Cassettes do have a heat and distinctive sound, although—upon getting a style for gentle hiss, you could end up lacking it in cleaner codecs. The distinctive issue of skipping songs provides the album format a primacy no different medium can—you could end up studying to love songs you’d have skipped. (Whereas scripting this assessment I spotted Liz Phair’s “Crater Lake” is an absolute banger.)
For the collector, cassettes are nonetheless comparatively low-cost and reasonably priced in an period while you see a vinyl copy of Billy Joel’s extraordinarily meh 1980 album Glass Homes marked at $25. Additionally, they appear cool and really feel good in your hand. Briefly, accumulating cassettes is sensible as a result of they’re available and solely the 1% can feasibly gather MiniDiscs.
Being Sort to Rewind
The Rewind has a really sturdy aluminum case and a built-in battery that recharges with USB-C. It weighs 14 ounces, just a bit lower than two iPhone 15 Professional Maxes. Along with the headphone audio out, there’s a 3.5mm audio in so you may file your tapes—you could discover it enjoyable to shock that particular somebody with a home made combine tape.
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{Photograph}: Martin Cizmar
I’ve owned a half-dozen cassette gamers since falling into the interest as a result of I purchased an previous Suburu with a damaged CD participant that ate my copy of Want. The Rewind is much and away one of the best—I prefer it a lot that I nonetheless use it to take heed to my tapes whereas driving despite the fact that I bought that Suburau and now have a stereo with CarPlay.
Anybody who’s ever needed to re-spool 100 toes of tangled tape, praying there’s not a tear, understands how vital it’s to have a dependable transport. The Rewind has by no means eaten a tape, not like half of my different gamers. There are some nice classic gamers on the market, however except they have been utterly cleaned and refurbished you run the danger of 1 weak element inflicting cascading failures. A high-end refurbished participant will price at the very least as a lot because the Rewind and you will not get any of the added trendy options.
The rewind sounds pretty much as good as any transportable participant I’ve heard, which is to say it reliably reproduces the sound of the cassette, pops and hisses included. That is even true while you use the Bluetooth operate to broadcast your tapes to wi-fi headphones. I am a kind of individuals who would not perceive the enchantment of streaming a bodily medium—if I needed to listen to a digital model I’d simply play it on Apple Music—nevertheless it’s good to have the choice right here. I used to be capable of simply pair the Rewind with a set of JBL Tune headphones, however I wasn’t capable of get it to work with my automobile stereo, as a substitute counting on a 3.5mm cable. The audio is muted utilizing Bluetooth in comparison with wired headphones.
A Little Hiss
The one concern is the shortage of auto-stop when the cassette has run out of string rewinding or fast-forwarding. The poor little motor continues to whir away with an disagreeable squeal that additionally means the tape inside could also be harassed. The participant would not ship with headphones. I paired it with a reasonable set of clear Koss headphones, however I used to be additionally despatched Rewind’s Bluetooth headphones which I used to be very unimpressed with—the classic look is cool, however they’ve a flimsy really feel and flimsier sound for $50.
These are all comparatively minor gripes, although, contemplating every little thing the Rewind does higher than anybody else proper now. This French cassette participant is one of the best in 2025, and relying on the accumulating traits, that will find yourself making it the final greatest tape participant there’s.
