1986 Sony Metal-ES Type 4 Cassette - Possibly The Best Cassette Of Them All
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- Опубликовано: 10 сен 2024
- This is an unashamed "love letter" to what I think is my favourite all round cassette, the Sony Metal-ES from 1986.
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I was working at Sony in the 80's and I was surrounded by all of the ES equipment, as well as also buying a few bits and pieces with my hard earned wages.
Whilst I appreciated the quality of the engineering, (being that I was in the service department) at the time, we all just thought it was going to last forever, and only get better. Little did we know that the world in general was just going to move away from producing quality.
I was lucky in as much as I could get to familiarise myself with the very best quality ES equipment, and then purchase it later on down the road when it became affordable on eBay.
Of course now, you have to trade in an internal organ for some of the stuff online :-)
The same of course was true with the tapes, the 80s produced some of the very best cassette's you could possibly lay your hands on, the one here (Metal-ES) as you say, is one of the best that has ever been produced.
I do have a very soft spot however, for the '84-'85 TDK range, there's just something about the look of them that brings back some wonderful nostalgia, the AD's, the SA's and the MA range. Very classy looking cassette's.
I'm still servicing vintage technology these days, and I'm glad cassettes are having a resurgence, keep up the good work, yours, Aston.
This is not a cassette! This is a piece of art!
I couldn't agree more.
Look at the Sony UX, UX-S and HF-S (circa 1986) cassettes, they were both work of arts. I only have my 1986 UX cassette and it was a beauty. The hubs are different than the later HF cassettes from 1989, but the 1986 HF has a slightly different hub.
Very nice, I love the old Sony tapes. But, you seem to forget to sniff at it after you opened it! You should sniff, sooo good! 👍😁
Smells like victory 😂
I’ve still got a wrapped one in my shelf - now really looking forward recording on it...someday. Thanks so much for your videos!
Save it for something, or someone, special 😉
Had to check my old recorded collection. I have none unused, but there is 36 Metal-ES in my shelf that I recorded on back in the day. About 10 of them was rotating as my car tapes. But I don't think I ever got to re-record on them ever. Because back then when I made my 10th "Car Tape mix" I mounted a DAT player in the car, and CD's took over as they became recordable. So it is possible that I have at least 10 Metal-ES in excellent condition that I can use for something else, after checking what I thought was good car music back then... :)
I had never had these Metal ES but i still have quite a few UX ES from same age. Absolutely my favorites
A thing of beauty!
I only ever bought one of these. Regret I hadn't bought more. Still have it with the original recording I made on it. A Mobile Fidelity transcribed LP of "Abbey Road" with dbx NR. Still sounds sweet.. Yes.. these Sony tapes are excellent. Would I buy another at today's prices... probably not.
This wrapper takes second place in beauty to the 88 SA-X. Can't beat the white and gold combo IMO.
But the shells of that era were simply amazing. I always loved their very japanese no-bullshit design approach.
Yeah, the 88 SA-X is another cassette of beauty and a terrific package.
When you like something this much, you don’t let go. Sucks about the hissy part. It may just have to be something you have to put up with. Doesn’t matter much when you love it mate. You know a great tape when you see and hear it. Raise a glass to you Tony and to Sony. Two greats, both great mates!
came for the tape review. stayed for the track. really nice synth work
Cheers!
Some specs on the Sony Metal ES for those who are interested.
Dynamic range 61db (The highest range of any tape to my knowledge)
Treble Level 10k +1.6db
Sensetivity +0.6db
Hiss (Bias Noise ) -55.5db
Modulation noise -40db
Overload 315hz MOL +5.5db
Overload 10khz SAT +3.2db
A fantastic tape but comparability is quite limited due to a strongly rising treble and solidly reinforced bass response, basically if you haven't got facilities to tune bias and Dolby sensitivity it is a bit of a wild card. Great review. Are you OK with me posting some data, where I have it, on the tapes you review CC?
Go for it, data bores me, so I'm happy for someone else to post it 😀
These are quite conservative ratings. Less dynamic range than, say, what TDK claimed for the 1994 AR (63 dB), and much less than measured by magazine testers (67 dB in 1990). This doesn't mean much except that the numbers aren't comparable across the board... and then they are still just numbers.
@@nvo7024 Source and summation care of HiFi Choice, not my opinion.
The best tape in the best deck ever made, absolute winning combination!
Beautiful shell indeed and it sounds great.
Tony, you're a man with taste, my favourite shell too. They look stunning imho.
Your passion make me smile. :)
Beautiful indeed. Classy.
Plus you can hear the bite of the hi-hats!
Great video Tony, we love the shows you do on the high end tapes. Sadly I only have one of the Metal-ES as they were so expensive. I remember picking one up in TopTape Exeter for around £4.50 in 1988. Also my less than premium equipment never brought out the best in these masterpieces. :-(
That's it, a deck is only as good as the cassette and a cassette is only as good as the deck.
@12:00 Variety makes or generates the cassette culture, much like analogue photography. We can enjoy both digital and analogue, and why not!? :o)
I’ve long read that the Metal-ES is WAS/IS the best Sony ever made. Not the Metal Master, not the Super Metal Master. My single example echos this. It’s a stunning tape, probably better than the TDK MA-R.
Nak Anon I need to get one of those
@Nak Anon
True in the USA all the major Hi-Fi magazines of the time rated this Metal ES the best of the best.
I love Sony cassettes! I still have 6 unused Sony Metal XR carter’s and 37 to be reused. Unfortunately I never had the opportunity to try a Metal-ES. And sadly, for that price I’m sure I never will🙁
I have the 1988 Metal Eses! Are they also rare?
From the days when Sony was (and was perceived to be because of its infinitely superior Trintron CRT TVs) a really premium brand. I remember buying an early Sony Metallic cassette (white and gold card) and, I must admit, I thought it sounded slightly dull (muffled) compared to TDK MA. I thus tended to stick with TDK and never tried the later Metal-ES.
Thats a beautiful shell
That's a gorgeous looking piece of industrial art.👌 Even more handsome than a 1988 TDK AD... 😉
The 1988 TDK "H" shell that that came in is another of my favourites...brilliant looking and performing.
@TheAylesburyCyclist
This was a time when the Japanese were putting in incredible attention to detail on almost every single electronic product they made that were even moderately priced! I was there, we'll never see this ever again most likely.
the only proper cassette deck to record a Sony ES metal from 1986 is the Sony TC-K777ESII from...1986!
Great to see that you switched to 60fps!
This cassette deserved it. Took 2 hours to render it...
Hi Tony! I totally agree with you: I would prefer to have a variety of cassettes for the same reasons you mentioned. Back in the day, when I got my hand on an album that was considered "special" for me, It was kind of a ceremony for me to go to the cassettes store (there was one store that their primary product was cassettes (audio and video), and choose the "right" cassette for the album in discussion. loved the tune! Best Regards, Moshe.
Snap. Cassettes for the car, cassettes to give to friends, cassettes for special albums, cassettes for "special" people 😉 That's part of the "magic" that's missing now...the agony of choice.
I've never seen one of those before. A damned foxy cassette!
They're rare birds 🥺
The shell kind of reminds me of a Scotch (IIRC). I know I have a couple that have the black-clear-black design, though the clear may be more smokey.
Yeah, it's a fine looking tape.
Awesome tape indeed. I have a few HF-S with similar shell although it does not have the wraparound clear part of the shell it's just the standard clear strip across the front. I was a Sony loyalist for most of my younger life, but eased up the last 15 years or so. Glad to see you're so passionate about this tape and it's a shame there aren't more floating around the universe
Burns my a$$ that back in 86 I coulda just walked in to the sony store and bought these, but I didn't. Think I was buying JVC and Fuji tapes back then.
Hindsight is a terrible thing. Grinds my gears more that these would have been a few bucks each on eBay 15 years ago...
Yeah, that's how I feel about those '86 HF-S, with the green printing across the tape shell. "Microfine Crystal Gamma". Wish I would have bought more.
Yeah,CDs were taking off around that time
That baby was a sweet jewel to record on. I always felt they made the best transport mechanisms. Sony made some fantastic tapes, and to me they were not as good as TDK, but they WERE better than Maxell. Better than Fuji or Ampex or JVC. Really, Sony made great cassettes in all formulations.
Ah yes, sigh. This is from when Sony was at its pinnacle. Excellent build quality, best televisions (Trinitron), great tech. I still have my working SLC-9 Beta VCR, and a working Sony VHS VCR too. Not to mention my Sony receiver, 5 disc CD player, twin-tape cassette deck and LaserDisc player! The only hardware with a better reputation at the time (IIRC) was the Nakamichi cassette deck; and I couldn't afford one of THOSE at the time. Most of my tapes were Sony too, whether audio cassette, Beta or VHS. I missed out on DAT, sadly, but *loved* Mini-Disc, especially for radio broadcasting. Brilliant technology! Since superseded by iPod/iPhone for personal audio, but still used in many community radio stations for convenience, functionality and reliability.
BTW, I did buy some TDK and Maxell cassettes, which I considered very good at the time, but sadly never graduated to metal audio tapes as I didn't have the equipment to support them.
Yeah, there was a time when Sony were the biggest and best...then, like Mercedes, they decided to drop build quality to increase profits...
@Cassette Comeback
I believe this was around the time when the last of the old guard and founders (Akio Morita and Masaru Ibuka) executive management left the company. You could really tell by the mid 90s the old Sony we knew and loved was gone.
@@watershed44 Yes, very sad, but sadly SO true. Their build was excellent, as was the tech. My Sony Trinitron TV served me very well from the late 1990s, through the digital TV revolution (with a world-class Sony digital TV box in 2004) until we went flat-screen around 2010. I believe my old CRT unit still works well (albeit with a digital TV decoder).
Back then it was Sony, Nakamichi, Revox and others which were the tech leaders. If ONLY today's products were produced with similarly excellent hardware quality! SIGH.
@rahb1
I was old enough to have been around during the late 70s to late 80s when the tier one and tier two Japanese electronic brands were making amazingly high quality products, the attention to detail, even in the less expensive moderately priced items was fantastic, and the quality was out of this world. I'd say even moderate priced brands like Pioneer, Sansui, Toshiba, Hitachi, Technics/Panasonic were just amazing items for the price you paid.
@@watershed44 "even moderate priced brands like Pioneer, Sansui, Toshiba, Hitachi, Technics/Panasonic were just amazing items for the price you paid." Agreed!
Sadly, this tradition did not continue, due to perceived price pressure from the low end. Surely SOME manufacturers could have continued to cater for the high end?
You had to either find a machine that was created with these in mind or one where you could actually set the recording bias. Even recorders with Metal and 70us settings did not always work as intended, unfortunately. When the bias level didn’t match the tape, you could end up with worse results with these than with conventional ‘chrome’ cassettes.
Definitely a beautiful cassette, puts me in the mind of the same era as the TDK SA and MA, but more premium looking!
Now you said the same thing about the Maxell and you know what, I whole heartily agree, I have the same one from 86 and one made in the 90s and the Maxells and the Tdk Ma-X and I love them all equally, and there would not have been any noise if you used your Aiwa deck(just saying) I’m sure know that, would have been a better demo, but I get your logic about displaying it
I use this cassette as a Master Reference Cassette. Record on it once and put it away, never play it over and over. I use it to record other cassettes of off this Master Tape. This cassette is one of the best cassettes Sony has ever made!
Man, I know a guy who’s sadly closing his music shop, and he’s got an entire displayer of Sony cassettes from that year (immaculate and perfectly complete). If you can afford the shipping and an offer he couldn’t refuse I might be able to get you his number
Depends where he is. Don't you fancy them yourself?
Cassette Comeback
Northern Italy.
I myself very much do.
My source of income (parents) don’t as much, and I have little space to put it :(
I've not yet had the pleasure of trying one of these. The type 1 HF-S/ES and type 2 Sony of this era are omongs my favourite cassettes of all time. To date the best I've had was a 1988 UX pro from yourself.
And, like it's nothing, Tony bangs out a solid track worthy of an '86 Metal ES 👍👍
I wonder if he has an old box somewhere of multitrack cassettes from the pre-DAW days 🤔
No. Too young and too expensive for me then, my music creation began "in the box" and that's where I like it.
@Cassette Comeback
I have one of these bought from new in 1986! I've used it on and off for decades now, and indeed they are really amazing, I remember buying it because it was rated as one of the best but I can't remember which HiFi magazine it was but they did publish the specs too. Bought from J&R Music World NYC. Very high quality amazing Japanese attention to detail! The Japanese were incredible with that back then and we will likely never see that ever again. These shells were also used for the Type ll non-metal versions as well at least for the USA versions. I still have all of the Type II Sony ES tapes I bought with that metal tape from J&R music world back in 1986.
You know. I don't think any of the 1986 Type 2 had this shell. As far as I know, it's unique to the Metal ES.
@Cassette Comeback
You are CORRECT! I just looked more closely and the UX-ES I have from 1986 only have a clear frame, which doesn't extend around the front to the sides like it does in the Metal ES. This is in the USA, I'm not sure about other markets though. Thanks for your great channel. I remember buying that ONE Metal ES because it was rated sky high by Hi-Fi Magazine back then but it was super expensive, it had to be 17$ a piece I think maybe more, can't remember clearly.
Nice video, Tony. Excellent cassette playing/recording through top-flight gear.
Nando.
Seems to be the perfect combination then, the ReVoX and a Sony metal tape. I asume you've align it before recording.
Yeah, just use the Revox Auto-Cal.
Awesome video and a truly beautiful tape! How do the Sony ES, XR, & SR stack up to each other? I wonder how much of a quality drop or difference in tape formulations there are between the three?
Nothing noticeable from my testing, it's the shells which are the main difference.
The tape sounded better than the source to my ears.
Hello Tony.I feel so luck that I actually still have two set,20 pieces of 1984 JP version Metal-ES in my collection. The package are shiny as gold brick and really amazing looking.I got them with 180 yuan each.And I think that is a good deal to me.And I think they are better perfomance than the same levels tapes like TDK MAX or Maxell Metal-XS,even the MA-XG(of course,TDK TOTL tape MA-R's receipes hasn't change since 1979,and Metal-ES is Sony's flagship at 1984 ).Just enjoy them,they are just NOICE!
Hi Frank! Greetings from Canada! Question: I have many 1980 Sony metal tapes withmy music but they are in 50%speed, how can I transfer the into normal speed?
It's a Sony ❤️❤️❤️
there is also the "QS" Line of Sony Stereo Receivers, cassette decks, CD players, ECT. but i do not want to talk about them '~'
Loving the Tunage Tony 👍👍👍
Cheers. Gotta give it a structure and some lyrics now...
makes a good instrumental too 👍
Tony reviews a Sony :)
😂
There's a tape that looks like it means serious business, and it's got the performance to back that up. What a beaut. For extra special (ES) recordings only (no Ed Sheeran then I guess).
Also: cracking track that, TV.
the tape sounds actually more punchy to me than the source... well done
ES - Elevated Standard
DO NOT OPEN, oooo...no...
Record in this video shonj drop in sound quality, most in high tones, I watch YouTUbe on my PC but music go thru Denon receiver and custom made JVC speakers with some specila tweeters from Japan, all on my desktop in level on my head and I can here a drop in sound quality when yu press source-tape, I do not expect this from Metal Sony and Revox.
Great video, regards.
It's one of those things that you wish you had a time machine so you could go back to 1986 and get a couple of boxes of them, when they were still 'somewhat' affordable. :)
They were probably at their most affordable in 2004 😀
@Cassette Comeback Ah, right, we'll go back to 2004 then :D
@@CassetteComeback The best deal was around 1990 when they were regarded "old stock" and the sales people at a department store put the same price tag on them as on the Metal XR: 5,95 DM, which was the equivalent of maybe £ 2.50 back then. Same thing happened with the Metal Master some year afterwards. I've seen customers walking out of the store with multiple 10-pack bricks under their arms. I was very happy with the more modest number of pieces I could afford to buy as a school boy, and I still have them.
@@CassetteComebackthe times I wish I wasn't 4 years old so I could get things lmao
What about the Sony Metal-SR? 90. I have a factory sealed 10 pack
Great cassette and quality shell but for me the styling leaves me cold near to freezing actually, anyway another great video Tony best cassette channel out there.
Looking like God's light shining out those reels 😂 I love that!
Loving this track Tony 👍
I'll turn it in to a proper song with lyrics in the future.
looks great sounds great and i love the video effects :D
I have the 1988 version, granted not as cool a shell, but I like it. Do you know if there's a significant difference in sound?
ES = Extra Special
Oh yeah...
Is metal mean its not full of a type of binder of any type etc or any plastic in the tape film itself?
Thanks for sharing this!
This might be the only case I've ever encountered in all of your videos, where the Tape actually sounded BETTER than the source!!
They're not my favourites for nothing 😍
@@CassetteComeback Rightly so!! A prime example of what cassettes are capable of! 👍🏼
So yummy I wish I could eat it! I just LOVE Cassettes so much!!
The first defective Sony tapes I ran across were el-cheapo late 90's UX-S labeled "for CD"
I think that's the case for all cassettes, as the quality dropped towards the end.
@@CassetteComeback I have two UX-S from the 1999/2001 lineup (the ones with the blueish-smoky clear shell) which should be identical but have different leader tapes. Makes you wonder what these guys in Mexico did 😂
@@svenschwingel8632 Lmao😂
Would it be fair to say you’re in love with this tape? Sure sounds like it to me. Tony, it’s called coinjection molded shell. Far harder to produce than standard single color/resin injection molded products. The set up on the machine takes longer and the die it gets injected into takes extra time to get right. Those that have never done it don’t understand. It takes time! Great tape yields great results! Hello!
I didn't know the term, but I guessed it wouldn't be easy to make otherwise others would have done it too.
Steady on, Tony.
Know the feeling, though.
I remember those, I preferred the MAXG
Tony, you pretty nailed it about the Metal ES. Very, very good tape, very cool looking - even though I prefer the '85 version, mostly for the more colourful j-card, but that's just me... should be technically the same. And living proof that you don't need over-engineered ceramic or rubber "resonance damping" shells for top performance. Have you ever tried a That's MR-X Pro? It is in the same league, I do personally consider these two, MR-X and Metal ES (1st and 2nd gen), to be the best tapes ever made.
The feature with the window going around the edges of the cassette was first seen on the BASF Cr Maxima from 1982, also a very cool looking cassette. But on that one, the designers forgot that not everyone had a Revox or other machine with a good view on the entire cassette, as it was lacking a window in the middle:
agfabasf.com/images/content/basf-cm-90-open-02.jpg
There is a funny story on Tapeheads about the press presentation of that tape. So, in a way, you could say Sony has taken over the good part of the Maxima design and developed something perfect out of it.
Yeah, I have a friend who hates the first CMII shell, but I really like it. I rate the MR-X Pro as well, but the shell looks the same as the rest of the 87 that's lineup (except the RX) so the Sony edges it for me with it's beauty.
OK, so what makes me wonder now, why didn't the Japanese throw in the ceramic tape guide of the UX PRO as well?! Have some UX PRO from the very same series, unfortunately used, so I can't sell it to you, sorry... :)
That is a beautiful cassette.
7:14 demo start
To my memory, I had one or two of these at some point, and I always thought they were the sharpest looking cassette tapes of my whole collection. They were far too good for my comparably low fidelity decks.
Here in the states they are $40 USA dollars with free shipping, each.
I bought some but they were expensive
How does it compare with the 85 version? Is the actual tape any different?
The 85 and 86 version behave quite the same, so I guess it is the same tape, but I have not measured them
Von dieser Cassette, hab ich noch einige, nagel neu, 60ziger und 90ziger.
I wonder why I haven’t seen any teac tapes on here.
Not common in the UK and now too expensive to buy
The searching begins
i recall you recently made some of your music available on Bandcamp? what name should i search under? great tape by the way!
Villarosso
Well done on the video mate :-)
So ES is better than XR/SR (as was called overseas)?
I wonder how does it compare to BASF Metal IV.
And by the way you can just cut open the side and slide the cassette out of it and then put it back, it would still look mint on display.
As long as ES and XR/SR were co-existing, the ES was better: double coating vs. single coating, lower hiss, higher SOL. But the last generation XR is said to be a very fine tape, too (never tested it thoroughly enough, I was burning CDs when the last gen XR was sold...)
BASF metal IV from the 80's is a rather early metal formula, which does not reach the same high values for dynamics as a good mid-80's or later metal tape from the competition. It is colouring the sound in a way you might find pleasant, but in measurable values, where you try to come as close to the source as possible, it is not top notch. That's why BASF at some point stopped making metal tapes shorter than C-120. They could simply reach better performance with their double layer pure chromes. They saw the C-120 length as the best resort for the metal IV, because metal coatings could be made thinner than ferrics or chromes without losing performance.
If you mean the BASF metal tapes from the 90's: I think they are also to be placed in the top 5, but the 353 series MP IV Focus/Studio were probably Taiyo Yuden tapes (That's CD-IV F), and the TP IV Reference Maxima was probably a Maxell tape (MX-S) in the good, but ugly (my opinion) TP shell.
@@kiirunavaara I had the opportunity to get several BASF Metal IB, one still sealed and I got them, I also have some XRs, but my deck is rather mid-range, so it still gets as much as it can out of those.
Definitely a favourite! and yeah the shell is much nicer than the metal master. Would be interesting to somehow compare the tape in both. did they use metal ES tape in the metal master perhaps ??
Not 100% sure they're the same, but I recon they were at least based on it then "tweaked'
... И божественный свет снизошёл на кассетную паству. :))
Да, недавно на ebay из-за таких четырёх бывших в употреблении кассет устроили настоящую битву. Это - кассета нуворишей. :)
Weird you know come to think all of a sudden noticing it looks lile fwiw how a pack of ciggarettes would look at the bottom of the tape lmao idk why but it just looks like a color of ciggarette boxes.
How do you erase a cassette on the Revox ?
Like on any other deck, record whilst having no source playing.
Is the 1988 Metal ES rare as these?
Tony, it sounds great, it was peaking very high and still sounded good. I would like to see you go down Sony list of metal tapes with comparison and contrast. How does this compare to the Famous Metal Master? Great job here. I agree with you, I like variety as well. They are expensive but not as expensive as the metal master. At this point in time I find the metal master over hyped. I have never had the metal es. I might have to go on the hunt, Tony you truly are a troublemaker, damn.
May as well save your time. I have several I got back in the day, also some Metal Masters. The Metal-ES tapes don't hold up well over time, just a couple years after first being recorded, they start to have quite a few drop-outs. The Metal Masters fare much better, but again, horrifyingly expensive, even back then. Tony seems to really like Sony's. I found most to be overpriced, only ones I really found to last and be worthwhile were the HF-S series and older UCX and EHF versions from around '78 to '85.
YamFZR93 , I have the HF-S, UCX and EHF along with the Metal ES, the black case one and I have one white Metal Master. I agree with your point I have had drop outs and the second white one is now gone. I made the mistake of buying a used White Metal Master with the ceramic case and the tape was dry rotted. I have to admitted that the other tapes have held up well and I found an older Metal Es in storage that still works. So your point is very valid and I won’t be looking any more Metal Masters. The Metal Es new ones I bought three months ago new from a vinyl store and I had that one in storage that I forgot about.
They talking about CD, it would be far more amazing to record a hi resolution digital file or SACD on it ! It would go far beyond the 20k cut off (hair cut) of the CD since the cassette is analogue (super analog at that) it can handle far above 20k! Just saying!😊
@7:20 you are producing this electronic music Tony?
Yeah, that's my work.
One thing I missed to do in the 90s was to hear THIS CASSETTE. I heard and now I know how godly it is
i was so sick of the word "Best" one time, i added a minus in front of the word in google search :-P
Also thats a fine Cassette indeed.
I only run my metals with dbx or Dolby C.
Source / Tape = No difference.
Uncannily good.
My thoughts exactly! What a tape!
Its not true to source in high treble at such recording levels as mild HF compression can be heard in the video. This ES tape had 0dB 10kHz SOL in the Howard A. Roberson 1990 tests. That's for 200 nWb/m on Nakamichi decks. -1.2dB when for DIN standard. Got 91% overall rating only second to TDK MA-XG with 92%. A great tape but use of Dolby and +3 max peaking should allow it replay better.
Forget CD digital, these tapes sound best with clean "audiophile" vinyl recorded to it! Or 7ips reel to reel! Hi resolution SACD is the ultimate to record on these tapes!