ADAT vs. Other Stand Alone Recorders

B

berkleywoods

New member
I'm thinking bout getting an 8 track machine. I have the Alesis 32 and figure that the ADAT would be the natural complement to my mixer. But is it? How does the ADAT compare to some of the other standalone recorders in the same price range?
 
I love my adat. In that price range I dont think there is
a comparable deck. The Tascams are supposed to be better but
they do cost more. Now you have your stand alone digitals, I think fostex just came out with one, and there are the Roland vs880 and1680 and others, you can pick up a used adat
with little hours for under 900.00 and pretty soon they will
be selling for under a 100.00 because they will be obsolete and then I will own a dozen! Yay!
 
Hmmmm....

You will not find one person that has actually heard a DA-88, and a ADAT say that the DA-88 sounds better. Tascam's transport is definately more reliable, and has far less syncing problems because of the tape format they use. But it is that very same format that also drops bits every once in a while too! The DA series stuff sounds, well, like digital in comparison.

ADAT's sound way better. The XT transports are just about as dependable the DA series stuff, and cost a whole lot less.

Ed
 
I guess my real question is: Can I achieve a sound from a Studio 32 Mixer, decent microphones, and the Alesis ADAT that is somewhat comparable to some of the Acoustic Rock songs I hear on the radio. I would love to record a CD with my band and I don't want people to buy it and not be satisfied cuz it screams Local Product and has poor quality.
 
I bought 2 x XT20 a while back. They have worked fine. Some tape problems only. Plus adats are easy to sync (sample accurate) to a DAW.

But if I was looking for a standalone recorder today, I would seriously consider the new Yamaha AW4416 16-track, 24-bit machine. I played with it for a couple of hours just a couple of days ago and it is AWESOME!. Some 40 channels at mixdown, 16 motorized faders, 4xparametric eq and dynamics on every channel, pad sampler, 2 fx units (very good sounding too!), 8 very good quality mic preamps, internal CD-R for backups (and maybe burning audio CDs as well?), a stereo master track to mix down to and lots and lots of other stuff. Everything is automatable. Syncs to MTC or SMPTE. Word Clock I/O. SCSI to connect to external gear. This is a serious machine.
And costs less that 2 new XT20's.

So if you are looking for a quality recorder this might be it.
Regards
Ora
 
alesis studio pack

hello I'm just entering the site and have a question- what do you think of the alesis studio pack? is it a good deal and will the board be ample enough for my needs. i will be putting together simple songs i.e. bass drums synth percussion guitar etc. i've looked at the new breed of digital 8 tracks and just feel funny about the lack of xlr inputs as i have lots of drums and percussion instruments and analog signals etc.
 
Berkleywoods, you can go to my website at
dragunworks.homestead.com and download an mp3 and check the
sound for yourself, they were recorded on about the same setup you are describing. If you do, download either first
street or 2001. The sound is pretty good and I did all the
engineering and I really dont have much exp., maybe I just
got lucky, if so, and you have the exp. you should be able to do much better. I hope this is not taken to be spam because it is not intended to be. Sonusman, thank you for
the info on the tascams, I said the tascams are SUPPOSED
to be better because all the literature I read said so, but
then again, dont believe anything you read.
 
Yeah.....

What you never really read about Tascam stuff is this....

The DA-88's were very popular for any kind of video/film production work because of their initial reliability, and that the sound was not as critical as it is with CD music production. This makes sense seeing's how video/film post production studios charge an arm and a leg (and your good looking sister!) for their services. They can't have any problems at those prices, and if the audio is going on a film, the DA-88's sound just fine fidelity wise.

The DAT players they were making at the time were far more reliable then just about anything else out their at the time. This was important for ANYBODY using DAT tape.

But when it comes right down to it, the ADAT's truely sound better. I have not heard the newer Tascam gear, but I am sure that they have made attempts to have better sounding A/D/A converters. But still, their prices are quite high, and I doubt that that gear sounds any better then the 20 bit ADAT's to justify the price.

Ed
 
adat xt

well I got no reply on the ALESIS STUDIO PACK. but thats ok what I did do was buy a studio 32 board and a used adat xt. I have a couple of questions for you veterans. The adat i got had a little over 200 hours time on it. Is this alot of time? should I have the heads cleaned or try to do it myself? how should I configure my patch bay? I got the +4dbu ELKO connector for the snake. My outboard gear consists of ALESIS MEQ. beringer MULTICOM PRO. beringer ULTRAFEX. ibenezCOMP/GATE. lexicon ALEX. tascom CDRW700. sony DUAL CASSETTE DECK and technics CD PLAYER. beringer ULTRAPATCH PRO. what is the best way to hook all this stuff up? is it all a crap shoot or is there order to all this madness? any help would be appreciated!!! garlock out
 
Gotta respectfully disagree with V.Ray....

Live in the Tampa FL area, and e-one here should know of the "chip n' dip, got it ALL together THEE repair man". Well, he loves the LX 20 and has explained to me @ length(and over my head, of the pin variety!) why this unit is just terrific. Not bad mouthing the XT, but at $999 brand new the LX is a deal if ya like ADAT's. By the way Barry is one of the very few in the country Alesis allow to do all of the field rebuilds. Real lucky to have him in the area, a great guy too. Don't fool yourself about the LX, it's a sweet box.
 
adat is better then standalone units. No compression...Almost every standalone unit compresses the sound and are difficult to learn. If you can get a sound card made for importing optical from and to adat and a copy of cooledit (for editing) you have the best deal.
 
To my knowledge, most new standalone (hd)recorders (Akai, Yamaha etc.) don't compress anymore. Instead, they offer 24-bit conversion and uncompressed storage.
Played some more with the Yamaha AW4416. Man, that is one serious machine. The only thing lacking is waveform editing...I think that this is the first "professional" all-in-one unit ever.

Mind you, I am not saying that ADATs are bad, far from it. I love the two XT-20s I have. For example, I can fly tracks back and forth between the ADATs and DAW (sample accurate sync).

Regards
Ora
 
I have never had ANY probs whatsoever with my 2 adats and have had 'em for over a year already. Computer based recordings and the like are way cool,buthe adats give me that certai,don't know how to explain this... that "Analog Feel" in the digital realm!
Peace
 
After so many years ... I think ADAT still rocks over the other formats. As long as the tapes are cheap and easy to get ... this format will be around for a while ... just because of the large number of devoted users.
I've had one LX20 for a about 3 years and the other for about a year and a half. I use the lightpipe I/O exclusively so I get around the unbalanced analog outs and inferior A/D/A converters. Other than that, the differences between the two units are slight (IMHO) ... a little better chassis on the XT20 and more locate points. I'm more than happy with these units and equally happy that I saved some $. Yep ... I bought cheap .. and I bought twice ... I got 2 of 'em! :D
I've had absolutely zero problems with either unit ... with the exception of a tape getting stuck in one a while back. But I blame that on the tape, not the machine. Use quality tapes and you should have no problems.
I had no idea that they were $999 now .. I might have to get a third one! ;)
 
Hmmm... as far as I know - the converters between the LX20 and the XT20 ARE different.... at least in oversampling rates where the LX20 is 64, and the XT20 is 128 -- both are 20-bit/48Khz...

Bruce Valeriani
Blue Bear Sound
 
Yeah BigKahuna! Musiciansfriends got 'em on sale for $999.00! I'm thinking 'bout getting another 1 myself!
 
Really like ADAT format too, plus you gotta kinda have one because if you do any sort of work that comes in on ADAT you need at least one. XT or LX, 20's, r great. XT probably can take more of a "beating". ADA board, very similar, rca vs trs, frame a bit stronger, blah blah blah. Both machines work great in my opinion, $999 lx and may go down soon again with all the DAW craze. But, lets not forget about bouncing to computer with ALL of the great software out there. Light pipe I/O and all. I'm a touchy feely kinda guy too, but keep in mind SOFTWARE, because that's where this recording bug that we all have is going to grow, and grow exponentially! You gotta kinda have the software base covered too, it can be a pain in the butt, but it can be great too (sorta like women!).
 
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