Recording Degradation on Recording to reel to reel

Cheap tapes were so bad to begin with it didn’t matter.

...not to mention that when recording using analog tape; for maximum audio quality, the deck’s equalization and bias must be set up for the particular tape formulation being used to record on. With calibration tapes, that used to be fairly easy to do, and common practice with professional decks (and probably still is if you own one), but most consumer decks were probably set up using only one formulation, and hopefully that would generally provide halfway decent performance for all tapes used when recording. Not that it’s a big deal anymore, since I never record (onto) cassettes anymore, but my Denon DN-790R cassette deck actually allows me to listen to the audio being recorded on the tape, and adjust the bias while monitoring the audio of the tape, while switching back and forth to the audio on the tape vs the input audio. Almost all professional reel to reel decks allowed this too, along with high performance consumer models.

Keep you heads, tape guides and capstan clean.

De magnetize heads and metal parts on tape path after some playing hours and keep the tapes stored properly.

Somewhere i have read that tapes can last 50 years, i think this claim is rather conservative.

To your question that would depend on many things, like tape quality, speed, tape machine, weather conditions...

Pre recorded  tapes were duped at higher speeds.  Irrelevant to the question. In 40 years of intensive tape recording I could immediately tell if the best available tapes had ever been previously recorded upon. Cheap tapes were so bad to begin with it didn't matter.

Another thing to keep in mind is that those early 7" pre-recorded tapes were sooo close to the master, that I’m not sure one can get the same reproduction today, even with today’s one steps, and other pressings (SACD and 192 kHz files included). It’s one of the main reasons why they are so coveted even today. Granted, the S/N can’t approach today’s technology (and S/N is a definite priority with me), but the dynamics (on the right playback equipment) on some of these tapes is just mind-blowing. I only own 7 of them at the moment, but whenever I throw one on, and put on the headphones, I’m still to this day blown away by their dynamics, to the point I feel like I’m almost sitting at the mixing board. Don’t forget to keep those tape heads and capstans clean.

Back in the day, I had Sony, Teac and Revox reel to reel recorders and I bought many pre recorded tapes.  One of my favorites was Abraxas by Santana. When new, it sounded amazing!  But after more than a few plays, you could hear the hiss increase and as the hiss increased, the high end started to disappear and sadly, the tape started to sound like mud with tape hiss. 

I grew up with my dad's Ampex tape machine and hundreds of prerecorded tapes, jazz and classical. The tapes were all 7.5 ips. Back then turntables, tonearms and cartridges were not near the quality they are today and in spite of considerable tape his the Tapes were vastly superior to LPs. Today the situation has been reversed. Modern upper level turntable playback especially with 45 rpm records recorded from uncompressed files are vastly superior (and quieter) than those old tapes. I can not speak for 15 ips modern transfers as I have no experience with them. 

@elliottbnewcombjr

I agree with you. The quality on some of those early pre-recorded 7" tapes is drop dead amazing. I’ve got a Temptations Gr. Hits Vol. 1 (7" pre-recorded) from the 1960’s, and there are a few dropouts on it (mainly from use), but the quality...OMG! I actually compared it to the commercially sold Motown CD, and that CD has more dropouts on it from their master tape than on my 7" pre-recorded version.

Everything is relative, i.e. perfection, darn good, good enough.

I have over 500 pre-recorded tapes, 7-1/2 ips. Inherited some, bought most on eBay. Played how many times?

Despite what people say, these tapes, and the Technics X2000r player are my best sounding source material.

I have many albums: CD; LP; R2R. Everyone picks LP over CD and R2R over LP, despite the fact that there is tape hiss in quiet passages and the S/N specs are worse than others.

Re-recording: IF the magnetic materials have not deteriorated, good to go. Repeated play, 60 year old tapes, no bleed thru, still sound better than other sources.

15 ips; 30 ips, gotta be amazing. I had a Teac that played 15 ips and 7-1/2 ips (they do not have 3-3/4 ips typically). I gave it to a musician friend and stuck with the X2000r (last pro-sumer deck Teac made). Plays big reela, 7-1/2 and 3-3/4. I do have some 3-3/4 ips, nowhere as good as 7-1/2, and LPs will beat them, but I can play them.

My tapes I made myself, FM simulcasts, still sound great.

like I said, if a perfectionist .....

yes; performance will diminish by playing; but you can’t really generalize about tape signal quality degradation as there are many variables. and also the question is at what point is this degradation audible?

modern tape formulations hold up better, properly maintained transports, and better tape paths are easier on the tape.

i have tapes i’ve played on my Studer A-820 master recorder dozens of times without apparent degradation. but the quality of the tape, and the transport quality is at the very tip top. this is 1/4" 15ips. all of my tapes are high quality modern formulations, most are at least 10 years old.

i’m sure there would be measurable degradation, but so far i don’t hear it for my playback purposes.

lower speeds, and less robust transports, less quality heads, less quality tape, will have different results.

to answer your question; playing a tape 3 to 4 times should not appreciably diminish the playback quality unless the deck has problems. most (but not all) 30-50 year old decks have some level of problems.

Interesting Discussion!  Thanks 

I think I remember hearing somewhere that in the good ol’ days of analog tape (pre-digital), Fleetwood Mac, while recording Rumours, had to go back and re-record some instrument tracks, because the master tape they were using had passed over the tape heads (probably at least a hundred times if not more) so many times (probably at 30 ips), all of the high end frequencies began to wash away.

I don’t think you need to worry about even 20 passings over the tape head. I have some prerecorded 7" reel to reels from the 60’s, and they still sound excellent.

Every EVERY time it is dragged over the heads it loses something. The same with cassettes. I notice it every time. Can't say for you.