Cassette review: Sony UX-S 60 min.

[NAD613]

I got about 2 dozen of these tapes last month at an incredible price on closeout from a tape duplication/media supply house. These are early 90's Sony cassettes. The wrapper style was very familiar, as I recognized it from the Sony HF-S & UX tapes I bought back around 1991-92.

After I demagnetized & cleaned the heads on my NAD 613, it was time to make a tape. I have a lot of 60's bossa nova re-issues that clock in under 30 minutes, so 60 minute tapes are perfect for those. The CD I recorded was "Brasil '65" from Wanda de Sah, featuring the Sergio Mendes Trio. Nice, mellow, acoustic music with some female vocal.

I recorded it in Dolby B so I could play it back on my late 70's Teac A-103. As expected, the Sony UX-S did not disappoint. No hiss, all the sound was there. Very full sounding. As I'm typing this, I'm listening to the playback on my Teac. Tapes I make work very well with all my decks, my Sony, NAD & Teac. There are no alignment or calibration issues.

These tapes sound great, so my luck with type II tapes continues! It's too bad that Sony doesn't make quality tapes like this anymore & that I couldn't get these in 90 minute lengths.

[Mr. Lin]

Well I'm glad to hear it since you sent me two of these, although I haven't had a chance to try them out yet. I'm not surprised, I figured these would be good. Did you get my PM regarding the TDK metal tapes?

[NAD613]

Well I'm glad to hear it since you sent me two of these, although I haven't had a chance to try them out yet. I'm not surprised, I figured these would be good. Did you get my PM regarding the TDK metal tapes?

Yep, just sent a reply.

[Mr. Lin]

I've yet to try the Sony SR either.

[Scorpion8]

Nice write-up, thanks!

[Marc Hugo]

I must say that I love the Sony UX-S. That vintage is great - but subsequent ones (brighter green wrapper) have not disppointed me in any way. Somehow too, I think I only got the 60s.

Cheers - Marc

[MacGyver]

i've got a single copy of the 90-minute version. didn't know anything about it until now, thanks!!




http://i291.photobucket.com/albums/ll310/shaorin-chan/UX-S90LA.jpg

[braxus]

I've heard some say the UX-S tape isn't much of a bump up from UX. I wonder if that is true? I do remember seeing on the back of the tape wrapper, a graph showing UX-S has a bump up in the high frequency compared to UX. I know UX-Pro does the same thing too.

[Marc Hugo]

No, I wouldn't say that Braxus. The UX-S is has a noticably rising sensitivity compared with the UX which is pretty flat. This results in a very different, much sharper, livelier sound. However, the UX-S does share with the UX its dislike of a heavy hand on the recording level. Luckily, its very quiet and therefore offers a good dynamic range.

MH

[BlazeES]

The UX-S and UCX-S's that I use (mid to late 80's versions) produce damn-near metal like recordings albiet not as loud and punchy because levels need to set lowered. And as Marc mentioned previously, the noise floor is amazingly low so the dynamics are outstanding at lower record levels.

Also, I've yet to encounter any significant smears or drop-outs on my stash of 20+ year old tapes...I actually prefer these now over my prior Type II standard, SA-X and SA-XG.

[Maxell-LN]

Hey NAD,

Haven't you had some azimuth issues with these tapes? I bought several HF-S of this vintage at the time, and though the actual tape was very good, I found the mechanics of the tape were very poor. Mine rewound with heaps of rattle, and the spools always wound on sloppily. After a few playbacks, you could hear that the tape, wasn't playing to it's most optimized abilities. Strangely, a new recording would sound quite good again, when wiped over, but again, after a few weeks, it would suffer the same fate.

[NAD613]

Hey NAD,

Haven't you had some azimuth issues with these tapes? I bought several HF-S of this vintage at the time, and though the actual tape was very good, I found the mechanics of the tape were very poor. Mine rewound with heaps of rattle, and the spools always wound on sloppily. After a few playbacks, you could hear that the tape, wasn't playing to it's most optimized abilities. Strangely, a new recording would sound quite good again, when wiped over, but again, after a few weeks, it would suffer the same fate.

I never had any problems with early 90's Sony cassettes, be it UX, UX-S, or HF-S. They were all wonderful tapes.