Re: [ARSCLIST] Preservation media WAS: Cataloguing still :-)

[Tom Fine <tflists@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hi Roger:

No, Soundstream was not developed as a commercial/mass-produced format, as I understand it. Its 
competition would have been 3M, Mitsubishi, Sony and Matsushita video-based PCM recorders, etc. The 
"Sony/Philips system" was the compact disc, as I understand it. I believe RCA dabbled with a 
competing system, perhaps building off their research in grooved video disks. I think there was also 
some dabbling in audio-only Videodiscs, which by the way were not a digital system (the surface 
modulated and FM signal).

A Soundstream machine was shown at the AES Historical Committee room the time before last in NYC (I 
think it was 2002). It was a modified instrumentation recorder. Bob Ludwig explained it and if I 
understood him correctly, the tapes would be transferred to a DEC mainframe computer and editing 
would take place there, using the non-linear properties of the computer's hard drives. The edited 
program would then be digitally transferred back to tape, where it would be played thru a D-A 
converter to the LP mastering system. As I understand it, early CD released from Soundstream, at 
least by Telarc, were transcoded to CD 44.1/16-bit and then digitally transferred to a CD master 
recorder. In more recent times, the Soundstream tapes were transferred to a modern DAW and 
transcoded using more modern techniques and the results have sounded better, according to people 
whose ears I trust. This would be for the SACD releases, so the transcoding would be up-sampling 
instead of down-sampling for regular CD, so it follows that quality might be better.

I believe the first all-digital rock record was Ry Cooder's "Bop Til You Drop," which was made with 
the 3M system. I don't have a CD of it but the LP is full of clearly audible digital artifacts.

Pablo Records got into making digital recordings pretty early in the game, maybe 1979 but definitely 
1980. They'd be released under the Pablo Today sub-label and were pressed on red vinyl. Some, 
especially the ones made at Oceanway using the Mitsubishi system, sounded OK, others had that 
"digital metallic" sound.

-- Tom Fine

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Roger and Allison Kulp" <thorenstd124@xxxxxxxxx>
To: <ARSCLIST@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Wednesday, September 06, 2006 2:16 PM
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] Preservation media WAS: Cataloguing still :-)


> I have a copy,of a famous Lp,called "Music From Mathematics" (Decca 9103),of music made by the IBM 
> 7090
> http://www.317x.com/albums/i/IBM/card.html ,that dates from 1961,that claims to be the first 
> digitally recorded record. As for Soundstream,I thought they were a competing system,being 
> developed at the same time,as the Philips/Sony one,sort of like VHS vs Beta,but  it seems they 
> were the first.
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soundstream
> Roger Kulp
> Tom Fine <tflists@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote: I think there were digital-original LPs early than 
> 1978 but I might be wrong. I think 2-track PCM
> recording onto videotape was possible before that and I think Soundstream had invented their
> instrumentation-recorder-based system before that.
>
> Actually -- perhaps the first digital-original recording was the Bell Labs mini-LP showing off 
> their
> voice-synthesis computer, circa early or mid 1960's.
>
> -- Tom Fine
>
> ----- Original Message ----- 
> From: "David Lennick"
> To:
> Sent: Tuesday, September 05, 2006 6:17 PM
> Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] Preservation media WAS: Cataloguing still :-)
>
>
> > Wasn't the first LP from digital originals an Odyssey release (c. 1978) of flute
> > sonatas, recorded in Japan a couple of years earlier? I remember that info being
> > proclaimed on the jacket. Telemann flute sonatas or trio sonatas or something
> > along those lines.
> >
> > Gawd those first "Digital!" lps from Angel, London and DGG were ghastly..Angel's
> > were also low level, not what we needed in those days of lousy vinyl.
> >
> > dl
> >
> > David Lewiston wrote:
> >
> > > Um. Somewhat before that, I'm pretty sure.
> > >
> > > I recall sitting with Tracey Sterne while she was still at Nonesuch (Warner
> > > fired her in '79) and hear her bitch about the atrocious unmusicality of the
> > > new medium.
> > >
> > > Salutations, David Lewiston
> > >
> > > ----- Original Message -----
> > > From: "Roger and Allison Kulp"
> > > To:
> > > Sent: September 05, 2006 10:08 AM
> > > Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] Preservation media WAS: Cataloguing still :-)
> > >
> > > > Japan.Sony inroduced them,like 1981 or so.
> > > > Roger Kulp
> > > >
> > > > steven c  wrote: ----- Original Message -----
> > > > From: "Don Cox"
> > > >> How did engineers make the first CDs, when hard drives were not big
> > > >> enough to hold 600 Megs of data?
> > > >>
> > > > Actually, I'm not sure...but one way it COULD have been done is with
> > > > magnetic tape storage, since that was used on mainframe computers at
> > > > least in the early seventies, if not before. When I was working my
> > > > way through university as a security guard for State Farm ('74-'76)
> > > > I recall seeing carts loaded with HUGE reels of data tape...and I
> > > > have no idea what the length v. data capacity algorithm might have
> > > > been (or how many reels of tape, if more than one, would be needed
> > > > to store the digital capacity of a CD...?)
> > > >
> > > > In fact, where WERE CD's introduced commercially?
> > > >
> > > > Steven C. Barr
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > ---------------------------------
> > > > All-new Yahoo! Mail - Fire up a more powerful email and get things done
> > > > faster.
>
>
>
> ---------------------------------
> Get your email and more, right on the  new Yahoo.com