11 December 2014

Microcassette in higher fidelity





The Microcassette was introduced by Olympus in 1969. The Microcassette is significantly smaller than a Compact Cassette but it uses the same width of magnetic tape.


Using thinner tape and a 2.4 cm/s standard speed you can have 30 minutes recording time per side and double that duration at 1.2 cm/s. Unlike the Compact Cassette the tape spools in the opposite direction, from right to left.


Microcassettes proved to be popular for recording voice in dictation machines and answering machines. However, Microcassettes have also been used as a medium for recording music on Type IV metal tapes. This article presents some of the higher fidelity Microcassette decks that were manufactured for a short period of time in the early 80's.

Before microcassettes, PHILIPS intoduced the minicassette that was featured in the movie A Clockwork Orange but every body mistakes them by the OLYMPUS microcassettes.

From the movie A Clockwork Orange 1971

From the movie A Clockwork Orange 1971

List of hi-fi stereo microcassette decks:

microcassette
SANYO RD-XM1 1980

microcassette
FISHER CRM 500 1981 (SANYO rebadge)

microcassette
JVC D-M3 1981 (Victor in Japan)

microcassette
Lo-D D-MC5 1982 (HITACHI)

microcassette
SONY TC-MR2 1982

microcassette
Technics M212 1981 (compact cassette - microcassette)

microcassette
Technics RS-G800 1982 (microcassette - tuner - amplifier)

Pre-recorded music microcassette