RE: arsclist reel to reel player/recorder

["Copeland, Peter" <Peter.Copeland@xxxxx>]

Sorry this discussion is getting rather skewed, because of the
time-differences between your continent and mine! Since others have leapt
into the deep end, I will fill you in on our philosophy here at the British
Library.
    Because of lack of resources, we are currently copying only "vulnerable"
media, by which I mean stuff which will self-destruct even if you leave it
on the shelf in benign conditions without even touching it. In the case of
tape this means:
(1) Acetate-based tape, which Holly Robertson already knows about;
(2) Thin-based tape, in which print-through increases with the logarithm of
the time;
(3) Polyurethane-binder syndrome tape, which hardly affects us because the
disease never afflicted British-made tape.
    This leaves (1) and (2). In these cases, the power-bandwidth product of
the original material is always much less than even an ordinary Red-book
compact disc, so we move the sound onto gold CD-Rs in duplicate. This
combines a long-life medium, a medium for which there are over a billion
players (so we are more likely to be able to play the things in future), and
one *not* controlled by "software" (which always seems to evolve with only
one layer of downwards-compatibility). We also find that copying the tape
only takes about twenty percent of the operator's time. The remainder is
taken in printing the CDs (we use Thermal printing), listening to the sound
and documenting it, making the inlay cards, and getting the complete
accession-record into the National Sound Archive's computer "Cadensa". This
includes the serial numbers of the CD-R discs, so if a batch becomes faulty
before its expected time, we can pull all the discs of that batch off the
shelf and start an emergency recovery programme.
    Messrs. Studer in Switzerland still make machines on this side of the
pond, but I understand there's only one model now (their type A807). For the
weird formats on quarter-inch tape, we are always looking out for examples
of a domestic/semi-pro machine made in London in the 1960s, the Brenell. It
has four tape speeds (1.875ips to 15ips), the Model 510 can handle NAB
spools, and there is enough space to mount four tape heads so it can be
assembled to play most track formats. (Mine contains an internal plugboard
so any head can be connected to any amplifier. And my amplifiers have been
built to cope with NAB, CCIR, and IEC characteristics). It's such a low-tech
machine that any half-competent engineer can keep it running!
    Here endeth the second lesson.   Peter Copeland
<peter.copeland@xxxxx>
 
-----Original Message-----
From: Holly Robertson [mailto:hollybry@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx]
Sent: 12 June 2001 19:55
To: 'ARSCLIST@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx'
Subject: RE: arsclist reel to reel player/recorder



Mr. Copeland, you mean there is no panacea?
Ha ha, just kidding.  In an effort to invite all sorts of experiences with
audio reel machines, I thought I'd just toss the general question out
there, but I should've footnoted it for the technically inclined.  I'm
from a primarily manuscripts archive with rich non-traditional (read:
non-paper) formats.  We are investigating methods to better handle the
preservation and accessibility of our audio recordings, going through the
growing pains of realizing what we can do (i.e., what equipment we can
purchase, what expertise we have, what sort of committment we can make -
in terms of time as well as budget) versus sending our materials out to
have preservation copies made elsewhere.

We have a bevy of reel tapes from a variety of sources -- every size from
about 3" to 10.5" most of which seem to be 7.5 ips and 15 ips, but so many
are unlabeled and as of now we have no way to know as we have no reel
player.  And while I don't have records that our reels are anything but
full or 2 track, I can't rule out 4 track as once again many are unlabeled
as to their tecnical specifications.  To boot, most of our reels come from
the "problem" times: a lot of the cellulose acetate tapes are 30-50 years
old and fragile and brittle; we also have a fair number of polyester tapes
from the mid 1970-1980's that we suspect of sticky shed.  

Right now, it seems to me most sensible to send out our current holdings
of original audio reels to a professional in audio migration/engineering
and purchase a reel recorder (here's where I'll attempt to define formats)
for the soul purpose of making those ordained preservation copies (from
original recordings currently on cassette, phonograph, CD, etc.) on to
1/4" audio reel, freshly obtained from a recognized manufacturer, at full
track for the more important items and half track for those of lessor
judged importance, and at 7.5 ips and reel spool measuring 7" in diameter.
At least until a uncompressed, non-sampling format appears heaven
sent, and from all the salesmen I've talk to lately that answer currently
appears to be flash memory (whole other can of worms).

>From all the email today, it seems there are two companies that still make
these monsters new (Tascam, Otari) and other brands available used
(Studer, Sony, Tandberg, and others, I'm sure).  And while I've heard
several recommendations on the Tascam BR-20 and the Otari 50-50BIII, 
does anyone use what looks like the lower end Tascam model, the Tascam 32?  

Thanks to everyone for their response and interest, off list and on.
And if anyone has any horror stories or words of inspiration and survival
re: making-analog-copies-on-audio-reels-in-the-digital-age-in-a-non-sound
recordings-focused-archive, I'd love to hear them.

Holly Robertson
Associate Archivist
Russell Library for Political Research and Studies
University of Georgia Libraries 
Athens, GA 30602-1641
www.libs.uga.edu/russell/russell.html


On Tue, 12 Jun 2001, Copeland, Peter wrote:

> Here at the British Library National Sound Archive, we do not know of a
> machine which will play all track-formats and all spool-sizes and all tape
> speeds and all equalisation curves, even if we only confine ourselves to
> *quarter-inch* tape! I'm afraid you must define the formats you're talking
> about first.
> Peter Copeland
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Holly Robertson [mailto:hollybry@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx]
> Sent: 12 June 2001 13:54
> To: ARSCLIST@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Subject: arsclist reel to reel player/recorder
> 
> 
> 
> Could anyone recommend an audio reel to reel (player/recorder) brand and
> vendor? 
> 
> Thanks in advance, 
> 
> 
> Holly Robertson
> Russell Library for Political Research and Studies 
> University of Georgia Libraries
> Athens, GA 30602-1641
> www.libs.uga.edu/russell/russell.html
> 


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