Messages

61

General Discussion / Re: My System

« on: March 19, 2014, 10:41:51 PM »

Thanks, John. You certainly are way ahead of me in your knowledge and experience. Your recommendations are much appreciated. I'll also see whether my consultant has used those tools. I do best with a lot of hand holding with these pro tools.

Larry

62

General Discussion / Re: My System

« on: March 16, 2014, 06:55:37 PM »

Thanks, I am using Izotope RX2 to declick my vinyl after it is digitized by the Pyramix software. Seems to work very well. I had a consultant, Mark Willsher, who taught me how to use the Pyramix software (which looks like the cockpit of a jet plane!) and set up some macros for me to use. He produces recordings and invited my wife and I to attend a recording session at Skywalker Ranch (in Marin County north of SF) where he was recording the Cypress String Quartet using Pyramix along with a triple stack of Pacific Microsonic Model Two's which belong to Skywalker.

He recommended Izotope RX2 as reasonably priced and very effective for various forms of noise reduction. I had been looking at Cedar which costs about 10 times as much as the Izotope. Mark set up the software and we tested different settings until we found one that takes away the scratches without affecting the musical content. You can even record a file which just has what has been removed - a very large number of small and large clicks and no music.

Larry

63

General Discussion / My System

« on: March 15, 2014, 11:11:05 AM »

I found this picture yesterday on the Merging Technologies Website. They are a company that builds pro digital software and equipment, most famous for their Pyramix software, which I am using to digitize my vinyl and R2R collection for posterity. More recently they have Horus which is some well regarded digital hardware.

http://www.merging.com/solutions/sacd-mastering 

The picture shows my system in 2010 (not much changed since then) including both my Bottlehead modified Technics 1506 (playback only) with the Bottlehead prepro mounted below in the same case, and my Otari MX5050 BIII below left. My Pacific Microsonics Model Two (which Paul and Romo both have more than one!) is to the left the Turntable. Steve Koto's Dolby B decoder sits below my TT and the CJ MET-1 multichannel preamp. Since the photo I have added a custom Bottlehead phono pre with variable EQ that Dan built for me that I use for the vinyl ripping.

The only things not visible are my rear channel Avantgarde Solo speakers.  The fronts are a Solo for the center channel and Duos for the stereo pair.

Claude and Dominic of Merging visited me in 2010 to talk about a new consumer oriented software which sadly has only partly been developed (Emotion). They took some pictures of my system, but I didn't know they used one in their promo material on their website. I haven't done any SACD creation (haven't a clue how to do it), but I guess the multichannel aspect of my system gives the viewer a sense of the SACD multichannel.

Larry

64

Nat King Cole Sings, George Shearing Plays / Re: First Impressions

« on: February 10, 2014, 02:20:32 PM »

I finally got to play the album yesterday. It is quite entrancing. In general, I am not very knowledgeable about the jazz offerings in the TP catalogue. It is usually a first time listening to these artists. However, in the case of Nat King Cole, I can remember his black and white television show, with the constant cigarette in his mouth, and the beautiful songs - "Mona Lisa" is one that I vividly remember from 50+ years ago. This album is full of songs like that - memorable tunes and lyrics, beginning with Kurt Weill's "September Song." I read somewhere long ago that Nat King Cole had a limited range of notes that he could sing, and he carefully chose songs that fit within that range.  I certainly don't think about that when I listen to him. What a great, expressive voice. His partner, George Shearing, was equally accomplished. I saw a video of Oscar Peterson explaining the techniques of the great jazz pianists and he demonstrated how Shearing would play whole chords in the right hand to carry the melody line. We have a Yamaha Disklavier and one of the discs we bought for it is George Shearing playing. Quite a bit of fun to have Shearing playing the piano in our living room. Cole was also a great jazz pianist, but we don't get to hear him playing in this album.

Paul did his usual great job in mastering the tape. I don't know what condition it was in, but it sounds really fine - the subtleties of voice, piano and the accompanying jazz combo and strings are all there. Cole is pretty much hard left, and Shearing hard right in the stereo mix, with the other instruments spread around the sound stage. There are not hi-fi stereo extremes in the album - it is designed to highlight the singing of Cole and the piano artistry of Shearing. I wouldn't mind more of this kind of music - there is another pretty popular Capitol singer whom I could suggest.

Larry
 

65

Nat King Cole Sings, George Shearing Plays / Re: They are shipping

« on: January 25, 2014, 12:24:47 PM »

Mine arrived yesterday. I'm warming up the R2R.  Larry

66

General Discussion / Re: Tape Data Storage

« on: December 10, 2013, 04:33:00 PM »

Thanks, Neal.

Larry

67

General Discussion / Re: Tape Data Storage

« on: December 10, 2013, 02:26:20 PM »

Sorry I don't get the Fuji 35-180 reference. I googled it and got Fuji 35 sailing boats and Fuji tape referenced with Maxell 35-180.

Thanks, Larry

68

Service Resources / Re: Otari MX5050 service

« on: December 07, 2013, 03:15:36 PM »

Curt recently posted a question on a Nakamichi Dragon in WBF. He seemed to be very knowledgeable about fixing complex equipment. Glad to know he will be able to help us 5050 owners.

Larry

69

General Discussion / Re: Tape Data Storage

« on: December 07, 2013, 03:10:43 PM »

Steve, that is very interesting. In my current massive ripping project, I generate (at 192/24) about 4GB per hour - about 3600 times less than CERN. To me that is a surprisingly small difference. I have similar concerns about data storage and redundancy and safety - since my project so far has taken 3 years and generated about 15TB of data. I have streamlined the process some and should have about 30TB when I am finished about 2 years from now. However, that is a lot of person hours of labor to lose. So right now I use a big NAS RAID5 system with two extra unused drives and two different backups for the data. I have not done off site storage, but we just rented a big safe deposit box and I am going to put another set of completed drives there. I investigated on-line storage, but with 15TB, the upload time and cost seems pretty high.

Haven't considered tape.

Larry

70

General Discussion / Re: Wally Heider web site

« on: September 20, 2013, 07:55:36 PM »

Steve, thanks for this link. I went to the first page and read the article from Ted Wallerstein of Columbia Records about the first LP they did in 1948 (I have a few of those old blue and white albums.) Nothing about Wally Heider, but very interesting and a different, but quite similar, perspective that what I have been researching for the book on Decca Records I am doing with Winston Ma. Decca was perceptive enough to follow Columbia's lead in releasing the 33RPM LP, while Columbia's arch rival RCA was still fighting to release 45's and Decca's rival EMI was staying with the 78's. Cost both RCA and EMI big money for delaying their move to 33's.

Larry

71

General Discussion / Ray Dolby RIP

« on: September 14, 2013, 12:06:43 PM »

http://www.sfgate.com/default/article/Ray-Dolby-pioneering-sound-engineer-dies-at-80-4810882.php

For tape buffs, I believe that the invention of dolby B may have been the most revolutionary, since it transformed the lowly dictating machine cassette to a reasonable player of music.  In the late '70's Barclay-Crocker's use of dolby B applied to some of the best commercial recordings made 7.5ips 4 track R2R a really fine hi fidelity source. I discovered this particularly with Steve Koto's custom modified original Dolby Labs dolby B encoder/decoder which has made my B-C tapes really come alive.

The Decca people told me that they used dolby A in some of their mastering in the '70's.

Of course, Ray Dolby made his big money in films.

Larry







 

72

Events / Re: California Audio Show

« on: August 31, 2013, 02:24:25 PM »

Thanks, Steve. Good to see you and your stuff there. Interesting that my friend Dennis Davis wrote the first article.
He also mentioned FIM, whom I am now working part time for.  In addition to the Decca book, Winston Ma has asked me to write the liner notes and do a little coordination on some of his new releases.

Larry
 

73

Prerecorded Tapes / Marian McPartland Dies at 95 - 8 albums on B-C Tapes

« on: August 22, 2013, 05:06:01 PM »

Jazz great Marian McPartland died this week. After recording on several labels, she started her own, Halcyon Records. Barclay-Crocker chose her label as one of those to reissue on their dolby B 4 track reel to reel tapes back in the laete '70's to early '80's. I have 4 of the 8 albums that they released. B-C's output was all classical except for a handful of film music and the 8 Halcyon albums which are all jazz. I think they were all live.

Someone with more knowledge of McPartland and Halcyon may want to comment more.

Larry

74

Reel to Reel Tape Machines / Re: Ampex/Quantegy 456

« on: July 21, 2013, 10:42:09 AM »

I had an old reel of Quantegy 456 and there was some shedding. Have you looked closely at your heads to see whether there is some tape shed?  That would certainly cause problems.

Larry

75

Prerecorded Tapes / New Classical Titles at UltraAnalogue

« on: July 17, 2013, 07:53:10 PM »

I just picked up the latest 4 titles from Ed Pong at UltraAnalogue. All chamber music as before. Xiang Yu, violin and Sieste-Jan Wiejenberg, cello are featured in Bach, Beethoven, Mozart, Handel-Halverson, and Vitali. I think the performers are getting even better and the sonics are very fine that Ed records in his home studio. So for those who want to supplement their TP collection with some more classical, these are excellent choices.

Larry