How to archive colour computer tapes

Equipment Needed:

• Cassette deck
• RCA to USB device
• Audacity (software)
• XRoar (software)

The TRS-80 Color Computer platform by RadioShack is one of my favorites due to its simple form factor and great games. Games were released on floppy disks, Program Pak cartridges, or cassettes. This article will focus on archiving the latter. It turns out that archiving Color Computer tapes is quite simple. In addition to this ''article'' I also made an episode of Adventures in Archiving about archiving Colour Computer tapes. 

Archiving:

1. Start Audacity and select the RCA to USB device as input. Set recording channels to MONO. Connect the cassette deck to the USB device. (Note: You can also use a USB cassette recorder.)
2. Insert the cassette tape you want to archive.
3. Begin recording in Audacity and press play on the cassette deck.
4. If all goes well, after a few seconds, an audio pattern should appear on your screen. Wait for the entire tape to be played.
5. Stop the recording in Audacity and export the file to WAV format.

Tip: When archiving multiple tapes or tapes with multiple programs, save time by implementing a consistent filename system.
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Testing Your Software:
Now comes the fun part—testing your software. I use the Color Computer emulator XRoar for this purpose, as it's the quickest way to test software. Alternatively, you can use a cassette adapter with an actual Colour computer (Check out my explainer video about that).

1. Start up XRoar. (Check out my explainer video on how to set up XRoar.)
2. Select "File" and then click "Load". Choose the file you just archived.
3. Type CLOAD or CLOADM, depending on the type of program. (Potential troubleshooting point!)
4. If all went well, your program will start. Enjoy your archived program!

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Possible Troubleshooting Steps:

• Right Basic Command: Ensure you used the correct Basic command to load your program. Try CLOAD and CLOADM.
• MONO: Was the file recorded in MONO? Select recording channels as MONO or separate the file into MONO.

​A couple screenshots: