Maxell XLII-90
A workhorse cassette that working musicians and mastering houses bought by the brick. The paper trail backs that up.
Overview
Dealer ads from the period show the XLII-90 sitting in a price ladder alongside its stablemates. A mastering-tape price list reproduced in EQ (undated clipping, p.158 of the issue) quoted XLII 90 at $1.30 each in bulk, with the 60-minute at $1.40 and the 100-minute at $1.60. The step-up XLII-S 90 was $1.60. That ordering says how the line was sold: the XLII was the value tier, the XLII-S the premium one, and the 90-minute length the practical middle of the range for full-length albums and demo reels.
Maxell's own advertising made large claims for the XLII-S formulation. The Audio (April 1983, p.11) spread described the XLII-S tapes as precision-engineered for a significant improvement in dynamic range, with smooth linear performance and low distortion. Treat that as marketing copy for the S variant, not an independent verdict on the plain XLII-90. The two tapes shared a name but sat at different price points, and the ad copy was written to sell the dearer one.
The archive can't tell you much beyond that. The fact sheet carries no formulation chemistry, no bias/EQ specification, no production years, no packaging details, and no measured performance data for the XLII-90 itself. What survives is the paper trail of commerce - classified ads, dealer price lists, and a promotional page. That is enough to establish the tape's role and rough cost. It is not enough to say how it sounded or how it was built. Anyone quoting a specific MOL figure or frequency response for this tape is working from something other than the sources here.
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