[Five]

Originally Posted by harpsichord

It's great that some people go to such lengths to capture old cassette recordings and digitize them, even better when they share the results with the class, but I have to wonder just how much better all this equipment can make a cassette sound.

I've done a few tape-to-computer transfers using my SoundBlaster card, nothing fancy, just to preserve material I could no longer find. I just question the end benefit of thousands of dollars worth of hardware and dozens of hours of effort to significantly improve on a $3 tape.

Still, this was an interesting and enlightening thread.

upgrading to a $120ish soundcard (edirol, e-mu, m-audio) from a stock soundcard or lowend SB will give enough improvement to impress anybody. moving up from there to a $5,000 tascam field recorder... more subtle!

also noteworthy is that while Naks still cost a fortune, highend consumer cassette decks that used to cost $400+ are now on eBay for $15 or so.

I think it is worthwhile to upgrade at least this far!