[Mxsmanic]

Marc Wielage writes:

Things are good and bad in degrees, not absolutes. I bet I've used software
a lot longer than you have, and trust me, there's many shades of gray in
there.

Yes, there are some shades of gray, but the fundamental principles are
unfortunately quite consistent.

The software world seems to play at business by different rules, and until and
unless consumers demand that it adopt the same rules as any other business,
there will be problems with software.

I have used absolutely horrendous, unusable software, even going back
to the Apple II in 1980 and MS-DOS throughout the 1980s, even on the Mac
starting in 1987 (for me). But it's not all garbage. I'd say on average,
software is more usable today than any time in human history, just because
everybody has built on the past 40 years through evolution and experience.

It's garbage in comparison to hardware. Even a lowly toaster is better built
than most software. Of course, if a toaster catches fire, people get sued, and
some may go to jail. But if software fails, the vendor just claims that bugs
are "inevitable" (a lie) and is let off the hook.

Tell me again what microphones and recorders you've used, and what you'd
consider good or bad.

I have the Zoom. I used to have some microphones for video equipment--Sony, I
think. There's a little microphone connected to my PC, plus a webcam mic and a
mic on my headset. That's about it, I think.

"Professional" is kind of ephemeral; "very high quality and reliable" is
really what I'm getting at.

So "professional" is actually a moving target, and highly subjective?

The Zoom won't qualify for that, but I absolutely agree the Zoom can be
useful for certain things.

I haven't seen any numbers on the failure rates of Zooms, even though they
seem to sell very well. Do they have a reputation for fragility?

I wouldn't want to rely on it for a situation that paid my wages, especially
one involving synchronization with a video camera.

All of the videos I make cost me money; none is a source of income. I suppose
that if someone paid me $100,000 to make a video, I'd use equipment that
_might_ be more reliable (although, as I've said, I haven't seen statistics
for the Zoom, so just assuming that it's going to fail at a critical moment is
perhaps premature).

The lack of timecode instantly kills it for me.

That is apparently a drawback. I'm not sure why syncing by hand to images is
such an awful and terrible thing, though. I haven't actually used it to record
sound for video, but that was my original reason for buying it. (None of my
current videos require anything other than ambient noise.)

For a quickie radio interview or grabbing a demo of a band... no problem.
It's fine for that.

Good ... an interview is one of the potential uses I had in mind, although
stereo is probably not necessary for that.

BTW, are you the same "MXSMANIC" who posts a lot of videos on YouTube?

A lot? There are about 87 out there, which isn't many. But yes, that would be
me. Extra points for having taken the time to Google, which most people never
bother to do.

I know a lot more about video than about audio, although some of this doesn't
show in the videos I upload because of budget constraints. And conversely I
don't make videos for a living, so I know less than someone who does.

[Mxsmanic]

vdubreeze writes:

The fact that you got Scott Dorsey to call you a troll is not
something to be taken lightly.

I don't know who Scott Dorsey is, either, apart from a name posting to this
group. I've heard of Jimmy Dorsey and Tommy Dorsey, though.

[vdubreeze]

On Mar 19, 3:08*am, Mxsmanic wrote:
Marc Wielage writes:

Open up your mind to the possibility there may be things you don't know..

I keep asking why one piece of equipment is called consumer and the other pro,
but I'm not getting any clear answers. If I ask ten different "pros," I'll get
ten different answers ... depending on how much equipment they have
themselves, and how much it costs.

So what? You're looking for an answer for which there is no question.

You remind me of a particular juror I once sat with, important case,
violence and deaths part of the picture. We had just gotten another
round of directions from the judge about how we were to deal with the
information given to us. You're not making judgments about this or
that, this or that is not part of what we're asking you think about,
you're not deciding on this you're deciding on that, the usual jury
stuff. And afterwards this one guy says, "Screw that, he looks
guilty, he's guilty. The judge is wrong saying that stuff. I don't
care what he or anyone says to me, that guy is guilty as sin, it's
obvious. His rules are wrong, I'm not following them".

If 200 duck specialists are telling you it's not a duck, and no one is
agreeing that it's a duck, you really should step back and consider
that it's not a duck.

[Mike Rivers]

On 3/18/2012 2:13 PM, Mxsmanic wrote:

How did they know the quality of the equipment?

Reputation, mostly. Some customers do their homework. They
perceive that because all of the records that they read
about are made on Ampex or Studer recorders and not TASCAM
recorders, that this must somehow be better, and that
they'll get a better record from a studio that uses this
equipment. It may or may not be accurate, but some consumers
work this way - just as they feel they'll be getting a
better car if they buy the Mercedes than if they buy the Ford.

So again it's about how much money he spent on equipment.

This is an unfortunate consequence of having better
designed, manufactured, and quality controlled equipment. If
Millenia could build preamps as cheaply as TASCAM, TASCAM
would probably be in a different line of business.

If the wedding couple is willing to let Cousin Vinnie take
their pictures, they get what he gets.

If Cousin Vinnie has talent, the results might be very nice.

That's true. But if Vinnie has talent, he's probably
nurtured it with some better than cheap consumer equipment.
Unless his talent is in getting professional results, by
hook or crook, from marginal equipment, pushing it to the
limit and getting better results than the casual user.

I've never said that it's impossible to get professional
quality results from lower grade equipment, just that it's
harder to do and less reliable. Sometimes it works and
sometimes it doesn't There are times when pro equipment
fails to do the job, but in the right hands, those times are
rare.

But the mics don't set themselves up. It all depends on how you use them,
right?

Right. You can get poor results from the best of mics, but
you can sometimes get better results with the right mic. But
the consumer who wants the cheapest rate really doesn't
care. When good enough is good enough, that's good enough.

Or are you saying that if I go out and buy the same mics, I'll get the same
quality of results that you get?

Depends on your luck. You surely don't have the skill and
experience to assure good results. You know what they say
about blind squirrels and acorns, don't you?


--
"Today's production equipment is IT based and cannot be
operated without a passing knowledge of computing, although
it seems that it can be operated without a passing knowledge
of audio." - John Watkinson

http://mikeriversaudio.wordpress.com - useful and
interesting audio stuff

[Scott Dorsey]

Jeff Henig wrote:

My bad, Scott. I know it wasn't a 2" machine. I think it was an MSR 24 1".
I think this because we had been talking about moving up to a 2" machine. I
thought I remembered our tapes being wider than 1", but it was a few years
ago and my memory's not what it was.

Oh, yuck! Those things had even narrower tracks than the 1/2 8-track machines.
They can sound pretty good but they're noisy and the alignment is touchy.

They edited breaths out by slowly jogging the reels to listen between
punches, then marking with a marker, then enabling record on that track and
jogging again. I don't remember a single physical slice being made--tape
was friggin' expensive!

Yes, and with 24 tracks on 1", window editing is out of the question.
Spot-erasing will let you silence one track at a time, which is very handy.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[Arny Krueger[_4_]]

"Marc Wielage" wrote in message
.com...
On Sun, 18 Mar 2012 13:19:11 -0700, Arny Krueger wrote
(in article ):

Now please name a piece of hardware (with no embedded software) that is a
100% functional replacement for it...
------------------------------snip------------------------------

A hammer? :-)

Exactly.

No, I agree. It's almost impossible to avoid software driven devices in
anything more than a toaster. (And even then, I bet there might be some
fancy ones running a stripped-down version of Linux.)

Either that or one of the 100 different "Operating Environments" (OS/s to
us old timers and other philistines) that run on ARM SOC CPUs.

http://www.arm.com/community/partner.../Categories/4/

I saw a flat-screen TV set glitch not too long ago, and it suddenly
started
spewing lines of Linux all over the screen. Funny and sad.

I have the service manual for my Mitsbishi DLP TV set. I found clear
references to at least 3 different embedded computers. There might be 5...

[Arny Krueger[_4_]]

"Scott Dorsey" wrote in message
...
In article ,
Mxsmanic wrote:
Scott Dorsey writes:

That's it. You really are a troll.

That's it: There really isn't a distinction between "high end audio" and
"professional audio." QED. Why not just admit it?

Because they are almost completely disjoint sets, and this shows in one
sentence how absolutely clueless you are about professional equipment.

Professional equipment is designed to do a job in an environment where
if it fails, you don't get paid.

High-end home audio is designed to work in a world where nobody is really
trying to do anything and nobody is getting paid for getting a job done.

Amen!

Either you are a troll and you are deliberately offending people in order
to have fun, or you really don't understand this. Either way, you really
don't belong in a professional audio group. Please go away.

I recommend that he lurk for a number of months before his next non-trivial
post or a post containing a respectfully-phrased question.

[Mike Rivers]

On 3/18/2012 8:07 PM, Jeff Henig wrote:

I always thought that TEAC was the consumer division of TASCAM, which in
turn was the equivalent of MCI, Ampex, et al.

Actually, it's the other way around. Dick Rosmini started
using a TEAC 4-track (consumer, quad) recorder in his home
studio and found that he was able to do some pretty good
work with it at considerably lower cost than working in a
professional studio. Now understand that Dick wasn't just
some stoned out guitar player with an empty wallet, he was a
skilled engineer and professional studio guitarist, among
many other things - also a professional technical photographer.

Anyway, he got to doing some consulting work for TEAC and
convinced them that they should make a line of equipment
that, while based on the pretty decent technology of their
consumer products, offered the features and functions that a
recording studio needed in order to work efficiently and not
kludge assorted pieces of gear together. That's when TEAC
decided to start the TASCAM division.

During what I considered TASCAM's strongest period, they
made a fully professional 24-track 2" tape deck, some pretty
reasonable consoles, and their DA-88 digital recorder and
its follow-up models waere the mainstay of video production
houses for probably 15 years before they all moved over to
Avid. After that, TASCAM concentrated on the fast growing
home recording market and pretty much dropped the
professional image and product series. Not to say that
professionals aren't doing SOME work with SOME TASCAM gear.
It's just another choice that they have available.

I always thought the TASCAM 24 sounded pretty dang good. Is going to 2" a
night/day difference? And is the horizontal transport that much more
reliable or easier to work with than the vertical?

Few things in this business are night-and-day differences on
their own, but when you combine a bunch of equipment to make
a complete system, that's where the little differences
combine to make a bigger difference.

Horizontal or vertical mounting is a matter of preference
and space availability. You probably wouldn't want to do
much editing on a vertically mounted reel-to-reel tape deck.
When I was editing with my consumer decks (which stood
vertically) I'd lay them down on their back and remove the
head cover so I could get to the heads more easily.

--
"Today's production equipment is IT based and cannot be
operated without a passing knowledge of computing, although
it seems that it can be operated without a passing knowledge
of audio." - John Watkinson

http://mikeriversaudio.wordpress.com - useful and
interesting audio stuff

[Arny Krueger[_4_]]

"Mxsmanic" wrote in message
...
Scott Dorsey writes:

Because they are almost completely disjoint sets, and this shows in one
sentence how absolutely clueless you are about professional equipment.

Then describe the consistent, objective criteria that unambiguously
distinguish between high-end and pro equipment.

Professional equipment is designed to do a job in an environment where
if it fails, you don't get paid.

All equipment designed by any reputable manufacturer is designed to do a
job
reliably. How reliably that is depends mostly on how much customers are
willing to pay, not on an imaginary line between pro and high-end or
consumer
gear.

High-end home audio is designed to work in a world where nobody is really
trying to do anything and nobody is getting paid for getting a job done.

So give me some examples in each category, with the distinguishing
features
that put them in those categories.

Please compare a typical Crown power amp

http://www.crownaudio.com/amps.htm

with a Goldmund Telos 5000:

http://www.goldmund.com/products/telos_5000

I'm interested to see if you can tell the difference...

[Arny Krueger[_4_]]

"Mxsmanic" wrote in message
...
Arny Krueger writes:

For one thing, if there's a high end audio and also a pro audio version
of
something, the pro audio version probably works better and cheaper. Most
apparent when you start looking at power amps and loudspeakers.

So how would you recognize one or the other in isolation?

For a given 8 ohm power rating, the pro amp will

(1) Have a 2 ohm power rating which the high end amp probably lacks. The
high end amp may not have a set of specs that are recognizable as such.
(2) Weigh less
(3) Be smaller
and
(4) A point that is very relevant but may not be available in isolation -
cost from 1/10 to 1/1000 th as much.
(5) Good chance that the pro amp sounds better simply because it presents a
low source impedance and has substantial power.

That's my whole point. Someone implied that a H4n wasn't really
"professional"
equipment,

BTW, A point with which I disagree.

A typical consumer would not know what a H4n was by looking at it, or know
what to use it for or how. Not even a teenager.

A typical professional audio guy would probably be able to make a good
recording with it without reading the instruction book or even the quick
start guide.

and I've pointed out that there is no objective way to say whether
it is professional or not.

You get to be wrong.

And this applies to all technology domains, not
just professional audio.

Professional grade tools are apparent even when they are primarily sold to
consumers. In the last stages of commoditization, what you say is true, but
only becasse things tend to converge on utility.

The only reasonably consistent rule I've found is the one I've already
mentiond: if it costs as much or more than you can afford, it's
professional,
otherwise it's just for amateurs.

Balderdash. High price is not an indicator of whether something is a
professional tool. Especially true in audio.

Even a specific individual's standard of "pro" equipment will change if
his fortunes change.

Let's put it this way. The more cash flow an area of endeavor generates, the
more money there is logically available to invest in it. However, the rate
of technological improvement and the point of diminishing returns for all
kinds of tools is not the same. There are many professional tools even in
audio, that represent mature, slow-moving technologies where the point of
diminishing returns starts well within the price range that many people are
able to pay. I would say that vocal mics for use in live sound would be a
good example of that. Yeah, there are some super-priced items out there,
but you still have to pay a couple of $100 to get a keeper, while there are
really good Neumann's cost only a few times more and are still well under a
grand.

[Mike Rivers]

On 3/18/2012 1:43 PM, Mxsmanic wrote:

Sometimes it sounds to me like the original poster is confusing the
"high end audio" and "professional audio" worlds.

What's the distinction between the two?

Professional audio engineers make the recordings that high
end audio consumers listen to.


--
"Today's production equipment is IT based and cannot be
operated without a passing knowledge of computing, although
it seems that it can be operated without a passing knowledge
of audio." - John Watkinson

http://mikeriversaudio.wordpress.com - useful and
interesting audio stuff

[Scott Dorsey]

Marc Wielage wrote:

Pro Tools has kind of become a symbol of what's "wrong" with the recording
industry today, and I kind of bristle at that because I think it's an unfair
description. The reality is, if you want to be in the recording business in
LA, Pro Tools compatibility is inescapable. Especially in the film & TV
sound business.

The compatibility is the good part. Pro Tools has become the 2" 24-track
of the current era, and that's a wonderful thing because it allows you to
take a project from place to place easily.

But Pro Tools started out as a pop music production aid... and as time has
gone by it has become more and more generalized with a lot more features that
are designed for specific kinds of projects.

Some of this is good... for example the original versions of Pro Tools were
not bit-for-bit accurate. You could load a 16-bit project, store it back
again, and the bits weren't the same. The new version of Pro Tools really
can store the original file bit-for-bit if you don't make changes. This is
a feature that I welcome.

But some of it isn't so good, when it adds stuff that clutters up the user
interface.

For music, it's wide open. But I still see Pro Tools in more places than
anything else. And I also see more mixing "in the box" than ever before --
good or bad.

I'd like to see more "pro-tools compatible" special purpose applications,
personally.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[Arny Krueger[_4_]]

"Mike Rivers" wrote in message
...
On 3/16/2012 2:27 PM, PStamler wrote:

And if you're close to a lion, you shouldn't be thinking about mics
and preamps, you should be thinking about getting away.

Sony has a story from a wildlife recordist about (I think) a PCM-D50 that
a giraffe swallowed. He wanted to rescue the recordings that were in the
memory of the recorder so he followed the giraffe until it came out. It
still worked.


Intersting line of recorders. Street prices:

PCM-D1 - $1,600
PCM-D50 - $460
PCM-M10 - $280

Which is professional and which is consumer?

I say they are all professional. The durability of the D50 seems
unimpeachable! ;-)

[Mike Rivers]

On 3/18/2012 2:17 PM, Mxsmanic wrote:

It's yet another effect of advancing technology and the democratization it
produces. There is a tendency to slide towards the low end of the curve.

No argument there. Do you consider this a good thing, a bad
thing, or something else? If it's a good think, then perhaps
there is no longer a need for the audio profession.

Maybe I should start up a food truck and serve up my famous
chili. That should work until someone discovers a way to
serve it cheaper, right?




--
"Today's production equipment is IT based and cannot be
operated without a passing knowledge of computing, although
it seems that it can be operated without a passing knowledge
of audio." - John Watkinson

http://mikeriversaudio.wordpress.com - useful and
interesting audio stuff

[Scott Dorsey]

In article ,
Mxsmanic wrote:
hank alrich writes:

Mxsmanic wrote:

Scott Dorsey writes:

Sometimes it sounds to me like the original poster is confusing the
"high end audio" and "professional audio" worlds.

What's the distinction between the two?

For ****'s sake, you lay out ignorance like it was a line of blow and
you're an addict.

What's the difference between high-end audio and pro audio?

Five dollars, same as in town.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[Arny Krueger[_4_]]

"Mike Rivers" wrote in message
...
On 3/18/2012 1:43 PM, Mxsmanic wrote:

Sometimes it sounds to me like the original poster is confusing the
"high end audio" and "professional audio" worlds.

What's the distinction between the two?

Professional audio engineers make the recordings that high end audio
consumers listen to.

....Using equipment that most high end audiofools can't even stand to look
at... Recordings are like sausage and laws, and we all know the rest of
that old saying... ;-)

[Mike Rivers]

On 3/18/2012 2:15 PM, Mxsmanic wrote:

An additional problem with software is that the people who are best at writing
it often know very little about anything else, including the application for
which the software is being written.

This is true. I sometimes wonder "What could these people be
thinking? Have they ever used a recorder or a mixing
console?" But what happens is that some adopters adapt to
different ways of doing things in order to take advantage of
the features which software can offer at the price that they
can afford, which hardware cannot. And newcomers who have
never known any other way learn how to do it "the software
way" and get their work done in twice the time it would take
them with a properly designed system.

This is something that we can discuss intelligently here. No
point in beating up on this "consumer" gear any longer.



--
"Today's production equipment is IT based and cannot be
operated without a passing knowledge of computing, although
it seems that it can be operated without a passing knowledge
of audio." - John Watkinson

http://mikeriversaudio.wordpress.com - useful and
interesting audio stuff

[Mike Rivers]

On 3/18/2012 5:52 PM, Mxsmanic wrote:

Real-world software systems can be written without bugs. The idea that this is
impossible is a myth foisted by software vendors upon their customers in order
to escape responsibility for their negligence.

It's not impossible, it's just too expensive and it takes
too long. Neither is good for business. It's just trading
old problems for new. You may need to keep up with updates
for your audio interface drivers but you don't need to align
the heads or calibrate the electronics of your tape deck or
replace dried out capacitors in your mixing console.

Professional systems are designed to work.

And consumer systems are not?

Depends on how you read that sentence. They aren't designed
not to work, but they don't take extra steps in design to
assure that the devices will work under adverse conditions,
will not wear out quickly (often because of the failure of a
single part like a switch that can't be replaced) and will
not fail catastrophically.

I have a wonderful wrist watch. It's a Timex. I think it
cost $29. It has analog hands and a digital window with
features that I use all the time. However, now the stem
that's used to select the digital function, start and stop
the stopwatch, and set the timer has become worn and, as a
switch, it's unreliable. Timex cannot repair it, and
unfortunately they no longer make a watch with the same
feature set.

Why don't I have a Rolex? Because there isn't one that
offers me the features of the Timex. I've searched and
searched. The critical flaw is the lack of a timer. How am I
supposed to know that it's time to take the roast out of the
oven when I'm in another room with my mind on trying to talk
to a troll in rec.audio.pro?



--
"Today's production equipment is IT based and cannot be
operated without a passing knowledge of computing, although
it seems that it can be operated without a passing knowledge
of audio." - John Watkinson

http://mikeriversaudio.wordpress.com - useful and
interesting audio stuff

[Mike Rivers]

On 3/19/2012 3:08 AM, Mxsmanic wrote:

But surely there are non-mission-critical assignments in pro audio, just as
there are in so many other domains.

Of course there are, but we still don't like to fail. And
failure results in a loss of business. And as you say, it's
all about business.



--
"Today's production equipment is IT based and cannot be
operated without a passing knowledge of computing, although
it seems that it can be operated without a passing knowledge
of audio." - John Watkinson

http://mikeriversaudio.wordpress.com - useful and
interesting audio stuff

[Neil Gould]

Mike Rivers wrote:
I sometimes wonder "What could these people be
thinking? Have they ever used a recorder or a mixing
console?" But what happens is that some adopters adapt to
different ways of doing things in order to take advantage of
the features which software can offer at the price that they
can afford, which hardware cannot. (...)

Those of us who have lived a long time with the limitations of hardware
welcome access to software tools that get past those limitations and add
significant functionality. Parametric EQs and limiters are two examples
where the software implementations are far superior to hardware versions.
The price wasn't much of a factor early-on, since the better software
implementations only appeared in higher-priced DAW apps.

--
best,

Neil

[Scott Dorsey]

Marc Wielage wrote:
On Fri, 16 Mar 2012 13:05:50 -0700, Scott Dorsey wrote

With the Nagra III, you could drop it off a building and it would keep
recording, and you could hear it hit and bounce several times on the tape
when you played it back afterward, and the tape would not have any audible
wow or speed change when this happened.

I agree with a lot of your points, but the reality is, if the Nagra III or 4S
was jostled hard enough, the tape could slip out of the guides, or the top
cover could break and expose the reels.

Absolutely, that's what amazed me when it dropped off a building and the
tape sounded clean!

I bet it'd do fine with a 3-foot
drop to concrete (especially if it was dropped flat), and I can't say that
about a lot of recorders today. The high-end Zaxcom, Aaton, and Sound
Devices recorders would hold up pretty well -- not much plastic, mostly
metal, very well-machined. And they also have great preamps, timecode, and
decent battery life.

Definitely, they are very much pro gear.
--scott


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

[vdubreeze]

On Mar 19, 10:20*am, Mike Rivers wrote:
On 3/18/2012 1:43 PM, Mxsmanic wrote:

Sometimes it sounds to me like the original poster is confusing the
"high end audio" and "professional audio" worlds.

What's the distinction between the two?

Professional audio engineers make the recordings that high
end audio consumers listen to.


As seemingly pointless as a thread like this seems, as long as people
like Mike can still go to the well and pull up statements like this
(which is a new one to me) I will still be nodding my head in
recognition of its truth. Thanks : )

[Richard Webb[_3_]]

On Mon 2012-Mar-19 00:40, hank alrich writes:
Mxsmanic wrote:

The statements I'm making don't require a knowledge base for audio

Obviously.


I note elsewhere when called on Scott calling him a troll he basically disrespects Scott as well. For Mxsmanic: Scott
has been a long time professional in this business, and been around this newsgroup for decades now, unlike yourself. HE
has credibility here.

Until about two months ago nobody here had ever heard of you before.

At first when you're spouting off about how audio production folks should do their work you were asked what your interest is in audio, what you do with it. YOu stated then that you
capture various sounds around you and manipulate them for
artistic purposes, etc. That's cool, nothing wrong with
that, but when you come into a newsgroup and start spouting
off about what tools we should consider professional, and
how we should use those tools, you need to back your **** up with some experience instead of being a hobbyist wonker in
your back room somewhere.

mxsmanic has made his way into the killfile via this method. As I stated, I still see him when accessing albisani
(spelling) but here on the bbs he doesn't get to stay in the newsgroup database very long.

I will say he's more polite than Bill Graham was anyway, but it still doesn't matter. HE has nothing to say worth
archiving here.

Mxsmanic, you may not consider yourself a troll, I don't
know, but if nothing else you need to stfu and do more
lurking and posting. You might actually learn something
that would assist you in whatever audio endeavors you're
involved with, even if those endeavors are for fun, as a
hobby, etc. That's why most of us who do this sort of work
for a living come here. I can safely say I've learned
nothing from you except you don't know wtf you're talking
about.

Regards,
Richard
--
| Remove .my.foot for email
| via Waldo's Place USA Fidonet-Internet Gateway Site
| Standard disclaimer: The views of this user are strictly his own.

[hank alrich]

Marc Wielage wrote:

Try a Sound Devices recorder before condemning the idea of a pro recorder
being better than a Zoom.

Excellent example of a a relatively expensive purpose-built piece of
professional gear with outstanding performance, build quality and
reliability. Doesn't make sense for any punter who isn't wealthy, while
for a niche of genuine professionals it's an affordable and effective
tool.

--
shut up and play your guitar * http://hankalrich.com/
http://www.youtube.com/walkinaymusic
http://www.sonicbids.com/HankandShaidri

[Richard Webb[_3_]]

On Mon 2012-Mar-19 08:57, Mike Rivers writes:
snip

During what I considered TASCAM's strongest period, they
made a fully professional 24-track 2" tape deck, some pretty
reasonable consoles, and their DA-88 digital recorder and
its follow-up models waere the mainstay of video production houses
for probably 15 years before they all moved over to
Avid. After that, TASCAM concentrated on the fast growing
home recording market and pretty much dropped the
professional image and product series. Not to say that
professionals aren't doing SOME work with SOME TASCAM gear. It's
just another choice that they have available.

YEp, I used a Tascam 34, then a 38 back in my analog days,
with one of their consoles in fact.

Back when the da88 was the mainstay for video and film audio production for dealing with stems was indeed their heyday.
NOw their digital interface standard tdif is basically an
orphan, everybody's adat for shipping digital audio.

Horizontal or vertical mounting is a matter of preference
and space availability. You probably wouldn't want to do
much editing on a vertically mounted reel-to-reel tape deck. When I
was editing with my consumer decks (which stood
vertically) I'd lay them down on their back and remove the
head cover so I could get to the heads more easily.

YEp, that's as we did as well with the 34 and the 38.


Regards,
Richard
.... Remote audio in the southland: See www.gatasound.com
--
| Remove .my.foot for email
| via Waldo's Place USA Fidonet-Internet Gateway Site
| Standard disclaimer: The views of this user are strictly his own.

[Mike Rivers]

On 3/19/2012 10:41 AM, Neil Gould wrote:

Those of us who have lived a long time with the limitations of hardware
welcome access to software tools that get past those limitations and add
significant functionality.

Those of us who don't find hardware to be limiting are
intimidated by all the choices that are available with
software - choices that we HAVE to make in order to get down
to work. I'm only capable of making a recording so good and
can't make it any better with software versions of the
hardware I prefer to use.


--
"Today's production equipment is IT based and cannot be
operated without a passing knowledge of computing, although
it seems that it can be operated without a passing knowledge
of audio." - John Watkinson

http://mikeriversaudio.wordpress.com - useful and
interesting audio stuff

[Scott Dorsey]

Mike Rivers wrote:

Those of us who don't find hardware to be limiting are
intimidated by all the choices that are available with
software - choices that we HAVE to make in order to get down
to work. I'm only capable of making a recording so good and
can't make it any better with software versions of the
hardware I prefer to use.

Just add bongos, Mike. Everything is better with bongos.
--scott


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

[Mxsmanic]

Mike Rivers writes:

It's not impossible, it's just too expensive and it takes
too long.

But that's true for hardware, too. Why is it acceptable to take longer and
spend more for quality hardware, while software must be rushed and cheap?

You may need to keep up with updates
for your audio interface drivers but you don't need to align
the heads or calibrate the electronics of your tape deck or
replace dried out capacitors in your mixing console.

You would need to replace things in your console every day if it were built as
carelessly as most software is.

Why don't I have a Rolex? Because there isn't one that
offers me the features of the Timex. I've searched and
searched. The critical flaw is the lack of a timer.

Rolexes are mechanical watches that keep terrible time. If you want the
correct time, you don't buy a mechanical watch, no matter who built it.

[Mxsmanic]

Arny Krueger writes:

Please compare a typical Crown power amp

http://www.crownaudio.com/amps.htm

with a Goldmund Telos 5000:

http://www.goldmund.com/products/telos_5000

I'm interested to see if you can tell the difference...

I don't see an obvious difference. If you cannot explain the difference, then
I'll hire whoever has the lower price, irrespective of what equipment he is
using.

[Mxsmanic]

Arny Krueger writes:

I recommend that he lurk for a number of months before his next non-trivial
post or a post containing a respectfully-phrased question.

People have to earn my respect; they do not get it by default.

People earn my respect when they provide intelligent, calm, and accurate
answers to my questions. No amount of claims of expertise or waving of
credentials has any effect on me. Those who engage in personal attacks are
immediately written off as losers, since I've never encountered someone who
was actually qualified to answer questions and yet refused to provide them in
favor of personal attacks.

[Mxsmanic]

Arny Krueger writes:

"Mxsmanic" wrote in message
...

So how would you recognize one or the other in isolation?

For a given 8 ohm power rating, the pro amp will

(1) Have a 2 ohm power rating which the high end amp probably lacks. The
high end amp may not have a set of specs that are recognizable as such.
(2) Weigh less
(3) Be smaller
and
(4) A point that is very relevant but may not be available in isolation -
cost from 1/10 to 1/1000 th as much.
(5) Good chance that the pro amp sounds better simply because it presents a
low source impedance and has substantial power.

Finally, some objective criteria. Thanks!

BTW, A point with which I disagree.

A typical consumer would not know what a H4n was by looking at it, or know
what to use it for or how. Not even a teenager.

A typical professional audio guy would probably be able to make a good
recording with it without reading the instruction book or even the quick
start guide.

I agree. No one to whom I've shown the Zoom has been able to figure out what
it is (even with the obvious microphones in front), with the exception of one
or two people who had a pre-existing interet in audio (not necessarily
professional). This to me indicates that it is not a consumer product.

I didn't know that recorders like this existed a few months ago, until someone
pointed them out to me as I was wondering aloud about how to better record
sound on location for videos. However, I would have immediately recognized
such a recorder for what it was had I seen one previously.

The recorder seems reasonably solid but not as solid as I might expect if it
were intended to tolerate very hard use in the field. But for the price it
seems well built. The other question is the quality of results that it
produces, but I'm not qualified to assess that. It seems to do well for my
purposes. I don't have any trouble imagining a professional using it for
professional purposes, even if it's not the Best of the Best.

Balderdash. High price is not an indicator of whether something is a
professional tool. Especially true in audio.

True in every domain, but price is often the criterion upon which people (pro
and amateur) will CLAIM that something is pro or consumer. And the price point
will generally be whatever the person's budget is. So a pro will claim that
whatever he can afford is professional, along with anything that he can't
afford, but he'll dismiss as consumer gear anything cheaper than what he has
or can afford. It's human nature.

There are many professional tools even in
audio, that represent mature, slow-moving technologies where the point of
diminishing returns starts well within the price range that many people are
able to pay.

As I attempt to learn more about audio, I have been surprised by what one can
buy for relatively reasonable prices (i.e., prices that someone who isn't
doing audio for a living can afford). This does indeed indicate that some
parts of the technology are quite mature.

I would say that vocal mics for use in live sound would be a
good example of that. Yeah, there are some super-priced items out there,
but you still have to pay a couple of $100 to get a keeper, while there are
really good Neumann's cost only a few times more and are still well under a
grand.

Yes, microphones came to mind immediately. I'm surprised by how affordable
certain mics are in comparison to the high praise they receive. I guess
microphones are a well understood and quite mature technology.

[None]

"Mxsmanic" wrote in message
...
Arny Krueger writes:

Please compare a typical Crown power amp

http://www.crownaudio.com/amps.htm

with a Goldmund Telos 5000:

http://www.goldmund.com/products/telos_5000

I'm interested to see if you can tell the difference...

I don't see an obvious difference. If you cannot explain the difference,
then
I'll hire whoever has the lower price, irrespective of what equipment he
is
using.

The difference between high-end audiophile equipment and professional
audio equipment has been explained to you several times now, in several
different ways, sometime with explanations targeted to an adult
comprehension
level, and when that didn't work, targeted at an utter novice. But none of
that
got through to you, because you have your hands covering your ears and
you're chanting "LA LA LA I CAN'T HEAR YOUR EXPLANATIONS!"

And then you say that nobody's given you an explanation. Maybe you
could take your hands of your ears if they weren't so firmly clamped
in place by your rectal lining. So just go with your rock-bottom cheapest
criterion. No wonder you thing everything is garbage. It's all you're
willing
to pay for.

[Mxsmanic]

Richard Webb writes:

For Mxsmanic: Scott has been a long time professional in this
business, and been around this newsgroup for decades now, unlike
yourself. HE has credibility here.

He is a name on a screen. That is neither good nor bad, but decades in
cyberspace have taught me never to pay any attention to claimed credentials on
a newsgroup. In any case, if he is truly a long-time professional, then that
should come through in his posts. I don't take anyone's word for anything.

Until about two months ago nobody here had ever heard of you before.

So?

At first when you're spouting off about how audio production folks
should do their work ...

When have I done that?

... but when you come into a newsgroup and start spouting
off about what tools we should consider professional, and
how we should use those tools ...

Where have I done that?

mxsmanic has made his way into the killfile via this method.

People who are emotional enough to killfile me are usually just sources of
noise, anyway, so it works best for all.

Mxsmanic, you may not consider yourself a troll, I don't
know, but if nothing else you need to stfu and do more
lurking and posting.

Since you've killfiled me, why do you care?

You might actually learn something that would assist you in whatever
audio endeavors you're involved with, even if those endeavors are
for fun, as a hobby, etc.

For me to learn something, I need to interact with people who can hold a calm
and intelligent discussion on topic, rather than hot-headed, pimple-faced
teenaged boys who attack anyone with whom they have a disagreement or whenever
they are at a loss for objective arguments.

I can safely say I've learned nothing from you except you don't
know wtf you're talking about.

I'm not here to teach. There are some domains in which I am extremely well
informed, but pro audio is not among them (although I'm much better informed
on pro audio than the average consumer, but that isn't saying much).

[Mxsmanic]

Mike Rivers writes:

No argument there. Do you consider this a good thing, a bad
thing, or something else? If it's a good think, then perhaps
there is no longer a need for the audio profession.

I consider it neither bad nor good. It has good points and bad points.

I think there will always be a need for audio professionals, but that their
numbers will shrink (after adjustment for population) in the future, as more
and more non-professionals take matters into their own hands.

One reason to hire a professional is to have someone handle a task that's
difficult. But as technology makes things easier, that reason for hiring a
professional fades away. Which leaves only other reasons for hiring pros, such
as getting the best possible result in a given situation. This will have the
effect of putting certain professionals out of business, specifically those
who have depended on large investments in equipment to keep them in business.

Some professionals with certain specialties that are being eliminated by
technology will simply have to find other work. For examples of this, see
typesetters and projectionists (both of whom partially dug their own graves by
being too demanding while they were needed, leading people to immediately put
them out on the street once alternatives existed).

With equipment getting cheaper and cheaper and of better and better quality,
the only thing separating the pros from the amateurs will be skill and talent.
And even some of the skill will become irrelevant, if it concerns the use of
equipment that is no longer used by anyone. And so the emphasis on talent will
increase. Those who stay in business will be the ones who have the right
skills and the talent to use them well, along with a professional attitude and
ethics that compel them to strive for excellence.

This applies to all domains, not just pro audio. It's a consistent general
rule that affects any field of endeavor that is closely linked to advancing
technology.

[hank alrich]

Jeff Henig wrote:

Scott Dorsey wrote:
Mike Rivers wrote:

Those of us who don't find hardware to be limiting are
intimidated by all the choices that are available with
software - choices that we HAVE to make in order to get down
to work. I'm only capable of making a recording so good and
can't make it any better with software versions of the
hardware I prefer to use.

Just add bongos, Mike. Everything is better with bongos.
--scott


And here I was thinking it was cowbell.

Yeah, if Scott were a pro he'd have a better sense of priorities.

--
shut up and play your guitar * http://hankalrich.com/
http://www.youtube.com/walkinaymusic
http://www.sonicbids.com/HankandShaidri

[vdubreeze]

On Mar 19, 7:45*pm, Mxsmanic wrote:
Richard Webb writes:
For Mxsmanic: *Scott has been a long time professional in this
business, and been around this newsgroup for decades now, unlike
yourself. *HE has credibility here.

He is a name on a screen. That is neither good nor bad, but decades in
cyberspace have taught me never to pay any attention to claimed credentials on
a newsgroup. In any case, if he is truly a long-time professional, then that
should come through in his posts.


If you don't think Scott's depth of knowledge comes through in his
posts you can't possibly have read any of them.

I don't take anyone's word for anything.

No one's saying you should take anyone's word for anything. But you
SHOULD be paying attention to what people are writing instead of just
using it as a springboard for more posts about a topic you ran out of
things to say about 40 posts back.

[Mxsmanic]

vdubreeze writes:

If you don't think Scott's depth of knowledge comes through in his
posts you can't possibly have read any of them.

That's not what I said. I said that if he is a professional, that will come
through his posts. I didn't offer any evaluation of the posts he has made.

No one's saying you should take anyone's word for anything. But you
SHOULD be paying attention to what people are writing ...

See above before telling anyone else to pay attention.

[Neil Gould]

Mike Rivers wrote:
On 3/19/2012 10:41 AM, Neil Gould wrote:

Those of us who have lived a long time with the limitations of
hardware welcome access to software tools that get past those
limitations and add significant functionality.

Those of us who don't find hardware to be limiting are
intimidated by all the choices that are available with
software - choices that we HAVE to make in order to get down
to work.

It's difficult for me to imagine that anyone who has been recording for any
signficant time hasn't run into at least a few limitations of their hardware
(back to the DR-40 vs. H4n, for example), and it's not like one doesn't have
to make choices in the hardware realm in order to get down to work. For
example, several consoles I've worked on were outfitted with more than one
brand of compressor/limiter, just because one would handle situations that
the other brands couldn't. One had to know the quirks of each brand in order
to make a good choice because their underlying the functions are usually
compromised by practical considerations such as component values and space.

--
best regards,

Neil

[hank alrich]

vdubreeze wrote:

On Mar 19, 7:45 pm, Mxsmanic wrote:
Richard Webb writes:
For Mxsmanic: Scott has been a long time professional in this
business, and been around this newsgroup for decades now, unlike
yourself. HE has credibility here.

He is a name on a screen. That is neither good nor bad, but decades in
cyberspace have taught me never to pay any attention to claimed
credentials on a newsgroup. In any case, if he is truly a long-time
professional, then that should come through in his posts.


If you don't think Scott's depth of knowledge comes through in his
posts you can't possibly have read any of them.

I don't take anyone's word for anything.

No one's saying you should take anyone's word for anything. But you
SHOULD be paying attention to what people are writing instead of just
using it as a springboard for more posts about a topic you ran out of
things to say about 40 posts back.

Listen, this slimy ****head is completely clueless. Sit him front of
Scott's kit and listen to what doesn't happen.

Time to ignore him. His mind is on vacation and his mouth is workin'
overtime.

Scott has never, ever claimed anything egotistically grandiose. What he
has done in this forum since it was founded is provide informed, cogent,
and interesting answers to a huge range of questions about, of all
things, professional audio.

MouthFull, on the other hand, is why there are shoes with velcro laces.
His level of hubris combined with his ignorance sets a whole new
dumb**** standard for rec.audio.pro. His proper forum would be
alt.asshole.troll. The Maytag forum would be too deep for him.

--
shut up and play your guitar * http://hankalrich.com/
http://www.youtube.com/walkinaymusic
http://www.sonicbids.com/HankandShaidri

[Mike Rivers]

On 3/19/2012 7:06 PM, Mxsmanic wrote:

But that's true for hardware, too. Why is it acceptable to take longer and
spend more for quality hardware, while software must be rushed and cheap?

Software has practically zero manufacturing cost, so the
sooner they can get it out the cheaper they can make it, and
the more people will buy it. The more people who buy it, the
more there will be who will get hooked on it and buy the
next version. It's just good business to make something as
cheaply as possible and sell as much of it as you can,
because there's a sucker born every minute who wants to
record himself.

You would need to replace things in your console every day if it were built as
carelessly as most software is.

No, I don't think so. If it was built poorly, it probably
wouldn't work when I first tried it and I'd return it and
get a refund. Generally you can't get a refund for software
that you claim doesn't work, or that you just don't like.


--
"Today's production equipment is IT based and cannot be
operated without a passing knowledge of computing, although
it seems that it can be operated without a passing knowledge
of audio." - John Watkinson

http://mikeriversaudio.wordpress.com - useful and
interesting audio stuff