Cassettes

Bumpboxx's latest product is a proper throwback boombox, complete with cassette decks and a CD player – along with thoughtful modern features that make it easy to live with. The BB-777 can play music plenty loud, and even digitize your collection.

Digital music players and smartphones pretty much caused an extinction event for portable analog audio. But RecordingTheMasters is banking on a comeback for tapes with the launch of Mystik portable audio cassette player.

Before pocket-friendly Digital Audio Players or even portable CD players, there was the Walkman. And before playlists, there were mixtapes. Now Crosley Radio is looking to inject some new life into the almost-forgotten cassette tape with the release of two retro players.

Though digital music accounts for much of what we now listen to, old school formats like vinyl and audio cassettes steadfastly refuse to disappear. Professional audio gear manufacturer Tascam is prepping for a cassette tape revival with the release of the 202mkVII dual cassette deck.

Artur Mlynarz collects, repairs and restores classic hi-fi equipment. Sometimes though, units come in that are beyond help. Wanting to bring new life to vintage cassette decks, he mounted a smartphone into a broken player, and the MP3 Tapeless Deck Project soon followed.

​Cassettes might not have the largest capacity or best sound quality, but they ooze retro appeal. Tapping into that hipster market is the Mixxtape, a portable Bluetooth music player that’s not only shaped like a cassette, it also plays in an old-school tape deck – if you still have one lying around.

Remember when people carried Sony Discmans in their cars, and used those cassette adapters to listen to them through their tape decks? Well, while a lot of those same cars are still around, the Discman has now given way to the MP3 player. That's why ION has released its Cassette Adapter Bluetooth.

ION's Tape Dock transfers your old cassette tapes to your iPhone, iPod touch and computer.

The compact cassette mix tape of old has been given a modern update by MakerBot Industries with a DIY home 3D print kit that snaps together to make a wonderfully retro tape-shaped Mixtape MP3 player.