Tape Transfer Mastering Recommendation

[captainj]

I am looking for a top notch mastering studio that can transfer a stereo 48k/24 (ITB) mix to stereo analog 30ips prior to mastering. I'd appreciate any recommendations.

Thanks,
Jon

[jdg]

are you looking to just layback your tracks to tape and get them back digital or finding a studio that will layback to tape and master from that?

[Darius van H]

Why not just find a good mastering studio that can work with tape that will take care of the whole mastering process? Then you have the option to run to tape during the mastering, although you may find that you get better results without going to tape (although you'll have that possibility).

[Time Tech]

PM sent.

cheers.

Bruce Maddocks
CUPS 'N STRINGS are experts in digitizing, restoration and preservation of audio recordings. audio analog to digital transfer specialists, Los Angeles

[captainj]

not sure if I understand your question. If you mean transferring the tape to digital and mastering from that vs. mastering directly from the analog, then yes I think I would like to skip the extra AD-DA conversion and master directly from the tape. However, I can see the advantage of having a flat transfer from the tape to digital (future hi-rez remaster?)

[Greg Reierson]

Any busy mastering facility will have good analog machines. I agree with the posts above. Minimized your steps and have your ME give you samples with and without the analog stage.


GR

[Table Of Tone]

If you are gonna put your digital mixes to 1/2" tape, you wanna master directly from the tape, using the tape machine as your playback!
That is the best way for sure!

Try to avoid going back to digital before getting the stuff mastered because there is a good chance that it's one conversion too many.

The company that makes the most reliable and best sounding tape has also just folded which means you can't buy good tape new right now.
I for one am truly gutted!

I just cut an album last weekend which was mixed from protools onto this newly available 1/2" tape, and then back to the digital domain and it just didn't have the dynamic range!
I ended up mastering from the original digital 48k/24 bit mixes that the tape had been created from in AIR studios in London.
They were using the slightly older Apogee purple converter (which I actually really like) but the digital mixes yielded better results for sure on this record.
I never got a chance to cut the record from the actual tape because just the one reel had been used over.

You need to find some stockpiled tape that's been stored properly.

If it's an album, your gonna need four reels if you wanna do it properly.
If you get the right tape on a well set up ATR it can sound killer!

[Greg Reierson]

Originally Posted by Table Of Tone

The company that makes the most reliable and best sounding tape has also just folded which means you can't buy good tape new right now.
I for one am truly gutted!

Who is that? I just bought a case of 1/4" from ATR.


GR

[Table Of Tone]

I meant the ATR 100 or 102 tape machine.

Did you just pick up a case quantegy tape?
If so, get more now as they're no longer in business!

[Greg Reierson]

ATR Magnetics, LLC


GR

[Time Tech]

Quantegy stopped making tape several years ago.

AFAIK ATR Magnetics and RMGI are the companies making Pro Audio Tape these days.

Back on topic, tape compression aside, I really don't see the sense in dumping a ITB mix to tape if the SR is below 88.2K.

It would be like "upsampling" a 44.1k file to 88.2K. You are not going to get anything more than what was in the original file.

Best case method would be to play out the session and record it onto tape.

Another option would make one pass as a flat transfer, and a second pass through a BASE unit or another type of "analog spectrum enhancer".

A solid external wordclock and quality D/A would also be required.

During mastering the tape should be used as the playback element, and mastered with either an Analog signal path, or Digital plugs working at 88.2 or higher.

IMHO that would be the best way to get the most out of the process.

Cheers,

Bruce Maddocks
Cups 'n Strings LLC

CUPS 'N STRINGS are experts in digitizing, restoration and preservation of audio recordings. audio analog to digital transfer specialists, Los Angeles

[captainj]

Hi, I appreciate the advice, however; I still want to transfer my 48k mix to tape prior to mastering. I have heard the benefit of doing this with 44.1/24 and even with 44.1/16. In any case, it's all subjective I suppose, and I happen to like the sound that tape imparts.

So back to my original post, I should add that it would be ideal (though not essential) if the mastering studio was in the UK as the artist wants to spend some of his UK £.

Gear should include top quality converters (ie Weiss, Prism, Lavry Gold, etc..), tube compressor (Manley, Requisite, etc....), eq's etc.....All the stuff you'd expect from a top notch mastering facility..including a great ME.

Budget is approx $450 US/ £300 UK (this is for only 1 track)

If that seems unrealistic, please let me know.

Thanks again,
Jon

[Table Of Tone]

Originally Posted by captainj

Gear should include top quality converters (ie Weiss, Prism, Lavry Gold, etc..), tube compressor (Manley, Requisite, etc....), eq's etc.....All the stuff you'd expect from a top notch mastering facility..including a great ME.

Budget is approx $450 US/ £300 UK (this is for only 1 track)

If that seems unrealistic, please let me know.

You should have no trouble getting the job done for that price or less in the UK!

I disagree with the 88.2k mastered digital capture because you are gonna need to get it back to 44.1k at some point which will mean another conversion that is best avoided!
Most of the serious AD converters have more dynamic range at 44.1/48k than they do at the higher sample rates.
My Lavry gold has 130db at 44.1/48k and 127db at 88.2/96k!
This comes straight out of the manual so at least Dan Lavry is being honest.

I have yet to hear an AD or DA converter that performs with quite the same dynamic range at the higher sample rates!
The makers probably just give you the 44.1/48k spec?

[illacov]

What???

Why would dumping a digital mix to tape (layback) and back to digital thru hi grade converters do NOTHING?? As far as the 88, 76, 60khz shit, don't worry about that. Upsampling the mix isn't what's important here. Better converters at 44.1 khz are going to smoke shit converters at 192khz because of a myriad of factors. If a guy records your stuff into a 50 dollar soundcard at 88 khz versus the guy who does it at 44.1 on Orpheus converters there will be a big difference.

Shoot a PM to bgrotto, he just gave me an INCREDIBLE quote for layback. Definitely within your budget.

I have the same situation as you.

I want to layback my OTB mixes to tape, which actually have all the multitrack stuff already layed back to tape at 15ips, but my two track machine isn't that good vs my 8 track machine. There's studios out there with upgraded ATR machines with the aria electronics blah blah thing going, sounds good from what I've heard on the web.

I however don't want to use anyone else to master my band's stuff except the ME I always use. But he doesn't have a 2 track machine in his studio. This hasn't stopped other big name clients from using him, but he understands what I want so he's cool with the scheme I came up with.

The studio is going to receive the mixes either FTP or Fedex on DVD at 24 bit 44.1 and shoot them out to the 2 track machine at 15ips onto RMGI 911.

They do a hi res recapture (I guess I get a mp3 to check for results) and then shoot a DVDR to me and possibly to my ME.

My ME masters the taped mixes and renders to digital.

I have him send the masters back to the first studio and they layback the masters to tape and digital.

Should sound phenomenal.

Peace
Illumination

[wado1942]

As far as the 88, 76, 60khz shit, don't worry about that. Upsampling the mix isn't what's important here. Better converters at 44.1 khz are going to smoke shit converters at 192khz because of a myriad of factors.

I agree. Although RECORDING at 88.2KHz or 96KHz is advantagous, upsampling for playback is not. The DACs always upsample internally to their maximum rate. That is, if you feed a DAC 44.1KHz or 88.2KHz, it will upconvert to the same rate during the reconstruction process. The exception is in the cheapest converters which are always set to fixed ratios. So whether you give it an 88.2KHz rate or a 44.1KHz rate, it will always bump up the rate by something like 8x. So in the case of good DACs, it makes no difference, you're just adding another time consuming stage. In the case of poor DACs, it will actually sound worse upsampling ahead of time because you'll double the jitter by clocking them faster.

[Table Of Tone]

Originally Posted by wado1942

I agree. Although RECORDING at 88.2KHz or 96KHz is advantagous, upsampling for playback is not. The DACs always upsample internally to their maximum rate. That is, if you feed a DAC 44.1KHz or 88.2KHz, it will upconvert to the same rate during the reconstruction process. The exception is in the cheapest converters which are always set to fixed ratios. So whether you give it an 88.2KHz rate or a 44.1KHz rate, it will always bump up the rate by something like 8x. So in the case of good DACs, it makes no difference, you're just adding another time consuming stage. In the case of poor DACs, it will actually sound worse upsampling ahead of time because you'll double the jitter by clocking them faster.

Most but not all DAC's upsample to their maximum rate.
My prisms possibly do but my lavry definitely does not!

I do agree with not upsampling ahead of time for the reasons you described.

[Time Tech]

The point that I was making is that you are not going to get any more "information" by doing a flat transfer from a 44.1 or 48K data file to tape.

Yes, depending on type of machine, speed, tape type, and operating level analog tape will impart its own character to the mix.

But it will not add more subtle information, it can only work with what it is given frequency wise (22k for 44.1, 24k for 48K)

My suggestions for adding slight spectral enhancement and then to recapture at a higher sample rate is to insure that all the desired detail that was wanted out of the exercise in the first place is fully recaputered, and not brickwalled again by the original SR.

We speak of any good mastering studio being able to handle this, so why not assume they can easliy deal with a 88.2 source file? The higher sample rate gives more clarity for Analog Mastering, and more horse power for digital tools to do their jobs. A good mastering house should be able to comfortably SRC a 88.2 file down to a Redbook 44.1.

The M.E. should master from the Tape Transfer if he has a solid 2 track deck, and N.R. if used.

What I feel is that if the engineer wishes to take the extra effort/step to get the most of their ITB mix, they should recieve the best quality tape transfer and returned DATA file they can.


I would be happy to provide samples of what I have suggested.

Cheers!

Bruce Maddocks
Cups 'n Strings LLC
Cobaltt Mastering

CUPS 'N STRINGS are experts in digitizing, restoration and preservation of audio recordings. audio analog to digital transfer specialists, Los Angeles

[illacov]

Originally Posted by Time Tech

The point that I was making is that you are not going to get any more "information" by doing a flat transfer from a 44.1 or 48K data file to tape.

Yes, depending on type of machine, speed, tape type, and operating level analog tape will impart its own character to the mix.

But it will not add more subtle information, it can only work with what it is given frequency wise (22k for 44.1, 24k for 48K)

My suggestions for adding slight spectral enhancement and then to recapture at a higher sample rate is to insure that all the desired detail that was wanted out of the exercise in the first place is fully recaputered, and not brickwalled again by the original SR.

We speak of any good mastering studio being able to handle this, so why not assume they can easliy deal with a 88.2 source file? The higher sample rate gives more clarity for Analog Mastering, and more horse power for digital tools to do their jobs. A good mastering house should be able to comfortably SRC a 88.2 file down to a Redbook 44.1.

The M.E. should master from the Tape Transfer if he has a solid 2 track deck, and N.R. if used.

What I feel is that if the engineer wishes to take the extra effort/step to get the most of their ITB mix, they should recieve the best quality tape transfer and returned DATA file they can.


I would be happy to provide samples of what I have suggested.

Cheers!

Bruce Maddocks
Cups 'n Strings LLC
Cobaltt Mastering

CUPS 'N STRINGS are experts in digitizing, restoration and preservation of audio recordings. audio analog to digital transfer specialists, Los Angeles

I think we've all wandered into a circle of negative agreement. We're all saying here here! But we've already agreed with each other, our gavels are just banging too loud to hear it.

Sure great fine, hi rez yada yada, to the OP go for it. Send the mix to tape, whoever is doing the layback will recapture it at the optimum rate they work with unless they're a complete moron. Again, any 2 track mixdown that's in the hands of a skilled tape operator is going to sound good going to a good deck in good calibration on good tape going to good or great converters at X sample rate.

Negate any one of those many factors and you can have Lavry Emerald converters at 384 khz doing the capture at 64 bit audio and you can just get your poo meter out before you receive the file.

Like I said bgrotto (on GS) is good for this, Mike Wells Mastering does this, many others, some of the thread participants I believe are able to do this for you, just take a stab at it, if its worth it for you to have your mixes on tape then get out your credit card, aim and fire.


I know that's whats going to happen for me.

Peace
Illumination

[KyleDiSanto]

Masterdisk - Experienced Music Engineering

[Silver Sonya]

Am I stating the obvious to mention these guys?

This is their entire business. They do nothing else. I learned about them through Tape Op.

Excellent work.

- c

[captainj]

thanks everyone for your feedback - it looks like there are lots of options to look into

Jon