Let's get synched (Lynx MK1)

  • Thread starter Thread starter jpmorris
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jpmorris

jpmorris

Tape Wolf
Long shot, but has anyone here used the MK1 TimeLine Lynx to lock two tape transports together? I've acquired a pair of them without manual - which appears to be extremely difficult to obtain. The deck is a Tascam TSR-8, and I've just this morning constructed (at great effort and ridiculous cost) a cable which should allow it to control one of the Tascams from the cable schematics which are available. Unlike the mess with the MMC100, this time, the EXT light is now flashing on the Tascam.

Now. One of the things I've noticed but not been able to pin down is that the
Lynxes seem to be different. I have a U16 and a U25. This appears to be related to the ROM version (*). One of the things which has been nagging me is that TimeLine might have made different EPROMS for different tasks, in which case they might not be suitable for transport control.

The main question is this. The Lynx has the following I/O:
TC IN, RESHAPE, GENOUT, PILOT IN, PILOT OUT

TC IN is obviously Timecode IN, and when hooked up to the Rees TS1 it decodes the SMPTE and displays the timecode position.
RESHAPE I'm guessing will output a regenerated version of the input timecode for copying/enhancement purposes.
GENOUT outputs a generated timecode, which makes the TS-1's SYNC light come on, although I haven't yet hooked it up to a sequencer to double-check. If the TS1 is happy to lock to it, I'm assuming it's what it says on the front.

Now, the PILOT I/O are the ones I'm curious about. If this Lynx was made to control the transport as a slave, would you feed the timecode from the master machine in here (with the slave machine that it will be controlling on TC IN)?
Or is this something to do with Nagra's PilotTone thing? (These machines were used in a broadcast studio I believe).
If not, would I have to have the other Lynx listening to the master and controlling this Lynx as its slave via RS422? (I don't want to have to make another one of those goddamn cables if I can avoid it)

Anyway I'm going to play around with it but if anyone has actually done this, help would be greatly appreciated.

(*)Yes, it has a ROM but I can't seem to find the microprocessor. I was expecting a Z80,6505,6800 or maybe 8080/8085. Some of the ICs are (C)Intel 1975, which makes the design older than me.
 
I can't answer any of your questions directly but I do have a 46 page booklet from TimeLine that has quite a bit of educational material in it and covers a similar product to the one you have there.

If you'd like me to e-mail it to you, just give me a PM with an e-mail addy and I can send it to you. It's in .pdf format.

Cheers! :)
 
The Ghost of FM said:
I can't answer any of your questions directly but I do have a 46 page booklet from TimeLine that has quite a bit of educational material in it and covers a similar product to the one you have there.
If you'd like me to e-mail it to you, just give me a PM with an e-mail addy and I can send it to you. It's in .pdf format.
Cheers! :)
Click to expand...

If it's not one of these, then yes, I would be interested:
http://www.sessioncontrol.com/TL_archives.htm

Cheers,
 
The Ghost of FM said:
No, I'm afraid I've got those same items that you've found on the web. :o
I take it you've read all that stuff and it didn't answer your questions?
Click to expand...
The Lynx-2 manual was surprisingly useful. I had assumed that it was a total redesign, and it does look like the circuitry has been more-or-less integrated into a single IC.
It gives a very helpful series of diagrams for various possible setups and how the units should be connected. It still doesn't seem to say what PILOT is for though, and it doesn't help with the internal jumper settings.

Re-reading the TSR-8 manual it looks like the EXT light has to be solid for full control, but it doesn't say whether it becomes solid during external control, or for as long as the synchroniser is attached.

The Lynx is quite happily reading the tach signals and reproducing the TSR's position counter on its own display. It is also capable of sufficient control to perform a seek to a specific point on tape, and with both lynxes connected up it will happily show the time difference between the two stripes. But I can't seem to make it lock them together. Perhaps I'll have to make the other control cable :(
 
The article at the site of sessioncontrol was a very nice introduction into tape sync for me!
 
Marcel-X said:
The article at the site of sessioncontrol was a very nice introduction into tape sync for me!
Click to expand...
I never did quite get the Lynxes to work - I bought an ATS-500 instead and use one Lynx as a timecode display.

In any case, the document you're referring to seems to be more about synchronizing sequencers to tape, which I've been doing for about 5 years now.
Thanks for the suggestion, though.
 
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