Situation: I have about half a dozen Audio DAT tapes containing stereo mixes of recordings by my band, the Scarlet Martyrs. I also now have the ability to burn CDs, and I don't have most of these tracks on CD. So frustratingly, I have a medium I can't read and one I can write if I could only get the data. I do have access to a some PC, Mac and Sun kit and computer DAT/DDS drives.
After regularly attacking this problem over several months, I have come to realise that I'm not the first to traipse down this singularly unrewarding avenue. For the benefit of those following me, these pages detail what I've found.
In summary: you need a DDS drive with firmware that can interpret audio-format DAT tapes. This is mostly non-standard, and the only place it is standard is on SGI machines. Obtaining the firmware and upgrading a non-enabled drive are also frustrating processes; don't bother naïvely asking Seagate or looking on their web site. And good luck finding a dealer who understands what you want. If you can sort the hardware out, there are one or two bits of software that will read the tapes for you. There are also some further resources worth checking out. And experiences from other people.
Alternately, you can beg, borrow or steal an ordinary audio DAT deck. Then either use an S/PDIF card to interface it to your PC and record to hard drive or sample directly via the audio port. (I suspect this is what I will end up doing, as soon as I can source a player.)
If all this is too much hassle, there are plenty of one-off CD creation shops that will happily take your DAT and charge you a considerable sum to put it on CD. Ask your local recording studio. But then, if you were prepared to pay for that, you presumably wouldn't be here in the first place!
Good luck. You'll need it.