What I do
No Frills Archiving is a small cassette digitization and preservation service focused on recordings that matter: family tapes, personal journals, radio recordings, church or community recordings, hard-to-replace music, and other cassette material you want to keep.
The goal is simple: preserve what is on the tape carefully, give you a high-quality archival copy, and also provide files that are convenient to listen to.
Starting pricing
- $15 minimum
- For tapes up to about 30 minutes.
- $20 per standard cassette
- For a typical full-length cassette transfer.
- Return shipping at actual cost
- No markup on postage.
Larger collections may be quoted as a whole once I know the tape lengths, condition, and amount of work involved.
What you receive
- A lossless archival master in WAV or FLAC format.
- An MP3 listening copy.
- For music tapes, track-by-track files where practical rather than one long listening file.
- The original cassette returned to you.
The continuous archival capture is preserved before any track splitting or other convenience edits are made.
Preservation first
My default is to preserve what is actually on the tape. I do not remove speech, gaps, room sound, false starts, background noise, or other recorded material simply because it seems unimportant.
If cleanup, restoration, transcription, or removal of material is requested, that work is done from a copy of the archival capture. The original preservation master remains untouched.
If it is on the tape, capture it first. Edit only when there is a clear reason and the customer wants it.
Transfer equipment
Cassette playback is handled by a freshly serviced Yamaha KX-530 component cassette deck feeding a Zoom H6 Essential digital recorder.
The Yamaha has received new transport belts, cleaning and lubrication, conditioned pinch rollers, calibrated playback speed, cleaned and demagnetized heads, an azimuth check with a reference tape, channel-balance and Dolby checks, transport-torque testing, and functional testing.
How it works
- Contact me first. Tell me what you have and roughly how many tapes are involved.
- We agree on the job. I confirm pricing and what files you want before you ship anything.
- Your tapes are inventoried. Each job receives an internal job number so customer material stays organized.
- The tape is inspected and transferred. If a cassette appears mechanically unsafe, I stop rather than risk unnecessary damage.
- The capture is checked. I verify the transfer and prepare the archival and listening copies.
- You receive the files and your tapes back. Return shipping is charged at actual cost.
Temporary file retention
Completed digital transfers are retained for 30 days after delivery as a temporary backup. Customers are responsible for keeping their own copies after that period. Audio files may be permanently deleted after 30 days unless other arrangements have been made.
Interested in a transfer?
I am currently collecting inquiries while the transfer workflow is being tested. There is no obligation to send anything just because you ask about the service.
Please do not ship irreplaceable tapes until I have confirmed that I am ready to accept them.