Home tools Buyer's Guides from tech enthusiast who loves technology and clever solutions for better living.
Best cassette to mp3 converter 2018 – [Buyer’s Guide]
Last Updated December 1, 2023
Hi there, I’m Roger Barnett. I spent 29 hours researching and testing 16 different types of cassette to mp3 converter and found that material, variety of sizes, and style were most important.
My main objective is to write article on these subject so that buyers like you can have the best assistance and education in making that next purchase. In this section we provide our readers with a comparison table of our top picks. Scroll past the table for a closer look at each of the 3 best cassette to mp3 converter in our review section.
Best cassette to mp3 converter of 2018
There is a wide range of products available on the market today, and below I have reviewed 3 of the very best options. You must have heard that the best cassette to mp3 converter should allow you to save money, right? Sure, but that’s not the only reason you should consider getting one.
Simply review and buy them. Before you spend your money on cassette to mp3 converter, start by familiarizing yourself with the various types.
Test Results and Ratings
| Rank | №1 | №2 | №3 |
| Product |  |
 |
 |
| Total | 4.8 | 4.5 | 4.3 |
| Style |
5 points
|
5 points
|
4 points
|
| Versatility |
5 points
|
4 points
|
5 points
|
| Construction |
5 points
|
5 points
|
4 points
|
| Quality |
4 points
|
4 points
|
4 points
|
| Awards |  |
||
 |
|
|
|
 |
|
|
How to save up to 86%? Here is little trick.
You must visit the page of sales. Here is the link. If you don’t care about which brand is better, then you can choose the cassette to mp3 converter by the price and buy from the one who will offer the greatest discount.
№1 – Reshow Cassette Player Portable Tape Player Captures MP3 Audio Music via USB
| Total: |
4.8
|
Why did this cassette to mp3 converter win the first place?
I really enjoy the design. It is compact, comfortable and reliable. And it looks amazing! I don’t know anything about other models from this brand, but I am fully satisfied with this product. I was completely satisfied with the price. Its counterparts in this price range are way worse. The product is very strong. Its material is stable and doesn’t crack.
5
|
5
|
5
|
4
|
№2 – DigitNow! Cassette Tape To MP3 CD Converter Via USB
| Total: |
4.5
|
Why did this cassette to mp3 converter come in second place?
I really liked it. It is amazing in every aspect. It did even exceed my expectations for a bit, considering the affordable price. Seems that the material is good. It has a very beautiful color but I don’t really like the texture. I recommend you to consider buying this model, it definitely worth its money. This is a pretty decent product that perfectly fitted the interior of our office.
5
|
4
|
5
|
4
|
№3 – Cassette to MP3 Converter，Wikoo USB Cassette Converter Cassette Player with Earphone
| Total: |
4.3
|
Why did this cassette to mp3 converter take third place?
The material is incredibly nice to the touch. It has a great color, which will suit any wallpapers. It is inconvenient to use due to the size. I am going to get something different next time. I liked the design. We’ve been using it for 2 months and it still looks like brand new. This price is appropriate since the product is very well built.
4
|
5
|
4
|
4
|
cassette to mp3 converter Buyer’s Guide
Get connected
The next step is to connect your hi-fi to your Mac. You’ll find instructions on how to do this in your hi-fi amplifier’s manual. In essence, you’ll need to connect the left and right RCA phono ends of the RCA phono to 3.5mm jack cable to a suitable RCA analogue audio output on your amplifier, and then plug the 3.5mm jack in to the line-in audio input of the Griffin iMic and make sure that device’s Mic/Line switch is set to the Line position.
Before you get gung-ho with an audio recording app on your Mac, it pays to make sure the sound coming into your computer is as ‘clean’ as possible. If you’re recording vinyl, make sure your turntable is properly set up (its manual will explain how), its needle is free from fluff, and the record itself is free from dust and fingerprints by using a suitable anti-static brush or cloth and cleaning solution.
For cassette tapes, ensure your deck’s playhead and tape pinch rollers are free of gunk using a cassette cleaning kit. The end result will be worth it.
Make sure the Griffin iMic is connected to a spare USB input on your Mac, then go to Apple menu > System Preferences > Sound > Input and select Griffin USB Audio Interface. This ensures your Mac is ready and listening to sounds coming from your hi-fi source.
Now open GarageBand, Amadeus Pro or whatever audio recording software you’re using. The next step, if you’re recording from analogue sources such as cassette tape or vinyl, is to get your recording levels right. Most recording software measures these levels on a scale from -60dB (decibels) to 0dB. Ideally you want most of what you’re recording to be in the mid range (around -30dB to -20dB), with loud passages peaking at -10dB to -3dB and only very occasionally hitting 0dB.
If the recording regularly hits 0dB, you’ll experience ‘clipping’ – a form of audio distortion that you definitely want to avoid if you’re to capture your recordings at the best quality.
Perfect peaks
The best way to avoid clipping is to find out which part of the source sounds the loudest, play it, and then monitor it using your audio recording software. The software you’re using should show the majority of sounds you’re recording occur around -30dB to -20dB (often represented by green indicators), sometimes tip over into -10dB to -3dB territory (yellow) and very occasionally hit -3dB to 0dB (red).
If the sounds you’re recording are too quiet or too loud, you can usually manually adjust your recording software’s gain (or volume input controls) to make them louder or quieter. Your best bet when recording is to err on the side of caution. You can always adjust loudness later, once the initial recording phase is complete.
Another thing to consider is the quality level you want in the finished recordings of your old media. Most audio recording software provides a range of options from super-high-quality to CD quality, down to MPor AAC.
The level to choose depends on what you’ll listen to the music on, and how much space on your Mac you want it to take up. Amadeus Pro, for example, lets you choose anything from 128kHz/32-bit recording (highest quality) to 6kHz/8-bit (lowest quality), with many options in between.
The higher the quality you choose, the larger the resulting audio file will be, but with storage being so affordable these days your best bet would be to pick the highest quality available and save that as a ‘master’ recording, which you can then convert for listening on your iPhone or elsewhere.
Sony WM EX194S
One of the last Walkmans to be built, the WMEX194S is a fairly basic player but it incorporates technology that provides extremely smooth tape speed and low power consumption. This gives it a claimed 2hour playing time from two AA batteries, which combined with good sound quality makes it a popular choice. Or for a cheaper alternative, check out little sister model WM-EX180 which has a great build quality for price.
Sony WM-D6C Walkman Pro
Sony’s Professional Walkman is one of the most desirable tape recorders ever made. Not only because its build quality is so high or that there are so many features squeezed into its compact form, but ultimately because it sounds so good. There aren’t many cassette decks that inspire enthusiasts to wax lyrical about sound but this is one of them, possibly the only one that isn’t a Nakamichi. Used by professionals to portable replace reel to reel recorder in the Eighties it retains a cult following but, thankfully, has not featured in any sci-fi movies to date.
This post has been flagged and will be reviewed by our staff. Thank you for helping us maintain CNET’s great community.
Sorry, there was a problem flagging this post. Please try again now or at a later time.
If you believe this post is offensive or violates the CNET Forums’ Usage policies, you can report it below (this will not automatically remove the post). Once reported, our moderators will be notified and the post will be reviewed.
The main function of MPcompression is storage. Whereas before, you would need to find a place for countless CDs and cassette tapes, all of your audio files can now be stored on your computer. Also, because of the relatively small size of the file, you can retain a vast quantity of files.
Cassette to MPConverter
Simply connect the cassette player to your USB port and then with just the click of a button, your dull cassette is conveniently converted. You can convert cassettes to mpor convert cassettes to CD.
Friends from the past, some are remade into mp3s, while others die off…
In addition to connecting the unit to the computer with a USB cable, you can even connect earphones to the 3.mm jack and use the Tape Express as an ordinary walkman.
Details on your cassette to mpconverter
Friends from the past, some are remade into mp3s, while others die off…
In addition to connecting the unit to the computer with a USB cable, you can even connect earphones to the 3.mm jack and use the Tape Express as an ordinary walkman.
Compared to DVD, let alone Blu-ray, VHS tapes are poor quality. If you haven’t viewed one for a while, therefore, it would be a good idea to play one to see if you’re still happy with them after becoming spoiled by the much improved quality of more modern video formats. After all, digitising your old tapes won’t improve the resolution one bit.
If you decide that you do want to preserve some VHS tapes for posterity, you’ll need a VHS video player, so if you’ve already got rid of your old one you’re going to have to borrow or buy one.
Despite being obsolete you can still pick them up, both new and second hand. The latter will cost next to nothing but do bear in mind that, like most equipment with mechanical parts, there’s no guarantee that a second-hand recorder will offer acceptable performance. It’s well worth asking for an unwanted player for free on sites such as Freegle and Freecycle.
More advanced and secure options include those that bolt to the wall with multiple points of attachment and feature a built-in backing plate, such as models from PRO, Topeak and X-Tools to name a few.
Lastly, the ultimate is something like the SteadyRack (read our review here), which holds the outside of the wheel and will not mark the rim.
Its unique design allows you to swing the bike nearly 180 degrees to get access to others or have the bike sit closely against the wall. The downside? This rack isn’t cheap, especially if you want more than one.
Horizontal racks
If vertical storage is best for when width is an issue, horizontal storage is ideal for when depth of space is the concern.
Generally holding the bike underneath the top tube, this method requires more wall space.
Basic options include foldable hangers that bolt to the wall, with more expensive options taking the design concept further and creating something that is visually appealing.
Brands such as Feedback Sports offer models with adjustable hooks to fit a variety of frame shapes, while other brands offer racks that double as shelves.
For those with plenty of ceiling or wall space out of easy reach, there’s the hoist system.
Generally, they are best for people that see cycling as an occasional pastime, rather than a lifestyle — it’s not the quickest system to use and installation is more involved than mounting a fixed hook or bracket.
Ceiling-to-floor rack
The most common type of non-permanent off-the-floor rack is the pole type that clamps between floor and ceiling.
Most common examples are the Feedback Sports Velo Column and Topeak’s Dual-Touch.
These use either a spring or hinge to lock in place, but can easily be removed if needed. Generally, these racks will hold two bikes, with the option to hold a further two with aftermarket kits.
External drives
External storage devices are basically one or more internal drives put together inside an enclosure and connected to a computer using a peripheral connection.
There are four main peripheral connection types: USB, Thunderbolt, FireWire and eSATA. Most, if not all, new external drives now use just USB 3.0 or Thunderbolt or both. There are good reasons why.
USB 3.0 offers a cap speed of 5Gbps and is backward-compatible with USB 2.0. Thunderbolt caps at 10Gbps (or 20Gbps with Thunderbolt 2.0), and you can daisy-chain up to six Thunderbolt drives together without degrading the bandwidth. Thunderbolt also makes RAID possible when you connect multiple single-volume drives of the same capacity. Note that more computers support USB 3.0 than Thunderbolt, especially among Windows computers. All existing computers support USB 2.0, which also works with USB 3.0 drives (though at USB 2.0 data speeds).
Generally, speed is not the most important factor for non-Thunderbolt external drives. That may seem counterintuitive, but the reason is that the USB 3.0 connectivity standard, which is the fastest among all non-Thunderbolt standards, is slower than the speed of SATA internal drives.
Kanye West is dumping CDs in favor of streaming, but Marshall Mathers, a.k.a. Eminem a.k.a. Slim Shady, is forgoing modern audio technology entirely and going way, way back: the rapper plans to re-release The Slim Shady LP on cassette tape. No, really.
Shady made the announcement on Twitter with a link to a site where you can sign up to receive updates. The album, his second, was a huge success and put the rapper on the map, so a re-issue is something we can live with. Plus, just the look of that plastic case and cover sleeve and the promise of the whirring sound as the film rolls over the tape spools is enough to tempt us.
Cassettes
There’s been talk of a cassette revival every year since the mid-‘00s, and although there are labels – and small scenes – that give an impression of good health with cassette releases as their key currency, it’s easy to neglect the fact that tapes in 201are still a very niche format.
Krokodilo Tapes recent examples.
Cassettes are niche for one key reason: most people simply don’t own cassette players. You could argue until the cows come home that this doesn’t make sense (after all, you can buy a Walkman for £10, which is nothing compared to what a decent quality turntable will set you back), but it’s undeniably the case. That said, there’s a strong argument that the cassette is a less redundant medium in 201than the CD (more on which later), and the arguments that tape nostalgia is invalid “hipster bullshit” – as seen on that aforementioned Martin Clark thread and elsewhere – don’t hold up: most music fans in their mid-20s to early 30s, I’d wager, bought cassette albums before they bought vinyl. My first cassette was Suggs and my first vinyl record was Swans – you guess what came first.
Understand Your Businesses Digital Copier Needs
Graphic capabilities: Production copiers can produce higher quality images with resolutions up to 2,400 x 2,400 dpi, and more accurate colors thanks to special color management controls. These models are only necessary if you require exact color reproduction of your source material, though.
Paper supply
A cassette inside your digital copier feeds paper into your digital copier. You can expect a capacity of around 100 sheets on the low end of all-in-one copiers and several thousand sheets in a production system. Different systems also hold different numbers of internal cassettes (usually between one and three) which will change how often you need to reload the machine.
Paper size
Different digital copiers can accommodate different paper sizes, with the primary determining factor being the size of the copier itself. All-in-one systems are typically limited to standard 8.x 11-inch sheets, while higher-end systems can handle large sheets of thick cover stock (with the cap typically around 1x 1inches). Some systems can also handle envelopes and other non-standard paper.
Storage
Most digital copiers (aside from low-end all-in-one systems) include onboard storage to hold digital versions of your copies, allowing you to make printouts without having a physical copy of the original document in hand. Capacity varies between 1.5GB up to 1TB on the high end.
Extra Digital Copier Features to Look For
Document feeder: Mounted at the top of many digital copiers, this feature lets you speedily batch-scan multi-page documents without feeding pages into the copier manually. Usually document-feeding trays hold between 7to 100 sheets a time.
Digital copier interface: A touch screen interface comes in handy on many newer digital copier models, giving you quick access to printing and editing options, like the ability to brighten documents or crop images before printing.
Account codes: Some systems let you bill departments or accounts directly. This is done via password-protected account codes.
Duplex copying: Look for this feature if you want to copy and print on both sides of a sheet of paper.
Stapler and three-hole punch: Some digital copiers can finish printing jobs by stacking and binding documents together with staples or a three-hole punch.
Most copiers come with a service agreement that includes maintenance and repairs, and some agreements include regular toner restocking. That way, you can focus on running your business and not worrying about running out of ink at the wrong time.
The parts of your copier that are covered by your maintenance agreement vary from vendor to vendor. Generally, parts that are expected to wear out or break over time – rollers and cleaning blades – are covered. And, remember, the cost for maintenance varies depending on whether or not you purchased your copier or are leasing it.
Olympus WS-853
Although its audio quality isn’t as good as our main pick’s, the Olympus WS-85has more internal storage and longer battery life.
The Olympus WS-85is the recorder we’d get if our main pick is unavailable. We found its menu system harder to navigate, and its recordings didn’t fare as well in our listening tests compared with the Sony UX560’s. But with GB of internal storage, 130 hours of recording time, and a battery the company claims lasts 1hours when recording in MPformat, the WS-85has the best storage and battery life of the recorders we tested. Like our pick, it’s slim enough to fit in a pants pocket, although it’s nearly twice as thick (0.7inch) as the UX560. The WS-85also has voice-activated recording to stop and restart recordings after silences, and a pop-out USB 3.0 connector for easy recharging and file transfer.
If you mainly record in quiet environments
The PX470 is a bit bulkier than our main pick, and its audio quality isn’t as good, but it has a similar layout and navigation system. It does best in quiet settings with minimal background noise.
If you’re on a budget, we recommend Sony’s ICD-PX470. The PX470’s buttons and navigation system are very similar to that of the UX560, but our listening panel didn’t rate the PX470’s audio quality as highly. Recordings were understandable enough, however, and if you don’t need the absolute best audio quality, the PX470 will save you some money. It also has longer battery life than the UX560 at 5hours, but it isn’t rechargeable—you have to remember to keep AAA batteries on hand. It’s also physically larger, measuring twice as thick as the UX560.
If you don’t want a physical recorder, or need to only occasionally make recordings, we also have picks for the best iOS and Android voice-recording apps.
How we tested
We tested recorders in common settings and asked a listening panel to score recordings based on quality.
Most of the recorders have options to select recording modes for scenes like lectures, meetings, interviews, or dictations. Recording modes do the work for you: Selecting a scene automatically changes the recorder’s settings for that situation.
Wirecutter writer Anna Perling recorded MPaudio at the highest bit rates available on each device in order to get the best possible audio quality—this showed what each recorder was capable of. That meant 19Kbps for all recorders except for the Olympus, which maxes out at 12Kbps (though even this should be good enough for voice recordings). For the lecture scene, Anna sat in the back of Sahithya Reddivari’s engineering class at Georgia State University in Clarkston, Georgia, and lined recorders up next to each other, with the mics facing toward the lecturer. For the coffee shop scene, she headed to a crowded Starbucks and sat near the bar with her mom. The two read a Seinfeld dialogue, with the mics facing toward the “interviewee,” or main speaker, to mimic an interview. For the office scene, Anna read a different Seinfeld monologue in a quiet room in her house to mimic dictation, placing recorders on a table feet away from her mouth. Once she had the recordings, she noted how each recorder and app let her store the files, and how easy or difficult it was to transfer those files to her computer, label and organize them, and then upload them to Dropbox.
Anna then conducted a blind listening panel: Four Wirecutter staffers listened to 15-second samples of each unlabeled recording and rated the overall audio quality and intelligibility of words for each.
Pull Quote
The Sony UX560’s extra features make an already-great recorder stand out from the rest.
The UX560 also has a rechargeable battery that charges via that USB plug. This means you won’t have to worry about having disposable batteries on hand. The UX560 doesn’t come with a wall charger—you’ll need to use a USB charger or connect the recorder to a computer to charge; if you have a recent Apple laptop or other computer with only USB-C ports, you’ll need an adapter. With a full charge, you can record for 2hours in the commonly used MPformat, or 2hours at the 560’s highest-quality setting (uncompressed LPCM audio at 44.kHz, or “CD quality” audio). Anna recorded for about two hours, and the battery indicator showed that the recorder was still fully charged.
The recorder comes with GB of storage, which allows for roughly 3hours of recording time using MPformat at 19Kbps; that’s comparable to what you get with most of the recorders we tested. A covered but easily accessible microSD slot allows for 3GB more of storage space if you need more recording hours. The UX560 offers a range of file and recording formats so you can opt for better audio quality or smaller file sizes.
Selecting the Clear Voice function during playback helped reduce background noise in our coffee shop and lecture recordings but didn’t make as big of a difference as the noise-cancel feature on the Olympus. The UX560’s other playback options, however, made it overall a better choice than the Olympus for people looking to transcribe interviews or lectures: an A-B Repeat function lets you go back and replay the same section repeatedly, and digital pitch control lets you adjust the playback speed if you need to listen more closely to difficult-to-decipher passages. The UX560 has a transcription mode that will give you a cleaner interface with fewer distractions while transcribing if that’s something you prefer, but you can still fast-forward, rewind, and adjust the digital pitch control in regular playback mode. Oddly, you won’t be able to use the A-B Repeat to replay the same section repeatedly in transcription mode.
For better audio quality, you can plug in an external mic, though we think that would be unnecessary for most people given the good results we were able to get with the onboard mics in our varied test situations. The UX560 also has a headphone jack for monitoring recordings and listening to playback.
The UX560 is a small, compact recorder that feels nice in the hand, and its matte plastic and sleek design make it look a little less cheap than others that were tested. At just inches tall, 1.inches wide, and 0.4inch thick, the UX560 is the slimmest recorder we tested. It can easily fit into a shirt pocket or in the pocket of skinny jeans, while the other recorders are almost twice as thick and fit better in a purse or bag.
The UX560 is half as thick as the PX470, making it easy to fit in a shirt or pants pocket.
Like all of the recorders we tested, the UX560 also comes with a strap loop if you want to add a wrist strap or lanyard; you’ll need to provide your own, though it’s easy enough to find an inexpensive option.
Flaws but not dealbreakers
The screen on the UX560’s fades and eventually shuts off during recording, which is a little disconcerting, but an LED indicates that you’re still recording. This recorder also lacks a convenient erase button, so you’ll need to navigate through its menu to delete recordings.
Vendor Resources
Magnetic tape is one of the oldest technologies for electronic data storage.
Tape has largely been displaced as a primary and backup storage medium, but it remains well-suited for archiving because of its high capacity, low cost and long durability. It is a linear recording system that is not good for random access. If the tape is part of a library, robotic selection and loading of the right cartridge into a tape drive adds more latency. In an archive, such latencies are not an issue. With tape archiving, there is no online copy for quick retrieval, as everything is vaulted for the long term.
A stack of magnetic tapes
The industry has largely moved from oxides as a recording material toward barium ferrite, which is capable of delivering high recording densities because of its support for perpendicular magnetic recording. Barium ferrite is used in both enterprise tape from Oracle and IBM, and Ultrium format tape from the LTO Consortium.
Item processing time
After confirming your payment, we usually ship products out within 2business hours. However, sometimes due to large transaction volumes or other order issues, we may require up to working days to process orders. You will receive a notification email as soon as your product(s) have been dispatched.
EU Warehouse: Typically 3-days to the UK, 3-days to other European countries.
How to save up to 86%? Here is little trick.
You must visit the page of sales. Here is the link. If you don’t care about which brand is better, then you can choose the cassette to mp3 converter by the price and buy from the one who will offer the greatest discount.
Final Word
First of all thanks for reading my article to the end! I hope you find my reviews listed here useful and that it allows you to make a proper comparison of what is best to fit your needs and budget. Don’t be afraid to try more than one product if your first pick doesn’t do the trick.
Most important, have fun and choose your cassette to mp3 converter wisely! Good luck!
So, TOP3 of cassette to mp3 converter
- №1 — Reshow Cassette Player Portable Tape Player Captures MP3 Audio Music via USB
- №2 — DigitNow! Cassette Tape To MP3 CD Converter Via USB
- №3 — Cassette to MP3 Converter，Wikoo USB Cassette Converter Cassette Player with Earphone
Questions? Leave a comment below!
Chatting about cassette to mp3 converter is my passion! Leave me a question in the comments, I answer each and every one and would love to get to know you better!
