Options
Your first audio recording device
Eye Sea
Posts: 4,366 Forum Member
✭✭✭
Mine was this rubbish Crown cassette recorder. I used to tape the Top 40 on it, but it didn't have a cable to record straight from radio to recorder.
So I had to put the radio in the spare room, alongside it the recorder; I'd shut the door and leave it recording.
Then I'd tell my family not to go in or near the spare room, because I was recording.:D So naff.:eek:
The recordings themselves were very tinny, especially on words starting with 's' and 't'.:mad:
Now, audio recording is flawless. You cannot tell the difference between the original and the copy.:)
So I had to put the radio in the spare room, alongside it the recorder; I'd shut the door and leave it recording.
Then I'd tell my family not to go in or near the spare room, because I was recording.:D So naff.:eek:
The recordings themselves were very tinny, especially on words starting with 's' and 't'.:mad:
Now, audio recording is flawless. You cannot tell the difference between the original and the copy.:)
0
Comments
I got it 2nd hand from my grandfather. He was getting rid of it, as the cassette player/recorder was faulty, it kept chewing up the tapes. I managed to fix it and used it for quite some years, until the cassette player finally failed and started chewing up the tapes once again.
The next one after that, was some cheap/tacky plastic boombox from the early 90s.
http://www.philipsmuseumeindhoven.nl/phe/products/e_cc.htm
Had a lever to control the transport. Push it in to play, pull back to stop, hold to the right to fast forward and hold to the left to rewind.
Wow... memories, yes mine was exactly as pictured with the two large DIN plugs connecting the microphone, One was a a 180 degree DIN, with either 3 or 5 pins, the mic was wired to 2. The other was a 270 degree din used to control the on/off switch. Made in Austria.
Oh, German technology, well Dutch actually. God bless Eindhoven!
Mine was purchased at Boots in Cleethorpes, not the chemist Boots but Henry Boots, which became Alex Owen then Rumbelows, grief!
Mine was a 'Pye' cassette recorder and I actually placed the radio next to the in-built microphone to tape my favourite top 40 tracks and even attempted to gradually turn the volume down towards the end of the track to fade them out...it was dreadful as I always missed a second or two at the beginning of the track and with fading them out I always got the wrong timing because I finished fading too early or too late with DJ warble over them.
I always remember a neighbour in the next block of flats to me who had a very nice Hitachi music centre and he used to tape me records and they sounded superb! We could not afford anything like that as times were really hard...but to go to his flat and see this Hitachi music centre and to hear it was awesome because I never believed that tape could sound that good. (well compared to my recordings) I was around 10-12 years old at the time and very early 1980's.
I then brought an old second hand record player with a 5 pin din socket so i could record vinyl direct from the record player to the cassette recorder - which was a slight improvement on taping from the radio using the built in microphone...although the recordings were still quite poor in comparison to my neighbours recordings from his Hitachi.
In 1985 my mother brought me a Toshiba SM-200 music centre which was better than any previous recording devices I had...but looking back it was cheap and nasty with no dolby and you could only use 'normal' tapes - not CrO2 or Metal of which I could have got a system for the same price that had these facilities, but being 15 years old I saw the first system that caught my eye.
The very best FIRST system I had was in 1988 which was a Sanyo midi-system of which had a seperate CD player/ digital tuning display (No RDS) and a Dolby twin cassette deck with chrome tape selector. I loved this system to bits as it had exactly what I have always wanted - but it came with a £325 price tag which was expensive at the time and these days you can get better on the hi-fi front for less of which you paid for back then.
An interesting topic though!
3 & 1/2 and 1 & 1/2 i.p.s obtained by removing a sleeve from the capstan motor!
I upgraded to an old valve Stella 1/4 track machine a year or two later.
Anyway. Recording. I really can't remember if I ever used to record on it, but I had an Elizabethan radio gram type doo-dah with radio, cassette and Garrard auatochanging record player.
When in the services I bought an Akai reel-to-reel tape recorder, which was well regarded in it's day.
Then, in the 80's I had a Digital Audio Tape (DAT) recorder and, I still have but rarely use, a Denon cassette recorder. I used both to record straight from the mixing desk of a band I was helping out for a while. Both with excellent results.
Regards Alan
Was it this one. I remember mine as the LZ34 but it may just be my memory playing tricks.
The frequency resonse and signal-to-noise weren't exactly up to Hi-Fi standards but I was impressed at the time.
Edit: Maybe the 32 was the 1/2-track version.
Found some info about Van Der Molen/Elizabethan Electronics here.
I think it was bought as a bare transport/mechanism and put in a home built wooden case and mated to a kit pre/amp and single speaker.
Interesting info on that link jackthom.
Your link just opened a blank page here, except for a icon in the top left corner... http://www.fortunecity.com/victorian/stone/1232/Radio048.jpg must be a site problem..I will google LZ34 and see what comes up ..
Regards Alan
Most of the cheap reel to reel recorders used BSR tape decks, I used to have two Fidelity ones - and repaired many different types using the BSR decks, as well as Philips, Grundig, BRC who made their own decks.
Repaired a few Ferrographs as well, and even gave a series 7 away earlier this year, I couldn't bear to bin it, so found a good home for it.
Hi Jack
Apologies, Firefox would not show the Jpeg, used I.E instead,, no it was not that particular model, the one I had had "rounded corners" and approx 6" wide cloth band with a pattern all around it with a "magic eye" (I think it was called) in the bottom right front which was the record sound level indicator, it looked like a couple of curtains opening and closing in time with the sound, and if they "touched" the recording level was set to high.. it was a green lighted thingy I remember, and it was finished in a reddish vinyl. all a little vague to be honest, but it looked a smart machine for all that..I think the input outputs were those DIN sockets / plugs..and the volumne controls were on the top, but not sure about that one.. but thanks for the info, fascinating stuff..
See - you didnt need the internet to pirate music!
Oh god yes! I had an Elizabethan reel to reel. 7", valves and all. 3 speeds. Happy days! (Still trying to let Mrs Blink allow me to buy a Revox)
My first was a Tiny Pal 3" or 3.5" reel to reel portable recorder. I remember it actually featured on an episode of Thunderbirds or one of the other Gerry Anderson progs once as a full size tape machine.
Should add - my first cassette deck was an Akai GXC38D and yes, I recorded the top 20, then the top 40. Still got the tapes!
Then I flipped the cover down
At Uni in the mid 70s the student radio station had one of these monsters.
http://www.vintagerecorders.co.uk/VR_View_Page.asp?IDS=3
It was absolutely lethal when fast winding. The spools rotated at a crazy speed. Despite the thing weighing as much as a small car
However in the early 60s my brother acquired a Gramdeck, an ingenious device that ran on the record deck. He recorded by sticking a mike in front of the radio loudspeaker and the rest of the family had to just keep quiet!
Downside of this device - discovered by my brother when he got a 'proper' recorder - was that you could only replay on the Gramdeck. Playing tapes back on a normal recorder showed up as a change in speed as the driven spool set the take-up speed, and that was fixed by the record deck.
Sounds like my Crown machine.
I had a Akai GXC38D as well. Used to love the sliders on top for the record level. My first bit of hifi kit in fact.