Lloydc I have been been reading on the naktalk forum and the clear winner seems to be the Dragon with the Azimuth adjustments u just mentioned. This makes this machines ability to play all tapes from any recorded machine something very special indeed. The Tanberg I am told has many high end audio parts installed thus maybe making it expensive to maintain. I have never seen one for sale anywhere come to think of it on the entire worldwide web.
Now for those of u wondering how my live recording turned out? Well magnificant with a few anxious momements.
I wanted to use an old TDK MAX-G Metal tape for the live
event, But upon recording from the tape a few days before the concert I noticed a couple of bad drop outs on the tape so I abanded using the metal tape and used instead a freshly bought Maxell XL-2. The Maxell I am sure must be optimized for my machine. It handled +2 DB over zero just fine. On live recordings u almost will have large dynamic swings and I know I was pushing right at the edge of that envelope even with DBX fully engaged. The group was a small
community symphony with about 38 members. The church was somewhat small in size so I had to set up far in the back which ended up being a good choice as I rethink things through. The symphony more times then not were playing at p
and pp on several movements. The softer they played the better the machine responded to them. This was by far the quietest recording I ever made of a live group even compared to DAT. I was thinking of recording as low as 3 or 4 on my mic. levels for the Teac, But compromised at a 5 level due to most selections being played at very softly. . When the group did rise to high levels at the end of some pieces I simply very carefully lowered the signal maybe one notch for a brief second to avoid tape saturation at a +4 DB Level. Well as stated before I'm a very happy camper and now I don't need to lug my big Teac A 4010S Reel to Reel around anymore. So now I understand first hand why the casette format killed reel to reel machines. All of these great players that were made in 1984
put and end to the open reel. You had the great Tanberg machine as mentioned in the previous post and the Dragon along with the Nak. 1000ZKL and Revox B215 : so why haul around a 75 pound machine. Thanks for all of those who have posted your comments and answers. I wonder what other
cassette gem machines are still collecting dust; what a shame.
Don
Now for those of u wondering how my live recording turned out? Well magnificant with a few anxious momements.
I wanted to use an old TDK MAX-G Metal tape for the live
event, But upon recording from the tape a few days before the concert I noticed a couple of bad drop outs on the tape so I abanded using the metal tape and used instead a freshly bought Maxell XL-2. The Maxell I am sure must be optimized for my machine. It handled +2 DB over zero just fine. On live recordings u almost will have large dynamic swings and I know I was pushing right at the edge of that envelope even with DBX fully engaged. The group was a small
community symphony with about 38 members. The church was somewhat small in size so I had to set up far in the back which ended up being a good choice as I rethink things through. The symphony more times then not were playing at p
and pp on several movements. The softer they played the better the machine responded to them. This was by far the quietest recording I ever made of a live group even compared to DAT. I was thinking of recording as low as 3 or 4 on my mic. levels for the Teac, But compromised at a 5 level due to most selections being played at very softly. . When the group did rise to high levels at the end of some pieces I simply very carefully lowered the signal maybe one notch for a brief second to avoid tape saturation at a +4 DB Level. Well as stated before I'm a very happy camper and now I don't need to lug my big Teac A 4010S Reel to Reel around anymore. So now I understand first hand why the casette format killed reel to reel machines. All of these great players that were made in 1984
put and end to the open reel. You had the great Tanberg machine as mentioned in the previous post and the Dragon along with the Nak. 1000ZKL and Revox B215 : so why haul around a 75 pound machine. Thanks for all of those who have posted your comments and answers. I wonder what other
cassette gem machines are still collecting dust; what a shame.
Don