Advice needed on digital transfers from old DAT tapes

[touched1]

I'm a little embarrassed to ask, as I should know all this.

I've got a box of old DATs that I'd like to transfer to my computer.

I've got an old Quicksilver G4 with an Audiomedia III card installed running OS 9.2 and Pro Tools 5.1. I don't believe this would work so well in OS X.

I have newer machines with better hardware, but this specific task, digital transfers, is specifically why I've kept this old machine around.

I've heard some static/artifacts during transfer, but not in playback from audio files. Again, I am doing mass transfers, so I am not listening too critically at the moment.

My questions are:

1. What is the best way to transfer old DATs to the system I have?
2. What pitfalls should I be looking out for? (Clocking? Sample Rate issues?)
3. If it's a 16 bit DAT, is there any benefit to writing 24 bit audio files? (plenty of storage, file size is not an issue)
3. It appears that the computer is grabbing the correct sample rate, regardless of what the session is set at, is that correct?
4. Is it affecting the audio file (noticeably) if I convert the 48000khz files to 44100?

Sorry for the remedial and confusing questions, and thanks in advance for any advice.

If there are articles or threads already covering this, feel free to point me in the right direction.

Thanks,

[Johnny B]

I did this a while back. Lots of fun. Anyway, I'll give what help I can:

1. Don't know. I'm not quite sure what you mean.
2. The biggest pitfall in transferring old DATs is the condition of the tapes. They don't age well. Did you check the same spot you heard problems in your transferred audio files? Sometimes tapes that haven't been played for a while will give a bunch of errors on the first play. "Exercising" the tape can help. I think some people fast forward and rewind them before playing. Sometimes I do this and sometimes I play them through twice. You shouldn't have any sample rate or clock issues.
3. If you're planning on doing any additional processing and will want 24-bit files for that, you'll save yourself time later on if you use 24-bit files at transfer time.
4. That's probably not good. I did that a long long time ago by mistake when I wasn't paying attention and remember having some playback issues later on.
5. Depends on whose ears. If the point of the transfer is archiving, the files should be saved at the original sample rate. That's standard archiving practice, though. My 48k DATs that I transferred, I kept the 48k file as a backup and converted to 44.1 to put on CD.

[japmn]

I tried to dump 3 dats today (from 2003) and 2 of them went... "^&%(*&^%*&^$(^&$#*^$%#*^$&%*^$&^(^$*&^%$&^$^(^$%(&^$"

which is a sound I do not know how to spell. I am sooOOO glad those things are going away!

FU DAT!!!

[farview]

My questions are:

1. What is the best way to transfer old DATs to the system I have?

Digitally

2. What pitfalls should I be looking out for? (Clocking? Sample Rate issues?)

Make sure the computer is slaved to the DAT machine. If you are making an analog transfer, it's not an issue.

3. If it's a 16 bit DAT, is there any benefit to writing 24 bit audio files? (plenty of storage, file size is not an issue)

If you are transfering digitally, there is no benefit. If you are doing an analog transfer, there will be just as much benefit as there is recording any siganl in 24 bit.

3. It appears that the computer is grabbing the correct sample rate, regardless of what the session is set at, is that correct?

If you are transfering digitally, yes. That's what it's supposed to do.

4. Is it affecting the audio file (noticeably) if I convert the 48000khz files to 44100?

It does affect the file, but it's normally not very noticable (if at all) and you don't have much of a choice anyway if you want it on a CD.

[touched1]

Thanks very much guys.
I've not had a lot of luck on this board, so I appreciat the detailed responses.

Sounds like I was on the right track.
I will most likely post more questions as I do more transfers. I'll try to make future posts more specific.

Thanks again for the help,