Are Maxell XL-II still available??

I was at NeXt Tech -- Radio Shack.
They had Maxell XLII cassettes in stock.
Thought they were no longer available.
Or are they old stock?

Also I been finding many 10 in a carton in many places. But they do look like old boxes.

Yes, XLII cassettes are still available (and in production) along with Maxell's UR (type I formulation).

The XLII (60 & 90 minutes) is still an excellent tape, although it is now packaged in a less sophisticated shell than the various forms that were used in the past. The XLII-S formulation is no longer available, but if you happen to be at the right place at the right time, you may be able to find NOS (still sealed) XLII, XLII-S, and the various metal (type IV) formulations.

My favourite source for these, and other high end tapes (sealed, NOS) is my local neighbourhood thrift store, where from time to time, they appear in box lots, and individual units. I've managed to build an abundant supply of Maxell's proprietary "black magnetite" at the give away price of .25 to .49 cents each...a huge difference from the price, "back in the day!"

Here's a link to Maxell Canada.

I just happened to buy two Maxell XL-II-S 60s, three Maxell XL-II 90s, one TDK SA-60 and a Sony UX Turbo 90 (all high bias, still sealed) for 50 cents each. That's a surprise cause my thrift store sucks.

I have some different earlyer versions of XL-II.
And two XL-II-S, 60 and a 100.
Some used, some sealed.

The XL-II is a great cassette. I still have some from the 80`s, with taped vinyl on. They still sound superb.

Maxell XL-II is a fantastic cassette. I think the newer XL-IIs are outsourced to a company in Mexico. The older ones are made either in England or Japan. Honestly, though... I can't tell much difference between the old and the new when I'm listening to them. The older ones do feel more substantial in hand.

I have been using XL-IIs since the 80s and have several examples of each generation. Mostly with CD or Vinyl recordings on them. I never was into pre-recorded tapes, so I'd rather buy the album or CD and record it myself onto a good tape. That way, I could edit out all the songs I didn't like and usually ended up with a much better recording.

All in all, I probably have around 300 tapes here that I recorded over the last 25 years. 80% of those are Maxell chromes. 10% are TDK SA or SA-X, and the rest is a mish-mash of brands.

There is a Wallgreens store not far from where I live that sells new XL-II c-90 tapes individually for $1.50 each. I usually pick up one or two whenever I am there as you never know when they will stop making them. Plus, I figure if they keep selling, they will keep restocking.

On a whim, I did some searching on eBay for Maxell lots a while back and ended up buying two batches of the older XL-IIs (20 in each lot) from former bootleg tape traders who had transferred all of their tapes to digital media. All in all, I spent less than $1 per tape, and that included shipping. The good thing is, they are the older, more robust versions of the XL-II with the supposedly more desireable tape formulation. The sellers had not labeled the tapes or written on the cards and they were in practically new condition. I'm sure there are other deals like that out there to be had.

I have been listening to some of these recordings to see if any are good enough to keep. So far I've found a Police & Ziggy Marley concert that were great music, but crappy recordings. While that's unfortunate, I bought them for the tapes, not for the music. Most of these are going to be erased and eventually recorded over.

I've also seen brand new boxes of both XL-II and XL-IIS tapes on ebay for around $20~$25 at times and have picked up 10 XL-IIS's as well. (one box of 10, not 10 boxes).

All in all, I've probably got about 60 blank Maxell CrO2 tapes at my disposal. Mostly Maxell XL-II's and a handfull of XL-IIS's. I'm thinking those will last me for a very long time! No more tape shopping for me...

Here are the originals that got it all started for me, I have two good examples of the UD-XLII from the late 70s

I guess I should get more of these.
The store had more in stock.
Not many thou.

So this is the Black Magnetite, dident notice that.

What are you waiting for? Go get 'em (quick)!

I got three more XL-II-S.
Total of four XL-II-S I have now.
Two Made in England and two made in Japan.
Still sealed in wrapper.
All 60 minutes.

Found another XL-II-S 100 minutes.

They wouldn`t be sealed long if i had em. I can`t go for all that "keep it sealed/boxed" crap.

I have a sealed 5 pack of really nice metal tapes.... but now I don't know where I hid them.

Dammit...

quote:

Originally posted by Litfan:
They wouldn`t be sealed long if i had em. I can`t go for all that "keep it sealed/boxed" crap.

I know what you mean.
One of them has a broken wrapper.
I will probably open that one.
I usually like to to find used ones at thrift stores to use, sence they do not have wrappers on them anyways.
But I do not have any used Maxell XL-II-S.
Now I rather find more used tapes than new ones.

Take one of those XLII-S cassettes apart,
instead of having a metal pin for the reels
it is molded plastic,part of the shell itself.
Don't worry about damaging the cassette,once you see the reel joke it will go in the trash anyway
I was wondering why all my XLII-S tapes had really bad drag,after dismantling all of them at least one if not both pins were broke

I opened the case of one cassette.
Does use the molded plastic as a post.

Still repairable if it breaks.
Good to know anyways.
I like the tape has nice weight to them.

Found another store with maybe 100 or
more C60 XL-II-S tapes.

Anyone interested?

quote:

Found another store with maybe 100 or
more C60 XL-II-S tapes.

Anyone interested?

If the ones you found in the other store are the same older formulation BLACK MAGNETITE examples as you pictured before, those are a great deal. I might be interested in 10 or so of those... Shall we PM? (just sent)

I'd normally pick up more of those, but I just picked up three boxes of Akai GX90's for $0.80 each from a website called www.batteriesandbutter.com

The Akais just arrived and I did a test recording on one of them. It exceeded my expectations. For the money, they are fantastic tapes. Lots of treble headroom and deep bass reproduction. They do have have a bit of background hiss, but Dolby or clever use of a deck's bias control eliminate much of that. This tape is perfect for use on a boombox for that price. It is a type II.

In the wake of so many good tapes becoming generally unavailble I have been experimenting with tapes that appear to be more readily available. Another, good tape I've recently discovered is the Fuji DRII. I think those are better than the Akai GX and I've seen some folks selling them on ebay in lots of 50 for very reasonable prices. I may pick up one of those lots to have them on hand.

With the amount of press out there comparing analog to digital recording quality, tape is actually starting to hint at making a bit of a comeback among audio afficianados... And with only a small handful of decent tape formulations out there for purchase in any kind of quantity, it may be wise to stock up on some of these while we still can.

quote:

Originally posted by JT:

With the amount of press out there comparing analog to digital recording quality, tape is actually starting to hint at making a bit of a comeback among audio afficianados... And with only a small handful of decent tape formulations out there for purchase in any kind of quantity, it may be wise to stock up on some of these while we still can.

Sage advice JT. I usually pick up a few whenever I see 'em. Have a look...











...and some goodies for my future grail reel2reel deck

NICE STASH, J.C.

Here is my little tape collection. These are either lightly used (like the XLIIs or the MX's above them) or are sealed completely.

Plus, I've got 4 used TDK MA-R's and two unopened boxes of 10 each TDK SA-X C-60s (last formulation) en route to me now.

And for the reel to reel I have a dozen or so 7" reel tapes. Half are Ampex and the rest are Maxell. One is an unopened Maxell UD 35-90.



For a decent deal on some TDK SA-X C-60s, check out this auction # 350036036439

Superb collection JT, and congratulations on your SA-X deal!

I feel kinda bad mentioning those SA-X tapes here since the thread started as an XLII discussion... (they're both awesome tapes)

But, that particular seller has something like 80 more boxes of those at $19 per box of 10. Snatch them up while the gettin' is good! Even with shipping, that's less than $3 per tape. Can't go wrong there. One guy from the TapeHeads.net forum ordered 10 boxes at once!