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Offline ironbut

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Calling all Pro's
« on: January 18, 2009, 11:23:50 AM »
I've been planning to buy a studio grade machine for a while. I think most of us think about this (if we don't already have one) and after considering the different needs that such a machine has to integrate into a home audio system, I'd like to get the experience of the professional audio guys we have here on this forum. What I'm looking for here are some of the more practical issues regarding the machines you've had such as reliability, ease of use, and any particular issues having to do with interfacing one into a home audio system. After all, getting one of these machines represents a pretty large investment in money and/or time and work to restore. There are lots of candidates such as Sony, Ampex , Studer, Scully, Otari etc. that have fans out there, but how do they compare?
I think that there are enough seasoned professionals here so we should be able to get some good first hand knowledge so potential owners will have a better idea of what they're getting themselves into before they buy one.
steve koto
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Offline Teeg

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Re: Calling all Pro's
« Reply #1 on: January 18, 2009, 05:58:33 PM »
 Steve-

     I am by no means a pro (and this is in fact, my first post since officially joining this forum); living in close proximity to New York has afforded me the opportunity to personally look at quite a few studio grade machines so I'll share the experience from the buyer's standpoint.
  New York City (and the surrounding boros/Long Island) were probably saturated with recording studios at one time, so its not uncommon to come across used high-end RTR equipment for sale.  When I went to look at a machine, the first requirement was that is had to be usable.  You mentioned 'investment in money and/or time and work to restore' , but used machines either work and were kept well, or they werent, and were complete junk. If a machine actually came from a studio, it usually worked or was close to it, unless it was a multitrack big-tape machine, which requires thought into the costs of converting to a smaller format.
  The majority of machines I looked at were simply 'acquired' by someone renting a building and were probably left by the previous tenants because they were not worth moving.  I came across quite a few Otari machines in this fashion; most were sitting in harsh environments (welding/fabricating shops, abandoned studios that were wet, etc). Many were two-track mixdown machines but had so much visible wear/physical damage that they needed untold amounts of work.
  Sony machines were also common, but only in multi-track formats, and I wasnt able to approximate a cost to convert to two-track, plus spare parts seem tough to find.
  Studer machines were usually found at working studios; their owners simply set them aside as they migrated towards digital recorders. Like the Sonys, the Studers were usually multi-track formats with big headstacks......not cheap.
  Ampex was my holy grail.....unfortunately I was not able to find an affordable ATR100 series machine that was runnable without major work. Even the machines I saw that needed a complete rebuild exceeded my budget, although I suspect that the buyers purchased them with high hopes but probably did not realize what they were into.
  In the end, I stumbled across an Ampex ATR-800 that was working in a studio up to the day I purchased it. It was clean, came with full documentation plus plenty of spare parts, and had a good reputation among small studios as being a good performer and reliable. It was a half-inch four-track machine, but Mark Spitz at ATR Services outfitted the headblock with new 1/4" heads, and compared to my other "consumer grade" machines, it is akin to comparing an economy car to a Cadillac.
  The bottom line of all this was this: to get into a studio machine I had to either purchase a rebuilt/restored one from a reputable shop, or acquire a cheap one and spend the money anyways, which put many machines out of my budget. You then have to factor in transport and spare parts, a big part of the equation.

  I could go on for literally *forever*, but hopefully this was something worth sharing.

T.j.
T.j. Bassi  
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Offline ironbut

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Re: Calling all Pro's
« Reply #2 on: January 18, 2009, 08:52:44 PM »
Hi Tj, welcome to the forum. Thanks for your input but I guess I should make myself a little clearer. I'm interested in some opinions of some of the folks here who have experience in a working environment who, over the decades, have used many of the top machines. I'm not actively looking for one (anymore than I have been for the last couple of years) but thought that this thread could be of service to anyone who might be thinking about one.
steve koto
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Offline reelnut

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Re: Calling all Pro's
« Reply #3 on: January 19, 2009, 04:15:25 PM »
Hi Steve-

Although you know I'm not a pro, you also know I have a Studer A810, An RS-1500, X2000-R, etc, etc. I would like to tell you that I do the maintenance on all of my machines and the Studer is by far the easiest machine I have to work on. The biggest job I had to do on it was changing the "basis board", which runs across the entire width of the machine and has around 12 cards plugged into it. It was a major task studying the machine and figuring out how I was going to do it. I was really surprised at how little dis-assembly was actually required. Most repair jobs would be far simpler than this because the machine is completely modular. I'm sure I could not have performed an operation like that on my X2000-R, for instance.

I was told during the purchase process of the A810 that "Once you use a Studer, you won't want to use anything else". That statement is very true. The Studer makes my Teacs, Akai, and Technics machines look like toys, literally.

I cant' tell you about any of the other pro machines because I don't have any.

I believe Ki Choi would likely tell you the same thing about maintenance, and I believe you know how many pro machines he has, not only Studer, but Sony and maybe others. You might shoot him a message this weekend. He is on the east coast until Friday.
John Hanek (dedicated amateur)- A810, X2000R, X1000R, A3440, GX636. Played thru Yamaha CX1, MX1, YST-SW150 (2), S55 (2).

Offline ironbut

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Re: Calling all Pro's
« Reply #4 on: January 19, 2009, 06:23:01 PM »
Thanks John, that's very interesting. I think that most professional machines are built for the long run with inevitable repairs from somewhat abusive situations in mind. Considering how complex the systems in the newer Studers are, your experience is very telling. In fact, one of the motivations for this thread has been some rumors that I'd heard that some models of Studers are less reliable than others. And contrary to what I would have guessed, it's been the less complex models that have been sited. Now, this is all total hearsay so I don't want to go into any specifics but I'm hoping that folks with first hand knowledge might.
Another thing that inspired this thread was a reply that Paul had made saying that an Ampex 440C with the servo capstan was a nice machine. While we all may dream about having MikeL's listening room with his A820 and ATR102, this just isn't in the cards for many of us. So finding out about machines like these could be some of our road to reel to reel heaven. I hate to think about it, but I'm sure that a great many of these wonderful, but not top, machines have found their way to landfills or long term storage and their owners won't even bother to try and sell them. The same goes for the big Otari's.
So if theres a machine that you know intimately and you don't think it gets the mention it should around here. This is the place.

Tj, I hope I didn't come across as being harsh in my reply. I'm just hoping to keep a little focus in this thread. I envy your owning an ATR since it's been a long time dream of mine to have one myself (I actually had a picture of one on my bedroom wall when I was a teenager! Scary huh?)
steve koto
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Offline reelnut

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Re: Calling all Pro's
« Reply #5 on: January 19, 2009, 10:32:48 PM »
I should make another comment about that A810, which some fight find interesting, and I certainly thought was waaay cool- I know I mentioned the machine is modular. But even on that basis board, which has 16 card slots, plus 10 more plug-in points, and over a dozen wiring harnesses going off of the board to other areas of the machine (I just now went and had a look at the old one, so I'd know what I'm talking about here!), there was not one wire which needed to be cut or soldered. Talk about plug 'n play!
John Hanek (dedicated amateur)- A810, X2000R, X1000R, A3440, GX636. Played thru Yamaha CX1, MX1, YST-SW150 (2), S55 (2).

Offline Tubes n tapes

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Re: Calling all Pro's
« Reply #6 on: January 20, 2009, 12:50:35 AM »
I fully agree with John. The Studer A810 is a very good choice. The commercial machines from Technics, Teac and Akai indeed look like toys in comparison. The A810 is in many ways identical to the A820 in that it uses the same heads and the same audio plug in boards. The audio performance of both machines is substantially the same.

The main difference between the two machines is the application. The A810 was targeted for broadcast use and mobile recording. The A820 was targeted for recording studio use. So, the main difference between the machines is that the A820 is optimized for a tape handling that has the absolute minimum of stress on the tape under all conditions of use. Keep in mind that the original mastertapes of so many iconic albums constitute an enormous value and need to be handled in the most gentle way. The A820 has no stationary surfaces touching the magnetic side of the tape other than the head surfaces during playback and record. During FF and REW there is no friction on the magnetic surface at all. The machine furthermore keeps the same tape tension under all circumstances including braking.

For the A810 the situation is different. The practical application is broadcast and mobile recording. Speed of use is the predominant factor for this machine. During record and playback the A810 also only has the head surfaces as friction points as well as an excellent tape tension regulation just like the A820. However, as soon as you go to FF or REW, the situation is very different. The tape is lifted immediately from the heads with stationary tape lifters and the machine will literally give 'full throttle' to accelerate as fast as possible. The tape tension will be as high as the motors can generate. During breaking it is even worse, it will brake at its very maximum power by applying both the mechanical brakes and 'full throttle' of the motors in the reverse direction at the same time.
If you switch from FF or REW to play, it will brake very fast until the tape reaches the play speed and immediately switches to play without having the tape come to a stop first. That is really cool by the way and incredibly fast.

So, to make a long story short, the A810 will give you virtually the same playback performance as the A820, which is probably the best R2R ever made. Your tapes will, however, see dramatically more mechanical stress. For normal 1.5um tapes (Agfa 468 and Ampex 456 etc.), that is no problem. For 1um commercial tapes (long play) it may stretch your tape, especially with 7" reels. Double and Triple play tapes will be transformed into a wire after a braking session.

Another option worth considering, for normally not too much money, would be the Studer B67. This machine uses constant tape tension during braking as well and has nice playback electronics, similar to the A80, but not quite the same mechanical performance.

Just my 5 cents worth.
Arian Jansen.

SonoruS Audio.
VP of technology of the Los Angeles and Orange County Audio Society (LAOCAS).
ESL/OTL builder and modest Studer/ReVox collector.

Offline mikel

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Re: Calling all Pro's
« Reply #7 on: January 20, 2009, 08:07:51 AM »
i wish this thread (and all the info in this forum) would have been here to read 20 months ago when i 'fell head-long' into RTR. i remember it was so frustrating trying to find answers to questions.

i'm no pro, likely the farthest from it; and do my best to refrain from giving any sort of advice.

OTOH; regarding Studer's......Fred Thal is one perspective worth considering. He did make some comments on Studer A810's on the Studer List last May which i think might be helpful to keep in mind when buying a used A810 or any used RTR deck. There is a value in buying a fully reconditioned Technics from Doc; or an ATR from Mike Spitz......or getting a Studer reconditioned by Fred. Unless you are qualified to inspect one of these machines yourself it's a crapshoot out there.

added note for those not already familiar with Fred; he has strongly held perspectives on RTR and Studer machines and is not afraid to tell it like he sees it. he characterizes RTR hobbiests (like me) as TRQ's (Tape Recorder Queers).

refreshing. ;>)

*******************

"Let me clue you in on A810s. Very few on this list using A810s bought theirs new. That is to say most who are using A810s, bought them used.

Someone was unhappy with my recent disparaging comments on the A810. I had lumped the A810 into a category of earlier, non-constant-tension broadcast machines from the USA manufacturers Ampex and Scully, calling all these machines poor performers in the time-base accuracy category.

Actually, I hadn?t noticed the mention of the A810 in the original post, where someone was asking which machine to use. But considering how bad off most A810s coming from eBay are today, I can probably just let my comment stand.

The problem is that the majority of A810s saw extremely heavy service before being retired to eBay (or collected from a dumpster and then resold on eBay). I look at totally trashed A810s that people have only now acquired and I just have to wonder what they are thinking.

Meanwhile, these new owners are looking lovingly at these major projects, so enamoured are they, with this, their very first Studer.

It is not just the flattened heads and the mirror-polished capstan surfaces and the rock hard pinch rollers and the ripple in the audio rails. Many of our A810 (ahem) specialist resellers take twenty such machines apart at a time to select and harvest the cosmetically best donor organs.

Then, they throw the piles of all the reject parts back together as machines to be resold.

So, what can we say, when someone posts here about their new A810 that makes scraping noises whenever tape is moving? Who wants to tell them that it might require about ten thousand dollars worth of work and parts to restore it to new condition? Could anyone be surprised? Should we be more sympathetic?

None of this is new. And it is of course not limited to A810s. It has been going on with all tape recorders on the used market for decades.

I often speak of provenance when giving counsel to would be buyers of used tape machines. The A820 or the A80 master recorders (the platforms WORTH restoring) whose provenance we know (and can prove) might easily command a price that is many times that of a machine with an unknown history.

Anyone reading this who was the original purchaser of an A810 knows what fine little machines these were. But to any prospective buyers of the used trash that people are shifting around today, all I can say is caveat emptor.

Fred Thal

*********************


« Last Edit: January 20, 2009, 10:27:19 AM by mikel »
Mike Lavigne

Offline Teeg

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Re: Calling all Pro's
« Reply #8 on: January 20, 2009, 08:50:20 AM »
  Interesting comment about the Ampex 440c; hopefully more discussion about the 440 series comes up in this thread. Those machines are relatively common and affordable (well, perhaps not the C), easy to work on and spare parts are plentiful. I own a 440B with SS electronics, and while it is a nice machine, it can be awfully rough on tape in the hands of an inexperienced user.

 Steve-no harshness noted in your reply; I understood where this thread was going and maybe jumped in too enthusiastically.

Tj
T.j. Bassi  
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Offline reelnut

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Re: Calling all Pro's
« Reply #9 on: January 20, 2009, 10:47:05 AM »
Wow, looks like someone might have an A810 which was badly out of adjustment! I could not disagree with the comments  Tubes n tapes made more! Another posting from me is in order here.

To begin with, the A810 does not stretch tapes in any way, shape or form. The LED counter is extremely accurate and all of my tapes are the exact same length now as they were the first time I played them. I know this for a fact because I have a Loc point programmed for 3600' tapes at -96:30. When starting rewind, I position the end of the magnetic tape over the left guide roller as a reference and the counter is reset. After pressing Loc1 and then pressing Play, the tape rewinds (at full speed) to this point, playback begins and the music starts at -96:25. This is the way I have set up my 3600' tapes and if the tapes were stretching, this kind of automatic playback operation would not work. Furthermore, accuracy is right to the second. I also have a Loc point for 2500' tapes programmed at -66:30 which works in the same manner. Very handy!

"The tape tension will be as high as the motors can generate." That statement is simply false. Tape tension is adjustable for each reel during Rew, and a separate set of adjustments set tension for each reel during the FF operation!

"..dramatically more mechanical stress". No way Jose! It's apparent from the observations I've made and my personal experience, as noted above, that the A810 is the only machine I have which does not subject the tape to ANY stress. As for the insinuations that after pressing Rew or FF the machine reacts just like an out-of-control powerhouse, nothing could be farther from the truth. It spools faster than my other decks, but that is a positive aspect of its operation. It's also true that the machine has not one, but four spooling speeds and Tubes n tapes neglected to mention that!

Triple-play tapes: I have in my posession three triple play tapes. The A810 is the only machine I own which I trust to play these tapes. It most assuredly doesn't break the tape as was suggested, nor does it stretch them, as counter readings are consistent every time the tapes are played.

Regarding mikel's comments and quotations from Fred Thal, I'd have to agree there. It's usually true that you get what you pay for. That's why I'd recommend buying a used Studer from Filmco. You don't need to use ebay, just give them a call and they will set up a deck for you just the way you want it. Shipping is strictly air freight on it's own pallet via Forward Air, then trucked, still on its own pallet via Forward Air in an air-ride trailer to the nearest F/A terminal, if necessary. Filmco purchased all of Studer Canada's parts inventory a few years ago when Studer pulled out of North America, and have a technician who's worked on Studer decks for 20+ years. The deck they sold me did not have a shiny polished capstan, in fact it was just the opposite. The heads had not even a trace of a flat spot on them. The pinch roller, far from being old and brittle is a Studer part, having a slightly greenish color, and being made of some type of silicone compound it should last a very long time, unlike the $50 so-called "Studer" pinch rollers commonly available on ebay. In a nutshell, the deck runs with the precision of a swiss watch.

Lastly, there is the support issue. Filmco stands behind their machines. The only reason I had to change the Basis Board to begin with is because I tried inserting a card incorrectly and cracked the plug-in receptacle on the board. I was wondering what to do about that and Filmco didn't even hesitate, they immediately said they'd send me a new board, no charge! They took the time to pull a working basis board out of another machine for me, and sent it without even charging me for the shipping.
John Hanek (dedicated amateur)- A810, X2000R, X1000R, A3440, GX636. Played thru Yamaha CX1, MX1, YST-SW150 (2), S55 (2).

Offline Tubes n tapes

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Re: Calling all Pro's
« Reply #10 on: January 20, 2009, 06:46:15 PM »
That's interesting, John. Your A810 apparently has a setting or software release that I haven't seen yet. My A810 (which is very well adjusted) and the handful that have passed through my lab all were not regulating tape tension during braking, but were braking at maximum reverse torque. (Great for fast editing). All clearly intentional because it nicely stops very controlled with the tension arms in the correct position again. The tape tension setting for FF and REW you are referring to only adjusts the tension during actual FF and REW, not during acceleration or deceleration. You can adjust the peak torque on the motors to a lower level, but that doesn't fully mitigate the mechanical stress for thin tapes on small hub 7" reel like the Revox A700 does for instance. Again the large stress only happens during braking and to lesser extent during acceleration, but not during actual FF, REW or PLAY. Any stretching over the full length of a 1mil tape won't therefore be measurable with the tape counter.

If there is a software version or a dip-switch setting that enables tape tension regulated braking, I an very interested to learn about that.

Anyway it was not at all my intention to pull the A810 down. Quite to the contrary, it is a great machine and it is my favorite machine in many ways, the accurate counter being one of them. I mainly use it with 1.5mil tapes and occasionally with 1mil tapes. Double play tapes and certainly triple play tapes, I play back with my A700 because of the tension controlled braking of that machine. The sound quality of the A700 is pretty mediocre but so are all those double play and triple play tapes anyway.

Fred's comments about the state of many A810s is very valid. There are many A810's around, which is a good thing, but if you can't restore them yourself, it is better to buy it from a qualified source, because they are quite complex machines. That is not gonna be cheap but compared to modern audiophile pricing it is always a bargain.



Arian Jansen.

SonoruS Audio.
VP of technology of the Los Angeles and Orange County Audio Society (LAOCAS).
ESL/OTL builder and modest Studer/ReVox collector.

Offline reelnut

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Re: Calling all Pro's
« Reply #11 on: January 21, 2009, 09:53:05 AM »
Arian-
Thanks for clearing that up. I re-read your initial posting and can see that you were referring to tension during acceleration and braking, not referring to tension during the spooling mode itself!  Your observations are certainly correct in that regard.

I am confused about your recent comment that any stretching over the full length of a 1 mil tape would not be noticeable on the tape counter. It looks to me like if the tape was stretching at all the difference would show up on the counter, and as earlier noted, I have not noticed my counter readings increasing by even 1 second. Thus I assume the tape is not stretching. I would like to re-iterate that the A810 is the only machine I have that I trust to play the several triple-play tapes that I own. It just does not have problems handling anything, as far as I can see!
John Hanek (dedicated amateur)- A810, X2000R, X1000R, A3440, GX636. Played thru Yamaha CX1, MX1, YST-SW150 (2), S55 (2).

Offline Tubes n tapes

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Re: Calling all Pro's
« Reply #12 on: January 21, 2009, 11:21:11 AM »
John,

I double checked with the A810 manuals, just to make sure I wasn't talking rubbish. The A810 indeed accelerates and brakes with the peak torque of the spooling motors. According to Studer you can set that peak torque for anywhere between 3 and 6N. (The normal tape tension during playback and spooling is 0.75N). You can set it even lower but that is apparently not recommended and the machine becomes quite sluggish in that case. In practice the peak torque is not regulated by the tape tension arms but preset on the spooling motor driver. That is why the stress on the tape with small hub 7" reels is really high even with the minimum recommended peak torque.

The stretch on a 3600' 1 mil tape wouldn't really be measurable on the counter because the actual stretch is only a few percent and happens only during the short length of tape during initial acceleration and braking. The effect will be more on a 1800' tape on a 7" reel. (That stretch slowly recovers over time, so it is not a disaster)
It has to be said that I have the peak torque adjusted close to the maximum for fast maneuvering with 10" reels. If I use a triple play tape on 7" reel, it will dramatically stretch the tape when you stop at the end of the tape or it pulls the tape in between the pancake and the reel. Ugly in both cases. At the minimum peak torque, that may not be the case.

In any case, my original post was intended to describe the basic difference in philosophy between the Studer recording studio machines like the A80 and the A820 and the Studer broadcast machines like the A810, and also the A807 and the Revox C270. But unlike the latter two which have some additional compromises, the A810 is substantially the same in almost all its parameters to the A820 during recording and playback and that makes it in my opinion one of the most interesting machines to get.
Arian Jansen.

SonoruS Audio.
VP of technology of the Los Angeles and Orange County Audio Society (LAOCAS).
ESL/OTL builder and modest Studer/ReVox collector.

Offline ironbut

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Re: Calling all Pro's
« Reply #13 on: January 21, 2009, 06:29:58 PM »
Does the 810 have a provision for library wind (it usually involves an alternate threading scheme)? In any case, it sounds like the 810 wouldn't be a very good choice if you have a lot of acetate tapes (like I do). Acetate backing doesn't stretch, it breaks with less than very gentle tape handling (they become even more brittle with time so they're very prone to breaking now that they're at least 33 years old).
steve koto
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Offline mikel

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Re: Calling all Pro's
« Reply #14 on: January 21, 2009, 08:56:00 PM »
Steve,

the A820 has library wind and it is really slick. one button engages it and the speed of library wind can be easily varied. it uses the standard threading scheme. beautiful tape pack every time.

who cares how the A820 sounds......it's just way cool watching it gently handle the tape. a thing of beauty.

mikel
Mike Lavigne