How to Improve Cheap Chinese Tape Player #2 (2021 update)

 Before that, I had been struggling to use this kind of cheap Chinese tape player and usually it doesn't work out of box as expected without any modifications until I broke my tape player and wasted so much money on this. Then, I'm got an idea to improve these crappy Chinese tape player - by replacing brass spindle on the cassette motor with the plastic spindle. Other methods such as replacing the belts with thinner belts not working because the tape will not achieve desirable speed even I set the pot to the max level. 

What you're gonna need is a plastic spindle with 2mm hole diameter which you can buy it from here: (AliExpress Link). After that, you will need to use flat-head screwdriver to pull out the brass spindle and then put it the plastic spindle into the cassette motor and reassemble back the tape rubber. Then, adjust the tape speed until you reaching the desired speed. You can use 1 khz sine tone tape which you can record it DIY to do adjustment until reaching the right tone. 

After that, you can enjoy the tape collection with this tape player. However, there's another problem with this tape - high treble noise which is some people including myself feeling dizzy after hearing from this tape. There's another way to overcome this by using a specific headphone that can dampens the noise and thus allowing comfortable hearing without bearing high treble noise which is Koss Porta Pro headphone. So far, this headphone gives an excellent hearing experience on any tape players, even though the tape player are producing crappy noise sound. 

However, watch out for fakes which they often sold in plastic packaging instead of cardboard box and usually cheaper than original retail price. If you bought it from local retailer, you're pretty lucky because this item is limited stock for now, but if you bought the fake ones but when paired with crappy Chinese tapes and then feeling comfortable while listening, you're also lucky but cannot guarantee that the fake ones can give similar experience with original ones which came from the box. 

But what about other brands? Other brands may have different experience but if you found other brands that have capable of dampening noise like Koss Porta Pro, you can enjoy it and also tell your friend about the headphone. Headphones for tapes are not always Koss Porta Pro, but there's another alternative that can give similar experience with this particular headphone. 

Here's the recap about this article today:

1. Replace the brass spindle with plastic spindle with 2mm hole diameter.

2. Use a better headphone that able to dampening noise like Koss Porta Pro.