Do you like Dolby SR at 30 IPS?

[underthebigtree]

Hi esteemed comrades -

I've been nervously puttering around all weekend waiting for our baby to be born. I have learned a new hell: contractions 15 mins apart on Saturday night, tapering off to nothing Sunday morning. The wait goes on. But I digress.

So I decided to take the time to really zero in on my mastering deck: An Ampex 440-B. I bought it a few months back along with a couple of channels of Dolby SR (Cat 280, in 361 racks), and was finally getting down to doing some serious mixes to it. It had already been calibrated by a great tech, but I busted out the MRL tape and very carefully cleaned, demagged, and cal'd the deck and Dolby SR units to my system.

Then I recorded the cleanest, best sounding digital recording I know to the deck: The DVD-A of Steely Dan's "Two Against Nature". (Yes, I know many here hate the Dan. I'm not one of them), at 30 IPS with and without SR, and 15 IPS with and without. I'm using Quantegy (sniff sniff) 456 at +3.

I loved the way the 440 squashed and glued the mix together, just a bit. the low end in particular was unquestionably improved, but the whole damn thing sounded better. This is what I found:

30 IPS Dolby SR: Clean as a whistle. No tape hiss at all, very slight high frequency whine noticeable before the music starts. Subtle trashiness/distortion in the high end, particularly the high-hat.

30 IPS no NR: Clean as a whistle. Virtually no tape hiss. Trashiness gone - just smooth and beautiful high end.

15 IPS Dolby SR: Very mild tape hiss, high frequency whine and trashiness back.

15 IPS no NR: Considerable tape hiss, no trashiness.

So my feeling on the matter is that I really liked 30 IPS no NR best. I think that mixing to 15 IPS, SR would be pretty important. Obviously, I'm worried about conserving tape in light of the Quantegy crisis, but this seems pretty damn great. I think I'll start tracking to my MM-1200 at 30 as well, though that's really gonna get expensive fast, and I'm concerned about losing the gorgeous low end bump I've been getting at 15.

Thoughts?

Nick

[Bear's Gone Fission]

It's trivia to me, since I have no NR and only 15ips decks, but I believe SR was designed for 15ips use only, to get about the same noise perfromance as 30 ips no NR. The high frequency whine does seem a bit odd, so I would recheck that you have everything set up right. My understanding is that with SR, you are trying to avoid any sort of artifacts from the tape, so the levels have to be such that the tape is not saturating - it might involve a very different calibration than standard.

When I was first scanning your post, I thought hey, that's the upside to the Quantegy shutdown - people will be recording at 15ips again. I have no problem with hiss on albums (Spirit of Eden and Laughing Stock), and to me 30 ips sounds like The Eagles and Steely Dan - yuck.

Bear

[ValveTone Mastering]

In my experience, 30 ips is fine all by itself for almost all program material. 15 ips can benefit from NR depending on the program material. SR is my favorite noise reduction overall.

Damon

[drumsound]

I always mix 30ips. I've never had a noise problem. When I track 15ips on the 24-track, I?m careful about mutes while I mix. I don't have NR so noise is sometime an issue on the 24-track, yet another reason to get 16-track heads to put on it...

[@?,*???&?]

For a 2-track mix, Dolby SR can spread the stereo image a bit which is nice. I don't really think it's necessary in the multi-track domain unless you're working at 15 ips.

[pantone247]

Hi esteemed comrades -

I've been nervously puttering around all weekend waiting for our baby to be born. I have learned a new hell: contractions 15 mins apart on Saturday night, tapering off to nothing Sunday morning. The wait goes on. But I digress.

Wait till it all kicks off... amazing times await you fella!!

best of lucks

[underthebigtree]

Thanks for the great responses, all.

I walked in the house just after writing this post, and my wife's contractions had started again, big time. 20 hours later, Julian Nicolas Peck came into the world. Mommy, baby, and daddy are all really tired but happy as clams - I'd even forgot about Quantegy closing their doors!

They tested his hearing yesterday - all is well. Oh yeah, his heart, lungs, and brain appear OK too.

To you TapeOppers who already have kids, it's an honor and privilege to join your club. To the rest of you, I hope many of you experience this unbelievable miracle yourself someday.

Happy, tired Nick