is DAT gone? - Page 2

Archived from groups: rec.audio.pro (More info?)

Chevdo wrote:

> And if you do decide to archive on
> DAT, you'd still be better off archiving .wav's to a computer DAT, because
> they actually have to reproduce perfect copies unlike audio DAT players which
> rely on lossy error correction like CD players do.

We don't "decide to archive on DAT." We make the original recording on
DAT because it was the best choice at the time, and we leave it there,
for better or worse. If I haven't touched a DAT in 10 years, only my
conscience keeps me from throwing it away. If, in 25 years, someone
asks if I still have that tape I made of their concert, I'll dig it up
and hopefully I'll still have a DAT deck that works. I never throw
anything away. Maybe the tape will play, maybe it won't, but in the
meantime, I won't have been worrying about whether it's a dead format
or not.

These days, if my portable DAT still worked, I'd probably use it, dump
the recording to the computer, and put it on CDs, probably audio CDs so
they'll play in the car or the living room or for whoever I give them
to. That's what I do with the Jukebox 3 now. The advantage over DAT is
that transfer to the computer is faster. Disasvantage is that if I
don't get the recordings off the hard drive before I need the disk
space, I'm in trouble.

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Paul van der Heu wrote:

> You buy 50GB 2.5" drives in a decent USB2 case for <$75 nowadays. No need
> for external power or anything, just plug and play.. Works fine for me..

The last 120 GB 3.5" drive I bought was $29 after rebates. I don't swap
drives often enough so that I need an active case for each one.
Besides, I don't have a computer currently that has a USB2 port.

You people must think that buying something is the solution to
everything. I make do with what I have or what I can buy for a price
commensurate with its value to me, and that works fine for me. It
doesn't have to get any easier than this.

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Mike Rivers wrote:
> Steve wrote:
>
> > I have seen horrible things happen to ext FW drives.
> > Is USB2 more reliable?
>
> No reason for anything horrible to happen to either interface format.
> There's no reason why one should be more or less reliable than the
> other. The drives are IDE, it's just a chip or two that does the
> interface conversion.
>
> I suppose it's easier to drop a drive in an external case than it is to
> drop a whole computer, but I doubt that's what you're talking about.
> Have you seen horrible things happen to DRIVES, or do you know a friend
> who has a cousin who plugged a Firewire drive into his computer and it
> instantly became unreadable?

It happened to me plugging a FW drive into a BW G4Mac.
The drive mounted as blank. It lost 50gigs of data.
Most was eventualy recovered but as it was not my drive or data it was
a very nasty experience.
Its never happened to me before and I now use USB2 so far without
probs.
The FW still works fine with an iCam but I would never trust putting a
FW Drive
on it again.
I would like to know if anyone has had any similar probs with USB2.

> I acutally came up with a system that would do that reliably when I was
> trying to find a Firewire drive case that would work with the PCMCIA
> Firewire adapter in my Dell Inspiron 2650 laptop computer. I could
> connect a drive, see the files, and, as soon as I tried to access one,
> the whole computer would freeze up. After rebooting, no files were
> visible on the drive. But there was a problem (unsolvable, but
> discovered) and so I just stopped doing that. Been using a USB2 case
> with a USB1 port since and haven't had any problems.
>
> So I suppose if you want, you can put this in your data base of
> "horrible things happening to Firewire external drives" but it isn't a
> valid scientific experiment since there's a known flaw.

Archived from groups: rec.audio.pro (More info?)

Chel van Gennip wrote:
> On Thu, 08 Sep 2005 03:00:03 +0200, Ed Anson wrote:
>
>
>>That's a good idea, but you need to give some thought to how you will
>>perform the transfer. It is not a given that anything made 25 years from
>>now will be able to communicate with today's old klunker.
>>
>>I have some computers that are less than ten years old, and I have yet
>>to find a way to transfer files from them to my current computer. They
>>have *NO* media in common, and can't even use the same network
>>connections.
>
>
> One of the first file transfer options: kermit, will work between almost
> any machine that has at least one serial interface.
>
> It is hard to find a system without at least one serial line or a system
> that does not support a kermit version.
>


You don't necessarily need kermit. Any presently available O/S will
support a slip/ppp IP connection. Host computers may or may
not support kermit in the future ( although it's
very close to trivial to code ).

Nothing wrong with kermit, but there are more options with
slip/ppp .

--
Les Cargill

Archived from groups: rec.audio.pro (More info?)

> > I have some computers that are less than ten years old, and I have yet
> > to find a way to transfer files from them to my current computer. They
> > have *NO* media in common, and can't even use the same network
> > connections.

E-mail?

Peace,
Paul

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Richard Crowley wrote:

> Mike Rivers says...
>>The closest thing to a serial interface that my laptop has is a USB1.1
>>port. Got a Kermit program that can talk to a USB port?
>
> Who needs Kermit when you can get something that plugs
> directly into the USB port

You will if the machine you're rescuing data from doesn't have USB.

--
JP Morris - aka DOUG the Eagle (Dragon) -=UDIC=- jpm@it-he.org
Anti-walkthroughs for Deus Ex, Thief and Ultima http://www.it-he.org
Reign of the Just - An Ultima clone http://rotj.it-he.org
The DMFA radio series project http://dmfa.it-he.org
d+++ e+ N+ T++ Om U1234!56!7'!S'!8!9!KAW u++ uC+++ uF+++ uG---- uLB----
uA--- nC+ nR---- nH+++ nP++ nI nPT nS nT wM- wC- y a(YEAR - 1976)

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"J. P. Morris" <jpm@it-he.org> wrote in message
news:4321c7d0$0$1310$ed2619ec@ptn-nntp-reader02.plus.net...
> Richard Crowley wrote:
>
>> Mike Rivers says...
>>>The closest thing to a serial interface that my laptop has is a
>>>USB1.1
>>>port. Got a Kermit program that can talk to a USB port?
>>
>> Who needs Kermit when you can get something that plugs
>> directly into the USB port
>
> You will if the machine you're rescuing data from doesn't have USB.

Yes, of course. I have ported Kermit to a couple of oddball
computer systems myself.

However, note that Mr. Rivers explicitly states that he has
a USB port available.

Archived from groups: rec.audio.pro (More info?)

"Scott Dorsey" <kludge@panix.com> wrote in message
newsfus3m$7ee$1@panix2.panix.com...
>
> Last time I bought DAT tapes, they were about $3 each for 120 minute ones.
>
> It was a total revelation when I went to DAT... after years of trying to
> save the last little bit of tape on the end of the reel and shutting the
> machine off during breaks between pieces to save tape costs, just letting
> the recorder run and run was amazing. It was just so cheap.

It's still cheap, and it appears that DAT tapes are still being made by a
variety of sources, including the good old Cassette House:
http://www.tape.com/cgi-bin/SoftCa [...] DAT%20Tape

It looks like my Tascam DAT machine is going to stay where it is, at least
for a while.

Stuart

Archived from groups: rec.audio.pro (More info?)

Paul van der Heu wrote:

> "Mike Rivers" <mrivers@d-and-d.com> wrote :
>
>
>>>Disks seem much simpler; and when you've done all the recording,
>>>transfer the data to a computer for mixing.
>>
>>And then what? Leave it on the computer disk forever?
>
>
> For big projects, why not?

When was the last time you lost an entire reel of 2" to a speck of dust
in the wrong place?

Archived from groups: rec.audio.pro (More info?)

Some time ago I searched the Web and read various articles on archival
media, which led to the following conclusions. I don't know how accurate
this information is, however.

1. How long does a hard drive last if you place it in anti-static plastic
and put it on the shelf, as suggested earlier in this thread? I expect
this will depend in part on environmental conditions (temperature and
humidity for example).

2. It is unknown how long CD-R and CD-RW media will last, although there
are CD-R disks designed for long-term storage which manufacturers and
archivists hope will remain readable for a century. Tests were conducted
on the materials, apparently.

3. The viability of DVD-R and DVD-RW media over the long term is unknown,
and so far as I could ascertain, there are no reputable DVD media which
have been subject to the kind of testing and assurance process carried out
for the CD-R disks mentioned above.

4. Analogue tape degrades more gracefully than DAT. That is, the audible
effects of modest degradation are less serious with analogue tape than
with DAT.

5. One suggested archival strategy is to maintain a large array of RAID
hard drives, which must be maintained and updated, transferring the data
as required and as hard disk technology evolves.

File hashes can of course be used to verify the integrity of the data.
Lossless compression formats such as Flac (http://flac.sourceforge.net/)
may also be valuable, whatever the storage medium used.

Comments/corrections/clarifications welcome.

Archived from groups: rec.audio.pro (More info?)

On Thu, Sep 15, 2005 at 05:29:47AM -0700, Mike Rivers wrote:
>
> I suspect that this might end up being something like the sticky shed
> syndrom with magnetic tape - not that the same thing will happen, but
> that something will happen and there will be a way to deal with it
> effectively. The biggest risk with putting a hard drive on the shelf is
> the same as with any other computer media - 25 years from now you may
> have difficulty finding something that talks to it.

That the IDE and SCSI interfaces, for example, are standardized may be
of benefit in ensuring that suitable hardware will continually be
available or at least can be produced.
>
> Will the person who has a computer ready-to-go that can read a Wordstar
> file on a 10 MB MFM hard drive please raise his hand? <g>

If it were an ASCII text file instead, the software problem would go
away, leaving only the hardware side. This is one of the many reasons
why I write all of my documents as text files (more precisely, as LaTeX
or as HTML).

If a format such as flac is used, then it seems clear that, given
availability of the source code, it will be readable for as long as C
compilers exist and there is hardware capable of playing the audio data,
assuming that the storage medium itself can be read.
>
> There's no reason why a pressed CD shouldn't last as long as a vinyl
> disk. A CD-R made on a good quality blank with one of the modern dies
> that don't die when left on the desk in the sun for a day is likely to
> have a pretty good lifespan with reasonable care.
Thanks for the clarification. On an unrelated point, I have noticed that
older drives won't read CD-RW disks; trying to play a CD-RW disk with an
older player is likely to fail.
>
> Too much trouble, and probably too expensive for most. Better to accept
> that the original format of your magnum opus may be gone, and that its
> survival will depend on how valuable the listeners think it is.

And if the copies are accurate digital reproductions of the original, no
quality degradation with be thereby incurred. The more listeners there
are, the more backups exist of the recording.

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Ed Anson <EdAnson@comcast.net> wrote:
> I have some computers that are less than ten years old, and I have yet
> to find a way to transfer files from them to my current computer. They
> have *NO* media in common, and can't even use the same network
> connections.

which computers? no ethernet?

--
Aaron J. Grier | "Not your ordinary poofy goof." | agrier@poofygoof.com
"silly brewer, saaz are for pils!" -- virt