In this video I unwrap a Yashima UFO I & UFO IS. Have a look inside and put them through their paces. Deck Used : Nakamichi ZX-9 For your North American cassette needs, go to: www.cassettecomeback.com
Oh that takes me back to my father's box of 120min tapes he had. Later the UFO (I think) tapes I bought were horrid type 0, basically unusable dropout city.
A surprise to me. I never liked the look of these and didn't bother with them back in the day. Recently i found a couple of used UFO and UFO+, they were drop out city but age, storage and all that i suppose.
Sounds good to me. Fun videos. Thanks. A dedicated video between the American late version (2000) Maxell XLII and Maxell XL II-S would be great, as we've boatloads here.
Were they really Taiwanese? I'm sure I had one that was an EMI, it even had "made in UK" on it. These were good (and the chrome ones were decent as well). But, I'm not sure exactly how this happened but years later, in late 1992, Argos released a ten pack of Yashima tapes for a fiver, a pound cheaper than a ten pack of Bush tapes. These were an absolute disgrace, they had the same cases as Acme were using on their clear-shell tapes and they sounded like Acme type zero as well - low sensitivity, distortion, no bass. No dropouts though. I was shocked as by 1992 I had thought such tapes were a thing of the past. I actually threw them out, which was a painful experience for a penniless student!
I've seen pics of more "modern" Yashima, but haven't got any to try. I read they were Taiwanese, and I'm inclined to agree with a name like that. If they were made in the UK, I'd imagine they would have bragged about it on the wrapper.
@@CassetteComeback Just thinking if these were perhaps mostly made by a Taiwanese supplier, at least at first, but the name was owned by this "Estuary Audio" and they ultimately went with anyone who would offer them a reasonable tape at a competitive price. I have one of the UFO tapes here and it definitely has "Made in UK" embossed on the cassette shell just as an EMI of that period would have. As you say it was standard practice at the time to use a name that sounded vaguely "Japanese" on cheap stuff!
Hi I have a Yashima UFO-I 90 in my collection. I would say it may be Japanese, but also other Asian production, like Singapore. The shell contains hubs of "Enplas" which was a large company making plastic components for audio and video cassettes of high quality, mostly for Japanese brands. (They made hubs for audio cassettes, for example, for brands like Fuji, Sony, maybe even Maxell) But the tape is unknown, with TDK D you can compare it directly in good light, the shade and surface of the tape very detailed, you can see the match or the difference. It sounded great on your video, I'll check my notes of the test recording. In my test I got good level readings in the peaks up to +4dB, but the difference from the source was in the overall level of 2dB. Bias was well out of range, so the highs were not sufficient, the sound suffered from distortion and fluctuations in azimuth stability. After unknown storage after 44years since manufacture, I am not disappointed. But on the leader tape, I must mention that Chinese and other manufacturers, who also produced fake audio cassettes, often copied the leader tape printing of TDK, Maxell and Sony brands. On my Yashima, the leader tape is also like TDK, red lines, but on the B side the markings are blue :) Your second Yashima UFO-IS, I don't have this one in my collection, but I already know this shell, the design belongs to the German company Magna. It is similar to the old Basf, but there are a few differences. The tape was also sometimes a mystery with Magna and not always of German manufacture, sometimes English or other. The sound in your test was pretty good considering the age of the tape, those dropouts were slightly audible there but still good. As I was going through google and the Yashima brand, I found that different manufacturers may have used completely different cassettes in different batches. This is confirmed by some of the posts in the discussion. I haven't found a Yashima UFO-II, but given what I've found, I assume also a Magna with true chromdioxide, or some other surprise. Thank you also for the Yashima flyer in the video, in the future I will add the year 1979 on my site to this Yashima UFO-I audiotape Sincerely EZ
My UFO II is a FeCo from Audio Magnetics (like XHE II, but in their plain black shell). And my UCD is a pure chrome in that same Magna shell as the UFO I-S in this video. I have also some Yashima in other Magna shells from the mid/late 80's, but funnily still with the old labels attached to them, no matter if the shell surface was designed for much smaller labels... The UFO I here reminds me of some of the better batches whcih the German company Roticet sold under their brands "Studio" and "Mark II"; you've also got the Enplas hubs there. Yes, Singapore or Taiwan are countries where they might have been made; I also rate them as too good for being from Hong Kong at that time.
@@kiirunavaara Thanks for the info! So I almost guessed it with the Magna and Yashima for the Type II, it was just a different model than I thought. Enplas hubs have often confused me, as one of the common designs I thought was a Sony or Fuji version. But knowledge is gained over the years and my notes still need to be corrected. That's why the website is a life's work and will never be finished and 100% accurate :D EZ
I remember these being advertised in national newspapers through the early eighties and being endorsed by Cleo Laine as cassette tape of choice. Made good recordings too and cost less than the well established brands.
8:55 Yashima cassettes were available at 29 Denmark St, Bristol. I remember that was a placed called "THE CASSETTE SHOP", that sold cassettes of all different brands, as well as open reel, 8-track, minicassette, microcassette, and various format video tapes as well. The shop was there until about the mid-90s.
@@CassetteComeback We wish. :) The premises is a Chinese restaurant now. I went there in the mid-90s to buy a Betacam tape, to test a rescued Sony Betacam machine I found dumped in Bristol. Which worked perfectly, and so I subsequently sold it.
The new one didn't come out for me here on droid but it came out for me just now on another platform Linux TV the EMIs look very plain on the paper labels on the first attempt it seems I like the newer paoer label with the coloured stripes and I prefer when you open the new 80s ones up you also got red spool rollers. There is more than meets the eye on at least the 80s Supers with the coloured 3 stripes and the more curveded white bit on the label the inside tape had those red spools on mine it's too bad they are not on show all the time due to the shell. Lol
EMI Supers including the lower end of the line normal XT or was it middle version I forget is all about the nostalgia for me knocking off top 40 the EMIs waring with age and having bad sound quality as they were early but the bad sound quality being a nostalgia factor in a worn out calendar in the formula EMI.
@Tony of Cassette comeback: maybe, you can take the old version of he Yashima UFO I tape and calibrate them up in the Nakamichi ZX-9... Then take an TDK D from the same year as the Yashima UFO I tape put it in the deck to see if the D is calibrated correctly (or almost correctly)... If the TDK D does, then you can say almost for sure the Yashima has TDK D tape in it...
It did not sound bad, although some of the highest "Highs" were a bit quieter but not a bad sound at all. I can see these being used for some bass heavy music like reggae or Hip hop or Dub, rap etc.
Similar, but still different - it's a shell which was probably made by Magna in Berlin, and also used by EMI and Memorex in the early 80's. While the latter two companies wound their own tapes into these German shells, this one here has one of the handful of different tapes Magna used to wind into their cassettes. Zonal was owned by Magna at that time - so we might even have a British tape in here. One thing is for sure: It's no BASF tape or shell.
There are actually some Agfa cassettes in this shell (yellow "Low Noise"), but only because when Agfa didn't have enough capacity on their own production lines, they bought some shells from others, in this case from Magna.
The UFO was something I encountered very early 80's in the then local newsagents when picking up The Beano and Look In together with a rack look after by some concern of records and tapes and I did buy a few. They were nothing to look at unless you count having a tick box of DBX for those who wanted to ensure recordings would never sound right on 99% of all other players but they were decent and pretty inexpensive. A much better idea than the cheap and cheerful market store Hong Kong offerings from the likes of KDK and Waltham for on a budget recording.
The UFO 1 was the first blank cassette I had bought for me as youngster somewhere in the early 80s. It was either birthday or Christmas and it was bought alongside a Binatone mono AM/FM cassette recorder. Back then I was not particular about tapes, but as I recall, the Yashima recorded many a top 40, outlasting the Binatone and a stereo Philips boombox.
I'm sure I have a couple of these tapes kicking around somewhere. Going to have to dig them out and try them again. I'm impressed with the sound quality, lets see how they have stood the test of time.
I could put on my engineers hat and go on about how I thought the top end was a little cleaner on the newer formula but that would be missing the whole point. I am pleasantly surprised by both of these, particularly given the era they were made.
One tape was a C60 and the other was a C90. I bought some Yashima cassettes in the early 70's that looked like these, very cheap from either Estuary Audio or Leda Tapes, can't remember which. I do remember that they were not good, dropout city as one might say. I still have them somewhere.
Yes you do get the feeling Arthur Daley has a job lot in his lock up and poor Terry has to schlep them all over town trying to flog them. A nice little earner. I actually got a couple of pluses and they're not bad at all. I put sci fi film and TV themes on them
Yes, but apart from super steady azimuth, perfect tape speed and super low wow&flutter, a lower-end Sony from the '90s sounds just perfect, too. But level&bias calibration facility and a cal tone generator is almost a must. I have a Sony TC-K511S, I am very satisfied with it. I also bought a TC-K711S, which has an order of magnitude better tape transport. But it needs a major repair, so I still use the 511S. So for the ones who would need to get a mortgage to buy a 3-head Nakamichi, these cheaper decks are just fine!
@@mrnmrn1 I wish I had azimuth adjustment. As you said the Sony seems to do well. I have a 3 head closed loop deck model TC-K850ES and I love it. Makes really good recordings although one day I hope to get a Nak
What kind of table or shelving do you have your equipment set up?? I have 4 decks and can't find anything that I consider usable. Great video, I have learned so much.
Have used all the different Yashima tape types over the years and personally found them to be poor apart from the UFO+ which, by the pattern on the leader looks like it had Maxell tape. Maybe they were the Strand/BBC of their day, made of bits of other tapes and you might get lucky or you might not!
GEEZ, Tony! I asked about these cassettes two days ago in the comment section of the first episode, and you delivered! Yes, these are good cassettes, were quite popular here in Hungary in the early '80s. BUT why I asked you what do you know about them, is because a few months ago I had a really interesting find. A Yashima UFO-I or I-s, in clear shell. And on the J-card, there was a microscopic logo of a Hungarian printing house! So at least the J-card was made in Hungary, but by good chance, the whole cassette was assembeld in Hungary. Yes, the second cassette you tested, the I-s looked like a German shell. Pre-recorded cassettes in Hungary came in the same shell during the early to mid '80s. And there was a cooperation between the German Magna cassette tape factory and the Hungarian Polimer tape company. Coincidence?
@@highpath4776 Could be! I remember similar issues with those orange BASF in the early 80's and even substantial shedding after sitting in the car radio. Our BX-2 was not happy!
No, this ain't a BASF shell, it's only very similar. Look at the following details: The window is placed slightly above the middle, while the BASF has its window exactly in the middle. The scale under the window is divided into 20 sections, while the BASF only has the usual 10 sections. The 5th screw sits in a different position. And if you open up the shell, you will find more differences, the most significant one being that there are no pins in the Yashima to hold the BASF SM guides. What we have here is a shell from Magna.
