What makes tape sound better than vinyl ?

^ Exactly, Geoff ... My very ´eavy.... very ´umble Uriah Heep Island Tapes, UK c cassettes from the Golden Age of Recording Technology til 1972 before Noise Reduction outperform modern 24 bit digital Japanese UH CDs hands down, both in dynamics (natural flow of music) and details (nuances) not to mention musicality. Despite they are mass produced using high speed copying. They sound quite incredible in a car as well, still after 40+ years.
Noise reduction only lessens tape noise (as it was meant to do obviously) but flattens real dynamics. Practically noise reduction on tape is exacly the same thing as backround noise in vinyl play. I never cared either of them, they are just backround noise due to the media in question. The actual signal on tape/record (recorded music) is all I have cared for. I have never used noise reductions whatsoever. That´s other peoples´ fantasy.
Furthermore, I never couldn´t stand digital distortions (whatever they may be) but like analog ones because they sound quite natural (right) to my senses. For me noise reduction is just another form of compression. What a bloody waste of time  :^ )

@raymonda    

You can't share anything of your vast experience with Geoff (or get him to admit he is wrong) even though your experience with compresion and punch is standard audio industry practice. Geoff is as slippery as the snale oil he purveys liberally on this site.

@inna

In order to avoid confusion, why dont you make another thread as this one is stated to be about Cassette tape recordings of Vinyl and how they sound better.

The purpose of this thread is to call attention to the tape and tape machines. Whatever anyone has to say. I think, many agree that there is something that makes the tape sound more natural. As for the cut-off frequency extremes that somehow make the sound more pleasing, I disagree. The biggest difference is in the midrange itself.
Vinyl playback is a very 'bumpy road' if you imagine the way stylus moves, not to mention the transformation of the mechanical energy into electrical. Tape is quite different, though there is a tape movement. Studers are first of all famous for their transport. I said that I use LAST head preservative when playing cassettes, I didn't say that it slightly improves the playback, you can easily hear it. In a manner of speaking, it improves the transport. I am not sure it's a correct way to put it but tape appears to give more 'sound saturation'.

I'm not going to get into why tape sounds, or does not sound, better because I really have no idea why. But I can tell you via first hand experience at many audio shows, R-T-R just sounds excellent. That's why dealers like MBL bring them. You can hear the resolution and air jump up on master tapes played at 15 IPS. At the LAAS, I remember the Evolution Acoustics room with Dartzeel and a Studer playing Peter Frampton's "Lines on my Face" just blew everyone in the room away. So dynamic and beautiful; very live with a ton of air. I also remember that the monobloc amps had power meters on them and though music was playing at perhaps a few watts per channel, there were some peaks in excess of 500 WPC and it just sounded amazing. Never got fatiguing in any way and for me, I just wanted more. It was an amazing demo and it proved the very significant importance of the source and the source media.