A cassette deck is a player, or player/recorder, for compact audio cassettes. It is a form of tape deck. The cassette recorder was introduced by the Philips Corporation in 1963 and marketed in 1965 as an improvement over reel-to-reel recorders designed for portable use. It enclosed both reels of the recording tape in a holder which eliminated the need to thread the tape through individual reels. The tape width was just 0.125 inches (3.2 mm) and tape speed was 1.875 inches (4.76 cm) per second, which meant that sound quality was appropriate for only voice or dictation use. In 1971, the Advent Corporation combined Dolby B -type tape hiss noise reduction system along with chromium dioxide tape to create the Advent Model 201, the first high fidelity cassette deck. This deck was an OEM unit manufactured by Nakamichi.

Cassette decks reached the pinnacle of performance and complexity in the late 1980's. Cassette decks from companies such as Nakamichi, Revox and Tandberg are thought to be the best ever produced, and since development of serious cassette recorders has ceased, are valued by collectors. Decks sold by Japanese companies such as Akai, Pioneer, Sony, Technics, and Denon were also common and each company offered models of very high quality. Tascam offered cassette decks for the professional audio community, and is a unique in that it still makes and sells cassette decks.

Cassette decks at their peak used 3-head recording technology (developed by Nakamichi but used in all serious decks from all manufacturers), the Dolby noise reduction system including the newer C (in 1980) and S types, and microprocessors to adjust tape bias automatically. Bang & Olufsen developed the HX-Pro headroom extension system in conjunction with Dolby Laboratories in 1982. This was used in many higher end decks.

Auto-reversing decks came into popular use because the user did not need to flip the cassette manually to play the other side.

Cassette deck sales began to fade with the advent of the compact disc (and recordable compact disc) and other digital recording technologies, such as the digital audio tape.

Despite the decline in the production of cassette decks, these products are still valued by some. Many audiophiles believe that cassette deck technology, due to its analog nature, provides superior sounding recordings to current digital technology, such as CDR and DAT. However, cassette decks are not currently thought by most to comprise a high end audio component.

Internal & External Links

• Pictures of Cassette Decks A Japanese language page, but containing pictures of historic cassette decks.

• Vintage Deck Pictures An external link with pictures of vintage cassette decks and reel to reel decks.

• Nakamichi and Revox These corporate pages contains links to external sites relevant to cassette decks.

• Audio Asylum Tape Trail A discussion forum of interest to those involved in cassette technology.

• high end audio This page contains links to high end audio companies, including companies formerly producing "high end" audio gear such as cassette decks.

• tape deck