"see if you can pick up the tape noise in this type 1 cassette" -- nope, i was too distracted by the terrible wow and flutter on the deck which manifested as a wobbly sounding piano 😅
@@BrentWatkinsMusic Do you own a BIC machine? They're decently built I'd say above average and they sound definitely above average of their class. IMHO one of the most pleasing piano key deck around with bright warmly lit VU meters and cassette well backlight.
Thanks for the great channel and contest. I was one of the winners. The tape arrived quick, well-packed and safe. Kudos to Nashville Supply Company for their shipping, packaging and sponsoring the contest. Will be recording something special on it soon. Thanks again to all involved.
You worried about noise ? The flutter will annoy me much more and if that deck is mine I repair it if possible or I wont use it anymore. Another thing about Dolby: you MUST calibratie your deck to the tape you want to use, in case of Dolby C within 0,3 dB else artifacts might be heard.
Thank you! I was about to write the same thing, the first deck had really bad flutter, the second, it was noticable too, switching between source and tape you could hear the wobbliness, it sounded a bit fragile on tape. I'd suggest those decks def get a full service and check the w&f is within manufacturers spec.
Same here, don't use it... could be a warped pinch roller, but how about wearing out bushings of parts that aren't available for decades. Not worth the risk.
I honestly kinda dig the hiss. Back in the day, it was annoying because you had to deal with it, but now that we have digital options if you're gonna be using cassettes your obviously not interested in getting the most possible out of your music. The imperfections give the format its unique and cool sound, so I definetly prefer it off.
Never had a problem with dolby C killing any highs and i love it. I find the calibration settings on this Sony deck a bit suspect for a maxell XL-II tape. Its difficult to imagine that it needs thst much bias and level. I personally believe that most problems with dolby are due to user error or equipment issues.
Congrats on the 6K subscriber count! Never thought about this until now, but Dolby A, B, C .... then S? Did they skip some letters, or have failures D-R along the way? (Reminds me of an old Mad Magazine joke about being a "beta tester" for preparations A through G). ... anyway a quick Google reveals S was the consumer version of SR for "Spectral" Recording. I think for most consumers, convenience features would override fidelity features, and by 1989 the instant track selection of CD would cause people to lean toward that format to say goodbye to fast-forwarding and rewinding. And without a Dolby S car deck, there would probably not be as much incentive to upgrade an existing working deck.
1:44 A certain type of distortion is due to the tape physically moving over the head, sort of a stick/slip in the kHz range. it's like how a violin bow works and causes a jitter like distortion. But that is proportional with signal level. NR cannot address this. Tape hiss is due to the finite size of the particles making up the magnetic layer compared to the width of the tape (head), and their alignment. Magnetic particles about half the size of rice grains could be used on a tape the width of a two lane road and have the same performance as an ok Type I. Speed also matters, as a slower tape speed generates more audible hiss. I believe it's the same hiss independent of speed, just shifted into different parts of the audible spectrum depending on speed.
I share most of your thoughts on Dolby usage. Generally speaking I use it when I need it depending on the source, music and tape type. I don't own a single portable Dolby C player but I have several Dolby B Walkmans so I can pull some Dolby C tapes within the range of acceptability. Your BIC T-3 could really use a service, both needles need attention and there's a lot of flutter which could be bad for the health of your machine. It could be a seizing take up spool, a dry capstan bushing (especially the back one) or the motor front bushing or a combination of all of the above and more.
I always use noise reduction for Cassette Tapes, B type for type 1 tape and C type for type 2 tape and no noise reduction for type 4 tape. I also use B type for 8 Tracks recordings and have had a lot of success with my Ex noise reduction system, that can work well with both B & C systems. The Ex system works in a very different way to Dolby noise reduction, by working with the phase off set between left and right audio channels.
I would point that very silent room at home has background noise about which our hearing is not very aware and it is minimum 25 dB but in more usual conditions it may be even 35dB . Pleasant no annoying level of listening is for me and my neighbours about 65, (say max 80dB) that makes minimum required treshold for pop music about 40 dB. Data for cassette without Dol;by is usualy about 45 dB - this gives 5 dB safety margin that we will not be at least annoyed by it's noise. Dolby B grants in normal pop/ jazz music max 55dB which gives already 15 dB safety margin - we can listen loudly and it is for silent moments in music or brakes between tracks. . Dolby C makes 63 dB treshold - even during listening 100dB loud we will hardly notice tape noise. That is why I generaly not use dolby to avoid forgetting to switch it on and off without noticing. . It makes to me no difference except when I play brand recorded in DolbyB tapes. I also have deck with High Com system which is comparable to Dolby S and works very well but I do not need it. I find the same as author - a bit noise is comfortable to keep ears continuously tuned to sopranos. Because with single instruments they adopt too quickly. I notice that playing DolbyB recorded tapes with Dolby not switched on is possible and in most cases satisfactory and helps a lot to avioid dynamic distortions. caused by Dolby system which requires exact levels of signal from heads. In most cases that level is affected by dirt on tapes and hardened dirty filt in cassette or not good tape transport or not good condition of head. Anyaway with care it may be achived and it is worthy because sound is better.
A lot of those SAME people who claimed that NR systems 'dulled out' the tape.... were also people who never demagnetized their tape heads. Ya gotta DO that.
I don’t bother with Dolby: too many variables that need to be exactly right for it to function properly, and poor transferability between decks. Instead, I play my tapes through a single-ended external denoiser (Behringer SNR 2000). 20-25 dB of noise reduction and no artefacts. By the way, the piano track on your BIC deck sounds wobbly. Wow & flutter issue ?
Yes! Finally! I'm still running a dehumidifier in there for the time being to be safe. Still have some siding to put back on outside, but that'll be done soon.
I never cared for any of the Dolby sound reductions, at least B and C... I preferred dbx on TDK-SA tapes. A recording from a CD was just as clear and with almost an identical noise floor. Too bad it failed.
I guess there's a difference between those who listen for nostalgia and those who want to hear how good analog can get. The cassette format was dependent on noise reduction technology to be viable. I would never listen to a cassette that didn't have Dolby B at the minimum, and Dolby C was even better. Like our host, I never knew Dolby S existed. Dolby did impact the source content, however. A better test of Dolby noise reduction would be to listen to the ring out of a crash cymbal. Monitoring the source would reveal the subtle nuance of the high-end harmonics the crash of a cymbal creates. These subtle inflections tend to get quashed by Dolby noise reduction. Granted, the difference is slight, but noticeable. But once on the tape, hiss takes over ALL this subtlety, so if you listen to cassettes, I think using Dolby is a no-brainer.
There's truth in many views... it strongly depends on how many dB(s) of range your let's say music has. If you have dance music chances are Dolby or no Dolby will make no difference at all except in fade outs to silence. But I could certainly discern the subtle details you're writing about. My recipe is sometimes to offset the highs of a certain level... which kind of partially defeats NR but it's PRE so technically no, it just makes up for the perceptual adaptation of the sound. Practically you hear as if it were the same but it isn't. Dolby B has a little drop off towards the end of the spectrum so it might help with that.
I have a Sony deck with Dolby S I bought a few years ago just to mess around with the format. I also have a single pre-recorded cassette with Dolby S encoding--Prince The Hits vol 1. It sounds really good, but still not quite the quality of CD. I'm thinking of trying to record some 24-bit/192khz DVD-Audio tracks to a type 4 tape with Dolby S and to a type 1 tape with no reduction to see how much degradation there would be between them and the original source.
I give out promotional tapes at events, and do use Dolby B on them. They're mostly talk content, so the hiss is noticable. I just tell folks to turn the treble down a bit if their deck doesn't have Dolby.
OUCH! Is it my headphones or my ears? I can't hear as much noise as I was expecting. Oh - I've turned up the volume! But there's a lot of frequency flutter.
I couldn’t even hardly tell the difference until the audacity bit. I listened on my TV thru a Denon AVR and Klipsch RF-35 at normal -29dB listening level via Ethernet. They all sounded well within an acceptable listening experience. I’ve found in my recent recordings when using Dolby B,C,or S , that when activated it should just barely change the music. Like only take the very small hiss and not the highs away. Then I’ve used inferior tape and the recording is dull with Dolby on. I have pre-made tapes from the 80’s that sound great with Dolby on , and pre-made tapes that are muddy with it on. Some pre-made tapes are made from a superior master copy and others are not. Just like CD’s , they are copies of original tape masters. Some sound amazing, others are just ok. A CD’s output level is also way higher than a tape. I have 12 tape decks from 10 dollar machines to 800 dollar ones. They all sound amazing if you can master the tuning of the deck. Speed , Azimuth,clean head and pinch roller, along with a quality blank like TDK, Maxell , or Sony. All the decks are quality vintage models run thru a vintage Amp and speakers. I enjoy a good CD , I enjoy tapes more. It’s a warmer less clinical sound with better stereo separation imo.
I have 2 Sony TC-K615S decks and neither work. I'm sure even without looking the belts turned to goo causing this problem. I don't know anyone in my town who will repair cassette decks so they sit. I bought these because I thought being a 2-motor transport it may be possible to keep the constant tape to head tension of the more expensive Sony Dolby S models that had dual capstans. Is this possible? Actually I don't know if each of the two motors are dedicated to each of the 2 hubs (could be the second motor did something like open and close the door and has nothing to do with the tape transport tension). Do you know? As for the question would I use S? Yes, once I had it I went forward using it on all of my recordings as I thought it was better sounding. The downside, unlike Dolby B, you really wouldn't want to playback Dolby S tapes on non Dolby S equipped decks as it obviously needed to be properly decoded to sound right. Do you find this true also?
Definitely NO, the dual capstan have two flywheels with a belt between each other, the 2nd motor just drives the hubs in take up, forward and reverse by the means of a swing arm.
Recently, I did some measurements from my deck. Reproduction of single frequency I've monitored on spectrum analyser. 1KHz , on reproduction, and there appear harmonics 2,4, 8 KHz etc. Please can you make video of this issue, it is not so complicated to view, but very important in tape reproduction. Imagine audio material of spread freqs with all that harmonics? Btw, I saw that by using "spectroid" for android.
It's because you're recording too hot for the tape formulation you are useing. Reduce the recording level a few dB and watch the harmonics fall off dramatically or disappear.
@@colloidalsilverwater15ppm88 most tapes can't handle 0dB of a single frequency, if you reduce the level you will see the harmonics drop significantly. Some tapes do better, some worse. But with music, you are not likely to hit 0dB at any 1 frequency anyway
@@VintageElectronicsChannel I understand, but does that mean you were currently recording? I’m sorry that I’m confused but usually when I press a monitor button, it doesn’t switch between the output of simple playback of a source, that usually only works during recording when you have input source audio and output…. I assumed that the cassette playback was the source. Sorry if I’m clueless.
@KevinR1138, I was recording, so it was switching between the source and the recording of that source on the tape in real time. So we could compare the result with the original. If that makes sense.
That's why I didn't ask that question. The question was, "Is Dolby S as good as digital?" Dolby's claim, as explained in the video, was that the average consumer couldn't distinguish between a CD and a recording with Dolby S. Hence tbe question.
Piano music is very demanding on a cassette deck , and , in first example, it demonstrates the decks wow & flutter issues . For some reason you didn't use same music on the better deck......
The reason for the different music is I wanted a shorter selection for the actual testing so I could play it from beginning to end each time and not have to cut it short.
If I may add , if the deck has excessive wow & flutter , Dolby won't be able to track its decoding. Having said that some cassette tapes lend themselves better to Dolby tracking than others .
Ugh! It doesn't matter if you have no hissing, no noise. The flutter is just killing me. It's just horrible. It's beyond, horrible. It's intolerable. I'm sorry. I'm spoiled. Flutter of only .7% is barely tolerable. Coming off of a $3700 in, 1979, dollars. Scully Studio Recorder. And so why would I want to hear, 10% flutter with no noise coming off of the cassette with far reduced sonic resolution? Why? Is there a reason for this? In the 21st Century? Is there something about your age that doesn't match mine? You don't know what year it is? Do you know who the president is? When's your birthday? No do not answer that on the Internet. I'm just asking. You could have a screw loose? Anything is possible at our age. I mean when you realize. Digital exhibits, 0% Flutter. What else is there to know? That your easy listening frequency response cuts off at, 20, 050 hurts? Is it really that painful? That it doesn't go out to, 40 or 80 kHz audio resolution? Your hearing is that refined? Wow? So you would need, a lot faster tape. But cassettes only move it 1.78 in./s. That's really low resolution. I mean you're trying to align a bunch of itty-bitty little, oxide particles in, wacky ways. That's blasphemy! To the audio. What did the audio ever do to you? That you would want to subject your audio to any kind of Dolby or DBX? I sure never did. There was no reason to. If somebody doesn't like the hissing? They should just purchase a cheaper stereo. RemyRAD
lots of effort to cover a nitch subject ,i appreciate that but ,i didnt care for the radio personality type narration,,it sounds unnatural or rehearsd ,,first video ,,ill check out some others
Audio tech since 1977 here. No, Dolby S is not "as good as digital." No analog system can be as good as digital, especially a cassette, due to the high areal density of the format. And this comes from a man who owns and uses a professional mastering deck that can run at 30 inches per second. And analog tape is always at its best with no noise reduction, as all NR systems increase the audibility of frequency response errors and dropouts.
Well it can come very close though.... when you switch monitor and tape in a well calibrated high end deck (quartz locked, closed loop dual capstan) you can appreciate the stillness of the waveform. The appearance of response error and dropout with NR chiefly happens for two reason: wrong calibration and or wrong EQ on the recording deck and degraded tape, which has happened quite extensively on type II tapes at this point in time. Type II had already the worst THD of all 4 tape types, cobalt added formulas didn't age well, chrome dioxide is practically a guarantee of degradation of some degree even if the cassette was sealed in the wrapper.
No. There are 3 groups of people. Those who love it. Those who hate it. And those like myself. Who just don't use it. Don't believe in it. Don't need it. To get rid of, hissy sounding tape. I've never needed that stupid stuff.. No. No not even with, 9 analog generation down, copies. I have no noise and hissing issues. And never having used, any Dolby or DBX, gobbledygook. Screwing up the sound. Making it sound all wonky. Because it does. But some would rather have wonky than hissing. I don't like either. So I got rid of it. How you ask? There's another faction out there like myself. We use, Broadband, Downward Expanders. That don't wonk. With the audio. And I've been using those since, 1973. So I don't know where you've been? Playing around with stupid wonky sounding Dolby DBX gobbledygook. When downward expanders work so much better. And what do, 9 generation down analog copies sound like without Dolby or DBX? You can be the judge. From this demo I threw together back in, 1979. All produced on analog. All approximately 6-9 analog generations down. With no tape noise reduction system in use. soundcloud.com/remyrad/remygolnickjinglesotdemomb2 This demo from 1979 is an average between 6 and 9 analog generation copies down. From the 30 IPS, Master Recording. To the 15 IPS, Master Mixes. To the 7.5 IPS, sales demonstration copies. To the 7.5 IPS consumer copy of the, 7.5 IPS sales copy. And no tape noise reduction used. Because I don't roll that way. So amateurs are plagued by hissing tape. Like a pit full of angry snakes. But real Audio Engineers like me know what to do. Because we design and build the stuff also. From that geared to the full-blown big studios. And so we are not home consumers worrying about, hissing consumer tapes. I mean how funny. Dolby A, Dolby B. Dolby C. Dolby SR. Dolby S. DBX -type I. DBX type-II. And now something wordlessly better! Something already archaic and better! Plus, you see. There's this thing called, Masking. And tape noise at 30 IPS. While it's hissing. It's not really, hissing. It's more like a spring shower. It's pink noise. It's a subdued, hissing. That gets Masked. By the level of the music. And the Tracking, Downward Expander. Takes care of the rest. Inaudibly.. Perfectly. Perfectly. Without a bunch of wonky sounding audio artifacting and aberrations. It's only the, 7.5 IPS copies of the copies, from other copies. I have posted here. From the transfer I made. Back in 1996. With a 1st Generation, Pro Audio, PCI based, installed soundcard. That wasn't 16-bit like everybody else's. It was 18 bit! And can also record at, 48 kHz. For, Video, soundtracks. WOW. Laughable by today's standards. On every, $150, bargain tablet. And even much less. On sale. Outperforms what I had back in 1996. When I made this transfer. From Sticky Tape Syndrome, old tape copies I had. Of whatever I had left after the fire. At the temperature controlled, humidity controlled, actual tape library. Where my masters had been stored. Until the fire. Took out the entire building. And all of my original Masters, gone. All I had left. Was a bunch of scrap tape copies. In a box. Of unlabeled tapes. And I found an old demo. And it still sounded reasonably good. Even though the tape is all sticky. And before we knew to bake them. To recover them. I came up with a different procedure I created. It worked. It was tedious at best. It was messy. It was problematic. It worked. And so when it comes to tape noise reduction schemes and themes. Most are made for amateurs. Even at the professional level. That don't know how to do it right. But don't have a full background of knowledge. Though many have college degrees. Which means, nada. I am not in possession of the stupid college degree. I teach the college professors. So I don't need one. Strange but true. I know. But there are those of us. And I am now Fully Retired. Having fun on CZcams. Watching stupid videos. Laughing my ass off. At all the amateurs. With all the information. Of which one is better! Answer? None! None is better! Don't use those hideous things! Just get yourself a, 53-year-old pair of, Allison Research, KEPEX-500, Key able Expander, a.k.a. KEPEX-1 or KEPEX-II. Tie the key inputs together for stereo tracking if you like. I didn't bother. Set them close. Set them real close. Set them, extremely, close. And you will be Awakened! Really these things don't screw up the sound. They add a very little, nearly inaudible, mush factor. That doesn't take away from the, Golden Quality of the sound. It remains intact. You can hear it. It's deep. You can listen deep into the mix. With no wonky. You can hear it as I intended for you, to hear it. Without a third-party factor making it sound, wonky. The purity is retained. Because it's a Broadband Device like a Limiter. Only the inverse. Under threshold control you set. With a release time, you set. With a depth, you set. To track the sound source. To make its effect inaudible. And you can hear it. You can hear it. On a couple of the count ins. Where's all the hissing? It's clean. It's real clean. I keep it, clean.. Just like my ass. So you know I'm a good date also. I want my music production to reflect my lifestyle. Bigger than Life. I mean this is Miami's hottest rock studio musicians. You've heard them on countless hits. And the Miami Symphony Orchestra. Inside an, announce booth. Designed to accommodate 4 announcers. I had approximately 13 people, in the room it wants. Along with the grand piano we got. And 24 chairs set up. All very tightly next to each other. It was a tight squeeze. To get 13 people in that room. At a time. Until I had re-created the entire Miami Symphony Orchestra. In overdubs. I had a lot of fun producing this. I had never done anything like this before. This is my first try. At 23 years of age in 1979. I mean never mind. I had to work out completely new recording techniques to do this. I had to modify equipment. To do this. I only had 8 microphones. To do this. And only 4 headphones. To do this. So it is not possible. To do this. But I gave myself no choice. I told the boss. I could do this. I must've been stoned? I had to be stoned. In order. To do this. And I was not compensated for my marijuana. I mean I walked into Leon GOLNICK's office. And plopped myself down. And said, look Leon. I blew through over, 1/4 ounce of marijuana. Doing these mixes for you. After hours. And I expect you to compensate for me the additional costs of this marijuana. He said no. He said he pays me well enough. Oh well? I tried. As he wanted me badly. I declined his offer for a year. And then figured? What the hell. It's 3 blocks from Fort Lauderdale Beach. I can go to the beach for lunch. I can walk to Fort Lauderdale Beach, for lunch. That's where the offices were. That's where the studio was. They built for me. They built the studio for me. But they did not equip it. With what I required. They gave me some junk equipment. And he told me you're supposed to be good. Use it. So I did. I don't let anything stop me. And I know what everything has to sound like in the end.. It can't sound like, amateur hour. The directive was to make it sound, New York City. Okey-dokey. As that's where they had been getting their jingles for years. And paying top dollar. I said I could do it for 1/10 th, the amount. In our voiceover studio. I was stoned. I meet you cannot undertake a project like this. Without smoking pot. It takes you to that next level. The focus is incredible. The creative juices explode. And you just make it happen.. I test all the audio out in my head first. If I can hear it in my head. I know it will work in real life. It's hard to explain. It's complicated. But I have to hear it first. In my head. As I see sound. I see it bouncing all over the place. But I don't see any colors like other people say they do. I don't know what they are saying? I just see sound. Like it bouncing off your wall. Of that picture. Off your desk. From your lamp. You can't see that? Hmmm? You might want to see an, OptoAudibleOphthalmologist? Which is a degree you can get from Yale. Where, JD Vance got his. After his traumatic brain injury he got in the USMC. And that is the result. Mini Fascist Donnie. In all its glory. What he really needs is a karma Full On, John Wayne Bobbitt. What a pompous prick. He should not possess. A full on John Wayne Bobbitt is waiting for him. In the great political ether of his nonexistence. What prick, be him? The maniacal thug attitude is truly amazing. They will Rule by roughshod! Ha ha ha. Ha ha. Yes what a patriot. He wants to be Vice President Prick. Ha ha ha. Ha ha. Mr. Prick. RemyRAD PS his confident attitude indicates. He owns more than one, AR-15. He still has one of his, M-16's. Ready to kill Americans with. Ha ha ha. Ha ha.
"see if you can pick up the tape noise in this type 1 cassette" -- nope, i was too distracted by the terrible wow and flutter on the deck which manifested as a wobbly sounding piano 😅
No kidding. BIC was a notoriously cheap off-brand. Hardly the deck you'd want to evaluate anything on.
@@BrentWatkinsMusic Do you own a BIC machine? They're decently built I'd say above average and they sound definitely above average of their class. IMHO one of the most pleasing piano key deck around with bright warmly lit VU meters and cassette well backlight.
Thanks for the great channel and contest. I was one of the winners. The tape arrived quick, well-packed and safe. Kudos to Nashville Supply Company for their shipping, packaging and sponsoring the contest. Will be recording something special on it soon. Thanks again to all involved.
You worried about noise ? The flutter will annoy me much more and if that deck is mine I repair it if possible or I wont use it anymore. Another thing about Dolby: you MUST calibratie your deck to the tape you want to use, in case of Dolby C within 0,3 dB else artifacts might be heard.
Thank you! I was about to write the same thing, the first deck had really bad flutter, the second, it was noticable too, switching between source and tape you could hear the wobbliness, it sounded a bit fragile on tape. I'd suggest those decks def get a full service and check the w&f is within manufacturers spec.
Same here, don't use it... could be a warped pinch roller, but how about wearing out bushings of parts that aren't available for decades. Not worth the risk.
I honestly kinda dig the hiss. Back in the day, it was annoying because you had to deal with it, but now that we have digital options if you're gonna be using cassettes your obviously not interested in getting the most possible out of your music. The imperfections give the format its unique and cool sound, so I definetly prefer it off.
There's definitely an argument for keeping it for a retro aesthetic.
Never had a problem with dolby C killing any highs and i love it. I find the calibration settings on this Sony deck a bit suspect for a maxell XL-II tape. Its difficult to imagine that it needs thst much bias and level. I personally believe that most problems with dolby are due to user error or equipment issues.
I bought a Sony with dolby S some months ago and it sounds very good. I use Dolby S now
Congrats on the 6K subscriber count! Never thought about this until now, but Dolby A, B, C .... then S? Did they skip some letters, or have failures D-R along the way? (Reminds me of an old Mad Magazine joke about being a "beta tester" for preparations A through G). ... anyway a quick Google reveals S was the consumer version of SR for "Spectral" Recording. I think for most consumers, convenience features would override fidelity features, and by 1989 the instant track selection of CD would cause people to lean toward that format to say goodbye to fast-forwarding and rewinding. And without a Dolby S car deck, there would probably not be as much incentive to upgrade an existing working deck.
1:44 A certain type of distortion is due to the tape physically moving over the head, sort of a stick/slip in the kHz range. it's like how a violin bow works and causes a jitter like distortion. But that is proportional with signal level. NR cannot address this. Tape hiss is due to the finite size of the particles making up the magnetic layer compared to the width of the tape (head), and their alignment. Magnetic particles about half the size of rice grains could be used on a tape the width of a two lane road and have the same performance as an ok Type I. Speed also matters, as a slower tape speed generates more audible hiss. I believe it's the same hiss independent of speed, just shifted into different parts of the audible spectrum depending on speed.
I share most of your thoughts on Dolby usage. Generally speaking I use it when I need it depending on the source, music and tape type. I don't own a single portable Dolby C player but I have several Dolby B Walkmans so I can pull some Dolby C tapes within the range of acceptability.
Your BIC T-3 could really use a service, both needles need attention and there's a lot of flutter which could be bad for the health of your machine. It could be a seizing take up spool, a dry capstan bushing (especially the back one) or the motor front bushing or a combination of all of the above and more.
I always use noise reduction for Cassette Tapes, B type for type 1 tape and C type for type 2 tape and no noise reduction for type 4 tape. I also use B type for 8 Tracks recordings and have had a lot of success with my Ex noise reduction system, that can work well with both B & C systems. The Ex system works in a very different way to Dolby noise reduction, by working with the phase off set between left and right audio channels.
I'd be interested in hearing some more about that.
I would point that very silent room at home has background noise about which our hearing is not very aware and it is minimum 25 dB but in more usual conditions it may be even 35dB . Pleasant no annoying level of listening is for me and my neighbours about 65, (say max 80dB) that makes minimum required treshold for pop music about 40 dB.
Data for cassette without Dol;by is usualy about 45 dB - this gives 5 dB safety margin that we will not be at least annoyed by it's noise. Dolby B grants in normal pop/ jazz music max 55dB which gives already 15 dB safety margin - we can listen loudly and it is for silent moments in music or brakes between tracks. . Dolby C makes 63 dB treshold - even during listening 100dB loud we will hardly notice tape noise. That is why I generaly not use dolby to avoid forgetting to switch it on and off without noticing. . It makes to me no difference except when I play brand recorded in DolbyB tapes. I also have deck with High Com system which is comparable to Dolby S and works very well but I do not need it.
I find the same as author - a bit noise is comfortable to keep ears continuously tuned to sopranos. Because with single instruments they adopt too quickly.
I notice that playing DolbyB recorded tapes with Dolby not switched on is possible and in most cases satisfactory and helps a lot to avioid dynamic distortions. caused by Dolby system which requires exact levels of signal from heads.
In most cases that level is affected by dirt on tapes and hardened dirty filt in cassette or not good tape transport or not good condition of head. Anyaway with care it may be achived and it is worthy because sound is better.
A lot of those SAME people who claimed that NR systems 'dulled out' the tape.... were also people who never demagnetized their tape heads. Ya gotta DO that.
I don’t bother with Dolby: too many variables that need to be exactly right for it to function properly, and poor transferability between decks. Instead, I play my tapes through a single-ended external denoiser (Behringer SNR 2000). 20-25 dB of noise reduction and no artefacts. By the way, the piano track on your BIC deck sounds wobbly. Wow & flutter issue ?
The sony had it too, but not as bad - i noticed it though
Studio Looks.....dryer.
Yes! Finally! I'm still running a dehumidifier in there for the time being to be safe. Still have some siding to put back on outside, but that'll be done soon.
I never cared for any of the Dolby sound reductions, at least B and C...
I preferred dbx on TDK-SA tapes. A recording from a CD was just as clear and with almost an identical noise floor. Too bad it failed.
What was that humming noise in test sample? Deck it self?
I suspect Dolby S would have had more time to get into the market had CD burners taken longer to become commonplace.
I guess there's a difference between those who listen for nostalgia and those who want to hear how good analog can get. The cassette format was dependent on noise reduction technology to be viable. I would never listen to a cassette that didn't have Dolby B at the minimum, and Dolby C was even better. Like our host, I never knew Dolby S existed. Dolby did impact the source content, however. A better test of Dolby noise reduction would be to listen to the ring out of a crash cymbal. Monitoring the source would reveal the subtle nuance of the high-end harmonics the crash of a cymbal creates. These subtle inflections tend to get quashed by Dolby noise reduction. Granted, the difference is slight, but noticeable. But once on the tape, hiss takes over ALL this subtlety, so if you listen to cassettes, I think using Dolby is a no-brainer.
There's truth in many views... it strongly depends on how many dB(s) of range your let's say music has. If you have dance music chances are Dolby or no Dolby will make no difference at all except in fade outs to silence. But I could certainly discern the subtle details you're writing about. My recipe is sometimes to offset the highs of a certain level... which kind of partially defeats NR but it's PRE so technically no, it just makes up for the perceptual adaptation of the sound. Practically you hear as if it were the same but it isn't. Dolby B has a little drop off towards the end of the spectrum so it might help with that.
I have a Sony deck with Dolby S I bought a few years ago just to mess around with the format. I also have a single pre-recorded cassette with Dolby S encoding--Prince The Hits vol 1.
It sounds really good, but still not quite the quality of CD.
I'm thinking of trying to record some 24-bit/192khz DVD-Audio tracks to a type 4 tape with Dolby S and to a type 1 tape with no reduction to see how much degradation there would be between them and the original source.
I give out promotional tapes at events, and do use Dolby B on them. They're mostly talk content, so the hiss is noticable. I just tell folks to turn the treble down a bit if their deck doesn't have Dolby.
OUCH! Is it my headphones or my ears? I can't hear as much noise as I was expecting. Oh - I've turned up the volume! But there's a lot of frequency flutter.
I couldn’t even hardly tell the difference until the audacity bit.
I listened on my TV thru a Denon AVR and Klipsch RF-35 at normal -29dB listening level via Ethernet.
They all sounded well within an acceptable listening experience.
I’ve found in my recent recordings when using Dolby B,C,or S , that when activated it should just barely change the music. Like only take the very small hiss and not the highs away.
Then I’ve used inferior tape and the recording is dull with Dolby on.
I have pre-made tapes from the 80’s that sound great with Dolby on , and pre-made tapes that are muddy with it on.
Some pre-made tapes are made from a superior master copy and others are not.
Just like CD’s , they are copies of original tape masters. Some sound amazing, others are just ok.
A CD’s output level is also way higher than a tape. I have 12 tape decks from 10 dollar machines to 800 dollar ones.
They all sound amazing if you can master the tuning of the deck.
Speed , Azimuth,clean head and pinch roller, along with a quality blank like TDK, Maxell , or Sony.
All the decks are quality vintage models run thru a vintage Amp and speakers.
I enjoy a good CD , I enjoy tapes more.
It’s a warmer less clinical sound with better stereo separation imo.
I was never a fan of dolby though apparently the decks need to be properly calibrated at the factory for dolby to work properly .
I have 2 Sony TC-K615S decks and neither work. I'm sure even without looking the belts turned to goo causing this problem. I don't know anyone in my town who will repair cassette decks so they sit. I bought these because I thought being a 2-motor transport it may be possible to keep the constant tape to head tension of the more expensive Sony Dolby S models that had dual capstans. Is this possible? Actually I don't know if each of the two motors are dedicated to each of the 2 hubs (could be the second motor did something like open and close the door and has nothing to do with the tape transport tension). Do you know? As for the question would I use S? Yes, once I had it I went forward using it on all of my recordings as I thought it was better sounding. The downside, unlike Dolby B, you really wouldn't want to playback Dolby S tapes on non Dolby S equipped decks as it obviously needed to be properly decoded to sound right. Do you find this true also?
Definitely NO, the dual capstan have two flywheels with a belt between each other, the 2nd motor just drives the hubs in take up, forward and reverse by the means of a swing arm.
I loved tapes in the past but I don't care about it anymore.
Recently, I did some measurements from my deck. Reproduction of single frequency I've monitored on spectrum analyser. 1KHz , on reproduction, and there appear harmonics 2,4, 8 KHz etc. Please can you make video of this issue, it is not so complicated to view, but very important in tape reproduction. Imagine audio material of spread freqs with all that harmonics? Btw, I saw that by using "spectroid" for android.
Interesting! I'll do some research on that.
@@VintageElectronicsChannel think it comes from inductance of head. If so, why nobody mentioned that?
It's because you're recording too hot for the tape formulation you are useing. Reduce the recording level a few dB and watch the harmonics fall off dramatically or disappear.
@@cuoresportivo155 didn't had clipping, 0dB, but thanks, I will try to reduce rec level. Interesting advice.
@@colloidalsilverwater15ppm88 most tapes can't handle 0dB of a single frequency, if you reduce the level you will see the harmonics drop significantly. Some tapes do better, some worse. But with music, you are not likely to hit 0dB at any 1 frequency anyway
Question, why do you keep pressing monitor? Kind of distracting.
Switching output between recording and source
@@VintageElectronicsChannel
I understand, but does that mean you were currently recording? I’m sorry that I’m confused but usually when I press a monitor button, it doesn’t switch between the output of simple playback of a source, that usually only works during recording when you have input source audio and output…. I assumed that the cassette playback was the source. Sorry if I’m clueless.
@KevinR1138, I was recording, so it was switching between the source and the recording of that source on the tape in real time. So we could compare the result with the original. If that makes sense.
@@VintageElectronicsChannel
Understood, thanks.
“Is Dolby S as good as Dolby Digital?” is like asking “Is a fish better than a bicycle?
That's why I didn't ask that question. The question was, "Is Dolby S as good as digital?" Dolby's claim, as explained in the video, was that the average consumer couldn't distinguish between a CD and a recording with Dolby S. Hence tbe question.
Piano music is very demanding on a cassette deck , and , in first example, it demonstrates the decks wow & flutter issues . For some reason you didn't use same music on the better deck......
The reason for the different music is I wanted a shorter selection for the actual testing so I could play it from beginning to end each time and not have to cut it short.
If I may add , if the deck has excessive wow & flutter , Dolby won't be able to track its decoding. Having said that some cassette tapes lend themselves better to Dolby tracking than others .
Ugh! It doesn't matter if you have no hissing, no noise. The flutter is just killing me. It's just horrible. It's beyond, horrible. It's intolerable. I'm sorry. I'm spoiled.
Flutter of only .7% is barely tolerable. Coming off of a $3700 in, 1979, dollars. Scully Studio Recorder. And so why would I want to hear, 10% flutter with no noise coming off of the cassette with far reduced sonic resolution? Why? Is there a reason for this? In the 21st Century? Is there something about your age that doesn't match mine? You don't know what year it is? Do you know who the president is? When's your birthday? No do not answer that on the Internet. I'm just asking.
You could have a screw loose? Anything is possible at our age.
I mean when you realize. Digital exhibits, 0% Flutter. What else is there to know? That your easy listening frequency response cuts off at, 20, 050 hurts? Is it really that painful? That it doesn't go out to, 40 or 80 kHz audio resolution? Your hearing is that refined? Wow? So you would need, a lot faster tape. But cassettes only move it 1.78 in./s. That's really low resolution. I mean you're trying to align a bunch of itty-bitty little, oxide particles in, wacky ways. That's blasphemy! To the audio. What did the audio ever do to you? That you would want to subject your audio to any kind of Dolby or DBX? I sure never did. There was no reason to.
If somebody doesn't like the hissing? They should just purchase a cheaper stereo.
RemyRAD
lots of effort to cover a nitch subject ,i appreciate that but ,i didnt care for the radio personality type narration,,it sounds unnatural or rehearsd ,,first video ,,ill check out some others
Audio tech since 1977 here. No, Dolby S is not "as good as digital." No analog system can be as good as digital, especially a cassette, due to the high areal density of the format. And this comes from a man who owns and uses a professional mastering deck that can run at 30 inches per second. And analog tape is always at its best with no noise reduction, as all NR systems increase the audibility of frequency response errors and dropouts.
Well it can come very close though.... when you switch monitor and tape in a well calibrated high end deck (quartz locked, closed loop dual capstan) you can appreciate the stillness of the waveform.
The appearance of response error and dropout with NR chiefly happens for two reason: wrong calibration and or wrong EQ on the recording deck and degraded tape, which has happened quite extensively on type II tapes at this point in time. Type II had already the worst THD of all 4 tape types, cobalt added formulas didn't age well, chrome dioxide is practically a guarantee of degradation of some degree even if the cassette was sealed in the wrapper.
No. There are 3 groups of people. Those who love it. Those who hate it. And those like myself. Who just don't use it. Don't believe in it. Don't need it. To get rid of, hissy sounding tape. I've never needed that stupid stuff.. No.
No not even with, 9 analog generation down, copies. I have no noise and hissing issues. And never having used, any Dolby or DBX, gobbledygook. Screwing up the sound. Making it sound all wonky. Because it does. But some would rather have wonky than hissing. I don't like either. So I got rid of it. How you ask?
There's another faction out there like myself. We use, Broadband, Downward Expanders. That don't wonk. With the audio. And I've been using those since, 1973. So I don't know where you've been? Playing around with stupid wonky sounding Dolby DBX gobbledygook. When downward expanders work so much better.
And what do, 9 generation down analog copies sound like without Dolby or DBX? You can be the judge. From this demo I threw together back in, 1979. All produced on analog. All approximately 6-9 analog generations down. With no tape noise reduction system in use.
soundcloud.com/remyrad/remygolnickjinglesotdemomb2
This demo from 1979 is an average between 6 and 9 analog generation copies down. From the 30 IPS, Master Recording. To the 15 IPS, Master Mixes. To the 7.5 IPS, sales demonstration copies. To the 7.5 IPS consumer copy of the, 7.5 IPS sales copy. And no tape noise reduction used. Because I don't roll that way.
So amateurs are plagued by hissing tape. Like a pit full of angry snakes. But real Audio Engineers like me know what to do. Because we design and build the stuff also. From that geared to the full-blown big studios.
And so we are not home consumers worrying about, hissing consumer tapes. I mean how funny. Dolby A, Dolby B. Dolby C. Dolby SR. Dolby S. DBX -type I. DBX type-II. And now something wordlessly better! Something already archaic and better!
Plus, you see. There's this thing called, Masking. And tape noise at 30 IPS. While it's hissing. It's not really, hissing. It's more like a spring shower. It's pink noise. It's a subdued, hissing. That gets Masked. By the level of the music. And the Tracking, Downward Expander. Takes care of the rest. Inaudibly.. Perfectly. Perfectly. Without a bunch of wonky sounding audio artifacting and aberrations.
It's only the, 7.5 IPS copies of the copies, from other copies. I have posted here. From the transfer I made. Back in 1996. With a 1st Generation, Pro Audio, PCI based, installed soundcard. That wasn't 16-bit like everybody else's. It was 18 bit! And can also record at, 48 kHz. For, Video, soundtracks. WOW. Laughable by today's standards. On every, $150, bargain tablet. And even much less. On sale. Outperforms what I had back in 1996. When I made this transfer. From Sticky Tape Syndrome, old tape copies I had. Of whatever I had left after the fire. At the temperature controlled, humidity controlled, actual tape library. Where my masters had been stored. Until the fire. Took out the entire building. And all of my original Masters, gone.
All I had left. Was a bunch of scrap tape copies. In a box. Of unlabeled tapes. And I found an old demo. And it still sounded reasonably good. Even though the tape is all sticky. And before we knew to bake them. To recover them. I came up with a different procedure I created. It worked. It was tedious at best. It was messy. It was problematic. It worked.
And so when it comes to tape noise reduction schemes and themes. Most are made for amateurs. Even at the professional level. That don't know how to do it right. But don't have a full background of knowledge. Though many have college degrees. Which means, nada. I am not in possession of the stupid college degree. I teach the college professors. So I don't need one. Strange but true. I know. But there are those of us. And I am now Fully Retired. Having fun on CZcams. Watching stupid videos. Laughing my ass off. At all the amateurs. With all the information. Of which one is better! Answer? None! None is better! Don't use those hideous things!
Just get yourself a, 53-year-old pair of, Allison Research, KEPEX-500, Key able Expander, a.k.a. KEPEX-1 or KEPEX-II. Tie the key inputs together for stereo tracking if you like. I didn't bother. Set them close. Set them real close. Set them, extremely, close. And you will be Awakened!
Really these things don't screw up the sound. They add a very little, nearly inaudible, mush factor. That doesn't take away from the, Golden Quality of the sound. It remains intact. You can hear it. It's deep. You can listen deep into the mix. With no wonky. You can hear it as I intended for you, to hear it. Without a third-party factor making it sound, wonky. The purity is retained. Because it's a Broadband Device like a Limiter. Only the inverse. Under threshold control you set. With a release time, you set. With a depth, you set. To track the sound source. To make its effect inaudible. And you can hear it. You can hear it. On a couple of the count ins. Where's all the hissing? It's clean. It's real clean. I keep it, clean.. Just like my ass. So you know I'm a good date also. I want my music production to reflect my lifestyle. Bigger than Life.
I mean this is Miami's hottest rock studio musicians. You've heard them on countless hits. And the Miami Symphony Orchestra. Inside an, announce booth. Designed to accommodate 4 announcers. I had approximately 13 people, in the room it wants. Along with the grand piano we got. And 24 chairs set up. All very tightly next to each other. It was a tight squeeze. To get 13 people in that room. At a time. Until I had re-created the entire Miami Symphony Orchestra. In overdubs. I had a lot of fun producing this. I had never done anything like this before. This is my first try. At 23 years of age in 1979.
I mean never mind. I had to work out completely new recording techniques to do this. I had to modify equipment. To do this. I only had 8 microphones. To do this. And only 4 headphones. To do this. So it is not possible. To do this. But I gave myself no choice. I told the boss. I could do this. I must've been stoned? I had to be stoned. In order. To do this. And I was not compensated for my marijuana.
I mean I walked into Leon GOLNICK's office. And plopped myself down. And said, look Leon. I blew through over, 1/4 ounce of marijuana. Doing these mixes for you. After hours. And I expect you to compensate for me the additional costs of this marijuana. He said no. He said he pays me well enough. Oh well? I tried. As he wanted me badly. I declined his offer for a year. And then figured? What the hell. It's 3 blocks from Fort Lauderdale Beach. I can go to the beach for lunch. I can walk to Fort Lauderdale Beach, for lunch. That's where the offices were. That's where the studio was. They built for me. They built the studio for me. But they did not equip it. With what I required. They gave me some junk equipment. And he told me you're supposed to be good. Use it. So I did. I don't let anything stop me. And I know what everything has to sound like in the end.. It can't sound like, amateur hour. The directive was to make it sound, New York City. Okey-dokey. As that's where they had been getting their jingles for years. And paying top dollar. I said I could do it for 1/10 th, the amount. In our voiceover studio. I was stoned.
I meet you cannot undertake a project like this. Without smoking pot. It takes you to that next level. The focus is incredible. The creative juices explode. And you just make it happen..
I test all the audio out in my head first. If I can hear it in my head. I know it will work in real life. It's hard to explain. It's complicated. But I have to hear it first. In my head. As I see sound. I see it bouncing all over the place. But I don't see any colors like other people say they do. I don't know what they are saying? I just see sound. Like it bouncing off your wall. Of that picture. Off your desk. From your lamp. You can't see that? Hmmm? You might want to see an, OptoAudibleOphthalmologist?
Which is a degree you can get from Yale. Where, JD Vance got his. After his traumatic brain injury he got in the USMC. And that is the result. Mini Fascist Donnie. In all its glory.
What he really needs is a karma Full On, John Wayne Bobbitt. What a pompous prick. He should not possess. A full on John Wayne Bobbitt is waiting for him. In the great political ether of his nonexistence. What prick, be him?
The maniacal thug attitude is truly amazing. They will Rule by roughshod! Ha ha ha. Ha ha.
Yes what a patriot. He wants to be Vice President Prick. Ha ha ha. Ha ha. Mr. Prick.
RemyRAD
PS
his confident attitude indicates. He owns more than one, AR-15. He still has one of his, M-16's. Ready to kill Americans with. Ha ha ha. Ha ha.