Are audiophile R2R tapes worth the money if you do not have a professional R2R deck?

I have heard a variety of prosumer and pro machines in home audio and professional applications over the years. Some had hot rodded preamp set ups.

Great sound but the objective for me is access to more, not less content and the price as well as limited catalog make this a non-starter for me, though I've thought about it more than once. Ultimately, the cost of the "software" will far exceed the hardware, even if you bought a pro machine that has been refurbished.  

Probably makes sense to hook up with somebody who is deep into this to get some direction- I know there were commercial safeties for sale at one point, and there is no doubt an underground market for dubs (not that I'm encouraging that- I used to be a copyright lawyer). 

Good luck

See this previous post on this subject:

https://forum.audiogon.com/discussions/open-reel-curious

I have been an audiophile for more than 55 years now, IMHO 15ips R2R tape can be the ultimate sound source, albeit very expensive. I have had people listen to my R2R system and say; "sounds like live music".

reimarc

I plan to "hot-rod" the old machine, going directly from the replay head into my own preamp (Supratek Grange) instead of using the internal preamp of the RS-1520. Any experience with such a mod?

If you do that, you’ll still need to provide EQ, NAB or IEC. 

My R2R, 7-1/2 IPS are my highest Noise to Signal and yet my best sounding content, everyone picks tape over lp after picking lp over cd here.

But the artists/content is limited to the era when they stopped making pre-recorded tapes, so I rarely play my tapes. 15 IPS is far superior to that, but I purposely stay in the pre-recorded 4 track world which is 7-1/2 IPS.

My friend has two Otari’s, and has acquired a collection of expensive tapes over the last few years.

Just as billstevenson said, my friend’s Led Zeppelin Tape is the best reproduction I ever heard, I thought I was hearing what they heard in the studio when creating the music. Previously unlistenable portions became the coolest stuff I ever heard.

Others, even tape versions of his/my favorite albums, the quality varies, great/darn good/ ok/ not so great, no-where worth the price ......

You need to make friends with others who are totally into it, and can lead you to providers of superior tapes.

I’m kicking myself towards digital only, as much as I love the idea of tapes and records - and I have two tape decks and two record players.

I use my tapes mostly to intrigue our 8 year old now days, as he’s fascinated by the concept. He’s more into using Alexa, but he listens to tapes also to my surprise.  And the records - when my wife and I have our fireplace going and some candles and a little wine. In other words, a couple times a month, if that.

Otherwise it’s always Amazon prime HD. Makes me sad.

I wouldn’t buy pre-recorded personally. I have some brand new chrome tapes, and I record on them my hi res play lists from Amazon. To me SQ is much better than pre-recorded.  And it’s been quite useful on a couple of occasions when we lost our internet access - tapes to the rescue.  
 

But now I view this as a toy and a conversation starter mostly - as most everyone who comes over for the first time are speechless and don’t really know what to say when they see the stack, haha!