any "tapers" here ?..there has to be a few

[nameloc01]

how many "tapers" do we have here? and have any of you guys happen to ever record TOOL? lettme know...

thanks

jason

looking for new and uncirculated sources for the archive. thanks.

[Giant_Rick]

I am a taper! Not so serious because of tight money, but I give it a try.. I have an NH900 witha Sony DS70P and home-made mikes with Panasonic WM61A capsules, a battery box and a preamp on the way.. in the future I'd like to grab a pair of Church Audio mikes!

[Samantha D.]

Hi. Yes, do a bit of "taping" but these days just mostly just my group live. Back in the '70's , my friends & I would borrow as many cassette portable recorders, and test them, at concerts, trying to capture a decent one for our historical archives. Amazingly, given that we were using mono portable cassette with their built in mic, mostly---one of the best was an all metal case GE portable with a metal 4AA battery cartridge that slid into the machine like a cartridge of pistol. It had an electret condenser mic that had a sensitiv adj, it would allow the mic to slide approx 3/4 inch out of the metal housing. It picked up great clean low end and was clear and clean to 12k tops. It obviously was a higher end , newsman-reporter type model. Never knew the year model as it was bought in a pawn shop for $10 US in around '77, I'd guess it was from about 1974, also had ability to plug an aux mic and had a wheel knob that allowed playback to be sped up or slowed down and approx 2 1/2 speaker--it was auto level control, no rec level adj. My friends got some good tapes with that one, even using it as late as early '83, but replaced with Panasonic walkmans with two mics (stereo)(built in) that bulged out of the top like steel mesh covered 1/2 of a golf ball.

.....make a long story, from gettin too long, still every now and then, the faithful ancient mt-821 sharp gets put into action by me, simple, but I get good results , as I use what I believe are great mics, uni-Panasonics, the microsound Y-stereo mic, and I transfer thru EQ from home md deck to standalone cd rec deck in actual time. Yeah, I know, I'm using ancient regular old MD and not Hi-MD. I have several friends that use Hi-Md quite often to record their performances as well as "tape" shows from the seats.

To locate live recordings made by some of the world's finest "tapers", you certainly want to check http://www.allmanbrothersband.com/ Click FORUM where it reads Board Index forum Click Music and look at Taper Talk, Trades, + Vines. Lot of amazing stuff out there of a tremendous number of bands/artists made by some of the world's finest "tapers".

[md user]

Thanks, SamD.

Useful.

[Samantha D.]

In addition to allmanbrothersbandDOTCOM here are a few links http://www.archive.org/details/etree http://www.archive.org/details/GratefulDead http://www.taperssection.com/ http://www.bootlegarchive.org/Forums.aspx Things have changed quite a bit since the old days when I'd carry the Panasonic RQ-J36, and Sony TCS-300 in my purse with batteries, and TDK SA and XLII c90's and batteries for the guys to tape with. Don't know anything about the last link, the bootleg archive, but I can say that ABB traders/trading circle is where you're gonna find the highest quality, classic rock /r&b/blues etc. ABB circle is strictly physical product on disc/tape sent old fashioned mail jiffy bag style. The Allmans do not condone making instant downloadable files to the masses, It must be Peer-to-Peer (essentially must be some work involved copying discs, packing envelope and mailing the physical product) just as it was in the old days.

http://www.archive.org/iathreads/post-view.php?id=274649

An excellent way I'm told is to GOOGLE microphone models and decks widely used over the years and sift through the google pages Example GOOGLE: Sony ECM-99 or GOOGLE: Realistic 33-1065

[nameloc01]

^ If you're into the ABB, I pulled a really good one of Dickey at the HOB here in Cleveland, and like you said, no electronic sharing. So, if you want a copy let me know and I'll drop one in the mail for you.

-jason

[dunebug81]

how many "tapers" do we have here? and have any of you guys happen to ever record TOOL? lettme know...

thanks

jason

looking for new and uncirculated sources for the archive. thanks.

I taped a few shows at the Pearl in Las Vegas a few years ago. I'll have to check and see if I still have them. If I do I'll send them to you so you can add them to your archive.

Glad someone started a Tool archive. Got a link to that? I wonder if the Tool show from Ozzfest in Orlando was ever recorded.

[star]

Hi,

Yes, I am a taper. I will not reveal what I've taped, but I have been doing it for nearly 13 years. I've seen Tool in concert - and I'll only say that much and nothing further.

You've brought up an interesting subject... so excuse me from drifting away from your objective of finding things on this forum.

From experience, I would never tape a show again with a MD unit. Why? This is because the capacity of the disc only holds 1GB - 90 mins of PCM audio. Since I archive, I prefer PCM audio (or WAV as we all know it). MP3 / ATRAC are not sufficient enough for archiving to retain high audio quality. When you sit down to tape a show, you have to swap out the MD and record onto a whole new one. Unfortunately, this is the sacrifice of using MD units at PCM mode. Because of that, I had to use TWO MZ-RH10s , one to record and one to put on standby.

I did not like doing this at all, because it was a lot of legwork to set these machines up to do stealth taping. The final straw that broke the camel's back was when I was at a concert that lasted over three hours. Think about it - yes, 90+90 = 180 = 3 hrs, but when you record shows, you usually have to start it up a few mins before the actual show time. This turned out to be a total disaster for me, and I decided that the Minidisc was not sufficent for my needs. I went ahead and bought the Edirol R-09HR.

I love the R-09HR a lot. Maybe I'll be buried with one.

While this unit is a bit far from perfect design-wise, it is one of the best recording devices I've ever used. There's no need to worry about "how much time do I have left to record." Additionally, this is straight WAV files unlike the MDs dreadful SonicStage software. Yes, I don't like the fact it's slightly bigger than the minidisc in, but the Edirol does the job better for live taping. I have read the reviews on here by people slamming the Edirol. It's come to my attention that many of them who talk about it don't own one. I have used DAT machines, MDs machines, and a yamaha pocketrak (which I highly don't recommend). In my opinion, as an avid recorder for the past 13 years, Edirol is the best out of all of these.

I have also ran into technical issues with the RH10 on one occasion. It all happened when I recorded a live concert, came to my computer, and I started to upload the show through SonicStage. Around 92% or so during the upload, SonicStage would have a problem and couldn't go further. So I tried it several times and I still got the same problem. Turns out that the MD audio had a flaw on that particular part of the disc - it played no audio, but if you skip through that little part, it played the rest of it. There was no way to correct it so this recording was no good to me.

The only thing good I find about the MD unit now is that I am putting a package together for a friend so he can record an audio tape in PCM so it can be archived properly. I don't want to send my Edirol, but since I have two spare RH10s, I will send him one to do the job. Because the problem I mentioned above happened during a live concert, I don't believe the same problem will appear. It only happened once.

I hope by telling you this, you can understand the fundamentals involved in recording a concert with one of these Minidiscs. Since I have owned a lot of these audio devices, I'll be happy to assist anybody who is looking for suggestions or opinions on what they should buy. There are some strengths on the Hi-MD - but compared to the Edirol, I get better results with Edirol.

[sfbp]

Hi,

From experience, I would never tape a show again with a MD unit. Why? This is because the capacity of the disc only holds 1GB - 90 mins of PCM audio. Since I archive, I prefer PCM audio (or WAV as we all know it). MP3 / ATRAC are not sufficient enough for archiving to retain high audio quality. When you sit down to tape a show, you have to swap out the MD and record onto a whole new one. Unfortunately, this is the sacrifice of using MD units at PCM mode. Because of that, I had to use TWO MZ-RH10s , one to record and one to put on standby.

Well, I recently acquired the Sony ICD-SX950. With built-in microphones, or your favourite pair of stealth mikes, you can get 12 hours PCM in a package weighing 2 Ounces.

This has been reviewed in another thread, and yes, it is possible there is slight bass roll off, but this is easily compensated for if you are doing a real "pro" recording. The voices generally sound BETTER than on MD, different codec makes them clearer.

[star]

Well, I recently acquired the Sony ICD-SX950. With built-in microphones, or your favourite pair of stealth mikes, you can get 12 hours PCM in a package weighing 2 Ounces.

This has been reviewed in another thread, and yes, it is possible there is slight bass roll off, but this is easily compensated for if you are doing a real "pro" recording. The voices generally sound BETTER than on MD, different codec makes them clearer.

What I failed to talk about was the fact that I did own about four DAT machines - all of which were Sony models, all of which broke.

They cost around 700 a piece. Do the math... I spent a lot of money on Sony products.

Since they have pretty much ended their support for Minidisc (while they still added in their unnecessary garbage in SonicStage that prevents certain transfers), I really have had enough with Sony.

For all I know, they can focus their attention on PlayStation 4,5,6...etc. They have brilliantly manipulated the trust of the consumer and they've given us crap as a result.

I have had enough. No more money will go to Sony in the foreseeable future.

[sfbp]

At $230 for the 8GB model and $120 for the 2GB model I hardly regard this as placing "trust" in Sony, rather the opposite. I figure all their *previous* investment in audio probably means that this one they got right. So far, so good.

[star]

At $230 for the 8GB model and $120 for the 2GB model I hardly regard this as placing "trust" in Sony, rather the opposite. I figure all their *previous* investment in audio probably means that this one they got right. So far, so good.

I would like to see people succeed in their investments with their products. This product looks relatively new - I hope you have a lot of success with it.

Unfortunately, after my time with Minidisc and DAT - I had it with getting a Sony product in the audio department. The other competitors released their "hard drive" recorders more rapidly than Sony - and from what I've seen, they have had better success.

I admit, I was skeptical on buying an Edirol at first, but I've used it for 2 years now with hardly any problem.

I've seen people on here who embrace Minidisc like it's their family member who have no plans to upgrade to something else. Nothing wrong with that - I just see things differently as an owner of so many audio products over the course of 20+ years.

Also, if I felt my Hi-MD was useless, I would have gotten rid of it long ago. I just recently found a good use for it after it sat in storage for over a year. On the other hand, I also still have DAT tapes - and I'm dreading the fact I have to go buy a used PCM-M1 DAT machine to transfer these tapes. It's going to cost a bit - I've looked up the price. I don't like the idea already.

[sfbp]

What I like about the ICD-SXnn0 line:

1. Drag and drop everything

2. Support for MP3 both direct recording as well as transfer in (the latter on almost any bitrate)

3. PCM (of course)

4. Their new LPEC codec which is (in its highest quality) 128kbps, the one thing missing from HiMD. How many times did you do the calculation and think: I wish I had 128kbps HiMD, would be perfect?

5. Size and connectivity (line/mic/USB).

I don't care about not being able to change out a microSD card. The minuscule weight compensates for that. The buttons and screen are WAY better than I have any right to expect.

[star]

What I like about the ICD-SXnn0 line:

1. Drag and drop everything

2. Support for MP3 both direct recording as well as transfer in (the latter on almost any bitrate)

3. PCM (of course)

4. Their new LPEC codec which is (in its highest quality) 128kbps, the one thing missing from HiMD. How many times did you do the calculation and think: I wish I had 128kbps HiMD, would be perfect?

5. Size and connectivity (line/mic/USB).

I don't care about not being able to change out a microSD card. The minuscule weight compensates for that. The buttons and screen are WAY better than I have any right to expect.

That's the way it should be with all of this media

I wish it was that way with Minidisc