Fancy playing your MP3’s in an 8-track player from the 1960’s?

Well no. Not many people have thought about doing this, I’m sure, but I’ve got in the rather geeky habit of following the Techmoan YouTube channel and his most recent video features a rather old piece of technology from the 1960’s called the “8-track”. The 8-track cartridge or 8-track tape came before the cassette tape that some of you may remember, but it’s where we started seeing problems with formats overtaking each other.

Fancy playing your MP3s in an 8 track player from the 1960s?

When the compact cassette started to appear in cars, people wanted to play those cassettes in the 8-track players that were installed in their vehicles. They had a choice – either rip out the 8-track and install an expensive new system, or buy a gadget that lets you play a compact cassette in an 8-track.

Fast-forward a few years and the same problem repeated itself as people wanted CD’s and MP3’s played through their cassette systems in their cars. Now, with very few tape players in cars and just CD’s, we’re into the world of mini FM transmitters and line-in and Bluetooth systems to get the digital music off our phones and into our cars.

Fancy playing your MP3s in an 8 track player from the 1960s?

Either way, I found this interesting, so I figured it was worth a share 🙂 It features a rather natty SD card-to-cassette gadget about half way through, which is of particular interest to anyone as geeky as me 🙂

If you’re determined to get a cassette player, have a look at the Best Portable Cassette Player 2018.