The Telegraph Article on Return To Reel To Reel. Lady Gaga Doing Some New songs on Reel To Reel.

spiritofmusic

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That's great, really.
But please please PLEASE don't take the resultant warmer master and mix it so hot it brickwalls.
A hot analogue master is as bad as a digital one.
 

Tango

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Cool. I need to get this album and use my golden ears to identify which is analog.

Tang o_O
 

microstrip

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Great news about the increase of price of old quality machines :cool: - I was seriously considering reducing my excessive collection! Or should I simply offer an old Studer A80 to the person who buys my EMT 927? ;)

And yes, I just saw that in three years they valuated more than old LPs!
 

Tango

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Great news about the increase of price of old quality machines :cool: - I was seriously considering reducing my excessive collection! Or should I simply offer an old Studer A80 to the person who buys my EMT 927? ;)

And yes, I just saw that in three years they valuated more than old LPs!
"Old quality machines" dear Micro, not just old machines. :p

Tang
 
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spiritofmusic

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Tang, I wonder how many of us "long in the tooth" audiophiles could be called old quality?
 
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microstrip

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"Old quality machines" dear Micro, not just old machines. :p

Tang

Fortunately IMHO my several Studer A80's and Revox PR99 mk3 qualify as quality machines dear Tang, particularly as I am able to provide the detailed spectogram of wow and flutter of the machines since long! https://www.whatsbestforum.com/threads/desert-island-r2r-1-4-2-track-master-player.14129/post-261034 .

But yes, I would not apply this epithet to the old Revox B77's where I learned about these aspects ...
 

Tango

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Fortunately IMHO my several Studer A80's and Revox PR99 mk3 qualify as quality machines dear Tang, particularly as I am able to provide the detailed spectogram of wow and flutter of the machines since long! https://www.whatsbestforum.com/threads/desert-island-r2r-1-4-2-track-master-player.14129/post-261034 .

But yes, I would not apply this epithet to the old Revox B77's where I learned about these aspects ...
Dear Micro. I must be very sleepy and don't follow you at this time. Why would you lead me to a link to your old comment that says "This picture shows a spectrogram of the 3150 Hz signal used to measure the wow and flutter of a poor condition Studer A80 I bough a few years ago with noisy bearings and a worn pinch roller." Is this the A80 you were talking about. Or you have two A80's one good the other bad. And you were illustrating the different spectogram of the two. One being better? My brain is the size of peanut I admit I do not know how to read the graphs.

Kind regards,
Tang
 

bonzo75

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Dear Micro. I must be very sleepy and don't follow you at this time. Why would you lead me to a link to your old comment that says "This picture shows a spectrogram of the 3150 Hz signal used to measure the wow and flutter of a poor condition Studer A80 I bough a few years ago with noisy bearings and a worn pinch roller." Is this the A80 you were talking about. Or you have two A80's one good the other bad. And you were illustrating the different spectogram of the two. One being better? My brain is the size of peanut I admit I do not know how to read the graphs.

Kind regards,
Tang

Hope nothing else is the size of a peanut
 

microstrip

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Dear Micro. I must be very sleepy and don't follow you at this time. Why would you lead me to a link to your old comment that says "This picture shows a spectrogram of the 3150 Hz signal used to measure the wow and flutter of a poor condition Studer A80 I bough a few years ago with noisy bearings and a worn pinch roller." Is this the A80 you were talking about. Or you have two A80's one good the other bad. And you were illustrating the different spectogram of the two. One being better? My brain is the size of peanut I admit I do not know how to read the graphs.

Kind regards,
Tang

Sorry, my fault, it seems you are not familiar with the Studer A80 - we addressed it several times in WBF. Any A80 is potentially a quality machine and can easily be put in good conditions. The mechanical parts having wear are standard bearings and can be easily replaced with currently available high quality parts. Spares are easily available - it was thought as a machine that could last forever. All the extremely detailed technical manuals are freely available. People know about it and it is why they are are sought now-a-days.

BTW, I now have four A80's. I bought two with poor cosmetics and worn heads just for spares and later found they could easily be refurbished, so I did not dismantle them. :oops: My intention displaying the graphs was showing that everyone wanting to dedicate some time to the task, even with people with little reel-to-reel expertise, can easily diagnose an A80 as there is lot of information around.

We have several A80 enthusiast people in this forum, did you never noticed them?
 
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back to the article:
I think Lady Gaga bought Frank Zappas old house which had a well equipped in-house studio, which happened to house a couple of Studer studio machines..that´s how she discovered their qualities....
interesting development
reg supply of particularly hi-end Studer, Nagra and ATR machines, I´ve got the distinct impression that the supply is shrinking fast and you hardly get an A80 wreck for less that EUR 2-3K
thank god I have all I need...and a couple more...
 

waltzingbear

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Interesting that you state a Revox B77 is inferior to a PR99, in that they are the same deck. The only difference is the PR99 is balanced vs the unbalanced B77.

Also the bearings in an A80 or any Studer machine cannot be replaced as easily as you seem to believe. There are always minor differences in thickness of the bearing housing. Studer incorporated this in their designs, all bearings are shimmed into final and correct placement for proper transport alignment. Without the needed knowledge and shim parts you will only be close, not correct, if replaced.

Cheers
Alan
 

microstrip

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Interesting that you state a Revox B77 is inferior to a PR99, in that they are the same deck. The only difference is the PR99 is balanced vs the unbalanced B77.

I have both, and as far as I remember there are a few more differences - for example heavier and more rugged chassis and a second tape damper. My PR99 is a mk3, BTW - I do not remember anymore the differences between models but I think that PCB quality of my PR99 mk3 is much better than that of the B77. But last time I payed with them was long ago, can't be sure!

Also the bearings in an A80 or any Studer machine cannot be replaced as easily as you seem to believe. There are always minor differences in thickness of the bearing housing. Studer incorporated this in their designs, all bearings are shimmed into final and correct placement for proper transport alignment. Without the needed knowledge and shim parts you will only be close, not correct, if replaced.

Cheers
Alan

Yes, your are correct, but these points are clear in the service manuals and fortunately people with expertise presented them clearly in several posts in the Studer list. BTW, do you have any information on the Studer A80 gauges? It is an almost ignored subject and I would love to know more about them!
 
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waltzingbear

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following the sale of Studer to Harmon and the subsequent moving away from all tape based activity, support was stopped, Frank R (Harmon Support) in Northridge kept a good supply of parts for a long time, but eventually that was stoped and all replacement parts and documents were transferred to Audio House. (http://www.audiohouse.ch/professional-audio/studer/index.html) I do not know what they may have or not in way of gauges and their web site doesn't inspire much confidence. They do say they still service motors when communicating with them. When I tried to purchase some alignment tools from Frank in the oughts he could not get them.
Usually there is enough information in the manual to have a machine shop fabricate the gauges. Certainly that is true for the A810 gauges. Head alignment tools are best done with optical tools today. (besides azimuth)

The manuals and support documents are no longer available from Studer. Samsung has purchased Harmon and since removed the web site. However it is found in several places as a mirror of the complete support site.
https://www.reeltoreel.nl/studer/

differences in circuit board material is indicative of when it was manufactured. This changes over time, not between products.
 

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