Hello Cubase Experts! Seeking experienced advice:

I am remixing old 4-track cassette recordings from the 80s and 90s in Cubase 12, using my Focusrite Pro 24 interface with two inputs.

Since none of my old 4-track tape recorders function anymore, I am stuck with using a standard cassette deck for the transfer process, as follows:

I play side one (Tracks 1 and 2 of the 4-track cassette) with the left channel connected to Input 1 and the right channel connected to Input 2. They record separately into Track 1 and Track 2 in Cubase.

So far, so good.

Now I flip the tape. It plays backwards (Tracks 3 and 4 of the 4-track cassette) with the left channel connected to Input 1 and the right channel connected to Input 2. They record separately into Track 3 and Track 4 in Cubase. After recording these backward-playing tracks, I reverse them.

So now I have all four tracks transferred onto separate digital tracks in Cubase.

The problem is tape drift. The two recorded passes, even when nudged into place to match each other at the beginning, soon fall out of sync with each other. This is due to slight variations of two different tape playbacks—natural tape drift.

Has anyone out there dealt with, and more importantly, RESOLVED the same issue? What is the best solution to synchronize the audio? Will the Audio Alignment tool work if some of the tracks are complex bouncedowns of three or four tracks? Or is there another way to approach it?

Back in the day, you could get up to ten tracks out of a 4-track by bouncing the first three separate tracks onto track 4 while performing your 4th part live, then recording over the remaining three tracks in the same manner—so you end up with 10 tracks: 4 parts on track 4, 3 parts on track 3, 2 parts on track 2, and a final single recording on track 1.

The trouble is, can you still successfully synchronize 4 complex audio tracks like this in Cubase?

Would love to hear anyone else's experience with this less-than-ideal procedure.

Thanks in advance!

Hi Mark, tried this years ago to no avail. Tape speed (drift) changes on every run.
Bouncing on a 4 track is payback and recording in the same run (and also is the drift).
In the end I got myself a secondhand 4 track and transferred all de recording to digital.
I would do it for you but I life in Europe. :/

Send the tapes to a transfer house like Sonicraft. It'll cost some money, but the azimuth will be correct and stable which won't be the case if you do it with a used 4-track machine.

And yes, because the cassette transports all have massive wow, there's no way to easily line up two playbacks together, so you need to play them all at the same time.
--scott

Thank you, gentlemen. Much appreciated.

I mistakenly thought we might be at the point where I could select one of the tracks and use some automated procedure to match the second tape-drifted track magically into alignment. Alas, we are not yet there as a species.

I did manage to locate on eBay the exact same model of Tascam Portastudio that I used to record with, so I'm hopeful it is fully functional and I will work from there, having found the Easy Button.

Thanks for your input!