Major updates: 2008-09-13, 2011-06-19 While dedicated reel-to-reel and later cassette-based digital audio recorders were being developed, for stereo use it became obvious that the high bandwidth of analog video recorders could be used for recording a digital audio bitstream. Also, video links were used to transmit high-quality digital audio around the world. Until the late …
In order to make this manageable, we have divided tapes into the following categories: Analog audio tapes (reels, cassettes, cartridges) Sprocketed magnetic film is addressed with film Analog audio on videotapes (VHS HiFi, Beta HiFi) Data tapes Dedicated digital audio tapes (reels, cassettes, cartridges) Digital audio on videotapes (PCM-F1, dbx 700, 1630) Instrumentation tapes (analog …
A variety of noise reduction processing was used This processing was a double-ended system where the record processor boosted certain frequencies and portions of the dynamic range while the playback processor provided a complementary reduction of the signal. These systems are generally referred to as companders for compressor-expander. Two different manufacturers of companders achieved high market …
At the top level, we are not making a distinction between cassette, cartridge and reel tapes. We will start by creating sub-groups for the different tape widths. While similar tapes were used for instrumentation and logging purposes, they are addressed on their separate pages and are not discussed here. There is further discussion of equalization, …
Remember, this transfer that you (or I) are about to undertake may be the last time (and hopefully the best time) that the original is transferred. Here are some suggestions:
I received a phone call today from someone who wanted my opinion on a Tascam 238 8-track cassette recorder for recording his music. This was like the person who wanted to know about the DCC recorder for the same purpose yesterday. People keep hearing that “analog sounds great” or that this or that format “sounds …
The question seems to regularly arise on mailing lists and chat rooms about Dolby and dbx plug-ins. I don’t think it will happen and I added that comment and some hopefully helpful operational hints to my noise-reduction page, here.
Note: This information has been incorporated into this page which contains a more in-depth discussion. I received an urgent phone call yesterday from a man who had digitized several reels of 2″ 24-track analog recordings that he wished to re-mix. The tapes were originally recorded in about 1978-1979 and he said that he needed them …
It is possible to capture both directions of a two-sided half-track mono tape in one pass. The critical factors are: Azimuth Direction Polarity
This page provides a table of signal wavelengths for different speeds and frequencies. It is sometimes useful in understanding bandwidth limitations at the high end for a particular head. The first null occurs when the wavelength of the signal is about 112% of the optically measured length of the gap. A common place to set …
Resources for Film Preservation and Transfers: Please note, I cannot make any first-hand recommendations of these resources. 8mm and 16mm consumer transfers: The good folks at www.homemovieday.com have a page of transfer resources. 8mm and 16mm professional transfers: VideoMedia (also 9.5mm), Montreal — Exclusive Film and Video, Toronto — Little Film (Brodsky & Treadway), Greater …