Tascam 414 Too Fast Playback Help

[wfreeze]

Hello all,

A decade or more ago I started home recording many tracks on a tascam 414 Portastudio. I haven't listened to the master tapes in years and am just now getting around to going back and having a listen. My problem is that now when I put the old cassettes in the 4 track machine and try to playback on some of the tapes(not all of them) the playback is super fast even with the pitch knob down low. Maybe I am forgetting some technique that I forgot on making these playback correctly? I thought that maybe the tapes I have that playback too fast were already in a mixed down format and that was the reason for the fast playback but when I tried playing them in a conventional cassette player they played back really slow like they were master tapes. So what am I doing wrong or what is wrong with these particular cassettes? I have tried flipping the tapes to the other side for playback too but it just expectedly results in the reverse playback sound.


Thanks,
Wilson

 

[Beck]

The 414 has only one speed and is double that of standard cassette speed. Either your 414 or your regular cassette deck may have an intermittent speed fluctuation issue, or your regular cassette deck is dragging all the time. Or you're getting tapes mixed up. Do you have any commercial prerecorded tapes you can test your standard cassette deck with?

 

[wfreeze]

Tascam 414 Too Fast Playback

The 414 has only one speed and is double that of standard cassette speed. Either your 414 or your regular cassette deck may have an intermittent speed fluctuation issue, or your regular cassette deck is dragging all the time. Or you're getting tapes mixed up. Do you have any commercial prerecorded tapes you can test your standard cassette deck with?

Commercial prerecorded tapes play correctly on my regular cassette deck. The tapes that play super fast on the Tascam play a good bit slower on the regular deck but still plays too fast and sound is too high. Nothing seems to be intermittent since the regular deck always plays the speed correctly for pre-recorded commercial tapes and the Tascam either always plays a problem tape too fast or always plays a non-problem master tape at correct speed the whole time. It is puzzling since I recorded all of these tapes on the same Tascam machine that I've owned all this time.

 

[matt saunders]

Same problem

Commercial prerecorded tapes play correctly on my regular cassette deck. The tapes that play super fast on the Tascam play a good bit slower on the regular deck but still plays too fast and sound is too high. Nothing seems to be intermittent since the regular deck always plays the speed correctly for pre-recorded commercial tapes and the Tascam either always plays a problem tape too fast or always plays a non-problem master tape at correct speed the whole time. It is puzzling since I recorded all of these tapes on the same Tascam machine that I've owned all this time.

I have the same problem, tapes playing too fast/double speed even with the pitch control down as far possible, also all commercial tapes do the same. I was wondering if you'd solved your problem way back??

many thanks

matt

 

[Monkey Allen]

My 414 does this too. Tapes recorded on this machine play back too fast like 2x or more too fast. Anyone with a solution?

 

[grimtraveller]

My 414 does this too. Tapes recorded on this machine play back too fast like 2x or more too fast. Anyone with a solution?

Now there's a voice from the past......


A solution is to copy them onto another tape in a standard deck in real time.

 

[Monkey Allen]

Now there's a voice from the past......


A solution is to copy them onto another tape in a standard deck in real time.

You mean my voice or the Tascam?

You know what I ended up realizing? It was fine...I recorded a little 15 second 4 track thing and it all played back totally normal. Just the old stuff won't play back.

Ah well. It works, so that's fine.

 

[grimtraveller]

You mean my voice or the Tascam?

Neither. I meant you. You used to be a sort of regular when I first joined HR properly in 2009. Then shortly after, it was like you disappeared into the Twilight Zone !

 

[Monkey Allen]

Well holy moly...it's nice to be remembered by someone

Yeah I did hang out here a lot. That was kind of right when I was getting into recording...but then I went overseas for 12 years for work. So most of my recording stuff got put on hold.

Back in my home country now and a little more time up my sleeve.

 

[stevenclements]

Tascam 414 pitch mod / normal speed​

link to YouTube video Mod 'regular speed'

I thought my machine was bad as well... but it seems that's just the default speed on the 414 and you can find that noted on page 8 of the manual. I found the above YouTube video on installing a switch to bypass a resister that allows you to get a more industry standard cassette speed... but I suppose it can also be used to affect alterations in your recordings if you're into that.
MANUAL
https://tascam.com/downloads/tascam/317/Porta_414mkII_manual.pdf

Cheers Steve