[Vintage-Audio] Re Recording 78 RPM To Other Media

[Duane B. Fischer, W8DBF]

Charlie, 	
	
First, I do not use a computer to do any of my recording or other audio work
with.	
	
I have been doing this now for forty years. Man, that sounds like a long time,
but four decades sounds even worse! I use all hardware devices, some of which
are stand alone and others that are integrated into the main sound system.	
	
I learned long ago, that every time another step in a process is added, the
quality of the end product generally is compromised. Whether it is a photograph,
audio, computer CPU time needed to convert languages to binary etc. Every noise
a computer adds, must be removed. Why filter out noise, and compromise the audio
frequency coverage and response, if you can avoid the noise that you must filter
back out? Such as using an Equalizer. 	
	
I will not detail my method here, as it is very involved and many on this list
could probably care less about converting vinyl recordings to a CD format.	
	
Simply put: I use the high end consumer audio equipment, and some near studio
grade equipment, that is purchased only by those who are true audio reproduction
accuracy nuts, (once upon a time they were affectionately known as audio
aficionados, now just as audio-fools). Today the true 'audio-fools' are the ones
who spend fifteen thousand dollars to purchase a vacuum tube integrated stereo
amplifier and tens of thousands more for everything from Oxygen free wire to a
anti-gravity suspension stylus etc. It is good for the economy! Somehow I just
do not think it is a sound investment to have an audio system that all of the
creatures with audio reception ranges outside those of human beings can also
enjoy. I strongly suspect that their taste in music may differ enough from mine
that they could wind up in my stew pot, pickled and hanging over the fireplace
or fertilizing the flower beds! 	
	
Charlie, I record from a turntable having variable speed to exactly match that
of the source, and use a stylus that is of the elliptical diamond family
tracking at .65 grams. (This is for 33 1/3 RPM vinyl albums, not 78 RPM media!
Which requires deeper groove penetration by about 2 mils, a wider stylus point
and a tracking weight of 2-4.5 grams +/-) The audio is fed by gold plated low
loss cables to a DAT deck, (DAT = Digital Audio Tape). 	
	
I am able to control the speed at which the DAT deck records, studio and
consumer speeds are different. I also can regulate the input from analog to
coaxial to optical etc. I use no EQ at any time.   	
	
The deck does use SBM (super bit mapping) and 'emphasis'. I am able to remove
noise that is not part of the music and get a CD quality product. It does not
enhance the audio frequencies of the source signal. 	
	
The DAT allows me to edit a track, insert a track, remove a track or change the
sequence of the tracks easily. Features such as "auto-ID" and "renumber" allow
me to automatically insert the instructions for a track prior to it being played
and if a track has been added or removed, renumber the ID data for each track.
Unlike the CDRW deck, I am not limited to four times and then no more editing or
incompatibility issues due to the special format used for CDRW that will not
play on about half the CD players out there today. I have full edit capability
at any time and that makes all the difference in the quality of the end product.
 	
	
Because vinyl recordings wear, even when used by the most cautious of humans,
some noise is ever present. This is most noticeable leading into the first
selection on either side of a vinyl album or into a particular favorite song
that got played a lot! I manually fade into and out of each track from the
source to the DAT deck to eliminate this noise when possible, and minimize it
the rest of the time. However, one must 'know' the music in order to do this!
Some songs have false endings, some end very abruptly when you least expect them
to and others blend into the next selection with almost no pause. Listening to
the album prior to recording it is mandatory! Even if you know the music, it
helps to refresh your neurons.	
	
It also comes in very handy when the last few seconds of a song have damage,
such as a scratch. You can time the music and do a fade down and out just prior
to the damage.      	
	
One trick to getting a vinyl album with a scratch on it to play through, is to
simply put a tiny drop or two of ordinary water on the scratch. Many times the
stylus will not become stuck and play through. 	
	
Sometimes this scratch turns out to actually be a single human hair that is
either across several grooves causing the stylus to skip or is actually in the
groove following the curvature. How does a totally blind man find these? Simple.
He uses his thirteen year old grandson equipped with a large magnifying glass!	
	
Once I have the DAT recorded to my satisfaction, I copy it track by track to the
CDRW deck. I manually stop the recording after each track. This allows me to get
exactly the number of silent seconds between each track that I want. Being as
little as one tenth of a second off with some CD players will result in them not
recognizing the code that tells the CD player it is a new track! Yes the tracks
all play if you let the CD play through. But if you try to manually select a
specific track it may not find it. For example, tracks five and six may be seen
as just track five, even though they are both present. One sure give away is to
compare the total number of tracks on the source against the total number of
tracks on the copied CD. Sometimes there will be a number indicating more tracks
and other times it will show less tracks. The more tracks results when the CDRW
hears a random noise and jumps back to the start of the song, which is still in
its memory, and begins recording it again. This will show up as track five being
the song and also track six being the song. Pressing either track gives you the
same song, but if you just let it play through, the song is really only heard
one time. Isn't technology great?	
	
That should give you a little to ponder Charlie. I hope you are still awake and
not snoring with the end of your nose on the keyboard home row!     	
	
Duane Fischer, W8DBF