Degraded sound quality when transferring from tape to digital

pitol678

New member
I have a Tascam 388, a Marantz cassette 4-track and a Fostex model 80 that I use with a Tascam M520. When I record to tape on any of these sources, I love the sound quality. Its 3 dimensional and sounds exactly like I want. However, on occasion when I route the the recorded material into my computer for editing or mastering or whatever, it loses that 3D quality. Is it because Im going from unbalanced outs to balanced in? Is it my interface (Tascam 1800)? My computer soundcard (early 2011 macbook pro)? Any other suggestions? Thanks!
 
Your computer soundcard shouldn't be doing anything when you have an external USB interface. What are the interface and project settings when you digitize?
 
I do tape to digital transfers all the time. I have a 520 as well. I'm doing 16 tracks of tape to digital and don't lose OR gain anything. What was on tape is what goes into my daw.
But my method uses the mixer only to track and later mix.

I'm running into 16 in 16 out ada converter, and everything I transfer is stored on an external ssd usb drive.

So I'm bypassing the mixer completely for the transfer.

The Wav files in the ssd then get dumped into the computer to either be opened up in PT or Reaper.

Then if i want, I mix on the console.

And I agree, your computer soundcard shouldn't be in the loop.
 
Ah that makes sense. As far as settings, are you referring to 44.1k and 24 bit?
Yes, that's what I meant.

Please post the raw stereo or LR tracks you're importing off the deck, so we can listen to what you're hearing?

P.S. You could take the unbalanced output into a stereo DI (or pair of the same DIs) to get a balanced signal, but a short run into a line input should be Ok, I'd think. (I just went straight from my cassette deck into a Zoom H2 line-in direct to 44.1/24 WAV and it worked fine when I did cassette transfers.)
 
All that gear is going to be putting out a -10db signal. Maybe you're trying to bring it up higher, and gettin some distortion in the interface??
Its not a problem feeding the interface /daw a weaker signal. All daws have some sort of clip gain to boost your wav file.

I've never found unbalanced to be a problem. Just don't run cable over 20 feet.

Oh. Btw, with your setup you're at no more than 8 tape tracks, right? And your interface has 8 analog ins and outs?
Well with the 520 you can feed a balanced output to tape, daw, whatever. Use the 8 subgroups to send a balanced out.
Check out forum member sweetbeats. He has in his sig, a link to his youtube channel
Has some great videos on the routing capabilities of the m520.
Lots of ways to skin this cat with what you have.
:D
 
It’s not an issue with balanced vs unbalanced.

I do think putting up a sound clip of what you are hearing would help if you can do that. What I’m wondering is if it is something having to do with how you have your DAW virtual mixer setup. I’m assuming on the 388 you have tracks panned left and right and everything in between when you are playing back your project to create the stereo soundstage, but since you are transferring individual tracks to the DAW you have to do the same thing on your virtual mixer. Your DAW software is playing back mono tracks just like your 388, which are mono tracks. The individual tracks are transferred as mono tracks...that’s what they are. So on your virtual mixer then you need to recreate the pan settings for those tracks on the virtual mixer like you did on the 388 mixer so get your stereo soundstage. Is that possibly what’s going on?
 
It’s not an issue with balanced vs unbalanced.

I do think putting up a sound clip of what you are hearing would help if you can do that. What I’m wondering is if it is something having to do with how you have your DAW virtual mixer setup. I’m assuming on the 388 you have tracks panned left and right and everything in between when you are playing back your project to create the stereo soundstage, but since you are transferring individual tracks to the DAW you have to do the same thing on your virtual mixer. Your DAW software is playing back mono tracks just like your 388, which are mono tracks. The individual tracks are transferred as mono tracks...that’s what they are. So on your virtual mixer then you need to recreate the pan settings for those tracks on the virtual mixer like you did on the 388 mixer so get your stereo soundstage. Is that possibly what’s going on?

That actually makes a ton of sense. I will typically pan them both to center before importing them, thinking that made sense ?. So, you’re saying that if track 1 on the 388 is panned left; I should keep it panned left when recording into digital, then also pan the track in my DAW (Reaper) also to the left?

As far as posting the tracks, I can do that but it’s not necessarily that they sound bad per se, but more that they just don’t sound as 3D after importing. So I’m not sure if it will be apparent unless you heard the two to compare. If I were to do that, would I just post a link?
 
So you are playing you tracks on the 388, and the source switches are set to RMX, and then you have the odd channels panned hard left and the even channels panned hard right, and channels 1 & 2 are assigned to PGM 1-2, channels 3 & 4 are assigned to PGM 3-4 and so on? And then the PGM OUT jacks are connected to the interface inputs?

If that’s what you’re doing, that’s one way to do it, but unless you are EQing your tracks or using an insert effect or something like that on their way to the DAW using the 388 mixer, you really should just use the TAPE OUT jacks. It’s the most direct way to get your tape tracks to the interface.

And then yes in either case you have to use the PAN controls in the virtual mixer to create your stereo soundstage...there is no stereo panning processing from the 388 that goes to the interface with the way you are doing it...if how I described above is what you are doing.
 
Sorry if this has already been suggested. I've come into this a little late. But, if you don't do this kind of thing that often, could you have the left/right on the digital side reversed or maybe somehow summing the tracks so you actually have a mono mix once it gets to the digital side? I'm just guessing with this as you say the mix has lost its 3 dimensional aspect. I assume it's still as clean as when on tape, but if it sounds somewhat flat, you could have your mix getting twisted up in the transfer.

As a test, you might try sending either right or left side to digital to see if it ends up where it's suppose to on the digital end. Sometimes, you can have all sorts of options and one little knob panned to the middle or opposite to where you want it to be can really flatten out a nice mix.
 
So you are playing you tracks on the 388, and the source switches are set to RMX, and then you have the odd channels panned hard left and the even channels panned hard right, and channels 1 & 2 are assigned to PGM 1-2, channels 3 & 4 are assigned to PGM 3-4 and so on? And then the PGM OUT jacks are connected to the interface inputs?

Right, that’s how I’ve been going about it

If that’s what you’re doing, that’s one way to do it, but unless you are EQing your tracks or using an insert effect or something like that on their way to the DAW using the 388 mixer, you really should just use the TAPE OUT jacks. It’s the most direct way to get your tape tracks to the interface.

I’ll definitely try that next time and see if that corrects the issue

And then yes in either case you have to use the PAN controls in the virtual mixer to create your stereo soundstage...there is no stereo panning processing from the 388 that goes to the interface with the way you are doing it...if how I described above is what you are doing.

So if I wanted things panned other than hard right and left, and wanted to mix in the box, I would record into the computer with the 388 knobs panned just as it was recorded, the be able to pan where I wanted inside the DAW right? Also, since I’ve experienced the issue with all my tape machines, could it be likely that my interface is the weak link or is that irrelevant? It’s a Tascam 1800 FWIW
 
Sorry if this has already been suggested. I've come into this a little late. But, if you don't do this kind of thing that often, could you have the left/right on the digital side reversed or maybe somehow summing the tracks so you actually have a mono mix once it gets to the digital side? I'm just guessing with this as you say the mix has lost its 3 dimensional aspect. I assume it's still as clean as when on tape, but if it sounds somewhat flat, you could have your mix getting twisted up in the transfer.

As a test, you might try sending either right or left side to digital to see if it ends up where it's suppose to on the digital end. Sometimes, you can have all sorts of options and one little knob panned to the middle or opposite to where you want it to be can really flatten out a nice mix.
Yeah, that’s definitely worth a try, thanks!
 
Personally, if you're going into the computer, you want every track individual and clean - so hard panning to make 1 got 1, 2 to 2 etc is the sensible one. You can pan in the software.
P
 
Right, that’s how I’ve been going about it



I’ll definitely try that next time and see if that corrects the issue



So if I wanted things panned other than hard right and left, and wanted to mix in the box, I would record into the computer with the 388 knobs panned just as it was recorded, the be able to pan where I wanted inside the DAW right? Also, since I’ve experienced the issue with all my tape machines, could it be likely that my interface is the weak link or is that irrelevant? It’s a Tascam 1800 FWIW

Using the TAPE OUT jacks won’t correct your “3D” issue. It gives you a cleaner signal path from tape to DAW. To correct your “3D” issue you still need to create your stereo mic using the PAN controls on the virtual mixer in your DAW. You do this on your 388, right? You are playing back your mono tape tracks and positioning them in the stereo field, right? Well you are transferring mono tracks to your DAW, and playing back those mono tracks just as you did on the 388. If the DAW PAN controls are all in the center for each track they’ll all play back where...? The center of the stereo field, right? And it will be a mono mix...no “3D”. So in the DAW pan each track to wherever you want it in the stereo soundstage using the PAN controls on your virtual DAW mixer.
 
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