Reel to Reel decks

a copy cannot be better than the original in a technical sense. It is just not possible.

That does not mean a copy cannot sound subjectively better however. That is more a function of what one likes to hear.

Copying often has a filtering effect on teh original meaning that some aspects of the signal are altered relative to otehrs which changes the sound.

The bad thing is that information lost in copying cannot be replaced should your preferences change in the future.

Better perhaps to find other ways of tweaking to achieve the desired results that can be reversed or eliminated dynamically if desired? Different ICs, tone controls, speaker toe-in, etc. are all examples of reversible tweaks that might have similar effect without risk of permanent loss or damage to the source.

I suppose you could keep multiple copies of recordings around but there is still a lot of time and expense involved in dubbing recordings to achieve sound improvements versus other options perhaps?

Here's what I think is happening in my case with the "copy" sounding better, through headphones at least. My TASCAM deck at 15ips is flat to 23Khz and with 3m/996 tape, has a 9db Headroom. Cutting out the room, the speakers, the speaker cables, the Cary monoblocks, the Transparent interconnects and the EDGE preamp, reduces a lot of aberrations done to the "original" down the chain and compression of headroom. A drum thwack I've heard a hundred times literally made me jump and, go ahead and laugh, I just love watching those huge, pro-grade VU meters on the 42B slam to the pin with no distortion with 996 tape.

I know what you mean.

I used to love to watch the VU meters jerk around to teh music back in the day when most tape units had VUs for playback as well as record.

My Denon CD recorder has LED meters but it just ain't the same.

Also my Roku Soundbridges have a VU like display mode, but I generally prefer to have the source track info show instead of jumping bars.

Assuming one's source is vinyl, or CD, or cassette, or 8-track, or me playing the piano... will the tape (recorded with the speakers off) playback sound better than the original source did when it was played back by itself (or played)?

Maybe. My comments only apply to previously recorded sources like LP, that can be affected by vibration. So a tape will never sound better as a copy of another tape, although it can sound better than a CD because it can filter the digital noise that a CD player cannot.

Sorry for my tardy response...

Okay, I understand that what I'm hearing is impossible. But the explanations aren't cutting it either. The most dramatic example of what I laid out above is a Gerry Mulligan tape, "Feelin' Good" on the Limelight label, a 3 3/4 ips "mistake" (I didn't know it was recorded at the slow speed before I bought it on Ebay.

Now, this is Mulligan with strings, and at 3 3/4 ips, the strings define "shrill" and "wiry" and have made the tape mostly unlistenable. Yet the 2-track 7 1/2 ips dub (from one Otari to the other) simply transformed it. And the 2-track dub of Miles' "Sketches of Spain" has transfixed everyone who has heard it. Cue the Twilight Zone theme.