Re: [ARSCLIST] Digital Audio Preservation Question

[Tom Fine <tflists@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Speaking of all this, what formats were used with the Commodore computers in the 80's? I remember a 
very primative "computer music" setup at college, circa 1984-88, based around a Commodore color 
computer and a Radoshack TRaSh-80. Come to think of it, what sound format(s) did the TRS-80 use?

For what it's worth, as I recall, the output of the computers were dumped onto Tascam multi-tracks 
and then over-dubbed with more bad-sounding nonsense from the computers. I think the computer 
programs were saved on 5.25" floppies but it may have been cassette tapes for the older gear. I 
remember thinking, I guess they can't spring for a Synclavier.

-- Tom Fine

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Don Cox" <doncox@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <ARSCLIST@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Monday, April 14, 2008 12:49 PM
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] Digital Audio Preservation Question


> On 14/04/08, Frank Strauss wrote:
> > Nothing that I know of can read the images that were produced by an
> >
> > > Apple ][ based graphics system that we used around 1980. There are
> > > many custom graphics setups from that period whose output will be
> > > lost unless somebody managed to convert it in time.
> > >
> > > Even reading cp/m data disks at all is very difficult.
> > >
> > > And we are talking about a period that is considered quite recent in
> > > audio recording terms.
> > >
> > > Regards
> > > --
> > > Don Cox
> > > doncox@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> >
> > Maybe some of those images were saved on the 5 1/4" Apple 140 kb
> > floppy disk drive.
>
> Fortunately I was able to transfer most of them to "modern" floppies
> before the Apple gear was thrown out. But suppose you were presented
> with such disks, with images (or audio) that needed to be preserved, you
> would be in difficulties.
>
>
> Physical data carriers are just as much a problem as data formats.
>
> And the example is just one of hundreds of formats that were in use in
> the 80s.
>
> Audio is actually in a good position - relatively few formats were used,
> compared to graphics.
>
> Regards
> --
> Don Cox
> doncox@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx