Transferring from cassette...

sad iron · Post by **sad iron** » Fri Dec 15, 2006 12:41 pm

Hey all,

I have the opportunity to take about 200 cassette recordings of writers doing live readings and transfer them into the digital world. Most of the cassettes were recorded with a table top cassette player and a knock-off 58. I shudder to think of what the quality might be like.

Questions:

I guess i need some sort of pro-quality cassette deck, right? Any suggestions on what I should look for on ebay or elsewhere?

Any suggestions on cleaning up the recordings once I get them dumped? Software? Plugins? Outboard stuff?

I'll be dumping through a Motu 828 MKII into Audiodesk (unless I go with something esle via suggestion). I the 828 is running into and out of an A&H System8 2416.

That's all I can think of now...thanks in advance

kayagum · Post by **kayagum** » Fri Dec 15, 2006 1:10 pm

Adobe Audition has great tools for denoising and other sound restoration utilities. It saved a major project for a client of mine.

Chrisbrownsound · Post by **Chrisbrownsound** » Sat Dec 16, 2006 1:31 am

Don't forget to clean the heads and adjust the azimuth for each cassette.

dirk_v · Post by **dirk_v** » Sun Dec 17, 2006 1:08 am

Search the Sound on Sound site - they had a noise reduction plug-in shootout a while ago between Sony Oxford, Waves, and BIAS SoundSoap. They didn't mention Digi's DINR, but by all accounts I've heard, it kinda sucks anyways.

If you don't want to invest in a noise-removal plug-in, you might have luck using a multi-band comp/expander to cut the tape noise out of the HF. Don't knock yourself out too hard with it, though... Sometimes tape noise on 'historic' source material kind of enhances the whole experience.

-dv

Johnny B · Post by **Johnny B** » Tue Dec 19, 2006 8:42 am

I second Adobe Audition. I've done a lot of cassette cleanup with it. It's not NoNoise, but for the price, it includes some great cleanup tools. You'll have to experiment with the settings, of course, but it works pretty well for that particular purpose. The key, though, is to make sure you're not removing too much of the program material because it leaves weird artifacts. You're pretty much always going to have to leave some of the tape hiss, but it you can make the material a lot more listenable.

I'm Painting Again · Post by **I'm Painting Again** » Tue Dec 19, 2006 10:43 am

nakamichi makes/made great cassette decks..probably pick one up for cheap..I wouldn't try to denoise anything if your being payed as a transfer service and not a restoration service..

sad iron · Post by **sad iron** » Tue Dec 19, 2006 7:55 pm

Thanks for all the good feedback. I will check out the nakamichi stuff.

most of what I am seeing on ebay is Tascam-type stuff. Any thoughts on their decks? Are there any decks out there that would combine something like cassette, but also CD-r or something that would be valuable to me as a mixdown apparatus? I am currently bouncing real world mixes back into audiodesk through my 828 with...unsatifying results. DOn't have hundreds to dump into a Masterlink or whatever.

J

Bill @ Irie Lab · Post by **Bill @ Irie Lab** » Thu Dec 21, 2006 1:39 pm

Nakamichi is quality (luxury) stuff and a pleasure to use.

Teac and Denon made great desks back in the day. Higher end Pioneer and Marantz are a good bet, too.

Good luck.

centurymantra · Post by **centurymantra** » Fri Dec 22, 2006 6:13 am

I've recently done some cassette transfers. Personally, I would skip the de-noising plug-in action unless they are really bad. Even then, I think it's more vibey than anything else. Whenever I've listened to CDs that are transfers of old scratchy 78RPM vinyl and it's evident that it's been "de-noised", I typically just cringe at the general 'feel' of the recording. Then again, it really depends on the source material you're working with. I've owned several Nakamichi decks in the past and they are indeed nice, although I have been told and have read discussions in which folks seem to think they do best with tapes that were originally recorded on a Nak deck. I've got a nice Sony ES three-head deck which is quite excellent. You could look at using one of the Radial JPC direct boxes http://www.radialeng.com/di-jpc.htm

These are designed to interface with consumer gear like tape decks and CD players. I picked one of these up and have ended up using it quite a bit, especially on laptop soundcard outputs. It's what I use for doing the cassette transfers into a nice clean pre.

Good luck.

Chrisbrownsound · Post by **Chrisbrownsound** » Fri Dec 22, 2006 6:38 am

I'm going to say it again because no-one picked up on my previous post.

Whatever deck, software or interface you use is irrelevant if you don't check the head azimuth.

More info here:
http://audio-restoration.com/cassette.php

centurymantra · Post by **centurymantra** » Fri Dec 22, 2006 10:12 am

Chrisbrownsound wrote:I'm going to say it again because no-one picked up on my previous post.

Whatever deck, software or interface you use is irrelevant if you don't check the head azimuth.

More info here:
http://audio-restoration.com/cassette.php

Yes...this is a great point to bring up.

Excellent link BTW...I'll be trying this out when I do some more critical cassette transfers.

bniesz · Post by **bniesz** » Wed Jan 03, 2007 9:16 am

whatever deck you buy, buy four of them.

getreel · Post by **getreel** » Wed Jan 03, 2007 11:38 am

I will second the Denon cassette decks. They truly are great sounding units. I have owned 2 and they are by far the best sounding cassette decks I've ever heard. The lower end unit I owned sounded just as good as the high end unit I had later. The more expensive unit had more features though.

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