Cool vintage tricks you tried....

steveinaz

In the mid-80's I experimented with recording CD's to a hi-fi VCR. With hi-fi vcrs' fast drum speeds, and recording at fast settings, signal to noise was extremely high---and with NO additional noise reduction scheme needed. Frequency response was also very good.

This method of transfer, and the success I had with it (not to mention the hours of music you could put on 1 tape) worked so well, I ended up selling my beloved Teac X200RBL reel-to-reel. Using the Panasonic hi-fi was far easier, media was cheaper, and it didn't require dbx pro for NR. Transferring the CD's to hi-fi vcr also tamed the digital nasties completely. The recorded sound was very analog sounding, while maintaining excellent fidelity.

A couple years later, DAT hit the scene using a very similar topology, though recordings were done in the digital domain.

Did you ever have any interesting setups?

vc69

I had exactly the same Panasonic (I would imagine) and used it as the 2 track master in a little 8 track studio I had. I eventually purchased a (first gen) Sony PCM2500 DAT. Those damn Hi-Fi VCR's were prone to dropouts.

steveinaz

Unfortunately for DAT, CD's were quickly becoming affordable and more abundant. I never owned a full-on DAT machine, but I would imagine that they also tamed digital well. I don't remember ever having drop-out issues, but recording CD's got tiresome, so I made the transistion to an all CD library. By the time DAT came out, I was knee-deep in CD's.

vc69

DAT was never meant to be a consumer format. I had cd's years before DAT was available.

It was a Pentax VCR that I had... gosh that was a long time ago.

Face

http://www.retrothing.com/2006/05/whatever_happen.html

I believe it also had something to do with Sony's greed for not sharing formats.

vc69

And RIAA's fear of perfect digital copies. Wonder how that turned out for them.:rolleyes:

sk1939

vc69 wrote: »

And RIAA's fear of perfect digital copies. Wonder how that turned out for them.:rolleyes:

Yeah, they sued everybody and their mother in the process too. I'm too young to have gotten into the DAT scene, but I did experiment with recording from CD's to Beta tape (not VHS, although we did have a VCR). Then I got into recording from records to Mini Disc, and after Mini Disc, to MP3 (first 128k then 320kbps)....now I just record from record to lossless WAV.

Professionally, we started recording things to DAT, then to cassette tape on multi headed Sony decks, but since the late 90's - early 2000's we started recording things to either a DAW or CD's.

heiney9

Don't forget VCR's were analog and DAT was digital and the final output had to be converted so the idea of DAT "smoothing" out the digital sound was completely different than transfering CD's to VHS tape. VHS tape as good as it's S/N ratio was, was still one analog generation removed from the original analog output of the CDP.

DAT if enabled could have been a full no loss digital copy.

I used to record VHS concert soundtracks from my hi-fi VCR to cassette tapes on my Nakamichi Dragon.

H9

dkg999

And who can forget quadraphonic sound! I had a Marantz quad receiver, a Dual TT with quad cart, and four Large Advent speakers. Seems like there was another part of that system, but memory fails me. I thought I was cool! I think I only had a few quad LP's, but listening to Deep Purple Machine Head in quad sound with those blue lights .......... now that was the high life!

Polkersince85

I have used and still have the unit which is a Sony ES piece. you feed the music into it, it converts to PCM and is recorded on a vcr. Playback is reverse. Works great. I need to dig that thing out and play with it sometime.

steveinaz

Can't remember the site, but I saw one today that sold DAT tapes.

George Grand

Polkersince85 wrote: »

I have used and still have the unit which is a Sony ES piece. you feed the music into it, it converts to PCM and is recorded on a vcr. Playback is reverse. Works great. I need to dig that thing out and play with it sometime.

I have one of those too Ken, it is a Sony PCM-501ES.

I used to cd onto videotape also. This all seemed to work fine and sounded GREAT, with very few drop-puts, as long as you used the exact same machine for playback that you recorded on. I have never seen another tape medium that was so dependent upon this. That's why it sucked.

mhardy6647

Just to clarify, VHS HiFi and Beta HiFi audio are helical scan, FM analog recording formats that offer excellent frequency response and dynamic range. While in theory the higher tape speed will offer (slightly) better performance than lower tape speed (SP vs. EP); in practice even the EP audio will be excellent. Listening to EP VHS HiFi dubs of very vintage vinyl Christmas albums even as I type this (on the Yamaha CA-610II/Polk Monitor 7A system in the family room; fire burning in the fireplace).

There were also stereo VHS VCRs that used the linear audio track for stereo audio. These are awful (the tape speed is 15/16 ips at SP, if memory serves). They can be identified because they will also typically have Dolby NR (and need it!).

The older/better HiFi Audio VCRs were designed to record stereo audio with or without accompanying video, and had variable input level controls and VU meters to set recording levels. Our ca. 1986 Zenith VCR is clearly, and proudly, labeled as a VHS Stereo HiFi Audio/Video Recorder. :-)

steveinaz

Yes, the plain vanilla "stereo" VCR's differed (greatly) from actual Hi-fi VCR's which used the helical head to lay the audio track, rather than a seperate stereo tape head.

Like I said, I had very satisfying results with the hi-fi Panasonic I owned. Far better than even my Teac Z6000 cassette tape deck, which pretty much ruled the day back then, with its only real competition being the Nakamichi Dragon. I don't know if the Nak could be optimized for a particular tape (brand) like the Teac Z series. I had mine tweaked (via the pots on the front of the player) for Maxell Metal.

George Grand

"IS" clearly labeled. He still has/uses it. Did you find that baby in the dump Hardy?

My first hi-fi vcr was a 30lb., $499 (at the BX) 1986 model VR-2220. It lasted until 2001 where it had been relegated to babysitter duty in my two daughters combined, bedroom HT rig. It wouldn't accept remote commands or a bunch of other things, but it still played videotapes just fine.

It was also the last hi-fi vcr I spent more than $100 for new, and the last one to weigh more than 10lbs.
Pretty soon you can buy a carton of smokes and maybe get a free hi-fi vcr glued onto the end of the carton.

Polkersince85

it is a Sony PCM-501ES

That's the unit, George. I use it with a professioinal S-VHS unit I got from the local Medical college. All kinds of dials and meters on that baby. That VCR must weigh 60 lbs. It's bigger than my Soundcraftsmen MA-5002 amp!

mhardy6647

George Grand wrote: »

"IS" clearly labeled. He still has/uses it. Did you find that baby in the dump Hardy?

Not the Zenith ;-) I got it at the "Stereo Discounters Show and Sale" in Timonium, MD, ca. 1986. Big bucks for a grad student it was, too.

Now... in the intervening decades I have picked up one or two at my favorite shopping destination. Many are dysfunctional; fortunately the dump has a generous return policy.

Happy holidays! I gotta get to bed.

skrol

"Stereo Discounters", that is a name I have not heard in many of years. I used to frequent the one in Dundalk and swing over to Stansbury Stereo where I first experienced Polk Audio. Stansbury later became Bryn Mawr (where I bought my RTA11TL's) and then Tweeter and then, ...well, you know.

WilliamM2

skrol wrote: »

"Stereo Discounters", that is a name I have not heard in many of years. I used to frequent the one in Dundalk and swing over to Stansbury Stereo where I first experienced Polk Audio. Stansbury later became Bryn Mawr (where I bought my RTA11TL's) and then Tweeter and then, ...well, you know.

Wasn't Stereo Discounters owned by Stansbury Hi-Fi? I ordered Denon separates from Stereo Discounters, when delivered the receipt was from Stansbury, I still have the receipt. Denon wasn't listed in the SD catalogs, but you could get it if you called.

skrol

I am not aware of an Stereo Discounters - Stansbury connection but I guess there could have been. As I recall, Stansbury had a little higher end stuff. I sure miss the days when you could pop into your neighborhood HiFi store and audition some decent equipment.

Oops, I guess we got off topic.

heiney9

steveinaz wrote: »

I don't know if the Nak could be optimized for a particular tape (brand) like the Teac Z series. I had mine tweaked (via the pots on the front of the player) for Maxell Metal.

Yes it could. Had seperate test tones and calibration for each channel for setting bias for each individual tape via a signal generator. It was bar none the best deck I ever heard.

The obvious advantage was the auto azimuth alignment. Any tape made on any deck could be optimized for the best play back in the Dragon. Nak also had uber expensive car decks that did the same thing.

The Dragon was a marvel of engineering and execution using the finest components. If there was any need for tape today I'd still have mine.

I did the whole VCR thing and it was cool, but unless you had some sort of indexing with search you could never find the beginning or end of songs. I used mine mostly to record Hi-Fi pre-recorded material to the Dragon rather than the other way around.

H9

steveinaz

The Dragon was very, very cool--I think the only thing cooler was the Dragon TT. I wish Nakamichi would go mainstream again.

heiney9

steveinaz wrote: »

The Dragon was very, very cool--I think the only thing cooler was the Dragon TT. I wish Nakamichi would go mainstream again.

I agree I used to lust over the Dragon TT. They made 2 versions. A members brother here had one FS recently.

Nak lost their way and never recovered. There was quite an upheavel in the Nakamichi family with the 2 brothers having a bitter battle and the old man dying.

H9

steveinaz

First time I saw the Dragon TT in the PX in Germany, I was in awe. There was a crowd of GI's just staring at it and lusting...LOL It made my Yamaha PF-800 look pretty lame.

sk1939

heiney9 wrote: »

I agree I used to lust over the Dragon TT. They made 2 versions. A members brother here had one FS recently.

Nak lost their way and never recovered. There was quite an upheavel in the Nakamichi family with the 2 brothers having a bitter battle and the old man dying.

H9

Yeah, after the Nakamichi family had a internal conflict, then the company was bought by the same company that now owns Sanyo, and then the Nakamichi in the Nakamichi company left.

As far as DAT still goes, it is still used quite a bit in recording studios, because it can be synced with timecode stamps (and do multitrack recording), among other things, although it is starting to be phased out by DAW's, but not quite yet.