I wrote some weeks ago, asking for help about transferring some vinyls
(thanks, Scott Dorsey!).
Now that's what I have:


- Pro-ject debut III turntable
- Nad PP2 Phono preamp
- Prism AD 124
-TASCAM DV RA 1000 Mastering Recorder

Yesterday I made some easy experiments: the turntable sounds very good and I
connected the Phono preamp directly in the line-in of the DV RA 1000.
I had to put the volume of the line-in quite high, and I'm wandering if a
(mic) preamp between the phono preamp and the A/D converter can help.

Another question regards a strange thing that happens when I play a vinyl: 2
or 3 seconds before the music begins, I can hear the same music with a very
low volume.
Can someone explain me why?

Thanks,

Diego

I wouldn't recomend adding another gain stage to your signal path. I'd
open up the NAD all the way and see if this doesn't get you adequate
level. My guess is the pre-sound your hearing is due to lousy vinyl
pressings.

Gigio wrote:
I wrote some weeks ago, asking for help about transferring some vinyls
(thanks, Scott Dorsey!).
Now that's what I have:


- Pro-ject debut III turntable
- Nad PP2 Phono preamp
- Prism AD 124
-TASCAM DV RA 1000 Mastering Recorder

Yesterday I made some easy experiments: the turntable sounds very good and I
connected the Phono preamp directly in the line-in of the DV RA 1000.
I had to put the volume of the line-in quite high, and I'm wandering if a
(mic) preamp between the phono preamp and the A/D converter can help.

Another question regards a strange thing that happens when I play a vinyl: 2
or 3 seconds before the music begins, I can hear the same music with a very
low volume.
Can someone explain me why?

Thanks,

Diego

Gigio wrote:
I wrote some weeks ago, asking for help about transferring some vinyls
(thanks, Scott Dorsey!).
Now that's what I have:
- Pro-ject debut III turntable
- Nad PP2 Phono preamp
- Prism AD 124
-TASCAM DV RA 1000 Mastering Recorder

Yesterday I made some easy experiments: the turntable sounds very good and I
connected the Phono preamp directly in the line-in of the DV RA 1000.
I had to put the volume of the line-in quite high, and I'm wandering if a
(mic) preamp between the phono preamp and the A/D converter can help.

Huh?

Why isn't the output of the phono preamp going into the AD-124 and the
output of the AD-124 going into the recorder?

The AD-124 has DIP switches in back that let you set the operating level.

Another question regards a strange thing that happens when I play a vinyl: 2
or 3 seconds before the music begins, I can hear the same music with a very
low volume.
Can someone explain me why?

It's a bad cutting job. What happens is that as the mastering engineer
cuts the groove, it deforms the groove that is outside it if he cuts too
close. So there is some "pre echo" when that groove is played. This is
usually a sign that someone is trying to get too much time on the record
and has cranked the groove pitch way down to get more running time.

It's too late now to send the tape back for remastering, so you'll have
to live with it. But if you can hear this, it's a sign that your playback
noise floor is reasonably low.

Unless, of course, it's a Murray Hill pressing, in which case you could
probably hear the pre-echo on a Victrola. Those things gave LPs a bad name.
--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

On 10 Feb 2006 12:26:45 -0500, (Scott Dorsey) wrote:

--------------------------8---------------------------------------

It's a bad cutting job. What happens is that as the mastering engineer
cuts the groove, it deforms the groove that is outside it if he cuts too
close. So there is some "pre echo" when that groove is played. This is
usually a sign that someone is trying to get too much time on the record
and has cranked the groove pitch way down to get more running time.

It's too late now to send the tape back for remastering, so you'll have
to live with it. But if you can hear this, it's a sign that your playback
noise floor is reasonably low.

Unless, of course, it's a Murray Hill pressing, in which case you could
probably hear the pre-echo on a Victrola. Those things gave LPs a bad name.
--scott

-- Actually, such a dense-cut induced pre-echo sounds much like a tape
print-trough. A fair number of singles 45 RPM I owned had it and in
fact, I had nothing against it during my DJ job -- it sereved
excellently for cueing in, and was of help in achieving a really good
mix-in. You would cue in the coming single and stop the motor and at
the present single fade out or end, you would start the turntable. You
ought to have a bunch of fresh Shure EJ-95 (the green, not white ED
ones) stylii in the drawer as well if you have been doing it that way
)

Edi Zubovic, Crikvenica, Croatia

"Gigio" wrote in message

I wrote some weeks ago, asking for help about
transferring some vinyls (thanks, Scott Dorsey!).
Now that's what I have:


- Pro-ject debut III turntable
- Nad PP2 Phono preamp
- Prism AD 124
-TASCAM DV RA 1000 Mastering Recorder

Yesterday I made some easy experiments: the turntable
sounds very good and I connected the Phono preamp
directly in the line-in of the DV RA 1000. I had to put the volume of the
line-in quite high, and
I'm wandering if a (mic) preamp between the phono preamp
and the A/D converter can help.

Given the quality of your converters, there should be no problem with making
up the gain in the digital domain.

Another question regards a strange thing that happens
when I play a vinyl: 2 or 3 seconds before the music
begins, I can hear the same music with a very low volume.
Can someone explain me why?

Either print-through from the master tape or the lead in grooves were cut
too close together. If a LP groove is cut too loud, and too close to the
previous groove, it will add some music-related deformations to the previous
groove.

Tape print-through usually effects both channels, but the corresponding
process on a LP will affect only the side of the groove that is closest to
the next groove.

Gigio wrote:

Yesterday I made some easy experiments: the turntable sounds very good and I
connected the Phono preamp directly in the line-in of the DV RA 1000.
I had to put the volume of the line-in quite high, and I'm wandering if a
(mic) preamp between the phono preamp and the A/D converter can help.

If you can get adequate record level at any setting of the record level
control on the RA-1000, it's OK. Your system doesn't need any more
help. If they didn't want you to be able to turn it up, they wouldn't
have put that control there.


Another question regards a strange thing that happens when I play a vinyl: 2
or 3 seconds before the music begins, I can hear the same music with a very
low volume.
Can someone explain me why?

I take it this is your first experience with vinyl? This is called
"groove echo" and it's caused by the intended quiet lead-in grooves
being deformed by the cutter when the adjacent (with music) groove is
cut. Acutally all grooves have this problem, it's just that you can't
hear it in the presence of music.

Mike Rivers wrote:

I take it this is your first experience with vinyl? This is called
"groove echo" and it's caused by the intended quiet lead-in grooves
being deformed by the cutter when the adjacent (with music) groove is
cut. Acutally all grooves have this problem, it's just that you can't
hear it in the presence of music.

As others have pointed out, this could also be tape print through on the
master tape.

Dr. Dolittle wrote:

As others have pointed out, this could also be tape print through on the
master tape.

And others might be right, but only rarely. They can do something about
that (like mute the feed to the cutter or put leader on the tape until
just before the music starts), but they can't do anything about groove
deformation, at least not until they start pressing records on
something harder than vinyl.

So unless it was really a sloppy mastering job (and since what the
original poster wrote led me to believe that he didn't hear this on
just one record, it's not likely to be just one poor mastering job
where they didn't take care of the print-thru), I stand uncorrected.

Dr. Dolittle wrote:
Mike Rivers wrote:

I take it this is your first experience with vinyl? This is called
"groove echo" and it's caused by the intended quiet lead-in grooves
being deformed by the cutter when the adjacent (with music) groove is
cut. Acutally all grooves have this problem, it's just that you can't
hear it in the presence of music.

As others have pointed out, this could also be tape print through on the
master tape.

Not usually. Usually we tag the front of each track and the space in-between
tracks with paper leader so there is no print-through between tracks. That
has been standard operating practice since LPs were new.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."