Overpriced Vintage Equipment: You've gotta be kidding me!

[senorverde]

T

Having never owned a Q8 tape or player, I have always wondered if they have that god awful hideous fade out > whirr > ka chunk > whirr > fade in like their Q4 brethren? That would be enough right there to disown them.

Thankfully Q8 albums are edited more sensibly than their stereo counterparts and rarely (if ever) do you get a song that splits between two tracks. After all, you do have about twenty minutes of tape to play with on a Q8 so the only biggie that usually happens is a solid minute or two of dead silence while the other program finishes.

 

[furui_suterioo]

Random question: Was there ever a Kenwood 8 track player?

 

[senorverde]

And for those who don't believe me I just got done serving a Lafayette RK 84 (which has a similar mechanism to my Toshiba PT

Random question: Was there ever a Kenwood 8 track player?

AFAIK no. There were some Q8 players from Pioneer, Harman Kardon and Marantz/Superscope.

 

[senorverde]

Speaking of Q8 players, I just picked this RK-84 up today at the local thrift store. Just needed a new 2 channel indicator bulb and a head clean/demag. Very similar transport mechanism to my Toshiba PT-114. Here's a scan from Lafayette's 1974 catalog.

1.7% Distortion & 50-8000Hz frequency response
Doesn't get any better than that!
But like I said, this is the kind of accessible gear most people used to enjoy Q8s on.

 

[furui_suterioo]

After all, you do have about twenty minutes of tape to play with on a Q8 so the only biggie that usually happens is a solid minute or two of dead silence while the other program finishes.

Making home recorded tapes(with the Akai quad), I've spent lots of time rearranging tracks to fit the programs more evenly so recording in quad(from a discrete source or through which ever decoder sounds best on the chosen material) does cut the track arranging work in half. Some blank 8 tracks have a little extra tape and others have slightly less than what is indicated so the Akai could definitely benefit from a counter due to the inconsistency, and could use lighting(like the Technics has), I end up having to shine the flash while using the stopwatch on my phone all the time.

 

[Soundfield]

1.7% Distortion & 50-8000Hz frequency response
Doesn't get any better than that!
But like I said, this is the kind of accessible gear most people used to enjoy Q8s on.

I'm curious to how much better any of them were - presumably they all had dreadful signal to noise levels.

 

[Quad Linda]

And for those who don't believe me I just got done serving a Lafayette RK 84 (which has a similar mechanism to my Toshiba PT


AFAIK no. There were some Q8 players from Pioneer, Harman Kardon and Marantz/Superscope.

There were a few Q8 's that split songs on both programs. Santana Welcome is one on Mother Africa.

We were both a Marantz and a Superscope dealer. I don't recall any Q8's under the Marantz label. We stocked several Superscope models.

We were also a dealer for both Pioneer and its' Centrex line.

H/K was actually a Sony Q8 player.

https://www.quadraphonicquad.com/forums/threads/q8-harman-kardon-8.14025/
You Tube demo w/2ch 8tk tapes:

 

[Quad Linda]

Quad was the only reason I got into 8-track. It was great to buy Quad albums that were not available on any other Quad format, and (hopefully) discrete besides.

I knew they paled compared to vinyl and open reel. I didn't think they sounded all that bad UNTIL I upgraded to seperate components: preamp, tuner, power amps, and MC phono cartridge.

There were differences in performance, but IMHO, none of the tapes or Q8 decks were true "high fidelity." They were mid-fi at best. I own 300 Q8 tapes and 3 Q8 decks. I also have a couple Q8 car players, which no longer grace my cars.

A lousy tape format, even worse than 4-track cartridges (2 channel cartridges with 2 programs.) A continuous loop where the tape feeds back into itself, 2 ends joined together with a foil strip. What could possibly go wrong????

I'm curious to how much better any of them were - presumably they all had dreadful signal to noise levels.

 

[mlrocker]

my collection of non-working quad machines is growing...growing leery of buying another.
what I have listed in 7" is all that's left in reels, presently my deck is down.
shifting over to Q8s for now.

 

[par4ken]

my collection of non-working quad machines is growing...growing leery of buying another.
what I have listed in 7" is all that's left in reels, presently my deck is down.
shifting over to Q8s for now.

While it is cool that you are/were making new Q4 releases did you ever think of just making available digital versions?

 

[MidiMagic]

Having never owned a Q8 tape or player, I have always wondered if they have that god awful hideous fade out > whirr > ka chunk > whirr > fade in like their stereo 8 track brethren? That would be enough right there to disown them.

That is a necessary evil of S8 and Q8 tapes when the programs are of very different lengths.

The fade out and in is necessary because the foil tape for the track change is on the oxide side of the tape.

 

[Sal1950]

A lousy tape format, even worse than 4-track cartridges (2 channel cartridges with 2 programs.) A continuous loop where the tape feeds back into itself, 2 ends joined together with a foil strip. What could possibly go wrong????

My best recollection of 8 track tapes is the untold numbers of them I've seen scattered along the roadsides. Their tape fluttering in the breeze after being freed from their cartridge confines. LOL

 

[par4ken]

That is a necessary evil of S8 and Q8 tapes when the programs are of very different lengths.

The fade out and in is necessary because the foil tape for the track change is on the oxide side of the tape.

Often the running order was changed in order to better fit the tracks to the length of the tape, without too many long pauses. Track switching in the middle of a song was probably the most annoying thing about 8-tracks!

 

[4-earredwonder]

My best recollection of 8 track tapes is the untold numbers of them I've seen scattered along the roadsides. Their tape fluttering in the breeze after being freed from their cartridge confines. LOL

Never thought of 8 track cartridges as ROAD KILL

 

[senorverde]

There were a few Q8 's that split songs on both programs. Santana Welcome is one on Mother Africa.

We were both a Marantz and a Superscope dealer. I don't recall any Q8's under the Marantz label. We stocked several Superscope models.

I was conflating Superscope being Marantz. Wasn't by the time the TD-48 Q8 player came along Superscope had bought Marantz something like a decade before?

 

[Quad Linda]

Superscope bought Marantz in the mid-'60's. Marantz manufacturing then became a partnership with Standard Radio Corp. (Japan) Marantz & Superscope were both manufactured by Standard.

The models and build quality were different for Marantz and Superscope products. They were marketed as two lines. I recall there being separate dealer agreements. Superscope was the budget line. Once Superscope products were introduced, Standard Radio name was no longer used in the US.

Complicating these issues was Sony/Superscope. Superscope had the distribution rights for Sony tape decks & portables in the US until '74. When that ran out, Sony tape decks no longer were marketed by Superscope, but by Sony itself. At that point, Marantz began selling their own brand of cassette decks.

In '75, Standard Radio changed its' corporate name to Marantz Japan.

In '80, Marantz USA was sold by Superscope to Philips.

In '02, Marantz Japan and Denon merged to create D&M Holdings.

In '08, Philips sold its' stake in D&M Holdings.

Clear as mud, ain't it?

 

[furui_suterioo]

I have Sony TPB-800 portable 8 track player which I glued the cracked plastic head bracket back together, is similar to GE players. It plays good but now the track indicator light is 1 ahead of what is playing. Anyone know how to synchronize the track indicator?

 

[ar surround]

I wonder if any “industrial grade“ Q8 decks were made? I once visited a local radio studio where a friend was a DJ. The head tech guy there showed me their industrial grade 8 track player. He explained that it was so expensive that none of us could afford it; and so robust that you’d have to run over it with a truck to damage it.

 

[jaybird100]

Superscope bought Marantz in the mid-'60's. Marantz manufacturing then became a partnership with Standard Radio Corp. (Japan) Marantz & Superscope were both manufactured by Standard.

The models and build quality were different for Marantz and Superscope products. They were marketed as two lines. I recall there being separate dealer agreements. Superscope was the budget line. Once Superscope products were introduced, Standard Radio name was no longer used in the US.

Complicating these issues was Sony/Superscope. Superscope had the distribution rights for Sony tape decks & portables in the US until '74. When that ran out, Sony tape decks no longer were marketed by Superscope, but by Sony itself. At that point, Marantz began selling their own brand of cassette decks.

In '75, Standard Radio changed its' corporate name to Marantz Japan.

In '80, Marantz USA was sold by Superscope to Philips.

In '02, Marantz Japan and Denon merged to create D&M Holdings.

In '08, Philips sold its' stake in D&M Holdings.

Clear as mud, ain't it?

I was selling Denon and Marantz when the companies merged. Customers tended to prefer the Denon; truth be known, so did I. In 2000, I won a free AVR-3300 from Denon, which I still have. Great receiver.

 

[Quad Linda]

I was selling Denon and Marantz when the companies merged. Customers tended to prefer the Denon; truth be known, so did I. In 2000, I won a free AVR-3300 from Denon, which I still have. Great receiver.

We have AVR - 3800 in our bedroom.