Hi Shai:

Here is a description of the system with a link to the user manual:
http://mixonline.com/TECnology-Hall-of-Fame/1978-EM-Mastering/

-- Tom Fine

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Shai Drori" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Friday, November 09, 2012 2:15 PM
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] Early digital recording history -- RCA's first (according to Billboard)


> Any info on tape speed and recording time per reel? Just my quirky brain?
> Shai
> בתאריך 09/11/12 7:01 PM, ציטוט Tom Fine:
>> Ye olde Billboard via Google Books yields another tidbit ...
>>
>> Levine/CSO - Mahler #7 was RCA's first digital recording. Medinah Temple, July 1980. The 
>> Soundstream system was used, and according to Billboard interviews with both producer Thomas Z. 
>> Shepard and Soundstream head Thomas Stockham, it was a more elaborate setup than previous 
>> Soundstream projects. Stockham said that his tape machine (a Honeywell instrumentation recorder) 
>> was capable of up to 8 tracks, although the typical Soundstream setup was 4 tracks and usually 
>> (in the case of Telarc at least), it was duplicate stereo sends. For the Levine/CSO recording, 
>> Soundstream was sent 8 channels from RCA's recording setup. So two Soundstream electronics units 
>> were sync'd together and the 8 separate digital signals were fed to the tape recorder. One can 
>> imagine how slow the editing was with 8 tracks loaded into the DEC computer. This was all 
>> probably pushing the capabilities of the Soundstream system. According to several different 
>> interwebs sources, the record wasn't released until 1982. I wonder if there had to be some R&D at 
>> Soundstream to get the project edited and mastered?
>>
>> -- Tom Fine
>>
>
> -- 
> בברכה,
> שי דרורי
> מומחה לשימור והמרה של אודיו וידאו וסרטים 8-35 ממ.
>