We provide high-quality transfers/copies
even from hard-to-play tapes. capabilities

I do not think that I could have found a better person than Richard for the transcription job.
— Bob Lankston, Geoscience Integrations regarding the IRIG tape of the Flathead Lake Seismic Survey discussed here.

Thanks so much for your hard and diligent work on the Stan Rogers transfers. They sound fantastic! I’m very excited about this project and I really value your part in it.
Paul Mills, The Millstream, referring to making 96 ks/s 24 bit transfers of the first five Stan Rogers album masters as well as digitizing seven historic tapes of radio and concert performances.

This sounds superb. Much better than I ever could have anticipated. Thank you! Also, you should realize that this is an important recording. We are thrilled you were able to capture it.
— Hannah Frost, Preservation Librarian for Digital and Media Collections, Stanford University Libraries — Referring to a damaged full-track 7.5 in/s tape from the 1975 Monterey Jazz Festival.

I received the CDs today. The sound result on the CDs far exceeds my expectations. I am tremendously moved at the quality and accomplishment of safely digitizing some tapes that have survived my chaotic life for 30 years. Thanks so much. — Sumner Nelson

We successfully played
this one from 1947!

We have played paper
tapes from 1948 and
processed hard-to-play
tapes from the 1970s
and 1980s.

We frequently play RCA Sound Tapes and other cartridge/cassette formats.

What we can play . . .

UPDATED (and downsized) 2024-10-26

Cassettes—Mono or stereo standard audio cassettes. We can also play 3-, and 4-track cassettes.

Other 0.15-inch tape formats—With the above audio cassette capabilities, we can play any other format (including micro cassettes and Revere cartridges) that use 0.150 tape by loading the tape from the other format into a standard cassette shell. The tapes will be returned in the standard cassette shell.

1/4-inch reels (common reel to reel audio tapes)
—full-track mono
—2-track NAB mono/stereo
—2-track DIN stereo
—quarter-track mono/stereo/quad (4-channel)
—3-track
—4-track
—4-track IRIG instrumentation tapes (FM or Direct)
—4-channel, 8-track

1/4-inch cartridges—We remove the tape from NAB broadcast cartrdiges, Elcasets, and the old RCA Sound Tape cartridges and can play the tape on our 2-, 3-, and 4-channel 1/4-inch players. We also have one of the special TOMCAT heads for the broadcast cartridge tapes from machines by Pacific Recorders (now Pacific Research and part of Harris Broadcast). See how we do it in the next section, below.

8-tracks—We can play stereo and 4-channel (Quad) 8-track cartridges in cartridge or out. Playing them on the open-reel machine provides superior results.

1/2-inch reels
—2-track
—3-track
—4-track

File Formats
We can accept most major audio file formats as an upload
to our ftp servers. Please contact us for the uploading details.

Digital Formats
—Digital Files on CD, DVD, hard drive, USB drives, etc.
—DAT (44.1 and 48 ks/s)
—CD
—MiniDisc (normal and HIMD stereo)
—PCM-F1 (Sony PCM601ES) on VHS or Betamax

See the next section for even more detail on noise reduction and variations on the theme.

We played both the
outer part and
the inner part.
No problem!

How we play your tapes . . . Noise Reduction, Equalization

UPDATED (and downsized) 2024-10-26

Cassettes—We have several Nakamichi Dragons modified with both manual and automatic azimuth adjustment for the highest quality playback.
In addition, we can handle 3- and 4-track cassetteswith our
DATATAPE 4-channel cassette players.

Reels—All of our 1/4-inch and 1/2-inch tape projects are accomplished uwing our many Sony APR-5003V professional reel-to-reel audio tape players with about ten plug-in head assemblies.

8-track cartridges—For best results, we remove the tape from the cartridge and play it on a special head assembly for the APR-5003V machines. We have an Akai CR-80D-SS four-channel 8-track recorder/player so we can play both stereo and quadraphonic 8-tracks, but the results do not match the reel to reel.

Other cartridges—Most cartridges, other than 8-tracks, use essentially standard reel-to-reel track configurations. We remove the tape from the cartridge, use a reel-to-reel player, and then return your tape on a reel. We have found few dedicated cartridge players that sound as good as our late-model high-end professional reel-to-reel machines. Here is a list of cartridge formats that we can play. If you come across a cartridge that is not on this list, please ask. It is very likely that we can play it.

• Cartridges playable with four-track 1/4-inch heads:
  • RCA Sound Tape cartridges
  • Elcasets
  • 4-track Muntz cartridges (same shell as NAB cartridges)
• Cartridges playable with 3-track 1/4-inch heads:
  • Stereo NAB Broadcast cartridges
  • Pacific Recorders and Engineering TOMCAT MAXTRAX cartridges— we have the special asymmetrical 3-track head for this application.
• Cartridges playable with 2-track 1/4-inch heads:
  • Mono NAB Broadcast cartridges
• Cartridges playable with 4-track 0.150-inch heads (Datatape)
  • Revere/3M/CBS single-reel music cartridge (square)
• Cartridges playable with Stereo 0.150 (standard cassette) heads (Nakamichi Dragon):
  • Micro cassettes
  • Stuzzi Memocord (computer speed-change required after the transfer as this machine did not have a capstan)

Tape types
—Acetate, including tapes needing hydration.
    We have successfully played a circa
    1935 tape.
—Polyester, including tapes with sticky-shed
    and other binder problems are
    transferred regularly.
—Paper tapes can be transferred, too!

Noise reduction
—Dolby A (8 chan Dolby 363)
—Dolby SR (10 chan Dolby 363)
—Dolby B (8 chan Dolby 422)*
—Dolby C (8 chan Dolby 422)*
—Dolby S (8 chan Dolby 422)
—dbx I (2 chan dbx 150)*
—dbx II (2 chan dbx 224x)*
—Nakamichi High Com II (licensed from
   Telefunken, (0 chan)*
—Telefunken High Com, (0 chan)*
—Telefunken Telcom C4, (0 chan)*

* While we have the listed quantity of these hardware noise reduction units, we generally use a variety of dedicated plugins as they offer a more stable and consistent decoding option without sacrificing quality.

Tape speeds—We can accomodate almost any tape speed in almost any format by the use of a variety of tape transports and/or computer tools to adjust speed and equalization.

For cassettes and other 0.150-inch-wide tape, nominal playback is 1-7/8 in/s in the Nakamichi Dragons. Our DATATAPE CMS 1044 players run at 15/32, 15/16, 1-7/8, 3-3/4, and 7-1/2 in/s and with varispeed can cover the range from 15/32 to 11-1/4 in/s

For reels, we have the following native speed capabilities:

Sony APR-5000: 3-3/4, 7-1/2, 15, and 30 in/s
These machines have –50% varispeed capabilites, so the APR-5000 runs reliably at 1-7/8 in/s.

Tapes with controlled variable speed such as those made on a well-behaved "rim-drive" recorder can usually be recovered, but guessing at the proper speed in the absence of some reference (like hum) is a bit difficult and recreating an exact pitch/speed is essentially impossible.

Tapes made with random and jerky speed variations are essentially impossible to recover, although some improvement can be made to assist in understanding the words.

Equalization
—NAB/AES Standard
—IEC Standard
—AME (Ampex Master Equalization)
—Nagramaster
Other custom equalizations can be accommodated.

Reel Sizes—Reels from 2-inches to 12-1/2 inches as well as both NAB and DIN (German/AEG) hubs (pancakes) can easily be accommodated.

1/4-inch quarter-track reels—We have special heads and techniques that can educe crosstalk on poorly recorded tapes.

Special processing / treatment
—We have developed a non-invasive method for playing squealing tapes such as 3M 175 and Sony PR-150
—We repair tapes with broken splices
—We repair broken cassette tapes usually by re-shelling them
—We are accepting some moldy tapes from the U.S. and Canada only
—We can treat sticky shed syndrome (binder breakdown/hydrolysis)

We turned this into a CD-R!

What we do after we play your tapes . . .

Digital Editing
—Samplitude Pro X Suite
—iZotope RX Advanced
—iZotope Ozone
—Additional assorted plugins
These programs provide substantial editing and processing capabilities to clean up recordings. Please note the difference between preservation reformatting (a clean transfer with no significant cleanup) and mastering (making the product as good as possible for public release). We do both.

Preferred output formats for clients
—Data files via Dropbox up to
    4 channels, 24 bit, 192 kHz

Additional available output formats

please enquire as many play formats can also be recorded, but we do not recommend it.

This one was a bit tougher,
but we still got it to play
reasonably well. If the
content had been significant,
we could have improved
the results.