[ARSCLIST] Transferring ye old grooved disks -- For Howard

[Tom Fine <tflists@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hi Howard:

OK, this all puts some perspective on your posts. Thanks for sharing.

I'll now share with you a few things I know, and there are others on this list with much more 
knowledge about the pre-LP disks you specialize in. Mine are a few general pointers, the 
disk-specific ones I learned from my good friend and mentor Art Shifrin. Others on this list with 
extensive expertise in making disk-to-digital transfers on this list include Doug Pomeroy and Steve 
Smolian. I named those two specifically because I know they've made excellent-sounding commercial CD 
masters from old disk material.

First, read this, a former thread on this list:
http://palimpsest.stanford.edu/byform/mailing-lists/arsclist/2006/11/msg00168.html
a lot of the good tips are here. Almost everything I said about LPs applies to earlier disk formats, 
except be particularly careful with what you use to clean old disk because, for instance, alcohol 
dissolves shellac. Again, I want to credit Art Shifrin with sharing his Soundforge tricks and also 
helping me learn how to (very) conservatively use auto-clean software  when necessary so it doesn't 
suck the still-beating heart out of the musical experience.

Bottom line -- start with as good a source as possible, clean it properly, use as appropriate and 
good analog equipment as you can afford and transfer at as high resolution as makes sense. What 
software you use in the computer is your choice. I'm a big fan of Sony Soundforge, others like other 
programs. For something like what you're doing the older, more straight-forward versions of 
Soundforge were even better but there is a "lite" or "consumer" version of SF that has a simpler 
interface. A bad soundcard or low-resolution transfers will cripple your ability to any reasonable 
fidelity from the get-go. Given how cheap lower-end USB adapters have gotten, I'd probably go that 
way. Do some research online and pick your weapon. M-Audio, Lexicon, even Behringer all make 
well-reviewed USB adapters to bring the audio into the computer. If anything in this paragraph is 
not clear to you, I recommend you do some research on your own because all of this is really 
elementary to ARSC List regulars and I'm trying to keep this at a very low technical-knowledge 
level.

Another route some people I know have taken -- very successfully in some cases -- is to avoid 
getting involved in computer workstation audio and just using a dedicated digital recorder of some 
sort. Some use a good CD recorder -- Tascam, Denon Professional and Sony still make them, plus I 
think Marantz Professional still makes a portable CD recorder. At least one person I know with a 
professional transfer business uses one of the new Tascam flash-memory recorders. There are a 
growing variety of these machines. I just ordered the newest M-Audio recorder and plan to report 
back here once I get it in hand and use it a while. Other devices are made by Sony, Zoom, Korg, etc. 
There are even recorder adapters for iPods. The advantage to this route vs. the computer workstation 
is that it's more akin to the old days of transferring to a cassette or reel to reel deck and 
requires little computer literacy (although you need to dump the audio from the flash recorders to a 
computer to burn a CD). The disadvatnage is that the user interfaces can be even more complex and 
confusing than workstation software and the options for post-analog processing are limited.

At the risk of being considered "age-ist" by the more politically correct among us, I would suggest 
you enlist the help of a younger person who is very at-home in the computer operating environment. 
They will be of great help installing and configuring your setup and showing you the basics of the 
software. Just make sure to find one with decent communication skills so they can tell you what they 
heck they're doing with those lightening-fast keystrokes and mouse-clicks. And don't be too 
intimidated by all the options -- the big difference between software and hardware is that software 
programmers seem to want to include every possible way to skin the cat at any given point in any 
given process, which often confuses the average mortal (myself definitely included) and clogs up the 
user experience.

In today's day and age, especially if you want to get into cleaning up surface ticks and the like, 
I'd recommend you find a decent audio workstation program and master it. Sony now makes a "consumer" 
version of Soundforge that seems to include all the features I think you'd want, but what software 
to use is a very personal choice and I recommend you take the time to research, download and try 
trial versions and read reviews and tutorials. Software manuals are not as well written as most 
military manuals, I should add! The Navy electronics course, circa 1960, was how I learned the 
basics of tube gear and the late 60's version was how I learned discrete solid state basics. If it's 
new enough to be full of chips and surface-mount stuff, it's not fixable by me.

Anyway, between what I just posted, plus Richard's and Mike's helpful advice plus all the answers to 
your questions last week, you have some studying to do! Best of luck in your endeavors.

-- Tom Fine

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Howard Friedman" <hsf318@xxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <ARSCLIST@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Saturday, December 15, 2007 4:09 PM
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] Scully Tape machine users group


Thank you, Mike, very thoughtful of you.  Howard

For anyone's information, I am a record collector, period.  I collect mainly vocal recordings but 
some instrumental recordings from 1898 through most of the acoustical era.    I also collect CDs of 
many records which I never expect or could afford to own.  I collect complete sets, and transfer 
them to my hard drive, usually as MP3, but more recently as WAV files, which I then merge into more 
or less single files.  My goal is to lose as little as possible of any fidelity or quality that may 
have been transferred to the CD from the original 78s in the first place.  Hence all my questions.

I have a B.S. degree in Biochemistry from the City College of the College of the City of New York, 
generally known as CCNY, (now CUNY) 1944, a Master of Arts degree in Bacteriology from Boston 
University, 1947, and a Doctor of Philosophy degree in Biochemistry from Georgetown University 1953. 
I am retired from the United States Air Force as a Lieutenant Colonel.  I am unemployed and exepct 
to remain that way.