How Often Did Your (Cassette) Tapes Get Eaten?

[kryten79]

One of my car stereos had better taste in music than some of my friends. They would put a tape by a "popular" group in the player and it would eat it. Then I would painstakingly remove the tape, tie it to the antenna and drive to unfurl it. The deck didn't ever eat a TDK SA-C90 that I recall. My Naka and Technics home tape decks didn't ever eat one, but I generally would do the FF/REW on a different deck before playing to retension.

 

[Quadman2]

An update since last April.

Had the old Onkyo cleaned/tuned by old tech friend of mine...hums along even better. Dirt/dust could have caused probs down the road he said.

Now some of my 8 trackers?...well, that's another ball of wax!

Q

 

[Lapis Dragon]

I have been listening to and recording music onto cassettes since 1978 and to this day I still own all of those cassettes ( 800 or so). Out of all that time, I have lost approximately 3 tapes to the dreaded "eating", I have broken a couple and repaired them and I have worn out another 2 or 3. In my experience, cassettes have been very durable and long lived. If you count the one time I lost a tape to a cheap car cassette adapter, that makes (4). I really do not consider "tape eating" to be a prevalent hazard and certainly not one that I am worried about. Others may have had a different experience and I have had mine.

 

[mc1822d]

More than I care to remember!

 

[faber12]

We had crappy players when I was a kid, seemed like we were always about half afraid every time we put a tape in that it would get eaten. I repaired and rewound countless tapes in my youth.

 

[Pyrrho]

I never had a cassette tape eaten by a tape deck. I usually bought quality tapes, mostly TDK, and recorded music from my LPs onto tape. And, when one of my brothers bought a CD player, I started buying CDs, which I recorded onto tape at his home, before I got a CD player for myself. I only had a few prerecorded tapes. I regularly used cassettes for about a decade, before I switched over to CDs.

I also cleaned and demagnetized my tape deck regularly. And I had a decent quality tape deck. But I also occasionally played tapes in my brother's car, and the player in his car was a cheap piece of junk. I remember hearing excessive wow and flutter when hitting bumps in the road, which probably kept me from playing tapes more often.

 

[sKiZo]

Been at least 30 years now ...

(which would correspond with the last time I spun a cassette ...) <G>

BIFF !
(owwwwww)

Thanx ... I needed that.

 

[steerpike2]

I've been using cassettes since around 1980 - and still playing them regularly, and I cannot recall EVER having a tape mutilated.
Good quality machines and cassettes, kept clean, just work without problems.

 

[twiiii]

Only my early Sony car stereo playback decks ate tape. As long as I have been using Maxell tape I have never lost a cassette, with my Nakamichis or car Stereo's.

 

[AudioFeline]

I took care of my tapes and players, so only had a few problems. Mainly in the car, so blame the portable technology.