Cassette, the newest product from Wavesfactory is an audio plugin that has been designed to emulate the sound of vintage cassette tapes and decks. It has been carefully modelled after exhaustive analysis. As a result, it gets the same sound and behaviour of the original units.

Unlike professional reel to reel machines, the compact cassette format prioritised size over performance and so was limited in terms of tape speed, tape width and this resulted in comparatively limited frequency response, noise, crosstalk and irregularities in tape speed resulted in wow and flutter which wouldn’t have been acceptable in professional machines. Once a tape has been kicking around on the floor of your Ford Escort for a few months and tape stretch and drop-outs from fingerprints colour the experience to “characterful” rather than one of high fidelity. However, for many people it is the sound of a particular time and one which people over 40 remember with affection and people under 40 find evocative.

All of these little quirks and random fluctuations have been modelled meticulously. Cassette imprints instant nostalgia, movement and analogue feel all around in its path. Find out more in the excellent video.

4 Cassette Types

Cassette has modelled the four cassettes types available. Each one delivers different sonic characteristics.

• I: was the standard and most compatible tape format. Featured a ferric-oxide coating (Fe2O3). First appeared in the 1960s.

• II: with a chromium dioxide (CrO2) formulation was introduced at the dawn of the 1970s featuring an undeniable increase in high frequency response.

• III: living a short period between the mid 70s and early 80s, the ferro-chrome (FeCr) never made it into the golden era.

• IV: metal-formulated hit the scene at the end of the 70s. Features firmer bass as well as louder high frequencies.

Changing tapes will have an effect in the frequency response of the plugin but also in the saturation, compression, static noise (hiss) and dynamic noise (asperity noise).
Cassette offers under the hood control of many aspects of tape emulation they include;

• Tape: Control how much of the tape effect is applied including frequency response, saturation and more.

• Stability: Control how the Stability parameter in the front panel works internally. Includes “randomness” in order to make things unpredictable and analog.

• Extra: More of what makes a cassette sound like a cassette. Including the innovative “Re-Cassette” parameter.

• Artefacts: Control how the Artefacts parameter in the front panel works internally. Includes “Random Snap” for simulating the tape being caught momentarily causing pitch instability.

• As you can see in this panel, Cassette uses oversampling in order to get rid of aliasing. The plugin always works at 192KHz sampling rate internally.

No iLok or challenge-response needed for registering Cassette. At the time of the purchase, customers will receive an e-mail containing username and serial number.

System Requirements

• Mac OSX (64-bit only): 10.7 or higher. DAW capable of hosting VST, VST3 or AU, or Pro Tools.
  Intel processor.
  Windows (64-bit only): Windows 7, 8 or 10. DAW capable of hosting VST or VST3 plugins, or Pro Tools.

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