 |
 |
On 2015-03-10 1:43 PM, Tom Fine wrote: > I agree with Richard in every point except I disagree with this: > "high quality music was never supposed to be recorded in a bidirectional > manner and quarter track was not a high quality music format." I accept your correction. With any format there is a small subset of tapes that far exceed the norm and we have to always be vigilant with knowing that we have one of those tapes. I think it is pretty obvious if we have one and then we take special care. It's well less than 1% and since my business does not generally do mass-duplicated commercial tapes, that could explain it. Copyright holders/agents thereof usually have access to something better. I'm leaving all the below so we have it in one place. > > There is a small subset in the sea of fast-duped quarter-track tapes > that are high-fidelity and sound very good to this day. And, I have > heard plenty of homemade recordings, mostly made in the late era of > quarter-track reel decks, mostly made on high-quality Scotch or Maxell > tape (good slitting, smooth movement across the thin-track heads), which > sound excellent. I've also transferred amateur live recordings and > "masters" of home-brew band recordings from quarter-track tapes, some of > my own and some made by others. When they were recorded well, they > sounded very good. The last-generation quarter-track decks, like the > Technics 1700, the Pioneer RT-707 and RT-909 and the Teac X1000, when > combined with low-noise tape and not over-driven with too-hot levels, > made quieter recordings than Ampex 350 2-tracks in the age of > brown-oxide tapes. I also made plenty good-sounding quarter-track client > dupes onto Revox A77 machines at Sigma Sound Studios NYC. > > The problems with many fast-duped quarter-tracks: 1) the Ampex 3200 > transport going at 30 or 60IPS, combined with 1-mil tape (no matter how > well it was slit) is just not a model of stable tape handling. A stable > tape path is key to quarter-track success. 2) at least in the early > days, the recordings were made on two heads on each duper slave. Very > few duper employees kept those heads in great azimuth alignment all the > time. 3) even when recording was made on a single 4-track stack, azimuth > alignment depended on the care and skill of the duper operator. 4) many > duped tapes suffered from being several generations removed from the > master tape, and this became more the case in the quarter-track era > because the goal with tape-duping was always lower costs and faster > output. 4) when duped tapes standardized to 3.75IPS playback speed in > the late 60s, it was all over! > > Many of the above problems also could apply to 2-track duped tapes, but > in many cases, 2-tracks were premium-priced niche products and a bit of > care was taken in their manufacture. > > One other note about 1/4-track 1/4-inch tapes -- I've transferred more > than a handful of Quad discrete-track tapes, and they tend to sound > excellent, and the quadraphonic effects are always better than > matrix-decoded LPs (much better channel separation). > > So, I conclude that while putting 4 tracks on a quarter-inch of tape is > non-ideal, it's not inherently low-fidelity. My experiences with tape > tell me that tape speed and what tape type the recordist chose to use > are the biggest factors about fidelity with these machines, assuming > they are in good working order and the heads are properly aligned. > > -- Tom Fine > > ----- Original Message ----- From: "Richard L. Hess" > <[log in to unmask]> > To: <[log in to unmask]> > Sent: Tuesday, March 10, 2015 1:19 PM > Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] Tape dubbing backwards? > > >> On 2015-03-10 12:14 PM, DAVID BURNHAM wrote: >>> When I talked about phase reversal when a track is played backwards, >>> it has nothing to do with azimuth, I'm talking specifically about the >>> polarity of the audio, which will be inverted whether the azimuth is >>> correct or not. >> >> Thanks for clarifying, David >> >> I was attempting to address several different concepts. >> >> - If made on well-slit tape on the same machine at roughly the same >> time, and assuming that both tracks of your premium repro head have >> precisely the same azimuth, the azimuth error coming off the forward >> and backward passes will be the same. Therefore adjusting for one will >> automatically adjust for the other. >> >> - For any tape that I would do this with, there will not be tones for >> precise azimuth alignment and none of the stereo tools will help as >> there is only one track (unless you have a split head like the >> Nakamichi Dragon's inner track heads) so you cannot compare. Therefore >> we are relying on peaking high-frequency energy from the program >> content as the sole means of adjusting azimuth. While that gets it >> close it is not as good as using tones. >> >> - I concur with Tom Fine and others, I pick what tapes I do this with. >> I would not do high quality, music that way, but high quality music >> was never supposed to be recorded in a bidirectional manner and >> quarter track was not a high quality music format. However, there are >> always exceptions to the rule. I do not reduce my charges because >> these tapes also often require more post processing and other >> fussiness so I can afford to do some if I capture in one pass. >> >> - If you do a reverse transfer the audio will require a polarity >> reversal in the software to match the forward channel. >> >> - There is no absolute polarity reference on a tape, so one cannot >> know which of the two tracks is correct. It is a toss up as to which >> is correct. You might do as well listening to see which sounds more in >> polarity and switch the other one. Or viewing the waveform is >> sometimes instructive (positive peaks are usually higher than negative >> peaks) >> >> Cheers, >> >> Richard >> >> -- >> Richard L. Hess email: [log in to unmask] >> Aurora, Ontario, Canada 647 479 2800 >> http://www.richardhess.com/tape/contact.htm >> Quality tape transfers -- even from hard-to-play tapes. >> >> > -- Richard L. Hess email: [log in to unmask] Aurora, Ontario, Canada 647 479 2800 http://www.richardhess.com/tape/contact.htm Quality tape transfers -- even from hard-to-play tapes.