I've noticed that the BR has been getting a little 'heavy' lately so, in the intention of lightening the mood, I've started this thread.
How many of us out there still have only a radio/tapeplayer in the car rather than a CD/minidisc/mp3/wax cylinder player?
And if you do have a tape player, what mouldy, broken old tapes are languishing in the back of your glovebox?
For the record, I only have a tape player and I can muster the best of Paul McCartney, Tony Bennet Swings, The Three Tenors, Round the Horne Vol 2 and several home made ones including The Rocky Horror Show, Barry White, Robbie Williams' Swing When You're Winning and a 70;s compilation.
Christ - I'm only 29!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Cheers
Rob
"Lord of Lard"
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Rob: I can't abide tapes. I make copies of CD's I own and use them in the car. I am told that this is illegal, but some of my CD's cost £60 or more and I'll be damned if I'm risking destroying those in the car stereo. Having destroyed my favourite Prokofiev and Shostakovich violin concertos CD I know how easy it is to do. Also I can sample them to get a CD of my favourites. My next will be a Black Sabbath and Hendrix compilation It's much easier than a tape cassette. And cheaper.
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Carlos Fandango, multiple amplifier and speakered to the hilt, Dolby Surround multichanger upgrade in the V70. Truly awesome. Very expensive, made me think very hard before signing on the dotted line, but in the event worth every penny.
Nice and simple, standard fit, Blaupunkt four speaker radio cassette in SWMBOs 306 Sedan. Actually a fairly honest setup in an honest car with no pretensions of grandeur. The cassette is distinctly, well, 'cassette' in sound, but FM radio is pretty good, with a nice feeling of space and good tonal range.
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Jesus Rob, I'm sure you only 'fessed up to a few of those to me!!
I have now reprogrammed my house elf into 'steal and replace' mode. So those very sad and embarrassing things are going to turn magically into The Boss next time you go in your car ;)
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Oh hell, DD, I'm so sorry - he's not gone schizophrenic - that was, obviously, me. Must be more careful about these log-in names etc. Sorry.
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My car came with an old-fashioned tape player which I quickly replaced with a Sony MP3 CD player. Cassettes are dreadful things. I always found it depressing when the tape got chewed up in the mechanism. I'm not the only one who thinks it's unbelievable that car manufacturers still install tape players: makeashorterlink.com/?V32F21E55
By ripping my own CDs to MP3 (using CDex - cdexos.sourceforge.net), I can get about 10 hours on one CDR. This means I can have a huge collection of music in my glovebox which it would cost only a couple of quid to replace if lost or damaged.
Not that a compilation of the complete symphonies and concertos of Shostakovich would be a tempting target for thieves...
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>>I always found it depressing when the tape got chewed up in the mechanism.
Christ yeah - nowt more depressing!
But what about us lesser mortals who have no choice but to reamain with the tape machine? (or should I just try and get a CD burner sometime?)
Wanted - nice working CD/radio thing that will fit an Astra of my kind etc etc. No tape chewing allowed. Consistent radio signals required so as not to pee me off anymore when radio (frequently) decides to lose itself.
HF
(and if this posts twice, my sincere apologies - it is messing me about and peeing me off no end right now ;)
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Why do you have to remain with the tape machine?
The MP3 feature is a nice bonus and adds little to the price of the player but a CD burner isn't essential.
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<
How else would I play my Willie Nelson, Waylon Jennings, Emmy Lou Harris and Loretta Lynn collection?
Not only that, where I live you can buy a legal cassette of any latest release from any record shop for under 2 of your Pounds.
A CD here in the Philippines costs 2 days' average wages so cassettes rule.
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I liked the concept of the MP3 feature until I thought about the amount of time I would then spend ripping CDs to MP3.. and realised I would spend my entire life listening to the same MP3 disk. Rather like never bothering to record more vinyl stuff onto tape for the car.
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I liked the concept of the MP3 feature until I thought about the amount of time I would then spend ripping CDs to MP3..
It's really not as laborious a process as you might think: certainly no more so than recording an old-fashioned cassette. Also, you don't do it in real time and you can go away and do something else while your PC is chugging away in the corner.
My top tip is to put the original CD in the PC while you're connected to the internet. That way the software can go off to a database on the net and get the track titles. It then uses these for the file names (and ID3 tags) of your MP3s. I've got some extremely obscure discs and it rarely fails to recognise them.
CDex and MusicMatch Jukebox, and I'm sure many others, have this feature.
Incidentally, doing a straight copy of a music CD is much simpler than this.
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".. us lesser mortals who have no choice but to reamain with the tape machine?"
Same here, HF, but I think that cassettes still have some virtues. They're much easier to handle in a car and are amazingly durable. Most players benefit from an occasional internal clean (tape or long Q-tips and alcohol) - and it's worth using decent quality branded tapes to record on in the first place.
I'm surprised Mini-discs haven't made more of an impact in cars, but I suppose we're stuck with CD's now nearly every computer's got a burner...
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Wellie - because I'm skint!
JBJ - I can't waste my alcohol on cleaning purposes!
Seriously, I DO actually like cassettes, but a lot of mine are now reaching the end of their useable life and it's rather sad not to be able to play them any more.
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Leif
it isn't illegal to copy cd's as long as its for your OWN use (ie you dont sell them down the market). I do exactly the same thing.
Jonathan
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Rob:
Thank you for this opportunity!
I have added "The Best of Paul McCartney" to my Grand List of Oxymorons.
YOu know, the ones like:
"Military Intelligence"
"Airline Food"
"Microsoft Works"
........:-0
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Back in March my car (with CD player) was written off in a horrific collision with another car (needless to say, not my fault). I had a hire car (with CD player) from the insurance for five weeks while I waited to get the money. Found a replacement car - NO CD PLAYER! Now, I've had a CD player for many years so my collection of tapes had dwindled to almost nothing but I had to wait a couple of months till I could afford to replace the Cassette player in the car with the CD player that it should have had in it. I managed to find but one tape in the house - a compilation I had made many years before with the Best of Bob Seger on one side and Conting Crows on the other. I listened to that tape maybe 100 times in those couple of months, it just went round and round and round. As a result I now know all the lyrics to all the tracks off the Bob Seger album off by heart, and I have vowed never to buy a car without a CD Player!
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>>I have added "The Best of Paul McCartney" to my Grand List of Oxymorons.
ROFLMAO Growler - very well said!
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Ah! Philips audio cassettes...
I thought meant 8-Track ;-)
John R
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All those under 50 quieten down please and listen to your elders.
Ah, now you're talking. Deep Purple and Hendrix, on 8-track - great channel separation and not monkeyed about with like the over-priced re-engineered versions you get now which make it sound plastic and contrived. 4 channel stereo in Olympic Studios as I recall.
Then again I recall the under dash 45 rpm single record player in my '54 Mercury (untaxed as usual) and a stack of Tamla Motown discs to stuff into it. Packet of 20 Senior Service, half-bottle of JW, Sandra my g/f, a farm track off the Sompting by-pass, and the Ronettes as they were meant to be heard when Radio London (the proper one) became unlistenable after about 7 p.m. due to interference. Great days (and nights, if I was lucky).
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>All those under 50 quieten down please and listen to your elders
At 48.75 years old does that qualify me to call you an old person?
Have to agree tho, even at the tender age of 48.75 I remember listening to Machine Head on an 8 track in a Hillman Avenger, and damn good it sounded too! Even better on an 8track "stereogram" at home.
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C3 belonging to Mrs H has one-shot CD radio with The Shadows in I think. Radio always tuned to Classical FM when I use the car.
Synergie (mine) has a radio cassette with Robin Bailey reading Peter Tinniswoode's Tales from the Long Room and a 6 CD changer somewhere at the back. I think it's got some classical stuff, Blondie, and a Top Gear compilation. Not been switched on for ... months. Generally listen to Radio 4 on the move unless we have Radio 1 on of a Sunday evening after a trip out. The kids have personal stereos/CD players. And there's 2 cassettes of Lonnie Donnegan and Arthur Lowe reading Diary of a Nobody in the draw under the front seat.
Music; just another noise to me.
H.
-----------------------------
Stranger in a strange land
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My 6-disc currently has:
Slipknot (Iowa)
Alice in Chains (greatest hits)
Cypress Hill (Black sunday)
The Smiths (Hatful of hollow)
Radiohead (Hail to the thief)
Red Hot Chilli Peppers (By the way)
But on longer journeys I plug my 10gb iPod into the cassette slot for a choice of the greater part of my CD collection (it fits over 200 albums). For this reason, I'm slightly disturbed by the possibility that new cars often don't have cassettes, just single CDs. roll on bluetooth all the way!
For info, Apple make the whole music thing dead easy. Time consuming is uploading CDs onto the hard drive. Thereafter though, I can edit my iPod (album download takes 5 seconds) and burn a new CD in about 90. Apple rocks!
Alex.
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Ought to add, I'm 32, and should know better. Don't feel ready for MOR just yet, although I recently saw Peter Gabriel in concert, and he was brilliant.
--
Dr Alex Mears
Seat ibiza Cupra
Mazda MX-5 1.8iS
Yamaha RD350YPVS
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i'm stuck with the standard ford radio/cassette player that came with my mk3 fiesta - with the display so low down and dim that you can't see what the frequency is!
however my setup is quite handy as I bought a minidisc player a while back to listen to on the train to and from work which came with a a free car kit (one of those fake tapes that has a wire that goes into the headphones socket of the minidisc player)
the handy thing about my minidisc player is that it can connect to my computer and using the software provided can convert MP3's to ATRAC3 the minidisc format, plus having its LP function i can fit four about albums on a disc. i have a bout 20 minidiscs full of everything from Hendrix, joplin and the beatles through to Nirvana, the stone roses and Sly and the family Stone.
All i have to do is remeber to take the minidisc player out of the car on a sunday evening ready for work on monday morning
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Hello Rob,
I hope life's treating you well, doing what you're doing now.
There will come a time, my friend, when you realise that CDs are the way of the future.
It really is SO EASY to copy a tape, an LP, a wax cylinder (lied there) onto CD nowadays, that you really should.
It's PERFECTLY LEGAL to make a working copy of a CD for your own, personal use so why not?
I'm so lazy that I bought a CD changer in an Argos sale. I just couldn't be bothered running the bus (there's a coincidence! ) cable from the head unit to the boot. When I'm over in Germany, all the VW Group cars have CDs so it's a bit of a change to come home and drive my old bus.
Deviation, 4 penalty points. Sorry, Rob. What was I on about?
Oh yes, digital quality and about 20p per disc.
Fits in personal CD Discman, Walkman, Car Cd, Home CD players.
They will put them in buses next, for you, mate.
Don't know what you'll listen to:
Led Zep, Stones, U2, Beatles, Pet Shop Boys.
They all work on CD.
Good luck mate.
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Well
How many people are driving around in those really basic cars that just have a radio as standard, and not just any radio - NO a MONO radio?
My Aunt's J reg Metro 1.1C that I sold for her last year - 4 speed box, lino on the floors (no carpet) and such elementary sound system. That will really blast some culture at the next Notting Hill Carnival!
Oh, and it had a sun roof but no air con.
My Stereo has the ability to accept a CD changer, but I've yet to bother with one.
H
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I\'m probably a boring old pink fluffy dice, but I use cassetes because I tend to while away my time in the car by listening to audio books I borrow from the local library. I\'ve also got one ogf those tape gizmos to plug into the CD Walkman if I want to listen to my Sinatra, Andy Williams, Nat King Cole CDs.
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When we got the new car, a CD player was on SWMBO's must-have list, so we had a multichanger fitted but kept the standard fit cassette player. I quite like the set up and keep (deep beath) only two tapes in the car : The Christians and Simon & Garfunkel to calm down those more stressful moments on the roads. I've still got loads of cassettes and should probably copy them onto CD or MP3 as I'll never listen to them otherwise.
The multichanger currently has...
Elvis - Essential collection
Loop 3 (New Zealand electro stuff, much better than it sounds)
Stan Getz
The Stone Roses by The Stone Roses
Moby "18"
The Police "Message in a box" CD1 (Early stuff)
Actually, apart from the Stan Getz lift music (SWMBO!) I'm quite proud of that, although I should probably have some 50cent or Justin Trousersnake in there too to add a little bit of credibility. The changer does see everything from Emimen to Andrea Bocelli on a regular basis, but I wish it were an MP3 multichanger, I'm sure then I'd never have to swap music!
--
Lee
MINI adventure in progress
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"..I wish it were an MP3 multichanger"
You'd have to go on some pretty long journeys to exercise that thoroughly! Cassette plus multi-CD is a good combination though, IMHO, as CD's are a nightmare to handle properly on the move.
I don't know why more in-car stuff doesn't come with a simple input jack, so you can plug your Walkman, Discman, MP3 player or whatever straight in, though...
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I still believe that good old-fashioned cassettes have a role as the best (or at least the most convenient) medium for recording stuff from the 'wireless' for later in car replay. I do this a lot and there really is some great stuff (documentaries, plays etc) broadcast on the radio (mainly R4, but R3 and even R2 still knock out some interesting programmes on occasion).
I do have a CD changer in the boot, but find I listen more to the radio (or to taped progs) than to CD's - not too sure why!
RM
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I still believe that good old-fashioned cassettes have a role as the best (or at least the most convenient) medium for recording stuff from the 'wireless' for later in car replay...
I have to concede that this is the most convenient way of doing this.
On the other hand, if there were an easy way to record programmes from the 'Listen Again' section of the Radio 4 web site, CDRs would be the better medium.
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"..if there were an easy way to record programmes from the 'Listen Again' section of the Radio 4.."
Absolutely! I've suggested to the BBC more than once that they make their programmes available in MP3 format for just that reason, but no response. I'm not even sure if you can save the RealPlayer files, but that's probably deliberate.
In answer to the original question, I had a rummage among my cassettes (which do get used, especially when our Beloved Leader is spouting more nonsense on the radio) and found:
Alannah Myles - Rockinghorse (good late night driving music)
Jacques Loussier - Bach to the Future (good anytime)
Mike & the Mechanics
Mark Knopfler
Don Henley
Mary-Chapin Carpenter
Sorry, can't remember all the titles - I just push them in and enjoy.
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"..if there were an easy way to record programmes from the 'Listen Again' section of the Radio 4.." Absolutely! I've suggested to the BBC more than once that they make their programmes available in MP3 format for just that reason, but no response. I'm not even sure if you can save the RealPlayer files, but that's probably deliberate.
At the risk of drifting off topic (I'll attempt to deny this by saying this is is a discussion about the most convenient format for car use) I'm sure you're right that the BBC site doesn't allow the Real Player files to be downloaded as a deliberate policy.
At one time you couldn't find all the programmes on the web because the BBC didn't necessarily have the rights to broadcast using this medium. Perhaps it's a condition that the programmes are only available for a limited time. Allowing people to download programmes might also affect sales of archive material.
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>>...I'm not even sure if you can savethe RealPlayer files, but that's probably deliberate.
I've discovered that there is a way of saving the programmes and the solution was in an obscure corner of the BBC's own web site: makeashorterlink.com/?Y2CD41465
I've just tried the Real Audio to wav recorder mentioned and it worked fine.
It then took only a couple of minutes to convert from wav to MP3 using CDex, although this stage is not needed (in fact it's best avoided) if you want to produce an audio CD, as opposed to a CD ROM containing audio files.
Sorry about this anoraky diversion but it does make life easier for anyone wanting to listen to the programmes on a car CD player.
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"I've discovered that there is a way of saving the programmes.."
That's excellent news, WS - thank you! Just to keep this relevant, I shall of course be using it to save stuff to play back in the car, as the one thing my car system lacks is a Record button...
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"It really is SO EASY to copy a tape...onto CD nowadays"
Not for much longer, if the record companies have anything to do with it. There are already CD's in the shops that cannot be read or copied using a computer. One only hopes that they won't sell!
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they wont, some of the damn things wont even play on a home or car cd player. They do not conform to the CD standard and philips have threatened to take them to court for using the cd logo
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"Round the Horne Vol 2"
Rob - are you sure you're only 29..? :-)
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JBJ this is seriously worrying, isn't it? ;)
Have we an onsite counsellor or something?
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"..this is seriously worrying.."
More for you than for us, HF! Still, at least it means his sense of humour's intact...
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I have a stonking Clarion radio/cassette in the car. i use metal tapes, clean the heads regularly and never have any problems. The sound is also very good. Oh, and all my music is recorded from vinyl (actually my domestic hifi is worth far more than the car!!!).
Any heavy rock (Scorpions, Purple, Quo, all the way up to The Darkness - opps thats one I have to record to tape from CD). Also Jools Holland, Blues Bros, Abba, Blondie, Shania etc etc. Radio 2 on the wireless!!
Am I old beyond my years at 38??
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JBJ - I may be young (I can provide proof of age if required!) but that doesn't mean that I can't appreciate classic humour does it? ;-)
HF - I'll deal with you later....
Anyway folks - interesting though this discussion on music formats is (!) I, as thread starter - twisted thread starter - reserve the right to gently point out that I was encouraging you all, through the friendship and mutual trust to be found here (!!) to confess what horrible and frankly sad cassettes can be found mouldering in your glovebox.
My favourite is Marcel Marceaux's Greatest Hits...
Cheers
Rob
"Lord of Lard"
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Rob - Don't be too shy - I have a Kajagoogoo tape! I think it was the only album they did.
I bet they're now a collector's item - well I thought when I bought it that it would be a good investment!
I was also on Jim'll Fix it in 1977, but that's another story......
****Signature? - Ideas on a postcard please anyone!****
Hugo
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Hugo,
Too shy? Hush hush - eye to eye!!
My word, you are a dark horse aren't you?!?
And much respect for you being on Jim'll Fix It - although I guess that you can only tell us about it here if it was motoring related!
Cheers
Rob
"Lord of Lard"
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Actually I met......
Basil Brush! Boom Boom!
I still watch the show on CBBC on Saturdays!
****Signature? - Ideas on a postcard please anyone!****
Hugo
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YOU MET BASIL BRUSH?????????????
Wow! At the risk of enraging the Mods (as this clearly has nowt to do with motoring!) I am really envious of you Hugo. BB was a childhood hero of mine and I'll hope that you agree that the current incarnation pales into insignificance compared to the one that we both remember!
Cheers
Rob
"Lord of Lard"
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Can someone explain why some threads (e.g. this) seem to be moderator-proof and others don't?
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>>Can someone explain why some threads (e.g. this) seem to be moderator-proof and others don't?
What a silly question, or a silly way of phrasing it, or perhaps a silly reason for asking it.
However, I've been away. I shall be clearing this up later, and form a quick look I suspect that most of it will go.
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"I shall be clearing this up later"
Don't be too hard on it. As a result of this thread, Welliesorter provided a nugget of information that I have been after for years and have not seen mention of anywhere else. These slightly tangential discussions often seem to reveal useful stuff...
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Fair enough;
I've locked it, but I'll leave it here.
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