So far in this series we've talked at an overview level, shared the quality differences between different ways of capturing so you can see for yourself and covered some potential buying guides. In this part we're going to assume you have now mostly decided a pathway and are ready to progress to make your first capture.

Getting the most from your player

• Always clean the heads with isopropyl alcohol and cotton buds or even better a chamois bud to ensure they are physically clean
• Be careful cleaning the rubber capstan, clean it lightly, over cleaning will (especially on older decks) make it slip and as a result you won't be able to use the deck until you replace or restore the roller. This happens due to older rubber capstans becoming hard with age and when you clean them too much, the dirt happens to be the only thing that was maintaining consistent grip and as a result you'll have problems with your capture

How to maximise the audio quality

Tape Mould - If a tape has mould on it, not only can it clog up your nice clean heads, but it will also affect the sound and picture quality. It is strongly recommended to do a general clean on these tapes before recording.

Tape Mould and other issues

Depending on your situation, there may be various issues with your tapes that could include mould, sticky tape syndrome, etched plastic housing that can cause tape breakage etc. As the years go by these tapes are going to get worse. If you're concerned about it and want your tapes to last longer, get them cleaned and store them in a dehumidified cabinet.

General Clean

First step here is to do a general external inspection of the tape. If there is white dust like in the picture, you will need to disassemble the tape and clean it. Unfortunately, it's basically impossible to find a tape cleaning device these days, so the only option available to most is to disassemble the tape and clean it by hand.

For this you will need:

• Cotton Buds / Or Chamois Swabs / Microfibre Cloth
• Isopropyl Alcohol
• Screwdriver - preferably Philips
• Can of compressed air
• Spare tape player
• Optional - Blank Cassette tapes that can be undone with a screwdriver

The below outlines the basic process I use:

1. Rewind the tape in the donor player
2. Remove the cassette and disassemble the case (If the case cannot be unscrewed and must be forced open, find a new blank cassette tape that can be unscrewed and transfer the magnetic tape into it. If possible, transfer the tape onto the new spools as well. You can still buy these online in various forms (or just buy some second hand blank tapes - preferably with the plastic seals still on.
3. With the cassette still open, blow away the loose mould with the can of compressed air (recommend do this outside or a place that can be cleaned afterwards)
4. Completely remove the tape spools from the cassette taking care to do so by holding on to the covering plastic protectors on either side. This will help prevent the tape from unravelling
5. Clean the inside of the case with isopropyl on a microfibre cloth. Also clean any spooling rollers, both sides of the plastic covering protectors etc. It's also a good idea to clean the leader path (first few cm's of the tape roll) manually as well as these cannot be cleaned by the remaining steps. Don't forget to clean inside the spool where the tape will go once it's been forwarded as well with isopropyl and I find a microfibre cloth on your finger is quite good.
6. Reassemble the case
7. Insert the tape into the spare cassette player whereby the front casing has been taken off so you can have direct access to the tape path
8. Fold a thin covering of microfibre cloth over a cotton bud and drop a decent amount of isopropyl alcohol onto the end of it, if this is too big, just use a Chamois Swab (though these can be hard to get)
9. Press the isopropyl covered cloth / swab / bud onto the outside facing part of the magnetic tape in the tape path on the right hand side (before it enters into the spool). It's very important to makes sure you do this on the right hand side when fast forwarding or the tape will jumble up and be damaged.
10. Fast forward the tape while holding the swab on the tape, until the end of the tape is reached. If you feel you need to add more isopropyl, you can do that by stopping part way and re-applying or another system of your devising
11. Once at the end of the tape, remove and disassemble again
12. From here, repeat from step 3 -8, except this time for step 8 put the microfibre cloth on the left hand side of the tape path (before it enters back into the spool and rewind. Like before it's very important to be on the left hand side to avoid damaging the tape
13. Open the cassette one last time and do step 3 again
14. Completed

Tip 1: It's safest to wear a full-face respirator with ABEK2P3 filters. Most types of mould can be hazardous to your health and should never enter your lungs or eyes, wash/wet clean your mask before removing it and showering. 

Tip 2: Practice this first on an unimportant tape. It's easy for the tape to unravel and end up in a mess.

Tip 3: If you see parts of the tape are coming off or the tape is making screetching sounds, you probably have sticky tape syndrome. To fix this, it requires baking your tape. For more information on currently identified tapes exhibiting this problem please see the Wikipedia article on the topic.

Tip 4: You will find a point where you can rest one finger on the player somewhere as a nice steady point while you hold your finger and cloth over the tape. Yes this is a bit hacky, but I haven't found a better way, please do let me know if you find one!

Once this is complete, you should now have a clean deck to play your tapes in and mould free tapes to give you the best audio quality possible.

You are now ready to do an actual capture!

NEXT: Capturing Analog Video Tapes - Part V - Capturing! (Coming soon)