Vinyl Transfer - some surprises

[mhschmieder]

Due to my family visit back east in a about a day, I couldn't procrastinate any further on my first serious vinyl upload project as I promised my brother a copy of the limited edition Ram - Mono.

I sold my moderately high-end hi-fi system a few years ago as it was too much work (and too much space) to switch back and forth with the computer setup. No looking back, really, but it does mean any legacy formats (and CD's) have to be uploaded and/or converted to be listened to anymore.

Anyway, the idea was to use BIAS Peak Pro 7, since supposedly working on single-track files is its forte. Well, as Ram is more or less continuous music like Sgt. Pepper, I waited until the end of side one to stop the recording and listen back, and it was all chipmunks!

After a half hour of diagnosing the problem, it became clear to me that BIAS can't be trusted for recording (vs. mastering), as I had it set to 24-bit 96k and yet it only sounds right at 44.1k. It also only allows SDII and AIF when recording, which is another strike against it. I think I remember someone mentioning before that it screws up the sample rate on input recording.

Well, DP8 came to the rescue and is actually better workflow for this sort of thing anyway. What I'm doing is making a sequence for each album side, so that I can split the tracks later. This is faster than using markers in Peak anyway as scrolling is so much faster in DP as well as splicing.

It's been so long since I worked with vinyl though, that I had forgotten some considerations that complicate the process.

1. The weight of the cartridge affects the torque and thus you need to sample part of the record to properly adjust the turntable speed

2. This is undesirable as it's best to give any section of vinyl a half hour or more to recover from the heat and pressure of the cartridge before going over that section again

3. Turntable speed is non-constant as you get closer to the center; likely due to the varying impact of the cartridge weight

4. Adjusting the turntable speed in real-time is a bit of a non-starter as it is inexact and most turntables have a slider that is hard to control with precision without overshooting a few times

Anyway, I decided to live with those flaws as I'm not doing this to make money. The turntable speed doesn't vary all that much towards the center, but we're all by now used to constant speed from digital files and not having pitch of known material ever be off even by a bit.

Not to get off-topic (even though I started this topic), Ram in Mono is as revealing as The Beatles Mono Box. This was already my favorite Beatles solo album due to its intimacy, carefree humor, and huge variety of styles as well as heartfelt honesty and solid playing and soloing.

[labman]

Hey MH. I really appreciate all the vinyl reminders. Thanks. I probably knew that stuff 45 years ago. Actually, i problem knew a lot 45 years ago ! LOL

[mikehalloran]

I use DP and RX 3 so I haven't felt the need to update my old copy of Sound Soap.

My old Techniques direct drive turntable has a motor driven straight arm so cartridge torque isn't an issue. It doesn't have variable speed, though so my other belt drive TT gets used occasionally.

[billf]

As an aside, but related to the subject of working with vinyl, there was a report this week that the market for vinyl records is on the increase.

America's largest vinyl record pressing plant in Nashville, Tennessee, will be expanding its operations to include a second warehouse full of record-making machinery. United Record Pressing LLC told The Tennessean on Monday that it plans to add 16 presses to its present 30, and it will use the remaining space in the new warehouse as storage to meet a robustly growing demand for its product.

…

Nielsen's SoundScan reported that 6.1 million vinyl records were sold in 2013, up from 4.6 in 2012 and under 1 million in 2007. But as The New York Times reported last year, “manufacturers, specialist retailers, and critics argue that SoundScan’s figures represent only a fraction of actual sales” and perhaps only account for as little as 10 to 15 percent of total vinyl sales, because Nielsen tracks records sold, rather than records pressed, and many vinyl manufacturers don't print bar codes on their record sleeves, so sales from independent shops that don't report to Nielsen don't get counted.

[Shooshie]

I wish I had a turntable now. There is a reason why I don't. In the early 1990s the digital age was upon us, so I'd started collecting CDs, and the first ones I bought were usually copies of my favorite LPs. Turntables and LPs take up a lot of space. Raising two kids in a small inner-city house meant that every square inch was precious. You can't stack turntables like rack gear or put it on a shelf, so eventually I decided it must go. I wasn't using it, and since I spent most of my days making music rather than listening to it, the whole collection of turntable, LPs, tape recorders, and tapes — my whole analog collection — seemed superfluous. Meanwhile, the turntable had developed electronic issues. It was an Accutrac, the first (and possibly only) remote controlled turntable. I really liked that thing. I used it to record tapes to my Nakamichi Dragon, which with Dolby C made copies that were indistinguishable from the original. Thus, most of my LPs since about 1982 have only been played once!

Now, with somewhere between 500 and 1000 LPs sitting idle in a warehouse, I'd like to hear them again. Maybe I will get a turntable one of these days.

Shooshie

[labman]

Shooshie, when I retire you can have mine. Even has 78's cartridges.

[Shooshie]

Shooshie, when I retire you can have mine. Even has 78's cartridges.

That's awfully nice, man. 'Course, I've gotta manage to live that long!

Shoosh