gjhardwick said:
agreed, the Fostex A8 is a great piece of kit.
only complaint is that it only has four inputs, making live band recording a little tricky, but a bit of creativity with my recording technique can get around that problem with ease...
I've got an A-8; it was my first open reel machine, I've used it for years, but you are not going to get the same frequecy range on tape as you will with a 2" Machine running at 15" ips.
I mean, that's just a fact. The A-8 was designed from the start to be a HOMR recording unit-The ads that they were running back then stated that the unit was deasigned for home use, and corners had been cut.
That said, I still like the unit, and generally have hung on to, because I'm just too tight to sell it.
So, it sits on top of a Rack full of Digital recorders; I've thought about testing it to see if I could use it for an Analog Tape Delay.
For Example-I use 28" kick drums.
There are frequencies invloved in it's "sound" that I had to BOOST on the A-8. These were fundamental in my reason for using 28" Kicks- the difference between a 28" Kick and a 24", seems to be about the difference between a 13" tom and a 24"kick.
There is a major amount of 80Hz and below in this drum, and I mean it has such a SOLID impact that it's amazing.
In Digital, I find I have to roll off the low end a little bit on playback, where in Analog-I had to boost the lows with a parametric EQ, at least 3-6 db's. That may not seem like much to you guys, but when it's part of MY SOUND(Since I am the Drummer), then it's of importance to me.
Try cutting playing your guitar or bass's low frequency set at -6 db@ 100 Hz.
Doesn't sound so great, huh?
I'm not sure what the A-8's range is (Mine has a completely new headblock on it-less than 30 hours on the block-but I don't think it will go below 40hz.
We tested my Kicks with some test equipment (thanks to a friend who's a physicist) and they were easily going below 15 Hz.
I had run them through my specturm Analyzer, but it only goes down to 20Hzm, and I wanted to see how much lower they would go-and they went alot lower.
I just want to be able to capture it all-that's why I chose Digital.
Tim