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EleosFever
New member
hello, how they were recording in the old days?
i mean there were no powerful PCs and software.
what gear they used?
i mean there were no powerful PCs and software.
what gear they used?
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Chibi Nappa
New member
Tape.
Mixing boards.
Hardware effects units.
If you ran out of tracks you brought in a second tape machine and ran both of them in sync.
If you wanted to make an edit (move a sound back and forth), you cut the tape with a razor blade and then stuck it back together after removing or adding the appropriate length.
Ever wonder why a loop is called a loop? Back then, if you wanted a repeating sound you took a razor and cut the tape to the exact length of the sound, then used sticky tape to fasten the ends together into a literal loop of tape. You then put the loop of tape over the reels on the tape player and it just kept pulling it through the playback head playing it over and over...
Mixing boards.
Hardware effects units.
If you ran out of tracks you brought in a second tape machine and ran both of them in sync.
If you wanted to make an edit (move a sound back and forth), you cut the tape with a razor blade and then stuck it back together after removing or adding the appropriate length.
Ever wonder why a loop is called a loop? Back then, if you wanted a repeating sound you took a razor and cut the tape to the exact length of the sound, then used sticky tape to fasten the ends together into a literal loop of tape. You then put the loop of tape over the reels on the tape player and it just kept pulling it through the playback head playing it over and over...
Massive Master
www.massivemastering.com
Since when are the 90's "the old days?"
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Chibi Nappa
New member
diggy_dude
Now 169% diggier!
Seriously. Whenever I hear a Gen Y'er use the phrase "old school", I piss myself laughing. 
grimtraveller
If only for a moment.....
I bought about 10 magazines called "Making music" earlier this year. They span 1988~1998 or so and I read it for 11 years from '89 as it was free {I paid a £12 yearly sub to have it delivered and help the guys} and it was the best music mag I ever came across. The reason I bought them was because I was curious to see how the new developments in recording technology were described during the 90s. Because I was an analogger in that period, I never took much notice of what was happening digitally around me. I've got through 4 so far. It's pretty rivetting stuff. The dominant word seems to have been "sequencer".
Actually, they did have computers to record in the 90s. And they had microwaves. And automatic doors and windows. And mobile phones ! And computer games. And CDs. It was only a few years ago, mate !
Seafroggys
Well-known member
Heh, yeah, 90's and 'old days.' LMAO. I'm only 24 but that still makes me rofl. I remember the majority of the 90's quite clearly.
In actuality, all the stuff we use today was around in the 90's, in slightly more primitive form. Hell, Facebook itself is nothing new, ever hear of the BBS's from the 80's and early 90's? Cell phones were starting to become common, PDA's came out (which you combine the two and you have your modern smart phone)....it wasn't that long ago, and it wasn't that archaic.
Most recordings were still on tape, but a lot was being done digitally. I know Queen recorded onto hard drives as early as 1984, and there were tons of digital effect units. Home recording was limited to portastudios, or if you didn't mind investing a few bucks, you could get an ADAT studio going (which was....ladeda....digital!).
In actuality, all the stuff we use today was around in the 90's, in slightly more primitive form. Hell, Facebook itself is nothing new, ever hear of the BBS's from the 80's and early 90's? Cell phones were starting to become common, PDA's came out (which you combine the two and you have your modern smart phone)....it wasn't that long ago, and it wasn't that archaic.
Most recordings were still on tape, but a lot was being done digitally. I know Queen recorded onto hard drives as early as 1984, and there were tons of digital effect units. Home recording was limited to portastudios, or if you didn't mind investing a few bucks, you could get an ADAT studio going (which was....ladeda....digital!).
diggy_dude
Now 169% diggier!
I have an old sequencer from that period. It was one of the most popular sequencers available at the time. It has a little flip-up panel with the operating instructions printed on the inside. Can you guess which one it is?
B
buzzard bass
Terminated
When I was recording back in't 90's we 'ad to use 'and cranked tape players. We 'ad to make tape by 'and outa saliva and dandruff. 1 microphone for everyone, we 'ad to mek the cable, shaved our 'eads, and knitted the strands together.
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Greg_L
Banned
Since 2000.
Armistice
Son of Yoda
Aye.........
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moresound
Loud Sun Studios
LOL This reminds me of when a few of my children found some 8 tracks in the attic and asked "is this one of those old videos before DVD?"
Man ..... where did the time go?
grimtraveller
If only for a moment.....
I still don't know what a sequencer is !I have an old sequencer from that period. It was one of the most popular sequencers available at the time. It has a little flip-up panel with the operating instructions printed on the inside. Can you guess which one it is?
diggy_dude
Now 169% diggier!
I still don't know what a sequencer is !
Think of it as a multitracker for MIDI data.
SouthSIDE Glen
independentrecording.net
Yeah, things were entirely different in the 90s. Way back then there were only 50 starts on the US flag, and I used Cubase24, then later upgraded to CubaseVST, for recording and mixing, and Sound Forge 2 and 3 for my pre-mastering and stereo editing. Pro studios were mostly using ProTools for their digital editing needs.
I know that ancient terms like "Cubase", "Sound Forge", "ProTools" and "flag" probably mean nothing to today's generation of home recorders, but that's the chance you take when you dive so deep into the prehistoric past.
23-skidoo!
G.
I know that ancient terms like "Cubase", "Sound Forge", "ProTools" and "flag" probably mean nothing to today's generation of home recorders, but that's the chance you take when you dive so deep into the prehistoric past.
23-skidoo!
G.
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shoggoth80
Member
" where did the time go? "
I wonder this myself. While I am not as old as some of the folks on here... sometimes, I feel a little amused by those younger than myself.
Yeah, sorry, I recall LPs, VHS, Betamax, cassettes.... CDs were a really big thing for me when they became mainstream. Laserdisc... not so big. Neat though. Hell, it was a big deal being able to rig 2 VCRs together. Lol. There were computers, and music software, I don't think it was anywhere near what we have now. I do know that I have some midi software for my Atari ST computer.... haven't bothered to try it, as it came with a large box of games. Ha ha ha!
Sorry for the thread derail.
I wonder this myself. While I am not as old as some of the folks on here... sometimes, I feel a little amused by those younger than myself.
Yeah, sorry, I recall LPs, VHS, Betamax, cassettes.... CDs were a really big thing for me when they became mainstream. Laserdisc... not so big. Neat though. Hell, it was a big deal being able to rig 2 VCRs together. Lol. There were computers, and music software, I don't think it was anywhere near what we have now. I do know that I have some midi software for my Atari ST computer.... haven't bothered to try it, as it came with a large box of games. Ha ha ha!
Sorry for the thread derail.
Simman
Well-known member
Yeah, exactly what I was going to say. Comon the 90s; now if you'd said the 70s I would have felt better. I recored in the 70's on tape you know...or maybe you don't
SouthSIDE Glen
independentrecording.net
Most of what you're talking about dates back to the early 80s, not the 90s. Within a year or two here's some actual dates:
Laserdisc was somewhere about 1981-82.
CD players first hit the stores around 1982 and took only a couple of years to become "mainstream".
Betamax was still around for a few years after this, but by 1986 it had already all but lost the format wars with VHS.
The Atari ST came out in 1985, though I think it may have still been sold into the early 90s.
By 1995, OTOH, dual-Pentium and Pentium Pro motherboards in the 90-200MHz range running WinNT3.1 were the "high end" of Wintel design, and on the Apple side there were the RISC Power Macs in a similar speed range.
While those seem small and slow compared to today's machines, they were already being used as DAW and DVW platforms not so different in look and feel as today's systems. Pro Tools audio and Avid video digital editing systems were already the standard on the pro level, with systems from D-Vision and Discreet Logic filling out the card.
On the prosumer and home level, Sound Forge was huge already for audio, with Cubase taking care of the multitracking, and for video, Pinnacle, Media 100 and D-Vision were popular.
I worked for D-Vision at the time, and it was pretty amazing. We had turnkey A/V editing systems that worked with D1 broadcast digital video and audio that ran on simple Pentium systems running WinNT3.1. Yeah, effects rendering tended to be a bit slow by today's standards, but other than that, there was nothing that Sony Vegas now does that couldn't be done on a D-Vision system back in 1995 and were done by professional broadcasting clients of ours.
But here's what really surprises most people. Before developing the WindowsNT version, we had the DV Pro system which did full audio/video NLE on 386- and 486-based computers running MS-DOS. It was rock solid, and worked better than even today's Adobe Premiere. My original Sound Forge 2 also ran on MS-DOS and worked just fine.
"Old school" isn't always all that old.
G.
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AbuseTheMuses
New member
ADATs.
I had a Roland VS880 when it first came out around 1996-97-ish. I'm pretty sure the mid-later 90s were when digital standalone recorders started becoming the norm for home recording. I know pro tools was out in the 90s and so was Cakewalk but they weren't often seen in home setups, I had to go bug Columbia College to use theirs.
Before that it was BALLS AND TAPE! (the first element necessary in the days when editing was such a pain, overdubs could sound clicky and the sound you lay to tape is the sound you are stuck with, no plug-in fixes). A Cassette tape was a small rectangular object about the size of an ipod that we used to store audio on.
I still prefer to record this way. Too many software options make my head spin.
I had a Roland VS880 when it first came out around 1996-97-ish. I'm pretty sure the mid-later 90s were when digital standalone recorders started becoming the norm for home recording. I know pro tools was out in the 90s and so was Cakewalk but they weren't often seen in home setups, I had to go bug Columbia College to use theirs.
Before that it was BALLS AND TAPE! (the first element necessary in the days when editing was such a pain, overdubs could sound clicky and the sound you lay to tape is the sound you are stuck with, no plug-in fixes). A Cassette tape was a small rectangular object about the size of an ipod that we used to store audio on.
I still prefer to record this way. Too many software options make my head spin.
diggy_dude
Now 169% diggier!
Releasing albums on analog optical disc wouldn't have necessarily been a bad thing.
