the following presentation was made using a 1984 pentax
pc-k1500a color video camera using a saticon image sensor tube
i'm sure most people watching this are familiar with the three most common sizes of audio cassette
tapes first there was the compact cassette introduced in 1963 by philips then there
was the mini cassette introduced in 1967 by philips which is about a quarter of the size
of a regular cassette and then there was the micro cassette
introduced in 1969 by olympus which is just a little bit smaller than the mini cassette
but what is a minisette? the short answer is it's complicated
the first minisette recorder was introduced in 1971 by radio shack and despite the name
minisette it actually recorded onto standard compact cassettes not mini cassettes
and i won't go through every model of minisette recorder that radio shack sold
because there were dozens over the years but pay attention to this one because like i said
it gets confusing in 1973 they introduced the minisette II which also recorded onto
standard compact cassettes then in 1977 they introduced the first minisette recorder that
actually recorded onto mini cassettes and what did they call it? the micro minisette again despite
the misleading name it does not record onto micro cassettes this model uses mini cassettes
then in 1979 they introduced their second model of mini cassette recorder which they called the micro
minisette II. finally in 1982 they did actually introduce a minisette recorder that recorded
onto micro cassettes and what did they call it? the micro minisette but hold on wait a minute
didn't they just use that name for the past five years for the mini cassette model? that's right
they just switched the name from the mini cassette model to the micro cassette model they still sold
the mini cassette model but they dropped the micro from its name and just called it the minisette II.
thankfully a year later in 1983 they renamed the micro cassette model to just micro removing
any reference to mini from its name to make it clear that it uses micro cassettes but meanwhile
they also introduced a new model of mini cassette recorder which they called the minisette the same
name they gave to the original minisette in 1971 which recorded onto standard compact cassettes
so by now they had two models of minisettes and two models of minisette IIs each of which
recorded onto different formats i'm sure it was confusing being a radio shack salesman at that
time if somebody came in with their minisette or minisette II and they needed tapes for it
you had to ask them which format it actually uses because by the name you couldn't tell
the mini cassette recorder continued until 1988 when it was discontinued
and the last minisette recorder of any type that they sold was in 1994
with the minisette 20 was recorded onto standard compact cassettes
and that concludes our confusing history lesson of the radio shack realistic minisette recorders
"when i travel for business of pleasure i take my realistic radio recorder from radio shack
it's compact and easy to carry it has a built-in mic ideal for taping business
meetings and the am/fm radio lets me enjoy music and news i can even record off the air
and right now radio shack has them on sale $30 off a real bargain for people on the go
the realistic radio cassette recorder just $59.95 only at radio shack a tandy company"
with that long and confusing history lesson out of the way let's take a look at this minisette
10 from 1981 it was introduced in the fall of 1981 as what radio shack called their high style
ultra compact radio cassette at a price of $89.95 and yes despite the name a minisette
this one uses regular cassettes on the front we get a tape counter with a reset button
a battery and recording level indicator the cassette compartment
a two and a half inch speaker am and fm radio tuning dial built-in microphone
there are the controls on the top it has a function selector switch for tape or off
radio and a sleep timer these are the cassette transport controls pause fast forward and cue
rewind and review play record and stop and eject and there's the volume control slider and finally
on the top there's the telescopic whip antenna for the fm radio on this side is the tuning dial
and the am/fm band selector switch and on the other side are your inputs and outputs
for a microphone remote earphone and a dc 9 volt adapter there's the carrying handle
and on the back there's an information sticker and on the bottom is the battery compartment
there's the information sticker on the back i don't know why it says trade name
i've never seen that before on a radio shack product but it's the realistic minisette 10
model number 14-1000 custom manufactured in singapore for radio shack a division
of tandy corporation on the bottom is the battery compartment for six AA cells
now let's give the radio a try it's currently set to the classical music station on fm
the
volume control is a little bit scratchy i need to spray some deoxit into that
now let's see what else is on fm "...nice and it rocks on 105.5 wdha
we are the rock of new jersey it's rock turtle monday on..." "sing along and feel
good with that one of a kind blend of music only found on one radio station sunny radio"
so it's actually very sensitive on fm it was picking up plenty of stations now let's
try am "...sketchy neighborhood now what is the defensive weapon you advertise on this..." "...say
drivers often try to beat the light at this busy intersection but the..." "...power on instagram
tonight will smith apologizing to comedian chris rock for slapping him on stage last night at the
academy awards the mbta says that service on the orange line is shut down in downtown boston from
back bay to north station until further notice..." now it's picking up wbz from boston and i'm here
in new jersey about what? 200, 250 miles away so pretty good reception on am at least at night
now let's try the cassette recorder appropriately enough i have a realistic cassette in it
so first let's just try recording my own voice through the built-in microphone
this is a recording test of the realistic minisette 10 cassette recorder radio from 1981
recording using its built-in microphone
it's hard to see that tape counter though
so here's the playback "this is a recording test of the realistic minisette 10 cassette
recorder radio from 1981 recording using its built-in microphone"
so not bad for the built-in microphone
"now i'm recording using an external dynamic microphone this recorder has
automatic level control so now i'm speaking at arm's length distance to the microphone
and now i'm speaking up close to the microphone to hear if that makes a difference"
now here's a sample of this dynamic handheld microphone connected directly to the video camera
if you want to hear how that sounds previously i
was using a sony camcorder microphone attached to the video camera itself
of course you can also record from the radio to the tape
so i'll try that now "...and (a minute) they started to dig
down like a foot at this point from where we were turns out for every three feet you
get down ten thousand years at times see the earth has layers kind of like a tree has rings
and every three feet down you go you're going back in time about ten thousand years and when you go
all the way..." okay i'll switch back to the tape rewind a little bit and play that recording
from where we were it turns out that for every three feet you go down ten thousand years in time
see the earth has layers kind of like a tree has rings and every three feet down
you go you're going back in time about 10,000 years" sounds pretty good to me
now let's try music playback with this sanyo demo tape
from around the same age as the cassette recorder i believe it's from around 1981 or 1982
it is in stereo but this player will play in mono i'll start out by playing it through the built-in
speaker but there's a break about halfway through the song and then i'll switch to a direct hookup
not exactly the best speed stability but you have to remember both the tape and
the recorder are about 41 years old and this is still using its original
belts plus it was never really meant to be a high fidelity music player anyway
there's only one more feature i didn't cover and that is the sleep timer mode
this works the same as the sleep timer on a clock radio except instead of using an electronic clock
to make it shut off after a certain amount of time it uses the length of a cassette tape to
determine when to shut off so you put in a cassette tape of your desired length
such as this one would be 45 minutes on one side of a 90-minute cassette
and you switch it to sleep timer mode and you press play but instead of hearing what's
on the tape you hear the radio playing until it finishes the tape and then the radio will shut off
"johann halverson's three norwegian dances
marianne... played violin emmy yerby conducting the bergen philharmonic here's music for strings
it's by debussy his string quartet in g minor tokyo string quartet right now on wqxr..."
and that's it it shut off the radio when the end of the tape was reached
so that's about it for the realistic minisette 10 from 1981
a very neat little portable radio cassette recorder with an interesting but confusing history
of all the different models and cassette formats they used over the years
but this one is certainly a very fine example of what they had to offer back then