Listen to the examples on the ClickRepair website.

On "Fiddler," there is very good success removing the bad ticks and pops, but to my ears some of the 
"air and space" is removed, but not enough to fuss since the really annoying surface damage was 
removed. The sonic image seems to be stable.

On "Capercaile," there aren't any audible digital artifcats, but the overall EQ has been changed a 
bit. Listen especially to the sibillences, to my ears they are louder and harsher. Also again some 
"air and space" (mainly reverb tails) are gone.  It sounds more "digital" than LP fans would 
probably like (brighter and somewhat "metallic"). In my experience, when you apply hum notching or 
rumble removal, you do effect other frequencies because you are removing an amount of information, 
and it's likely out of phase to something else, especially in a stereo recording. So you have to 
listen carefully to untreated and treated and decide if the hum or rumble is annoying enough to be 
worth the other changes you make in overall EQ.

The "Dvorak" click removal was completely successful, to my ears, but I'd want to hear a part with 
very quiet playing or less playing to make sure there isn't the "digital gurgle" of semi-removed 
surface noise, which to my ears is more annoying than un-treated surface noise.

The Ted Weems selection is another example of the EQ changing. Listen to the differences in the 
cymbols at the beginning and the triangle or xylophone at the end of the clip. I would suspect the 
"dehiss" did something to the overall treble EQ profile.

The Percy Grainger is all wrong on several counts. First of all, someone transferred it with a 
stereo cartridge, so the surface noise overpowers the music rather than being partially cancelled. 
Second of all, the phono EQ was clearly wrong, you could cut a lot of that surface noise by using 
something like the Restoration Preamp, EQ'ing to ear to preserve the piano and as little other as 
possible. There is a faint amount of "room tone" that should also be kept. You could definitely 
low-pass out a lot of the high hiss. Once the hiss and click filters are applied, you end up with a 
digital mess. It sounds like a warbly synth effect rather than a piano, and the percussives of the 
key strikes are gone. To me, this is a classic example of over-use of a digital tool. However, it is 
how all to many "restorations" of old, old records sound.

Bottom line is, as with everything in life, there is no magic nostrum. You can sometimes improve 
something so it sounds better to your ears, but it's very rare when you can remove the "bad sounds" 
without effecting the "good sounds," usually in a bad way. My bottom-line assessment of ClickRepair, 
based on the examples provided on the website, is that it's a useful tool, very much value-priced, 
and worth trying, but with a keen ear for the consequences of using it.

-- Tom Fine

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Richard L. Hess" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Saturday, April 21, 2012 11:26 PM
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] SV: [ARSCLIST] Reducing crackle on 78s analogue and digital


> Hi, Jan,
>
> I have both DC6 and DC8 but have not used DC8's click repair as I never really liked DC6's.
>
> As I said, my experience was on a very bad LP and there was no comparison to DC6 or the Samplitude 
> product. I only tried a little with DC6 as the Samplitude product always worked better for me.
>
> It is a mixed bag, but for the price ($40?), I would try Brian's little program. You can check the 
> price at the website
>
> http://clickrepair.net/
>
> It was less than the upgrade to DC8 when it was on sale, and I haven't used DC8 except to try it 
> and not see a huge improvement in noise reduction over DC6. Maybe, I'm missing something. I think 
> Brian's tools are a great addition to the toolbox, both denoise and clickrepair. Also EQ. Your 
> mileage may vary. I have not tried Izotope recently. It had promise, but it didn't offer an 
> improvement for me for my tape work. I have not evaluated it for disc work as that's not my main 
> business. I've just fallen into a dozen or so LPs recently that people wanted me to do as part of 
> larger packages or 'cause they are friends willing to pay. The real noisy one I just did for a 
> friend.
>
> Cheers,
>
> Richard
>
> On 2012-04-21 9:01 PM, Jan Myren wrote:
>> Hi again!
>>
>> Have you really checked out DC6 and think this Click repair is really
>> better? What's the price on it?
>>
>>
>
> -- 
> Richard L. Hess                   email: [log in to unmask]
> Aurora, Ontario, Canada           (905) 713 6733     1-877-TAPE-FIX
> http://www.richardhess.com/tape/contact.htm
> Quality tape transfers -- even from hard-to-play tapes.
>