Probably the only aspect of its design that bums me out at all (and that I didn't know about/understand before buying it) is that it is a 2-head machine, so it's trickier to calibrate than the more-common (?) 3-head types, and I can't monitor off the reproduction head to get the 'tape sound' straight to digital, which might be handy vs. syncing to the computer and dumping to digital after recording. Yadda yadda.

the typical design for machines is erase head, record head, and repro head, right? does this one just combine the record and repro head, so that you're either recording or outputting?

i'm kinda bumming out on that right now...

i think it might be time to look at the $900 otari on craigslist in san jose...

Yep, RCA I/O. Somewhere here or on TapeOp, I remember reading Greg explain that RCA is actually a really good connection type (at least for short runs) because it has a lot of surface area vs. other types. I console myself with that memory when I cobble-together adapters to get a preamp connected to the tape machine.

There's an erase head and a combined record/repro head, so the outputs only pass-along the input signal during recording, and play off the tape on playback. Not an incredibly big deal to me. Separate record/repro heads would be nice for recording hybrid-style like I mentioned before, and also for hearing exactly what's going to tape as you track. I track in the same room as the drums and amps anyway, so I wouldn't realistically get much out of that feature.

Three heads and balanced I/O probably would be nicer, but there's the price difference for you.

Here's a spec sheet I found for it, which I could also email if the link doesn't work:
http://web.archive.org/web/199806240616 ... l/tsr8.pdf

thebookofkevin wrote:

oyrgawd wrote:It would sorta be nice if it had XLRs instead of RCAs

Aw fuck, the inputs are unbalanced??

...

i think it might be time to look at the $900 otari on craigslist in san jose...

Be aware that the inputs on the Ortari MX5050 are also unbalanced, they just use XLR connectors. They're also usually wired pin 3 hot so be sure to swap that over if you get one. Even so they are a ton better than Tascam machines, easier to align, more robust, better sounding....

Don't skimp on an MRL tape. It's worth the piece of mind to have a new one, and it's worth the money for the quality of product and service they provide.