What do I do with my Old ALESIS ADAT XTs ???

raybbj

raybbj

Member
My 2 x ALESIS ADAT XT's have been sitting in my rack for the past 15 years since I made the jump to PC/DAW recording. I may transfer my old ADAT tapes to DAW, but after that, what am I supposed to do with them? I see a ton of them on ebay for $150 to $400 but I don't know if people are buying them. Are people actually buying these?
I would hate to have to take the previous heart and soul of my 90's recording studio to the electronics re-cycler and just dump them in a bin full of old VCR's and fax machines. But maybe that's just the reality.

Any thoughts?

Regards,
Ray
 
I replaced my 3 with an HD24 when they came out and the ADATs went to land fill six years ago. Not a single bid on Ebay with a starting price of 40 pounds. Perfect working order. I scrapped them with great sadness. The HD24 I gave to a friend on loan 7 years ago, and had forgot about it until reading your post. It's very, very sad. Back in the late 90s, they got so much use, but now they're dinosaurs I'm afraid.
 
I have a room full of old stuff, reel to reels, every format, DAT machines, Cassette decks, I just keep it all because it's not worth anything. Its handy if someone wants to transfer some old stuff, if they stop working thats the end. I just had a call from someone that wants to retrieve a 16 track recording from 17 years ago, we will see shortly if the 16 still works and the tape actually plays LOL

Alan.
 
I seriously don't think I have the heart to just take them to the re-cycler. To this day I still smile when I press EJECT on the master and both tapes eject at the same time :).......... so fancy !!! Maybe I will bronze them and hang them on the wall.
Ironically, my FOSTEX R8 - 1/4" 8 Track still has value. A local reel to reel refurbisher offered me $200 for it "as-is".
I wonder if my YAMAHA MT1X 4 track has any value ??? Doubt it.
 
Hang on to them, if it’s like a lot of other gear, someone will do something cool with them, then everyone will be buying them up. lol
 
rob aylestone said:
ADATs went to land fill six years ago. Not a single bid on Ebay with a starting price of 40 pounds. Perfect working order. I scrapped them with great sadness. .
Click to expand...

I see this kinda thing all the time and wonder if it's an ego thing or something. Craigslist ads do this. Here's my bottom dollar and if I don't get it, I'm gonna throw the thing away! Don't get me wrong, i've done much the same in my past, but that was before i tuned into repurposing and charitable giving and the like.

I'm certain there's some up-and-coming teen or twenty that could use a multitrack platform because their Mom won't buy them that nice laptop. It might not get MUCH use, but it's better than the landfill. And no, I don't care two whiffs about the landfill - they're invariably the iceberg tip of a mismanaged municipal bureaucracy - it's just the idea of discarding fine crystal that's no longer fashionable.

ADATs are very highly unlikely to ever be worth anything ever again. Not as ADATs. Not as recorders. No one will ever be looking for "that ADAT sound" as the transparency is too great. No one will be looking for "that ADAT look" to impress a client. Like many old ROMplers of the same era, they have been completely superceded in every metric on every side by newer, usually software-based, products because that's how much technology sped up during that decade.

I have a few pieces I might make into coffee tables, office furniture, or something. If I could find a 19" refrigerator, I'd cut off several faceplates and make a new door for one. I dunno. Most pieces from that era are good for what they were.... or decoration. Not much else.
 
I'd hang on to them. You never know, you might make more money by running a "will digitize your adat tapes" ad than you'd get selling them.

You could gut em and re use the rack case for something. Compressor?

Put up on ebay some parts, someone has got to have a broken one.
People make more $ parting out discontinued electronics.

What ever you do is your thing.

Me, I hate this disposable society. If you can't use it, re purpose it, mod it, rob parts for some other use, ect.... that's my philosophy
:D
 
I actually would like to place the adats on a road and run over them with a big truck. They ruined the recording industry when they came out. I had just bought a brand new good sounding 16 track tape machine then the adat came along and everyone wanted studios with inferior sounding Adats as it was Digital and digital is best :laughings: Everyone that rang the studio "do you have Adats?"

Alan.
 
I kinda feel like I wasted my money on these ADATs. I wish I could have held out another couple of years and made the jump directly from Analog tape to PC/DAW. I only used them for maybe less than 3 years. I still have 6 brand new tapes in the shrink rap (will sell cheap!!). I guess it was just all part of the evolution process that we all had to go through. I can remember arguing with my friends saying "I'll never record on a computer. That's just stupid" Who knew ????
 
raybbj said:
I kinda feel like I wasted my money on these ADATs. I wish I could have held out another couple of years and made the jump directly from Analog tape to PC/DAW. I only used them for maybe less than 3 years. I still have 6 brand new tapes in the shrink rap (will sell cheap!!). I guess it was just all part of the evolution process that we all had to go through. I can remember arguing with my friends saying "I'll never record on a computer. That's just stupid" Who knew ????
Click to expand...

ADATs were key in my transitions and learning path :listeningmusic:
Analog 8 track, then Fostex RD-8 time code chase the analog deck --and ADAT maintenance of course.. :>) Then a second Fostex... and on to the DAW.

And 'No f**king moving parts! ..Finally :rolleyes:

Anyone wants a T/C ADAT.. call me. It was well maintained ...probably still works.
 
Haha. This thread is going to bring out of the woodworks everyone seeking to get rid of their adats.

I had one. Never owned it, just on loan from a buddy when I was jonesing to record, but had no gear. Didn't like it.......at all. Gave it back in a hurry.
Went and bought a 238 cassette 8 track.
Liked that much better. :D
 
RFR said:
Me, I hate this disposable society. If you can't use it, re purpose it, mod it, rob parts for some other use, ect.... that's my philosophy
Click to expand...

While yes, this thread will be the pro/con ADAT rant -- and why not? -- there might be something useful come of it.

Like this thing.
I'm just thinking out loud, here. While the ADAT proper was no trophy in human interface respects - adequate at-best - the BFR was a nice piece of long gone human interface.

So I'm wondering if it would be possible to yank the VHS transport unit and plop in an ordinary terrabyte SS hard drive?? How far off would that be? Okay, fine there's all sorts of internal protocols, but so what? As long as sound goes in and comes back out the same way, I wouldn't care.

THEN, alla sudden, the ADAT would be standalone, not requiring those disappearing wear-items called 'tapes'.

All told, it'd probably be easier to just encase a Raz Pi recording project (or Archival project, etc.).

Just spitballing.....
 
One thing ADATs were good for is for live recording. One of my racks was a 12U rack where I put 2 x ADAT's,, some compressors, gates and mic pre's. That with a 16 channel board made for a fairly "portable" live recording rig. I, of course, use the term "portable" fairly loosely compared to today's laptop and AI. I even would have 2 tracks left to set up 2 house mics to capture audience banter and applause. It really added to the "live album" feel.
 
witzendoz said:
I actually would like to place the adats on a road and run over them with a big truck. They ruined the recording industry when they came out. I had just bought a brand new good sounding 16 track tape machine then the adat came along and everyone wanted studios with inferior sounding Adats as it was Digital and digital is best :laughings: Everyone that rang the studio "do you have Adats?"

Alan.
Click to expand...


Exactly.

I remember when I was shopping for a multtrack machince...looking at the Tascam stuff, but finally ended up with the Fostex G16.
Anyway...it was right at that time before the ADATs hit the streets. So the sales guy in one of the music stores was trying to sway me into waiting, and not buying a tape deck. I'm sure he must have had some manufacturer inside info about the ADATs soon to be available...but he just said to, there's going to be some really great new multitrack technology that will make the tape obsolete.

Boy...I'm so glad I ignored the guy and still bought the Fostex G16...but yeah, everyone was going nuts over the crappy ADATs, and analog tape for the pro-sumer market went right into the toilet. I think if those stupid ADATs were held off for another 1-2 years, the better machines, like the G16 and the Tascam MSR decks would have gained a greater foothold, and then further development and support of them would have continued...instead, production dropped off...and they soon vanished. Same thing with the smaller project studio consoles...like the Tascam M3500, etc. They would have kept developing/improving them for the home/project studios...but everyone suddenly had digital fever.

My dumb purchase was the DAT deck! :p
It was going to be my mastering machine...and I managed to complete one bunch of song to the DAT...but they just died off so quick, that no one was buying them anymore. I still have the DAT, it was the early DA30 from Tascam, and mine got the chip upgrades at one point that fixed some issues.
Still works great, like new...but I can't remember the last time I even powered it up...and on my most recent gear rack overhaul...out it came. I needed the room for some new gear I bought last year...so the DAT is now a doorstop. :D ;)

Actually...now that I think about it...my REAL DUMB purchase was my AKAI S1000 racked sampler. That damn thing set me back about $6k around '92-'93. I got extra memory added (a whopping 8MB!!!) and some other card upgrades that cost a fortune at the time.
That damn thing is still sitting in a rack with some other sound modules...none of which I've used in at least 10 years...but it still all works, and I have a pretty extensive sound library (16bit)...which has some decent stuff. It was more when I was obsessed with MIDI and synths and all that nonsense.
 
i actually still use my Alesis adat HD24... i use it to convert and nothing more...my signal from an analog console "Mackie 24x8x2" has 24 direct outs that feed into my HD24 ..wala...24 simultanious channels into my DAW via lightpipe...in essence i have a 24 channel analog preamp channel strip :listeningmusic: now mind you my Presonus light pipe went capoots on me ...but easy enough fix...in comes the MOTU 828 mkII interface...the first 8 channels of the MOTU are fed by the HD24 through tape out send that would or could have gone to the console. But i never looped back. always just used the HD24 as a ADDA converter. so the first 8 channels go into the MOTU and the 16 remaining are again fed light pipe into the MOTU's remaning input options...i can actually record and track 24 tracks of a full band if i so choose ..and with no latency...i can also send headhope mix into a channel of Mackie and use the 6 aux send to have 6 totally seprate head phone mixes to make everyone happy while tracking via my ARThead Amp 8 Pro... if it ain't broke don't fix it...if and when my console goes and or my HD24 fries...i will then down size to 2 8 channel preamps...such as Focusrite, presonus digimax, etc etc...however i am very fond of analog preamps...so more than likely i would just get another console and a way to get 24 channels into my DAW either via the HD24 or another source of lightpiping adda...:guitar::listeningmusic:
 
Most interesting thread.

I have a 96 channel fully automated, full flying fader console and attached to this I have in frame accurate sync 3 x Alesis HD24 recorders (NOTE no computer !!!), I also have (as my first digital recorder) an Alesis ADAT recorder no longer used (?) in a portable rack case.

I only ever use a computer if I have to remove one of the HD24 hard drives to copy some externally recorded tracks from a client's computer on to the HD24 hard drive --- transfer from clients computer to mine, then from mine to HD24 hard drive using the Alesis Firewire unit and its associated software.

This gives me a total of 72 perfectly frame accurate tracks.

All mixing is done within the console using all of the plugin processing cards that I have purchased and the desk's frame accurate automation that controls every aspect of the mixing (eg volume, panning, effects, processing, etc). After pre-mastering using various plugins in the desk, the final stereo mix is then sent to an Alesis Masterlink unit, where I can undertake limited processing (if really felt necessary !!!) and ultimately burn a red book CD (for CD pressing purposes) or data disk.

Using this system I have recorded a number of award winning CDs including a best album of the year, best male vocal of the year and most innovative production of the year and I believe that one album (CD) got to about 10 on the Billboard charts (although I never checked this claim).

About a year ago, I had a client contact me and he required a studio that could hold about a 50 piece orchestra and the ability to record about 78 tracks for a particular song/track, so after telling the client that I could do it if he accepted a 16bit recording, I dug out the old ADAT unit and connected this to the time code generator and away we went --- the ADAT recorder was the reason for the 16bit limitation.

Everything was in perfect sync, the only things that I had to get use to again, was the fact that the ADAT required a run up time when recording and rather than an immediate jump to start/cue point, I had to wait for the ADAT unit to rewind/fast forward and sync itself.

End result --- the client was very happy and has been back a few times since to undertake more recordings (all 72 or less tracks).

I would definitely not be throwing out the ADAT machine, as it is still an excellent unit (especially for someone starting out or only requiring a maximum of 8 tracks), the hardest part today would be purchasing VERY good quality S-VHS tapes.

David
 
I can't say anything bad about ADATs. They were the next rung in my recording ladder, and they allowed me to make a huge jump, from 8 tracks with my TSR-8 to 24 with three ADAT-XTs. There was no other way for me to make that leap in 1996. They synced up nicely, never caused me a bit of trouble, and I did some good work with them.
I used them for four years till I was able to get into a Pro Tools TDM rig.

Most of my recording gear is still here, because I don't want to throw it away, and I usually can't get anything for it.

I let someone talk me into selling him one of my three ADAT-XTs, and I wish to this day I hadn't.
 
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