What is it with bulk erasing?

[niklasthedolphin]

Why don't people trust their own decks eraserheads to do the job properly?

I never had the need for bulk erasing before a recording on non-virgin tapes.

Am I missing a point somewhere?

"dolph"

[Scorpion8]

Bulk earsers apply a much higher field, allowing thorough blanking of the tape. Your tape deck's erase head does an acceptable job, but it may leave residual noise from the previous recording. Bulk erasers generally return a tape to virgin condition. Depending on how seriously you listen with a critical ear, you may or may not notice the difference.

[stuwee]

Bulk earsers apply a much higher field, allowing thorough blanking of the tape. Your tape deck's erase head does an acceptable job, but it may leave residual noise from the previous recording. Bulk erasers generally return a tape to virgin condition. Depending on how seriously you listen with a critical ear, you may or may not notice the difference.

What frequencies are usually left by a decks erase head? And should folks using Metal cassettes just do this as a given, so to speak, I admit I'm a little anal when it comes to stuff like this, and I've never had a problem rerecording on the SAE, I tried the Nak and it seemed fine to me, I want one of those old Rat Shak retro looking jobs, well, because I want one *devil**eyepop*

[Mr. Lin]

I have a Realistic tape eraser (not a bulk eraser) that leaves most tapes dead silent after erasing. I don't know if it's necessary, but I'll play it safe whenever possible.

[Web Police]

I use my bulk eraser on old cassettes and used cassettes of unknown origin. If I am going to record over a freshly recorded tape then I just let the decks erase head do the erasing. However a bulk tape eraser can lower the noise floor on a tape to near new levels, something like -70db.

[niklasthedolphin]

Bulk earsers apply a much higher field, allowing thorough blanking of the tape. Your tape deck's erase head does an acceptable job, but it may leave residual noise from the previous recording. Bulk erasers generally return a tape to virgin condition. Depending on how seriously you listen with a critical ear, you may or may not notice the difference.

Don't play that thing on me with how serious I am listening or how serious my set-up is.

I listen and I tell you there is NO problem with erasing heads not doing the job good enough.


I think that this thing with bulk erasers is similar to when people buy equipment for cleaning the power.

I say:
If you have good amps and other parts in your setup, the power circuits built in is plentyfull cleaning the power supplied.
If you can hear the difference with perifer power cleaning equipment, your gear's power supplys are bad quality.

People buy power cleaning equipment because "the neighbour does".
It's fashionable for the time being.

My Tape decks all erase plentyful. I can't hear any leftovers, You can't hear any leftovers, noone can hear any leftovers. Not on my decks.

No offence to you, though. Just the way you put your words before.
*shoot**btoast*

"dolph"

[NAD613]

I actually bought a bulk tape eraser @ Radio Shack back in 1991, when my cassette deck was just a Seiko boombox.

[Mr. Lin]

Don't play that thing on me with how serious I am listening or how serious my set-up is.

I listen and I tell you there is NO problem with erasing heads not doing the job good enough.


I think that this thing with bulk erasers is similar to when people buy equipment for cleaning the power.

I say:
If you have good amps and other parts in your setup, the power circuits built in is plentyfull cleaning the power supplied.
If you can hear the difference with perifer power cleaning equipment, your gear's power supplys are bad quality.

People buy power cleaning equipment because "the neighbour does".
It's fashionable for the time being.

My Tape decks all erase plentyful. I can't hear any leftovers, You can't hear any leftovers, noone can hear any leftovers. Not on my decks.

No offence to you, though. Just the way you put your words before.
*shoot**btoast*

"dolph"

I don't think his post was aimed specifically at you, or in any way questioning how critically you listen to your setup. If your decks eraser head does a good enough job, good for you. If you find that a power conditioner does nothing in your system, that's your experience, it does indeed make a difference for others. But if you keep taping over something that's already been recorded on, there's going to be something left behind, and it's certainly possible it could be audible.

[niklasthedolphin]

I don't think his post was aimed specifically at you, or in any way questioning how critically you listen to your setup. If your decks eraser head does a good enough job, good for you. If you find that a power conditioner does nothing in your system, that's your experience, it does indeed make a difference for others. But if you keep taping over something that's already been recorded on, there's going to be something left behind, and it's certainly possible it could be audible.

No more audible when erased by the eraser head in my machines than with a bulk eraser.

For the record:
I hardly ever record on non-virgin tapes.
If I do it might be that one tape out of 100 has been recorded upon twice.

Still...............
Well, I made my point.

And power conditioners are, IMHO, for improving sound on equipment with not-that-great power supply. Do people know the function of capacitors?

"dolph"

[Teresa]

Why don't people trust their own decks eraserheads to do the job properly?

I never had the need for bulk erasing before a recording on non-virgin tapes.

Am I missing a point somewhere?

"dolph"

I have a Nakamichi cassette deck and buy used TDK and Maxell Metal tapes from the thrifts and record over them.

All I can say is the erase head on my Nakamichi leaves nothing behind, I can verify this as I record a lot of classical music and sometimes have as much as 2 or 3 minutes of blank tape on the first side and even recording over hard rock music that was taped way to far into the red even through headphones there is nothing left of the previous recording and the tape is so quiet you have to turn the volume all the up to hear any tape hiss at all.*check*

So I guess it would depend on how good your erase head is one your deck?*hope*

[itzmike]

I have a tandberg 3014A and it will not erase dead quiet. I thought something was wrong with it until I talked to a knowledgable person and he said Tandberg will not erase dead quiet as a NAK. Anyway I always bulk erase.

[Acoustic]

Bulk earsers apply a much higher field, allowing thorough blanking of the tape. Your tape deck's erase head does an acceptable job, but it may leave residual noise from the previous recording. Bulk erasers generally return a tape to virgin condition.

I've always heard that erase heads erase with current and not magnetism. And using a bulk eraser can get the tape a few db quieter than most erase heads. Essentially back to it's virgin condition. And since it's current it may not cover the entire width of the signal... esp when your using a tape not made on the same machine your taping on. I also have heard that the Nak erase heads are/were about as good as they get.

[niklasthedolphin]

Now I became puzzled by the last few posts.

They seemed so convincing to me.

So nothing could stop me from testing this thesis.

Erased three very old tapes. One type I that was recorded over again and again and one type II that was only recorded once but where I soon after recording got the LP. Finaly one type IV that I bought used and recorded some mix tape for a party.

I did it to test my Tandberg TCD 910, my Tandberg TCD 440A and my Revox B710.

All three tapes were erased for 15 minuttes in each machine.
Signal from a non-playing Vinyl-rig and input set to zero.
No NR.
Azimuth, bias and rec level alligned when optioned.

All three dead silent after erasing.

Even when played on the other two decks.

Also when listened to through earphones and earspeakers.

So much for bulk erasing.
:-oo

Maybe I've been using my defluxer more regularly.
*reelspin*

P.S.:
Erase heads get current to produce magnetism.

"dolph"

[Acoustic]

Just goes to show you that there is many theories to end up with a good recording. Great discussion. Cheers.

[bobschneider]

And using a bulk eraser can get the tape a few db quieter than most erase heads. Essentially back to it's virgin condition. And since it's current it may not cover the entire width of the signal... esp when your using a tape not made on the same machine your taping on. I also have heard that the Nak erase heads are/were about as good as they get.

That's the theory, but as others have noted it may not make much difference in practice, at least with a good deck.

One thing to note is that most bulk erasers can't handle metal tape. I have two different bulk erasers, both old ones from fleaBay that were designed to handle R2R tape as well as cassettes. They both work fine on type I and II cassettes, but only partially erase metal cassettes. But my decks that can record metal tape erase those just fine.

[MacGyver]

Don't play that thing on me with how serious I am listening or how serious my set-up is.

I listen and I tell you there is NO problem with erasing heads not doing the job good enough.


I think that this thing with bulk erasers is similar to when people buy equipment for cleaning the power.

I say:
If you have good amps and other parts in your setup, the power circuits built in is plentyfull cleaning the power supplied.
If you can hear the difference with perifer power cleaning equipment, your gear's power supplys are bad quality.

People buy power cleaning equipment because "the neighbour does".
It's fashionable for the time being.

My Tape decks all erase plentyful. I can't hear any leftovers, You can't hear any leftovers, noone can hear any leftovers. Not on my decks.

No offence to you, though. Just the way you put your words before.
*shoot**btoast*

"dolph"


Ooooooo, Touche'!!!! *whipslap*

[MacGyver]

*eyepop*MAN!! this is one touchy subject!! still, if nothing else, a bulk eraser does save wear and tear on your deck...

[Scorpion8]

No offence to you, though. Just the way you put your words before.

No offense intended, and this certainly isn't a contest to see who has a more "golden ear".

But bulk tape erasers do erase the entire width of the tape, whereas your deck's erase head may not. Decks slightly out of alignment from one deck to another (or even on the same deck with a erase head that doesn't track perfectly) will thus suffer crosstalk between channels of residual signal that may not have been fully erased by the recording deck. As has been noted, this usually isn't an issue if you play record only on the same deck or within a small group that are fairly well compatible. Some decks provide a stronger erase current than others, and that varied from manufacturer to manufacturer.

But it's been covered in literature many times, and I'll see if I can find some material online.

[Battlesnoopy]

Interesting... none of my decks, not even my LX-5, get those non-virgin metal tapes absolutely clean with one pass. Even when I'm setting bias and whatnot on the Nak and I go back to make a blank pass on it to prepare the tape for the real deal I get a bit of residual going on, usually not over -40db... I guess it's lacking power somewhere then? *headache*