1950 GE Play-Talk Turntable Tape Recorder

Here's a demo of an odd bit of transistional tech. This is a GE Play-Talk from 1950. It's a kid's toy, but it's actually pretty advanced for the time, since tape recorders were just start to become available. This is a tape recorder / record player hybrid. The paper disc is coated with magnetic tape, and the tonearm has a tape recorder head on it. The little plastic disc that goes over the "tape" disc has a spiral groove for guiding the tonearm. The speaker serves double duty as the microphone. All tube electronics.

What's great is the way you can play/record in random access mode. There's no erase head, so the sounds just keep building on top of each other until you erase the disc with a bulk tape eraser.

In the 2nd part of the video, I use another fantastic GE toy- the Tote-A-Tune keyboard from the early 70s. I record a scale onto the disc, then attempt to play a tune by manually moving the tonearm over the disc. Lots of creative lo-fi applications for this sucker!!

MUCH thanks to Llyswen for getting this thing for me (years ago) and Robert for recently bringing it back to life!!

Category:

Music

Tags:

• ge
• general
• electric
• tote-a-tune
• play-talk
• vintage
• lo-fi
• tape
• recorder
• record
• player
• toy
• tube

[ccryan75]

So If I I'm getting this right, the center plate with the grooves only acts as a "guide" for the player arm and keeps the arm stable and "on track". The actual recording and playback is on the larger magnetic "disk tape" which lies beneath the "groove plate"

[peahix]

@ccryan75 yes, that's right.

[inbredagogo]

That is wild, I've never seen that type of recorder before.

[chrishibbs201012]

replace the caps and the buzz will go away.

[cd637299]

@stormyhawn - :) Thanks...also in keeping with Norton that he'd send the wrong disc....!! Now to listen to "Swanee River..."

[stormyhawn]

@cd637299 The recorder seen in that "Honeymooners" episode was a home disc cutting lathe; probably a Wilcox-Gay or a Presto. Such machines were popular in the early 1940s and were replaced by wire recording, and then tape. They would record for a maximum of about three minutes on 78 rpm acetate records. Home disc recorders were already obsolete by 1955, but it is in keeping with the character of Ed Norton that he still had one and never upgraded to tape!

[pinballKing012]

Works well !!!

[thereelmaster]

it has a bad filter capasitor that is why it is buzzing

[GreatNorthWeb]

the most awesome part of the whole video is listening to the 50 year old recordings of some unknown children. that could have been my mom singing when she was a kid.

[FlametopFred]

I need to collect 37 of those and make a DJ-Mellotron combo

[Figlitiblitification]

What a weird thing

[ccryan75]

That's actually quite a clever idea!