Would Sending an Analog Mixdown to a Minidisc Stereo Deck Steal the "Warmness"?

  • Thread starter Thread starter myurbanodyssey
  • Start date Start date
M

myurbanodyssey

New member
Would Sending an Analog Mixdown to a Minidisc Stereo Deck Steal the "Warmness"?

Hi there,

I love my Tascam 234, and I love analog, but I'm wondering if preserving my "warm" recordings to mini disc would steal from their wonderful analog sound. I have a 122 Stereo deck, but it's adding more hiss than desired to my recordings. The initial hiss and warmth from the 234 is enough for me, and I would like to keep it. Perhaps the transparency of MD can help me do that. Advice?

Thanks
 
As not all Mini-Disc recorders and ATRAC encoding schemes are equal, much depends on the quality of the MD deck in being used.

I own a couple of different higher end, home use MD decks, a Sony and a Yamaha which both sound a bit different to my ears. The Sony seems to make the recordings a bit too bright while the Yamaha seems to be pretty flat. Both though, use data compression which will tend to eat up things like reverberant information and a good deal of spatial stereo information but neither one adds any noise or wow and flutter so it's a question of picking the lesser of several evils.

Considering you're starting from a cassette source though, I don't see the MD format as being a poor choice...it's probably just about perfect.

Cheers! :)
 
Thanks for the advice, Ghost. I like the idea of storing my projects on MD because I really want to stay away from my computer for storage.

Now this:

MD sounds like a good archival format, but what problems would I have if I sent my projects in MD format to mastering places for a finished CD product? Would they laugh me out? Does anyone here use this process?

Thanks!
 
I don't think you'll find anyone using MD as a serious mastering format because, as I mentioned earlier, it uses data compression, just like an MP3. It is a decent format for your own personal use.

For mastering, you generally want to move up in the quality scale so that your master has the best chance of capturing every last bit of detail without adding any shortcomings of its own and MD does have short comings!

Serious mastering formats would start from 1/4", 15 ips 2 track stereo and move up from there to half inch, 30 ips for analog and for digital, 24/96 would be a pretty well accepted standard.

But you're dealing with a 234 cassette format so there's no need to go too crazy on the mastering side of things unless you plan on upgrading your multi-track format.

Cheers! :)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top