Retro 80s Tape Tech: The 4-Track Cassette Recorder | Tascam Porta One

Back in the days before DAWs, the only affordable way to make multi-track recordings would have been to use a 4-track cassette recorder, like this Tascam Porta One Ministudio. Let's perform a little restoration on this example I found on eBay, then see just how capable it can actually be.
All music in this video is original and was made by The Orphic Creative
00:00 Intro
01:09 What is a 4-Track cassette recorder?
01:53 First look
02:47 Diagnosing the problems
05:40 Clean-up and restoration
08:01 First test
08:45 Fixing the flashing power light issue
09:45 Fixing the take-up reel problem
10:31 Deoxidising the pots and faders
11:00 Calibrating the record and playback levels
13:30 Creating a multi-track recording
17:50 The finished track
20:33 End screen
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☺️ Some gear & software I use ☺️
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Video:
Panasonic Lumix GH3 (main camera)
Panasonic Lumix G5 (secondary camera)
1080P HDMI YPBPR Game Capture HD Video Recorder (HDMI capture device)
Samsung Galaxy S9+ (mobile camera)
GoPro Hero 7 Black
DJI Spark (drone)
Neewer Bi-color 660 LED Video Lights
Audio:
Rode Stereo Videomic Pro (Hot shoe mount mic)
Rode SmartLav+ (Lavalier Mic)
Roland R-05 (sound recorder)
Music Production:
Main DAW: Ableton Live 10 (Primary DAW)
Logic Pro X (Secondary DAW [Still love you bae] )
Ableton Push 1 (Ableton Controller)
Alesis MidiMix (Mixery controller thingie)
Sennheiser HD650 (Studio headphones)
Sennheiser HD25 light (DJ Headphones)
KRK Rokit RP6 G2 (studio monitors)
Video Production:
Final Cut Pro X (But don’t do it. Or maybe do. I can’t decide)
☺️ About le Moi ☺️
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My name is Rob and I go by the working title of The Orphic Creative. I’m a composer, songwriter, music producer, sound engineer and DJ, and occasionally also a human. I love anything to do with music tech and recording; I love making videos; and I love setting myself weird or interesting challenges and experiments with all of the above. And making some dank ch00ns bro 💀🤟
I’m also passionate about proving that you can make great music with whatever you have in front of you right now, without needing to be a slave to the latest technology, software or plugins. Music stuff is expensive, but making music shouldn’t be. In fact, limiting yourself is one of the best ways to encourage your creativity.
Some fantastic music charities to support:
www.youthmusic.org.uk A UK charity investing in music-making projects for children and young people experiencing challenging circumstances.
www.helpmusicians.org.uk A UK charity helping musicians of all ages at times of crisis, but also at times of opportunity, giving people the extra support they need at a crucial stage that could make or break their career.

[@Stricknyne1]

Amazing! The skills required to take this Tascam apart and repair it, well it is just very impressive. Really enjoyed the video, wish I could do this.

[@TheOrphicCreative]

Thank you! Honestly it's not all that tricky, it's just a case of taking it step by step and remembering where all the screws go, haha

[@CryptToneMusic]

I've been wanting to get an old 4 track recorder to record some punk rock or death metal demos like they would've in the 80's! Great video i appreciate all the technical stuff and the repairs too!

[@TheOrphicCreative]

Thank you! Hope you get to do that 🙂

[@spooktasticaparanormal]

Wow. That's a really bright and punchy sound. Like something out of the 80s. Very well done. I've just subscribed.

[@TheOrphicCreative]

Awesome, thank you!

[@mistersprinlesdude00]

Big ups to ya dogger 🏄‍♂️

[@paulr2389]

Well-done! I've had my Porta-One since new. Yes, it needed about the same work yours did after all these years. But, used properly, it produces very respectable sound quality. They're quite collectable these days. :)

[@TheOrphicCreative]

Thanks! I've really enjoyed using mine, it's a great way to spark creativity

[@dannydaniel8975]

Loved it!

[@garrycraig2095]

Great stuff.

[@mahammeiqany]

Really enjoyed watching it

[@FreddieShreddieTV]

such a great piece of machine

[@wasiuuu1]

good track and informative repair kit , thanks for showing and all best with many new tracks 🙂

[@tjtheedge29]

Quality video man! Fun to watch all the way through. Keep up the great work

[@dreamscuba]

Very impressive restoration and I admire your dedication and patience. The final song is really cool. Thanks.

[@TropicIslandMusic]

outstanding work dude!!!

[@TheOrphicCreative]

Thanks! Glad you enjoyed it 😊

[@acidgirl.303]

Amazing! Subscribed

[@nigelboothman6653]

Really impressive. Good editing, camerawork, sound (of course!) and enviable skills to revive the broken 4-track machine. I'm about to embark on a similar project with the cheap and nasty Vestax 4-track I got in 1991 or '92. Why only 686 subscribers (counting me)? You deserve a few zeros on the end of that.

[@TheOrphicCreative]

Thanks so much 🙏 still growing slowly but unfortunately don't have time to put out regular content at present. Hoping to change that I'm the next year or so

[@jarrydmb]

This is AWESOME! I just bought a Tascam Porta One MiniStudio this week with plans to restore it. Thanks for the great video. And glad to see a fellow South African on here :p

[@TheOrphicCreative]

Awesome! I'm sure you'll get a lot of good use out of it 🙂

[@mudeth]

Randomly recommended by YT and I was pleasantly surprised. Great production and presentation, thanks for the effort!

[@TheOrphicCreative]

Thanks! Glad you enjoyed it

[@jezbon]

Totally subscribed - I mean a Portastudio, some awesome 80s sounding synth pop... just begged for cheesy vocals, haha. Amazing persistence on getting it to work - you now have the coolest "real life retro tape deck filter plugin" for Ableton. :-D I just looked up how much these are now, they're about as much as a brand new DP-24SD, damn. And all of them would likely need to be repaired and serviced.

[@TheOrphicCreative]

Yeah, prices have gone a bit mad for these now - hard to justify a tired old tape deck for the same price as a new digital desk 😁. But if you keep an eye out on eBay you might still get lucky, especially if you are willing to do a bit of restoration.

[@AbdiPianoChannel]

This was my ultimate dream when I was young musician

[@TheOrphicCreative]

I can imagine! It's cool to think about what I could have made back then if I'd had one

[@cortical1]

Nice! My friend had one of these (exact same model) from 1986-89 so I used to borrow it all the time. I still have all the demos I made with it and they sound good. I used to ping-pong tracks to get 10 different instruments recorded instead of just four, but that obviously degrades the sound quality somewhat. Thanks for taking me back. Great work and track!

[@TheOrphicCreative]

Thanks very much! Yeah I must say I was pretty surprised how good it sounded in the end. Definitely very usable for a demo at least, although I know even some commercially released albums were actually recorded on these. Glad I could take you on a trip down memory lane 🙂

[@Rialas]

@@TheOrphicCreative well done, subscribed.

[@italiad1013]

Bounce

[@cortical1]

@@italiad1013 Recording engineers also called it ping -ponging. The term "ping-pong recording" is in both the dictionary and Wikipedia.

[@italiad1013]

@@TheOrphicCreativewhich albums were released on this???

[@mjstow]

In the '80s I had a four-track cassette machine... pretty sure it was a Tascam but my memory ain't what it used to be. I remember it being fairly awful... particularly the treble reproduction (almost non existent)... but it was more fun than I'd previously had with recording. Before then I had to play all my instruments at once... my ukulele, drums, trombone and double bass. That wasn't as easy as it sounds because I'd lost a thumb in a hitch-hiking accident. Kids today wouldn't understand that.

[@TheOrphicCreative]

Wow, that must have been quite a spectacle to watch! I think the most I tried was playing the keyboard with one hand while strumming a retuned guitar with the other 😄

[@mjstow]

@@TheOrphicCreative This is the first time I've subscribed to a channel because the creator has tolerated my BS! And well done on your multiple-instrument playing. Serious note: I remember my multitrack ran at normal cassette speed and I thought, OK there's nothing to be done about the *size* of the tape, but why don't they increase the speed.... double or quadruple it? That would have improved the quality, and as users would generally only be recording a 3 to 5-minute song or whatever, the reduced record time wouldn't have been an issue. But it was not to be.

[@TheOrphicCreative]

Interestingly some of the later Tascam 4-track units did have an option for double tape speed. Guess they eventually caught onto that idea too :-)

[@simondavid2519]

About the manual written in a conversational way : I own a TEAC 80-8 and I have the original manual which is written in the same way. I see why they did it (makes it more personal, sounds familiar, basic marketing to make us like their brand), but I’ve always felt that it was nice. I didn’t know anything about recording to tape and it made reading the manual feel way easier for me. It also felt like an old and wise audio engineer, or the person that designed it was explaining it to me with passion. I 100% fell for their marketing and I know it, but it really is a nice touch in my opinion ! :)

[@searchiemusic]

I've got a Fostex E16 and frankly its just broken english, but they're trying at least, same ballpark

[@TheOrphicCreative]

Totally agree on the 'old wise engineeer' vibes! I also really like it, I wish more manuals were written like that these days

[@WesleyWattley-xy4fg]

Sell me this four track machine?🇬🇧

[@andyr72]

Sounds great, mate! I have an identical Porta. Think I'll have to fire it up again. Last time I used it, it was working fine.That was, perhaps, 7 years back? I also had a Tascam 388 (1/4 in. 8-track) which sounded a shit-ton better than anything my DAWs have ever produced. Subscribed. Whoa! ✌️😁👌

[@TheOrphicCreative]

Thanks! Yeah I've been loving the sound from it, definitely helps to spark some new creativity

[@mahammeiqany]

So you're an expert in multiple tasks

[@duboracle]

I think it sounds better then a porta 07, a newer model. Sounds realy good by the way, you had luck because the tape heads where not worn out

[@TheOrphicCreative]

Yes, they were in good condition thankfully. Just needed a good clean and some degaussing

[@dougweiss2368]

Hi any idea where I can get a replacement FF gear for my porta one?

[@DarenLee]

I have one of these how much doesn’t it cost now?

[@searchiemusic]

the RTM cassette tape is actually open reel tape that they packaged in a cassette shell, it takes high bias like a type 2 but has a lot of the sound of a bog standard ferric tape because it is ferric, certainly makes sense it'd work with a portastudio but neat to see

[@searchiemusic]

12:37 my friend this is, in fact, not how you adjust the azimuth, you need a test tape and an oscilliscope, you have to put each input to an X/Y graph so they modulate each other, if there's any phase difference it deviates from a straight line and makes a circle, you have to adjust it so the graph is a perfectly straight line, guessing by ear is going to cause big dips in frequency response between tracks, it'll record yeah, but you're basically adding a microscopic delay to each track

[@searchiemusic]

(also not flaming this is why i've not touched my azimuth, i still need an oscilloscope lmao)

[@searchiemusic]

13:16 yeah, that's kind of what i expected, it should work, but not as well as it can, unfortunately you do really need test equipment to calibrate such a slow and tiny tape, it's the tiniest of tiny adjustments, you also will have to adjust the bias for sure, and since it's 2 head it's really test recording a sine wave, sweeping the bias until you find the sweet spot with least distortion, i exceptionally doubt it's the caps

[@TheOrphicCreative]

Very interesting, definitely explains the results I got

[@TheOrphicCreative]

I'm not a tape technician and definitely don't claim to have got it working at its best, I don't have the skills and equipment for that. But as it is now, it produces very usable recording and I'm happy with it, without spending silly money on equipment or servicing. Possibly there might be some slight phasing issues caused by the azimuth, but certainly nothing I can detect with my own ears - which is good enough for my purposes 🙂

[@ibreadman7]

Awesome vid Rob! 🙌 Just spotted one of these in mint (cosmetic) shape going for R1000 in Cape Town area and I’m head hunting to get in there before anyone else does but the seller seems to be playing hard to get 😂 I’ve already missed out on a few decent 4-track recorders these past few weeks, most of them sell damn quick down here so I hope to finally land (this) one. Where about in rural South Africa did you grow up? Lekke bru 🤙

[@TheOrphicCreative]

Nice one! Hope you managed to nab the deal there! Really cool bit of kit to have in the studio for some analogue magic :-) I'm from the KZN midlands - grew up in a tiny little place called Boston, on the way between Pietermaritzburg and Underberg. Nice part of the world, but not much going on there!

[@rocoafricamg1094]

Just gotta be quick before I snatch it 😂😂😂😂

[@aSpeaker2BlocksAway]

Great Video man! On mine the pitchcontro doesn´t work. Do you have any ideas?

[@TheOrphicCreative]

Hmm, thats a strange one. The pitch control slider is mounted on its own little board with the tape mechanism, so I'd maybe look for a loose connection there, and maybe try some deoxit in the slider as well.

[@aSpeaker2BlocksAway]

@@TheOrphicCreative Thanks man, will try it.

[@truthfinder4973]

Lol 80s gothic music lol epic

[@Domzdream]

AT (1:36)....you obviously own a cat....or a psychotic sleeve-chewing hamster. haha - thank you for the clip! Well made.

[@TheOrphicCreative]

Haha! I wish I could blame the cat, its actually just a really old comfy hoodie I can't face throwing away 🤣

[@user-gq6sf4si6j]

Good job! So everything is in mono?

[@TheOrphicCreative]

The tracks are mono but you can still get a stereo mix by using panning. 😊

[@georgescremades9872]

Tarifs des ventes de 4 pistes

[@user-wd8cs8ue7r]

The videos you create are of high quality but why are your followers so low?

[@TheOrphicCreative]

Thank you 🙂 I'm only a new channel still so still building the followers!