Nothing wrong with reel to reel tapes. I listen to lots of them and even rip them into the computer. I have an old Revox and a Crown, but the Crown needs new rubber. It would only cost about thirty bucks to fix, but I would mean that I would have to actually do some work. Can't do that - I'm saving myself.
If you were talking about cassettes, there are only a few machines that are decent audio quality, but the problem is that the manufactured tapes are shitty to start, because of high speed duplicating. If you have a good machine and make your own at one-to-one speed, they will sound OK, until the fragile tape messes up.
Still playing jazz. Miles Davis at the Fillmore ... Bitches Brew era.