Re: [ARSCLIST] DAT Archival Housing

[Tom Fine <tflists@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Richard is 100% right. And, unlike reels and disks and cassettes, it's hard to argue with any 
science behind you that you cannot get EXACTLY what is on a non-damaged DAT and put it on your hard 
drive, using a simple digital cable. If a DAT was recorded at 44.1K sampling rate, then the same can 
be said about a simple S/PDF or AES connection between a DAT machine and a CD recorder.

So I can't see any reason to make a big deal about "preserving" DATs. I CAN see making a huge deal 
about transferring DATs to other digital media ASAP since DAT mechanisms are no longer made and it 
is a fast-submerging format that is unlikely to be usable in a decade or two.

Bottom line -- any dollars you'd invest in "preserving" DATs is better invested in a 
managed-hard-drive storage system (managed = drives continually refreshed and several backups of 
every file, off-site backups preferable).

-- Tom Fine

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Richard L. Hess" <arclists@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <ARSCLIST@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Saturday, February 17, 2007 3:01 PM
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] DAT Archival Housing


> At 02:43 PM 2007-02-17, Farris Wahbeh wrote:
> > List,
> > Any suggestions on how to archival-ly house DAT tapes would be most helpful.
> > Are the plastic cases that they come with archival-ly sound? What are some boxes that can be used
> > to house the tapes? Has anyone come across a box that fits both DAT and CD's together?
> > I can't seem to find any in the Gaylord catalog.
>
> That's because they and the machines they play on are not archival. The only archival way of 
> storing a DAT tape IMHO is to transfer it to a digital repository or a gold phthalocyanine dye 
> CD-R, with the former method preferred. DATs are living on borrowed time. THey are far more 
> fragile than analog open reel and fewer machines were produced (I think) and few if any machines 
> are being made now...just like open reel in a much shorter timeframe.
>
> Cheers,
>
> Richard
>
>
> Richard L. Hess                   email: richard@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Aurora, Ontario, Canada       (905) 713 6733     1-877-TAPE-FIX
> Detailed contact information: http://www.richardhess.com/tape/contact.htm
> Quality tape transfers -- even from hard-to-play tapes.