II COOL ICE ~1996 - US
Very little known about this tape. High Bias Type II. Studio Quality tape as per ICE.
A cassette put together by seemingly defunct 'Information Communications Entertainment Inc.' (ICE) of San Diego, USA. However, they were "assembled in China".
NAD613, member of Tapeheads was able to capture some information on the internet back in July of 2008 (15 years ago) and got this description about the quality of the tape and shell parts used on the manufacturing of this cassette, "Our tape manufacturing plant uses the finest grades of polyester materials and magnetic oxides in a long generation of particle development, resulting in higher frequency response and much lower noise. We use technically superior audio cassette shells, which provide a sleek high-tech appearance with improved recording and playback performance."
During the late 80's and much of the 90's many different companies were producing cassettes but being very vague about much of the origin of the tape used, shell and other parts as well as other information such as the year of production, etc, etc. The year 1996 is just a guess on my part. I always welcome input from anyone who may have more precise information about this tape or any other tape featured on this site.
A few other Tapehead members speak rather highly of this tape. You may wish to look into it. I have not had a chance to try one out yet.
The cassette does have a "Cool" look to it. There are 6 different colours available here at CassetteComeback; Green, Purple, Orange, Yellow, Red, and Blue. The second last picture shows the back of the wrapper of this cassette with a typical CD disk image. This side is common to all of the different coloured tapes.
The shell looks and appears to be of decent quality and it uses screws as opposed to being welded. The tape is exceptionally dark, very shiny and super smooth... it screams quality! See picture, scroll towards the end!
NOTE: Just received a total of 38 of these today (November 20, 2023), and the Blue tapes are very few (only 2), and no Yellows! The Yellow shown was opened for photography and it was from a shipment of about a year ago. Surprisingly most of them are Orange!
Special Note: Kindest regards and a very big thank you to Bert R. of Idaho for sending me a good batch of these uncommon tapes to be shared here with all of you. I would have liked to price these at around $7.50 each, but logistics costs pushed up the price a bit.