Tape Noise

[Chuck Teed]

I am transferring some old tapes to my computer, and I am encountering tape noise. I am not sure what's causing it, but I think it has something to do with the age of the tapes. It's not your standard hiss, but more of a creaking noise. Any suggestions?

[Malcolm Boyce]

I'm assuming you are dealing with "cassette" tapes so I will suggest the following.

Remove the reels and associated tape and place them into a new "good" housing very carefully. This should alleviate some if not most of the noise.

Be sure to clean your machine often when transferring older tape as it can dirty it up pretty quickly. If you don't know, learn how to adjust the azimuth on your machine play/rec head and do it for each and every recording for maximum quality.

Many tapes can become unplayable, even from just 15-20 yrs ago, depending on the quality and length of the tape. 90+ minute sizes are the worst.

Hope this helps. Some of my old tracks have required trying different machines, as well as disabling "auto stop" functions, just to get the tape to pass one more time.