Let's Talk Reel to Reel Tape Decks & Music

I can answer many yes's to items in your post, but not to newly released music. I have ten decks. Before I think about purchasing newly released material, I buy the CD to see if it matches my musical tastes. I have not found such, yet. I do have a large collection of tapes used in broadcast studios years ago. In addition I have a large collection of AFRTS tapes, which I find high quality. Our government spent huge amounts of money on these and they are top quality pre recorded media. Try one, you will be surprised. I have about 3,000 pre recorded tapes.

J. Valin just reviewed the United Home Audio Tascam BR-20 phase-11 reel to reel, with lot's of mods and silver wire, etc. the machine costs $21K for record and playback mods (17K for playback only). he seems VERY enthusiastic about the sound, especially SGT.PEPPERS (a studio master!) that's a lot of money for
a compact recorder (not a big studer or ampex, 3M, etc.) but IF YOU CAN GET
SOME GREAT TAPES FOR IT he claims it sounds MUCH better than a Walker turntable.
of course vinyl records are far more available than 2nd generation master tapes (!) but the idea is pretty intriguing.
i have a bunch of "cheap" decks- teacs, a tascam br-20 (stock of course), etc. i like them a lot, but admittedly to get them up to the standards of a good SACD disc i have a ways to go yet. OTOH, i can still make live recordings with them which is still a lot of fun if you play an instrument. Years ago if someone had a record you wanted to copy, this was the way to do it. Now not so much (thanks to Jobs and gates).

I still have my Teac 4 track lying around. I used it a lot back then for home studion work.

I rarely use it now, even though I have some nice tapes, both home recorded and commercially produced. In general it sounds a bit hissy and rolled off compared to CD and vinyl. I think it's top end is only 17kHZ, and it is all original, so it could be the deck or it could be the tapes.

If I were to consider playing RTR tapes, then I would most certainly have to consider newer produced recordings. Most of the old stuff is going to be deteriorating in a big way now.