In Reply to: Home recording posted by LtMandella on January 12, 2020 at 12:36:18:
If you can afford 15 ips half-track you can forget NR systems. You can get a good deck for somewhere around $1k or less, like an Otari MX5050 B2 or later series recapped, aligned, and relapped, or a Studer B67 for $3500-ish. Tape will run you around $75 a reel (1.5-mil 2500 feet). Take it up to a much higher level with better repro amps, like Dan Schmalle's Bottlehead or the hard-to-find Manley repro amps.
The performance difference between quarter-track consumer machines and studio machines is enormous. I found that good digital far outperformed quarter-track tape, and I'm not quite sure why you want to base a studio around quarter-track decks. (If you sold those decks, you would have more than enough to set up one really good half-track deck.)
Of course you know that much 456 had sticky-shed. If you are setting up a home studio, ATR Master Tape is a wonder, and the RMG/Emtec 911 is supposed to be good as well. If your transport says "Studer" on it, you can use ATR's 1-mil MDS-36 tape which packs 3,400 feet on a reel.
My recommendation is to skip noise reduction, go half-track, and stick with studio machines. They are almost always much easier to work on, and designed for tens of thousands of hours of use. Get a studio machine, get an MRL tape, learn to align it, send the head block to John French for a dose of his magic, and you're off to the races.
WW
"Put on your high heeled sneakers. Baby, we''re goin'' out tonight.
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Follow Ups
- RE: Home recording - Bill Way 15:51:23 01/12/20 (7)
- RE: Home recording - LtMandella 18:30:26 01/12/20 (5)
- RE: Home recording - Bill Way 21:56:58 01/12/20 (4)
- RE: Home recording - LtMandella 12:31:54 01/14/20 (3)
- Be forewarned - Victor Khomenko 14:02:08 01/14/20 (2)
- RE: Be forewarned - LtMandella 10:08:27 01/23/20 (0)
- Agreed... - kootenay 09:54:50 01/15/20 (0)
- I believe... - Victor Khomenko 18:23:37 01/12/20 (0)