A cheap USB cassette deck that actually sounds good!

Another Non-Audiophile-Approved equipment review -- this time of a USB cassette deck whose sound quality really surprised me, in a good way: the Grace Tape2USB and Tape2USB II, also sold as the Plexgear Soundsaver.
Download the audio samples in uncompressed .WAV format:
drive.google.com/open?id=0B_o...

[@LGR]

Dang, that is not bad at all. I recently passed up an ION Audio Tape 2 PC at Goodwill, but now I'm curious how well that one works.

[@LGR]

Wow... well, no regrets passing on that thing, haha.

[@TechnologySpotlight]

Wow.

[@ahadmiah9660]

Use a tape walkman, panasonic, sony or a boombox, much better than using a usb type tape converter.

[@kitchentable1362]

Yeah those ION things are terrible

[@Raguleader]

Although, as VWestlife pointed out in his introduction, a lot of newer computers lack a Line In port. Although in that case, you should be able to substitute a USB audio interface.

[@fiftyclown]

Also, I'm extremely impressed at the quality of the rip.

[@MSB3000]

A high quality rip, you say?

[@vwestlife]

You can't "rip" cassettes. "Ripping" specifically refers to the process of extracting the digital data from a CD or DVD. With analog media, it's called a "dub" / "dubbing".

[@DMessham]

**silvagunner intensifies**

[@fiftyclown]

it's a meme u dip

[@The8BitGuy]

I'm surprised you haven't been hit with copyright issues due to those songs you played. (or did you?) . This device doesn't sound too bad from what I can tell, but it still looks really cheap. I wish there were something out there like this that cost maybe $150 to $200 that was built really well, you know, made to last so to speak.

[@vwestlife]

If you keep the music clips below 28 seconds usually you won't get any Content ID matches.

[@mszymcza]

It's an Alan Parson's project.....project.

[@splangley]

28? Wow, I've had stuff match with as little as 6 seconds. May depend on quality but still.

[@kitchentable1362]

David, I do think theese new decks are great, but if yoy really want to listen to cassettes with high quality, you need an older deck. My main cassette deck is from 1976, I got it from goodwill for 10$, compared to some restorations you have done, theese decks will be easy.

[@kitchentable1362]

Why are you watching videos about it? I Can have any hobby I want. Have you ever actually listened to a high quality tape through a high quality deck? Dont start an argument unless you know what youre talking about.

[@buamfrequencies6087]

i just want to say that i really appreciate the detail you go into and how you give a lot of care to what's on the screen and the audio quality.

[@JoeJ-8282]

That's cool, I actually have one of these things. I found it in a trash dumpster one time, brand new, unopened, still in the box! (Ridiculous what some people throw away! Maybe they just thought it was a junk player so they tossed it without even trying it... whatever, their loss, my gain!) I still haven't used it to record from a tape to USB, but maybe I'll try it now!... It's also really cool that it still works as an analog LL to USB audio converter, even without having to use it as a tape recorder in the process! It's also nice that it doesn't require any software or driver installs on any computer, it just acts like a normal USB thumb drive and is automatically recognized by whatever computer that you plug it into. Nice review, thanks for re-igniting my interest in its usefulness!

[@Dulayne]

All the songs in your videos are just so good. I've enjoyed watching and seeing all your different types of videos. Very well done and looking forward to more.

[@electrojones]

Another great video. This channel and Techmoan are life savers at my boring job.

[@jaykay18]

EXCELLENT choice of music for this demo!

[@spidergloo2708]

jaykay18 ikr

[@doorhanger9317]

_Relax,_ _Listen to one cool cut after another,_ *ＣＤ－１０１．９*

[@bigtimefans100]

major nostalgia

[@HBC101TVStudios]

Happy New Year VWestlife aka Kevin! Thank you for providing the community with your informative videos since 2006! I enjoyed your videos for 8 years already and your video is not boring but rather entertaining for us general viewers to enjoy.. Sincerely, Fred..

[@vwestlife]

I've had my channel since 2006 but I wasn't making videos until 2008.

[@HBC101TVStudios]

Oh. Didn't know that before. Sorry.

[@21minute]

The music samples you included sound so good! 😍

[@clydesight]

Sounds really good! Nice to know there is a machine out there that can do this effectively for folks who aren't into the vintage equipment. For use with vintage analog outputs, one could use an audio out to USB adapter. cable.

[@verastaki]

That's interesting, I do the opposite. I've got my professional tape deck hooked up to my computer. And I record all of my music from CD's and computer MP3 files unto the compact cassette. People get amazed how good my tapes sound. It's cuz I use studio quality Type II chrome and Type IV metal tapes and studio quality Technics tape deck. I love audio compact cassettes. You can fine tune them, they come in different formats, they last a very long time (I got tapes from 1960's which still sound good today). They come in different styles, brands, colours etc... Tapes are awesome!

[@wolfetteplays8894]

Facts!!! I absolutely love tapes, music streaming is too sterile and limits self-expression

[@PardonJulianAssangeNow]

You've just got me hooked onto Jazz music. Thanks VWestlife!

[@baikkuma]

I've seen the 8 bit guy's episode and got disappointed with his cassette recorder, but your solution just blew up my mind! Thanks for your amazing solution for recording cassettes to digital format.

[@blocSonic]

After checking your review, I got a hold of one of these cheap on ebay. I'm glad I did! Pretty damn good. Thanks for the review!

[@superotterboy7937]

I love cassettes still! I'm no hipster either because I actually grew up throughout all of the 90s using tapes and still use them now. Finding decent blank tapes has become a struggle though! Online prices are insane for the quality offered. I've found a dollar store in another town which sell them for a much lower price but I can't imagine their stock lasting! It's a shame as there's a nice, tangible practicality to opening a new tape and loading it up. There's so much nonsense about them sounding terrible about but a well recorded tape loading in an old, properly engineered tape deck is just as enjoyable to my ears as any CD or spotify session. Yes, the quality is slightly lower but not to a degree that most normal music lovers, like myself would notice.

[@JesseEasley]

great review! and informative audacity tips! thank you

[@tostoday]

George Benson...Richard Elliot....Spyro Gyra...Anita Baker...

[@talesfromthelotuspodcast]

Love spyro gyra

[@Bembeleke]

This was very helpful you just gave my old dell an extra life now i just need to get a deck. Thks

[@MyDiesel101]

Good Morning VWestlife, Wishing You & your Family a Happy & Healthy 2017! Thank You for the excellent & very informative videos.

[@DoRC]

a lot of "headphone jacks" on modern laptops are actually software definable jacks that can be selected to be used as a mic or line in as well as headphone and line out.

[@CoolDudeClem]

Not bad apart from the slight wow and flutter, I could really hear it on the sax in that jazz piece.

[@JohnAudioTech]

I might be more sensitive to it but the flutter was quite a bit more than slight.

[@CoolDudeClem]

I was being a bit lenient (i think that's the right word) on saying how much wow and flutter there is, I could notice it in quite a few other places, if they fixed that, and maybe make the frequency response a little flatter, it would be pretty good. Don't know if this has AC or Dc bias recording though.

[@vwestlife]

It has AC bias recording.

[@5roundsrapid263]

I'm listening to this on my 5.1 system. This deck does sound really good.

[@xfilesfoxisdead7979]

Its extreme low fi equipment it Has to have huge wow and flutter. Despite some morons claiming audiophiles are wasting money on expensive gear, truth is you spend more you have more quality. But feel free to listen and record from this crap deck. Im not wasting money and time on it

[@nrdesign1991]

This one doesn't sound too bad at all! I usually detest USB audio hardware, it always causes issues with programs forgetting the settings or mixing up devices.

[@rafalg2113]

My friend once purchased an expensive USB audio interface for podcast recording. He didn't realize that the Zoom H6 recorder he already owned, works as an audio interface, once you hook it up to the computer with USB. I think that even the cheapest H1 Zooms work as USB interface.

[@CANDEEIRO]

Very precious tips, man! Thanks for sharing.

[@Mystique2u]

That sounds like one of my cassettes! Great video!!! 🎶💖

[@megabojan1993]

Happy New year Vwestlife.

[@Well_hello_there_]

Who else was diggin' the smooth jazz version of I'm not in Love by 10cc?............Anyone?

[@mjh5437]

I went to see 10cc in London about 2 years ago,they were great..hit after hit.

[@stephendobbins9251]

What a great device. Thanks for sharing. It sounds like it has good signal to noise ratio.

[@spongeyperson]

Actually sounds pretty good considering it's going through USB, then an Audio format on your pc, then encoded onto youtube. Hope you've had a great New Year Vwestlife :)

[@cameronrivascreativedirector]

This sound great! I couldn't believe it! All of those great music samples brought me back to the 80's.

[@vwestlife]

You mean the early '90s. The tape is from 1992.

[@mr.smash698]

But it sounded like it was from the 80's though.

[@cameronrivascreativedirector]

If you're old enough to remember the 80's, you know that the years begin to run together after a period of time.

[@mr.smash698]

Cameron Yup.

[@chrysanth.5700]

I have thought on and off about starting a cassette collection. There is something more interesting to me about it than vinyl. Nice to know there's a good device to record those with if I ever start my collection.

[@bobroberts135]

The best test of wow and flutter on a tape deck is a pre-recorded piano performance. If the transport isn't steady, it's immediately revealed. I think I'd rather have a vintage tape deck with a better transport. But I enjoyed your video! I subscribed.

[@LaskyLabs]

"Weenie modern computer." Seems accurate.

[@johnmcminn8288]

great tutorial, really well made . I digitized a cassete for a out of print Hal Leonard Book, recently from the Chris Amelar Jammin Series, I found when you go R L out RCA jacks , you get R Mono L mono What i did was go 30$ Beringer UCA 222, to USB then using a generic driver into CUBASE 8 Then did 6 Channels and EQd sets of R and L channels one track at a time to get track separation so I had as follows A1 A2= scooped midrange Ballance 50% R and L A3 A4 = high cut low cut all Midrange Ballance 15% R and L A5 A6 stereo split = lower volume R and L Ballance 100% of higher frequence treble Then it was mixed down int 1 wav file and entered a 1 channel Mastering , where it is funneled into 16bit (Which is the most common bits for phones computers CD players etc) i put a little maximizer on there to make it a little bigger. I found if the recording is not rare and out of print , you may be better getting an m4a file of a Digital remaster I seem to remember Jimmy Page of Led Zep, being one of the first guys doing Digital Remastering , he would goto the vault and get the actual master reels and run the board out into a digital board to get real ambiance and ACTUAL Digital Stereo Also when CDs first appeared in the early 90s , after liner tracking turntables(lol) you saw AAD and ADD also DDD . Analog Digital . the 2 inch tape on the master reels were put through a different board . RUSH power windows, may have been the very first , DDD recording released mainstream Now a days you can subscribe to Spotify and stream Digital at 4K for like 10$ a month , and Download as much as you want , of course people in general, are not actually going to Download that much content as a collector or DJ might. I saw the CHICAGO doc on NetFlix, the one member says ," Back in 84 when technology was just getting good...I mean, becoming inventive, or as to say just more stuff available, the drummer got electronic drums" I just have to laugh at the amount of BACK Peddling in that statement . "Getting good " would be like mis speaking for what was available back then! XD

[@ChritsianBucic]

Interesting review and suggestion!

[@SuperDboy4]

Thanks for introducing me to that last song

[@suprb6970]

I bought one of these. Does what it claims. But still nothing beats a vintage quality recorder.

[@wb3ccn]

I've had one of these for several years now and have had no trouble with it. Even better now that I have a better and faster computer than I used to.

[@colefreddy1]

I love this channel, great and informative video's

[@tjs2014]

I like that Grace machine. It's a very nice looking machine, and seems to work well.

[@patriciovelizcontardo848]

Excellent video!!!

[@codykamminga9667]

Happy new year!

[@RussellRadio]

I love those radio liners.

[@laranaarana]

I own over 200 cassettes (pre-recorded and the ones I created for my individual listening), and I always used Dolby when recording them. And I always used Chrome or Metal tapes.

[@samserios6428]

Thats a great idea and much nicer than most devices that just create super low bitrate mp3s. Another way would be to use an external usb soundcard and a seperate tape deck.

[@ClevelandStorms]

Nice video as always. Luckily I have a focusrite audio interface. I like it because it supports XLR, 1/4 inch, and rca. I can use it to record any audio but it isn't very cheap. It's cool that they made some specifically for tapes though

[@Jorge0s]

I came up on one at the Goodwill in Los Alamos,ca in good condition for 9.90 can't wait to try it out

[@alexmihai22]

Very nice sound, great actually.

[@garohagopian2253]

Hello. This does look marginally better than the new cassette deck fare currently out there. There are two things of note that I feel everyone who undertakes "digitizing" their tapes should be aware of. The first is proper head alignment. I see a little hole just below the cassette door about where the azimuth screw for the record/play head would be, which tells me the user can make this adjustment, which is critical. Tapes are recorded on different machines, each with the head alignment likely slightly off, so the treble/high end may be rolled off, leaving tapes sounding "flat" or "dull" when you play them back here. Adjusting the head azimuth (with a small Philips screwdriver, like what jewelers use) for each tape until you hit that "sweet spot" is essential. The second thing is wow & flutter. The new machines out there now are atrocious in this regard, and that's partly because they only use one motor to drive the capstan (which pulls the tape across the heads at constant speed) and the reels. A two-motor machine (whether belt or direct-drive) means one motor is used just for the capstan, and the other for the reels, which results in much more stable and accurate tape speed. There are other points to consider, but again, I feel these two top the list when prepping for transferring cassettes to digital. By the way, though admittedly irrelevant to the discussion, I disagree with your assertion that not that many people used Dolby noise reduction. It was VERY widely used and was virtually "standard equipment" on tape decks, less-so with arch-rival dbx, tapes made of which only sounded good if you could play them back with it, but relatively few decks used dbx.

[@SudosFTW]

the fact they even give you a linear wall-wart is a neat thing in itself.

[@wisteela]

Cool looking unit

[@supernovagamer929]

i use a cassette player from the 70's as my main one, actually there's a neat story behind it. it's a multi media system that also has a radio, phonograph (record player, i say phonograph because it sounds neat) and 8-track player. i got it as it was being tossed out at my township's fall cleaning thing for free, next year i got a free karaoke machine with microphone, both working.

[@marekmaslak8040]

Thats some good ,,modern casette recorder that doesnt suck" type machine.I like the design and the sound of it is amazing.

[@DevaPermanaDrums]

You have all best songs collection by the way

[@stereophonicstuff]

I've been curious just how bad those cassette to USB converters really are, but could never justify paying for something I knew would be a lost cause. The quality of the Tape2USB would be more than adequate for most every cassette tape transfer undertaken. I'd be interested in seeing a review of the "weeny modern" computer that made a brief cameo in this video. :)

[@michaelmartin9022]

My mum has one I used to record some 40's to 60's comedy shows so I could listen on my phone. It did okay for spoken word and the incidental music, I guess.

[@mercuryoak2]

I think thats ridiculous that they gonna try get rid of the 3.5 mm jacks. heck I heard the iphone 7 has no headphone jack. bluetooth headphones are what your to use but fact is i have bluetooth headphones. the connection can suck . even the sound can skip. .

[@mercuryoak2]

I had android since the Motorola citrus. My first Android. Then I got a pantech burst. Then went to a s3 mini. To a s6 active till I dropped it and screen split. The s3 mini still have but I currently have a s3 phone I like but straight talk gave small memory on this. But its nice. Miss my s6 active. Heck half stuff I have is old reel to reel from 60s. I even take and make music on phone sound analog because I hate thr tin sound of mp3s

[@mercuryoak2]

The big issue I have with android is the fact every update is memory hungry . Or their is useless apps that are not used

[@slawor4]

Matthew N You can root the phone and delete the useless bloatware

[@wilkes85]

If it was just Apple that was doing that, it's fine because there are other alternatives.... but every other manufacturer tries to copy everything Apple does whether it's a good idea or not. That means in a few years, headphone jacks will not be an option. Apple is also putting non-standard USB plugs on their computers, so you need a string of adaptors to hook up the most basic components, so expect that to become the norm too. Apple does things that almost any other company would go out of business for.... but since it's Apple, everyone copies the stupid crap they do.

[@mercuryoak2]

Thats just it theres a cost or getting told you cant because it will mess up phone. Google is the biggest bloatware

[@lispmachine9687]

Compliments on that Gato Barbieri at the end.

[@BertGrink]

Towards the end, it sounded as if that radio dj actually ENCOURAGED his audience to tape his shows hehe

[@vwestlife]

The tape was produced and distributed by the radio station as a promotional item.

[@TheFruitMugger]

Those rips sound fantastic, the quality is unreal.

[@JoshuasRecordings]

Wow, sounds good!

[@markusTegelane]

Hey, I know The 8-bit Guy!

[@markusTegelane]

***** No, his channel

[@refraggedbean]

I know him more from 8-bit keys

[@maziu27]

Who doesn't

[@jamescollins6085]

I remember when he was The iBook Guy.

[@ourwonderfulworld8214]

You can use a small USB sound card

[@duprie37]

@@kumarsajal8400 They sound fine. DAC chips are cheap as chips these days. A $5 USB sound card is as good as the rip-off expensive options. It's the source player that determines the quality.

[@RightWing1]

Even though I don't use it anymore, that is why I hung on to my Pioneer 3 head deck from the late 80's. I suspect nostalgia may set in 1 day for me to resurrect it back into my system, but I tend to play more vinyl or use minidisc for own recorded stuff.

[@cbehr91]

I've had success converting reel-to-reel recordings with a USB sound card and Audacity.

[@zhbvenkhoReload]

happy new year

[@djflixxstudio5735]

This tape deck has amazing quality

[@subbookkeeper]

They used similar font as Oracle Corporation logo.

[@PardonJulianAssangeNow]

ORACLE: One Rich Arsehole Called Larry Ellison

[@WarthogRacer]

Looking at just the video thumbnail, I was like "I never knew Oracle made cassette players." lol

[@vwestlife]

Grace Digital isn't even using this logo anymore, anyway. They changed it to all lowercase, to be trendy with the hipsters...

[@trevnral1]

When I saw the logo my initial thought was why is Oracle making audio electronics.

[@rarewavemusic]

Enjoyed the video. One feature that would have been nice to have on this is pitch control. I know you can adjust pitch in software, but it seems it never sounds as good as an analog pitch adjustment. By the way, I used Shazam to figure out the songs I didn't recognize.

[@connorm955]

5:35 That is a beautiful waveform

[@praisealcolic]

You have good taste in music!

[@uxwbill]

Right away I noticed the unusually heavy bass and flutter in portions of the audio. Other than that, and all of that is pretty minor, it really does sound quite good. I'd be curious to know if the lack of Dolby NR decoding in these units has to do with the lack of suitable ICs being available, and no desire on the maker's part to spend the money on a discrete component implementation. Is it possible to play something from the computer over USB to that unit's sound hardware and have it recorded on tape? There are some cheap USB DACs on eBay with line level inputs and a few of them (particularly one that's seen in a blue colored aluminum shell with multi-channel outputs) are really quite good.

[@vwestlife]

I didn't try using it as a USB sound output device. I did notice that the microphone on/off switch is functional during cassette playback as well as recording, I guess so you can sing along with your cassettes while transferring them to the computer!

[@vwestlife]

I just tried it, and you can use the tape deck as a USB sound output device, but it doesn't work -- nothing comes out of the speaker or is recorded to tape, and the level meter doesn't show any activity.

[@FakeTheAntivirus]

uxwbill o

[@doomermusic7810]

If you want to record from computer to tape on this machine, you can just use an RCA to 3.5mm cable like this one tinyurl.com/ybm98u56 Just plug it into your headphone jack and into the record jacks on the back of the machine and you're good to record anything straight out of your computer. Works beautifully.

[@cliz305]

Hey, it's 8 bit guy!

[@stighenningjohansen]

I have one works very well, surpricingly good sound quality

[@jeremymiller3800]

I doesn't need two speakers when they would be that close together. You wouldn't experience the sterio effect. Your still hearing all the sounds you would hear if it had another speaker. It is a cool device. Thanks for sharing.

[@mikeculbertson]

I think I'd rather get a USB audio stock. those are really cheap these days and you can use a high quality tape deck

[@leonjohnsonjr3331]

I got 2 of these grace and I love them

[@JOELwindows7]

Full Reincarnation! Duper Duper​ Awesome I (we) want to buy! hope it's there on Amazon!

[@JOELwindows7]

it's on ebay! shown on video!

[@hughjanus6975]

Just passed on one at the goodwill, should have got it!

[@coondogtheman]

When I bought the PC I'm using now, I specifically asked the guy at best buy if it had a line input jack. I also told him I'd be using this machine for games. I have a lot of first person shooter games, most are older (Half Life 2, Doom 3) and this machine plays them with no issues. My new laptop does not have a line input which sucks but I don't use the laptop much anyway. I use GoldWave for audio editing because I know it well and used it for many years. I have a few cassette machines to record tapes to the computer but the belts are breaking down on them. My Sony Casette-Corder is still running strong but it's only mono.

[@dannyrampling]

This is a great video very helpful does the Grace have autoreverse feature thanks.

[@tylerwatt12]

most laptops, even the cheap ones do have audio input, it's just using the headset jack. Get a 3 ring 3.5mm splitter. I have one so I can use my ipad as a guitar amp.

[@BadAndUgly]

Seems like a good unit to buy since I've got some tapes to play with.

[@joeblankenship377]

I guess it’s good to know that decent versions of this do exist. No telling how many tape nostalgists have bought garbage.

[@refraggedbean]

I actually made sure my computer motherboard had a full cluster of AUX jacks on the back, all 6, 4 out 2 in, but I used my driver to allow the 2 in to work as outputs, and same with the 2 front jacks

[@screamengine]

I have a 'plus deck' 5 1/4 bay cassette deck I cant live without. Uses serial for software control. Auto reverse etc. A lot like an old VW/Blaupunkt car deck!

[@michael4762]

Interesting video.

[@danthemainman1]

I have some experience with a mic in (and possibly line in) to USB adapter (effectively a tiny sound card embedded into a device no larger than a small USB thumb drive) from a few years ago. I had been looking to get line in audio into GarageBand on my iPad, if I remember correctly. And to use it with a line level input, you’d want to have a line level to mic level attenuator. (Incidentally, for input onto an iPhone or non-USB C iPad these days, the Lightning to 3.5mm adapter Apple sells supports TRRS jacks, and there’s at least one firm currently online selling line level attenuators using the same TRRS standard Apple uses/used.) So the lack of line in on modern computers isn’t an insurmountable issue, which does free you up to use a better, retro tape drive and hook it up to a computer running Audacity. Though yes, it is a more complicated setup than most people who just want to digitize one or two tapes would want to do. Another option would be to hook up a tape deck to a modern PCM recorder with a 3.5mm jack, but the same caveats about line in to mic in attenuation probably still apply. For spoken word tapes, though, you could probably get away with a much cheaper voice recorder (like one of Olympus’s models with a mic or line in), it’s just that the PCM will capture in PCM, of course.

[@SHAD0WxF1R3]

That Smooth Jazz Tape would be great as vaporwave!

[@micnor14]

That thing sounds great! Wow what a blast. Hey are you gonna upload your collection by chance?

[@vwestlife]

I've already uploaded several radio airchecks from my tape collection, both here and on my Vimeo channel.

[@blackestoftheblack6418]

thats some good music man

[@nerwin]

Grace Digital seems to make some decent stuff. I never knew they made this.

[@yukisaitou5004]

The analogue audio input is still there on modern laptops, you just need a TRRS to dual TRS splitter to use it. You do only get mono though.

[@woodgrainstudios7321]

That's Hot...gotta get it...thanks, you're playing some Kick Ass songs too.

[@AnotherWorldYT]

I use a saffire pro 40 as my output and put it into the aux/ line in of a high quality tape deck. If you're using a deck with phono in make sure the master track of your DAW has an RIAA EQ curve adjustment.

[@a1930ford]

I got a model EzCAP230 recently and it would only use about an 8gb flash card. That is actually plenty, but all I had on hand were much too large to use. One thing about it though, is that it will not break down all the individual music clips into separate files, but just copies one file. This is an issue for me, as I have a lot of different music pieces which have different instruments playing the same tune and I wanted to put the better stuff onto a CD once I go through each tune. Will this recorder allow single files to be made of the music being copied with it? Very nice video and I picked on up on Ebay after viewing this. My old reel to reel players were great and I spent a ton of time in making tapes with all the bells and jangles to try to have the best quality audio possible, but that was in the day when record players and turntables actually were produced with very good quality and so were the old reel to reel tape recorders at the time.

[@therestorationofdrwho1865]

This has to be as good as my Phillips tape and vinyl turntable mix.

[@birbv]

1:19 you just predicted the future

[@keithjones7810]

Dont know if I'm on my own but I go the other way and record digital on to cassette tape. I think it sounds more pleasing. Love your vids.