Instruct: Given a question, retrieve relevant passages that can help answer the question.
Query: Who invented cassette tape technology?
The Compact Audio Cassette (CAC) or Musicassette (MC), also commonly called the cassette tape or simply tape or cassette, is an analog magnetic tape recording format for audio recording and playback. It was developed by Philips in Hasselt, Belgium, and released in 1962.[2] Compact cassettes come in two forms, either already containing content as a prerecorded cassette, or as a fully recordable "blank" cassette. Both forms are reversible by the user.[3]
Homemade mix tapes became common in the 1980s. Although the compact audio cassette by Philips appeared at the 1963 Berlin Radio Show, the sound quality of cassettes was not good enough to be seriously considered for music recording until further advances in tape formulations, including the advent of chrome and metal tape. Before the introduction of the audio cassette, the creation of a pop music compilation required specialized or cumbersome equipment, such as a reel-to-reel or 8 track recorder, that was often inaccessible to the casual music fan. As cassette tapes and recorders grew in popularity and portability, these technological hurdles were lowered to the point where the only resources required to create a mix were a handful of cassettes and a cassette recorder connected to a source of pre-recorded music, such as a radio or LP player. The 8-track tape cartridge was more popular for music recording during much of the 1960s, as the cassette was originally only mono and intended for vocal recordings only, such as in office dictation machines. But improvements in fidelity finally allowed the cassette to become a major player. The ready availability of the cassette and higher quality home recording decks to serve the casual home user allowed the cassette to become the dominant tape format, to the point that the 8 track tape nearly disappeared shortly after the turn of the 1980s. The growth of the mixtape was also encouraged by improved quality and increased popularity of audio cassette players in car entertainment systems, and by the introduction of the Sony Walkman in 1979.
Rumours have sometimes associated C120 and longer cassettes with double or triple play reel-to-reel tape, but in fact even C60 cassettes use tape thinner than double play and little thicker than triple play. The main thing that the longer cassettes have in common with double and triple play reel-to-reel tapes is that they are pushing similar limits of technology, and as a consequence suffer similar problems.
The Compact Cassette originally was intended for use in dictation machines. In this capacity, some later-model cassette-based dictation machines could also run the tape at half speed (15⁄16 in/s) as playback quality was not critical. The cassette soon became a popular medium for distributing prerecorded music—initially through The Philips Record Company (and subsidiary labels Mercury and Philips in the U.S.). As of 2009, one still finds cassettes used for a variety of purposes, such as journalism, oral history, meeting and interview transcripts, audio-books, and so on. Police are still big buyers of cassette tapes, as some lawyers "don't trust digital technology for interviews".[80] However, they are starting to give way to Compact Discs and more "compact" digital storage media. Prerecorded cassettes were also employed as a way of providing chemotherapy information to recently diagnosed cancer patients as studies found anxiety and fear often gets in the way of the information processing.[81]
In 1935, decades before the introduction of the Compact Cassette, AEG released the first reel-to-reel tape recorder (in German: Tonbandgerät), with the commercial name "Magnetophon". It was based on the invention of the magnetic tape (1928) by Fritz Pfleumer, which used similar technology but with open reels (for which the tape was manufactured by BASF). These instruments were very expensive and relatively difficult to use and were therefore used mostly by professionals in radio stations and recording studios.
, a website dedicated to cassette tapes , an online collection of blank audio tape cassettes , a cassette tape reference site
Magnetic cassette technology was developed in 1963 by the Dutch electronics firm Philips. In the late 1960s, the introduction of prerecorded cassette tapes made it possible to listen to tapes of music on car stereos, though vinyl remained the most popular format for home listening.
Following the invention of the audion tube in 1906, electric microphones gradually replaced the purely acoustical recording methods of earlier dictaphones by the late 1930s. In 1945, the SoundScriber and Gray Audograph, which cut grooves into a plastic disc, was introduced, and two years later Dictaphone replaced wax cylinders with their Dictabelt technology, which cut a mechanical groove into a plastic belt instead of into a wax cylinder. This was later replaced by magnetic tape recording. While reel-to-reel tape was used for dictation, the inconvenience of threading tape spools led to development of more convenient formats, notably the Compact Cassette, Mini-Cassette, and Microcassette.
Digital dictation became possible in the 1990s, as falling computer memory prices made possible pocket-sized digital voice recorders that stored sound on computer memory chips without moving parts. Many early 21st-century digital cameras and smartphones have this capability built in. In the 1990s, improvements in voice recognition technology began to allow computers to transcribe recorded audio dictation into text form, a task that previously required human secretaries or transcribers. the technology is not robust enough to replace human transcription in most cases.
Between 1985 and 1992, the cassette tape was the most popular format in the UK and wealthy record labels experimented with innovative packaging designs. A designer during the era explained: "There was so much money in the industry at the time, we could try anything with design." The introduction of the cassette single, called a "cassingle", was also part of this era and featured a music single in Compact Cassette form. Until 2005, cassettes remained the dominant medium for purchasing and listening to music in some developing countries, but compact disc (CD) technology had superseded the Compact Cassette in the vast majority of music markets throughout the world by this time.[32][33]
Inside the Pocket Rockers cartridge, the same 3.81 mm (0.150 Inch) tape like in the Compact Cassette is used, running at same tape speed of 1⅞ Inch per second. The upper two tracks contain one mono recording, each. Winding the tape into a Compact Cassette, the recording is playing backwards. The lower two tracks were not used. The tape head is bottom top mounted Compact Cassette player head. The small Endless tape cartridge based on a technology invented by Bernard Cousino is operated by a belt-driven capstan.
Though in the mid-'90s cassette culture seemed to decline with the appearance of new technologies and methods of distribution such as the Internet, MP3 files, file sharing, and CD-Rs, in recent years it has once again seen a revival, with the rise of partly or wholly tape-based labels such as Burger Records, POST/POP, Memorials of Distinction, Tuff Enuff Records, First Base Tapes and Gnar Tapes. An exhibition was held at Printed Matter in New York City devoted to current American cassette culture entitled "Leaderless: Underground Cassette Culture Now" (May 12–26, 2007).
The tape speed of DCC is the same as for analog compact cassettes: per second, DCCs use tape that is the same width as that from analog compact cassettes: 1/8 of an inch (3.175 mm). The tape that is used in production cassettes is chromium dioxide- or cobalt-doped ferric-oxide, 3-4 µm thick in a total tape thickness of 12 µm, identical to the tape that was widely in use for video tapes.
One of the most famous political uses of cassette tapes was the dissemination of sermons by the Ayatollah Khomeini throughout Iran before the 1979 Iranian Revolution, in which Khomeini urged the overthrow of the regime of the Shah, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi.[30] In 1970s India, cassettes were blamed for bringing unwanted Christian and Islamic influences into traditionally Sikh and Hindu areas. Cassette technology was a booming market for pop music in India, drawing criticism from conservatives while at the same time creating a huge market for legitimate recording companies, as well as pirated tapes.[31]
D/CAS (Data/CASsette): An obsolete data backup technology that uses an upgraded version of the common audio tape cassette. It can hold as much as 0.6GB of data. It is closely related to ArVid technology. Unlike QIC, Travan and DAT it does not require a specialized Tape drive. It was superseded by the DDS data format stored on digital audio tape.
A key advance in audio fidelity came with the Dolby A noise reduction system, invented by Ray Dolby and introduced into professional recording studios in 1966. It suppressed the light but sometimes quite noticeable steady background of hiss, which was the only easily audible downside of mastering on tape instead of recording directly to disc. A competing system, dbx, invented by David Blackmer, also found success in professional audio. A simpler variant of Dolby's noise reduction system, known as Dolby B, greatly improved the sound of cassette tape recordings by reducing the especially high level of hiss that resulted from the cassette's miniaturized tape format. It, and variants, also eventually found wide application in the recording and film industries. Dolby B was crucial to the popularization and commercial success of the cassette as a domestic recording and playback medium, and it became a standard feature in the booming home and car stereo market of the 1970s and beyond. The compact cassette format also benefited enormously from improvements to the tape itself as coatings with wider frequency responses and lower inherent noise were developed, often based on cobalt and chrome oxides as the magnetic material instead of the more usual iron oxide.
The compact cassette technology was originally designed for dictation machines, but improvements in fidelity led the Compact Cassette to supplant the Stereo 8-track cartridge and reel-to-reel tape recording in most non-professional applications.[4] Its uses ranged from portable audio to home recording to data storage for early microcomputers. The first cassette player (although mono) designed for use in car dashboards was introduced in 1968. Between the early 1970s and the early 2000s, the cassette was one of the two most common formats for prerecorded music, first alongside the LP record and later the compact disc (CD).[5]
The 8-track tape standard, promoted by Bill Lear in the early 1960s, popularized consumer audio playback in automobiles. Eventually, this standard was replaced by the smaller and more reliable Compact Cassette.
Philips' development of the Compact Cassette in 1963 and Sony's development of the Walkman in 1979 led to widespread consumer use of magnetic audio tape. In 1990, the Compact Cassette was the dominant format in mass-market recorded music. The development of Dolby noise reduction technology in the 1960s brought audiophile quality recording to the Compact Cassette also contributing to its popularity.
It is a widely accepted fact by now that the invention of the recordable cassette by the Philips Corporation and the commercial cassette distribution network in the Tel Aviv train station had a large impact on the popularity of Mediterranean Israeli music. Cassettes allowed the Mizrahi population create and distribute their own music within their communities. They also allowed for more musical integration. One could have Umm Kulthum and a neighbor who is an emerging singer.
Cassette tapes were a predominant factor in the growth of Mediterranean Israeli music in the 1970s. After first being a favorite at community celebrations, such as weddings and birthdays, the recording of one particular wedding party became a desired commodity in the Mizrahi ma'abarot ("transit camp"). These cassettes are what caused ethnomusicologist Amy Horowitz to start researching this blossoming new music style.
A cassette adapter could also be used with other audio equipment, such as a microphone, handheld game console, or laptop computer. It can also be used in a home tape deck to play sound from any equipment, such as a personal computer, when computer speakers are in short supply.A cassette adapter is shaped like a cassette tape. However, instead of having reels of tape inside, it has a transmitting head where the tape is normally read by the reading head. This transmitting head is connected to the input cord, which connects the head to the audio source. A cassette adapter must also include a mechanism that simulates tape movement. Modern cassette players monitor tape movement to detect when the tape ends. This is done using a rolling wheel that rides against the tape. To simulate tape movement, a system of gears or a drive belt connects the tape player's drive motor (via the take-up spindle) to a wheel inside the adapter. This wheel rides against the detection wheel to simulate tape movement. Because the wheel never stops spinning, the deck never senses an end-of-tape and never tries to reverse the tape. Some adapters contain a one way locking mechanism, to stop the detection wheel if the tape is played in the wrong direction (and thus reading the wrong side of the head). The stopped wheel then would cause the cassette player to either stop the tape, or reverse the direction if the player supports it.
Ampex and Mullin subsequently developed commercial stereo and multitrack audio recorders, based on the system invented by Ross Snyder of Ampex Corp. Les Paul had been given one of the first Ampex Model 200 tape decks by Crosby in 1948 and went on to use Ampex eight track "Sel Sync" machines for multitracking. Ampex went on to develop the first practical videotape recorders in the early 1950s to pre-record Crosby's TV shows.
Inexpensive reel-to-reel tape recorders were widely used for voice recording in the home and in schools before the Philips compact cassette, introduced in 1963, gradually took over. Cassettes eventually displaced reel-to-reel recorders for consumer use. However, the narrow tracks and slow recording speeds used in cassettes compromised fidelity. Columbia House carried pre-recorded reel-to-reel tapes from 1960 to 1984.
The third wave of development in audio recording began in 1945, when the allied nations gained access to a new German invention - magnetic tape recording. The technology was invented in the 1930s, but remained restricted to Germany (where it was widely used in broadcasting) until the end of World War II. Magnetic tape provided another dramatic leap in audio fidelity — indeed, Allied observers first became aware of the existence of the new technology because they noticed that the audio quality of obviously pre-recorded programs was practically indistinguishable from live broadcasts. From 1950 onwards, magnetic tape quickly became the standard medium of audio master recording in the radio and music industries, and led to the development of the first hi-fi stereo recordings for the domestic market, the development of multi-track tape recording for music, and the demise of the disc as the primary mastering medium for sound. Magnetic tape also brought about a radical reshaping of the recording process — it made possible recordings of far longer duration and much higher fidelity than ever before, and it offered recording engineers the same exceptional plasticity that film gave to cinema editors — sounds captured on tape could now easily be manipulated sonically, edited, and combined in ways that were simply impossible with disc recordings. These experiments reached an early peak in the 1950s with the recordings of Les Paul and Mary Ford, who pioneered the use of tape editing and "multi-tracking" to create large 'virtual' ensembles of voices and instruments, constructed entirely from multiple taped recordings of their own voices and instruments. Magnetic tape fueled a rapid and radical expansion in the sophistication of popular music and other genres, allowing composers, producers, engineers and performers to realize previously unattainable levels of complexity. Other concurrent advances in audio technology led to the introduction of a range of new consumer audio formats and devices, on both disc and tape, including the development full-frequency-range disc reproduction, the change from shellac to polyvinyl plastic for disc manufacture, the invention of the 33rpm, 12-inch long-playing (LP) disc and the 45rpm 7-inch "single", the introduction of domestic and professional portable tape recorders (which enabled high-fidelity recordings of live performances), the popular 4-track cartridge and compact cassette formats, and even the world's first "sampling keyboards" - the pioneering tape-based keyboard instrument the Chamberlin, and its more famous successor, the Mellotron.
Despite the decline in the production of cassette decks, these products are still valued by some. Many blind and elderly people find the newest digital technologies very difficult to use compared to the cassette format. Cassette tapes are not vulnerable to scratching from handling (though the exposed magnetic tape is vulnerable to stretching from poking), and play from where they were last stopped (though some modern MP3 players offer savestating electronically). Cassette tapes can also be recorded multiple times (though some solid-state digital recorders are now offering that function).
The result was a slew of commercial and fundamental results, including the cassette tape in 1962, Plumbicon camera tube and the Video Long Play disc, which was the technological basis for the 1980 compact disc. Results were also achieved in the area of integrated circuitry: Else Kooi invented the LOCOS technology and Kees Hart and Arie Slob developed the I²L (Integrated Injection Logic) in the early 1970s.
Though spoken recordings were popular in 33⅓ vinyl record format for schools and libraries into the early 1970s, the beginning of the modern retail market for audiobooks can be traced to the wide adoption of cassette tapes during the 1970s. Cassette tapes were invented in 1963 and a few libraries, such as the Library of Congress, began distributing books on cassette by 1969. However, during the 1970s, a number of technological innovations allowed the cassette tape wider usage in libraries and also spawned the creation of new commercial audiobook market. These innovations included the introduction of small and cheap portable players such as the Walkman, and the widespread use of cassette decks in cars, particularly imported Japanese models which flooded the market during the multiple energy crises of the decade.
By the early 1900s, the main responsibility of a doctor lay in treating the patient and other responsibilities such as creating a patient's medical record, keeping the files up to date and any other related paperwork eventually fell into the hands of hired medical stenographers. With the invention of typewriters, maintaining records became easier and with the invention of cassette players, it made way for the development of transcription machines. The initial versions available for purchase, offered the ability to record speech on cassette tapes. In fact, they were very popular for a long time although they did not offer much voice clarity at all. As soon as the usage of computers picked up in organizations and in other sectors, cassette tapes were replaced with better storage devices such as floppy discs and CD's. Today, the availability of highly sophisticated recording equipment ensures that multiple high clarity files can be created, stored and sent for medical transcription purposes.