1993 TDK SA-X 60 Super Avilyn Audio Cassette

The early to mid 1990s TDK SA-X 60 audio tape was the upmarket high bias product in the range. TDK had notably used their own Super Avilyn tape coating for high bias Type II cassettes right through the era when chrome was the most popular Type II formulation. But by the time this cassette was manufactured in the early 1990s, most rivals had dropped chrome and followed the TDK path, adopting a cobalt-ferric mix of some sort.

Radio Shack Tape Recorder Head Cleaner (Fluid)

A break from actual cassettes today. This bottle of Radio Shack (Tandy) Tape Recorder Head Cleaner fluid, from 1993, was actually part of a kit. In addition to this product, the kit contained a bottle of Head Lubricant of equal size, and ten long-reach swabs. In the year this was bought, the price of the kit was £2.69.

The Tandy range included quite a variety of maintenance products and accessories for audio cassette users in ’93. A Cassette Deck Demagnetizer and Cleaner, priced at £9.99, topped the range of maintenance artefacts. There was also a fluid plus cleaning tape kit at £1.99, cleaning fluid alone at 99p (different bottle from this one), a cleaning tape alone at 99p, a pack of swabs at 99p, and a replacement fluid pen at £1.99.

Among the more specialised products, was a Cassette Fast Winder (£3.49), with which you could rewind your tapes by hand whilst your cassette deck was still in use. There was also a Tape Splicing Kit (£3.99) which catered for both audio and video tape. The inevitable variety of storage solutions was also offered of course.

1995 Sony FXI 90 Audio Cassette

As promised in yesterday’s post depicting the 1996 Sony FXI, this is my other 1990s FXI, from 1995. This version was not pre-labelled at the factory, and came out of its packaging with a bare plastic face.