• Registered: 2023-06-16
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Topic: ADI-2 Pro FS R BE to Vinyl Studio for DSD256 recording Master tapes

I have a RME ADI-2 Pro FS R BE and I want to record 1/4 reel to reel in DSD256 with Vinyl Studio.
Is there a cheat sheet somewhere for what settings should be in the ADI-2 and in Vinyl Studio?
Right now my chain is:
Otari MX5050 BXII-2 XLR ---> ADI-2 analog inputs ---> ADI-2 USB ---> Windows 10 DAW running Vinyl Studio w RME ASIO driver iupdated/nstalled ---> Vinyl Studio Record device ASIO with dsd256 selected as the sample rate.

All I get is the white noise of listening to a DSD stream as analog.
What mode does the ADI-2 need to be in?
What config needs to happen in Vinyl Studio?

I ask here because I don't see this info posted anywhere but it seems several people are doing this type of recording.
TIA,
Eric
NYC

  • Registered: 2018-06-29
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Re: ADI-2 Pro FS R BE to Vinyl Studio for DSD256 recording Master tapes

Why DSD? This is a distribution format, not a production format.

Chain should be pcm of choice > editing > mastering > distribution format of choice

Every you actually do in Vinylstudio is carried out on pcm data, no matter your output choice.

Making changes after saving to DSD will involve lossy conversion to pcm.

Also, DSD256 seems like an overkill given the task at hand (7.5 or 15 IPS half-track). PCM96 would capture everything useful, and then some. You may want to have a look at the spectrae.

Last, but not least, your recording will have to be equalized to be faithful to the recording. Not something VINYLstudio was designed for. Not the version I own, as far as I remember.

So better preserve that precious tape in a format that can be processed later on.

  • ramses
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Re: ADI-2 Pro FS R BE to Vinyl Studio for DSD256 recording Master tapes

+1
Thought the same when reading.
Double speed is more than sufficient and offers linearity even beyond 20 kHz.

BR Ramses - UFX III, 12Mic, XTC, ADI-2 Pro FS R BE, RayDAT, X10SRi-F, E5-1680v4, Win10Pro22H2, Cub14

4 Reply by MC

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Re: ADI-2 Pro FS R BE to Vinyl Studio for DSD256 recording Master tapes

Worked here without any issue, at DSD256 (705.6 kHz) record and monitoring, realtime as well as playback.

You activated DSD mode for the Analog Input at the unit?

Regards
Matthias Carstens
RME

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  • Registered: 2023-06-16
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Re: ADI-2 Pro FS R BE to Vinyl Studio for DSD256 recording Master tapes

How do you activate DSD mode for the Analog input at the unit?

  • KaiS
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Re: ADI-2 Pro FS R BE to Vinyl Studio for DSD256 recording Master tapes

bahringe wrote:

How do you activate DSD mode for the Analog input at the unit?

I/O / Analog Input / Settings / AD Conversion: “DSD”

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Re: ADI-2 Pro FS R BE to Vinyl Studio for DSD256 recording Master tapes

Could you detail the "Settings" part?

8 Reply by KaiS (edited by KaiS 2023-08-08 11:21:47)

  • KaiS
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Re: ADI-2 Pro FS R BE to Vinyl Studio for DSD256 recording Master tapes

KaiS wrote:
bahringe wrote:

How do you activate DSD mode for the Analog input at the unit?

I/O / Analog Input / Settings / AD Conversion: “DSD”

bahringe wrote:

Could you detail the "Settings" part?

This is the detail, just:

Press I/O /
Scroll to: Analog Input /
Scroll to : Settings /
Go down to: “AD Conversion” and set: “DSD”

That’s it.

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  • Registered: 2023-06-16
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Re: ADI-2 Pro FS R BE to Vinyl Studio for DSD256 recording Master tapes

Thank you. That's the configuration I needed.

Eric
NYC

10 Reply by paul.sanders (edited by paul.sanders 2023-08-08 21:19:39)

  • Registered: 2023-08-08
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Re: ADI-2 Pro FS R BE to Vinyl Studio for DSD256 recording Master tapes

joachim.herbert wrote:

Last, but not least, your recording will have to be equalized to be faithful to the recording. Not something VINYLstudio was designed for. Not the version I own, as far as I remember.

Won't the tape deck do that?  In any event, the 'Pro' version of VinylStudio does have equalisation facilities but you'd need to know the curve to be applied.  We've included presets for all the curves we could find for vinyl (including discs pressed before the RIAA curve became standard) and for 78's, but not for tapes.  Contributions welcome, we'll add them.

Many thanks for sorting this customer out guys, by the way.

11 Reply by KaiS (edited by KaiS 2023-08-09 01:20:46)

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Re: ADI-2 Pro FS R BE to Vinyl Studio for DSD256 recording Master tapes

paul.sanders wrote:
joachim.herbert wrote:

Last, but not least, your recording will have to be equalized to be faithful to the recording. ...

Won't the tape deck do that?  ....

Yes, of course!

If well maintained a professional tape recorder like your Otari MX 5050 has a very exact frequency response.

Nothing to EQ, except if the recorded material needs a refresh due to changed taste - people like a bit more bass and treble these days.


What‘s important for tape transfer: older tapes, dependind on the brand, can tend to leave more residue on the tape heads, which kills the treble.
Cleaning heads with Q-Tips and isopropyl alcohol after every run is mandatory.

Sometimes this is necessary even between each music track, and some tapes, e.g. BASF LGR-50, do play without any issues even after more than half a century.

In contrary, if it’s Ampex 456, you’re out of luck - this tape won’t play at all after only a decade of storage.
“Tape baking” is needed to make it playable again:
12 hours at 55-60 °C, then let cool down for another 12 hours, can restore the coating for a little time to make transfer possible.
A fruit-dryer oven is suited for the job, for more info search “Tape baking”.

Here’s some good extra info on the topic:
https://www.tangible-technology.com/tape/baking1.html

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  • Registered: 2023-08-08
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Re: ADI-2 Pro FS R BE to Vinyl Studio for DSD256 recording Master tapes

KaiS wrote:

Yes, of course ...

OK, thanks.  Thought so smile

What you say about tapes degrading makes a lot of sense, so joachim's point about keeping a pristine digital copy is well made.  And just to say, I agree that PCM 96 / 24 is more than good enough.

  • Registered: 2018-06-29
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Re: ADI-2 Pro FS R BE to Vinyl Studio for DSD256 recording Master tapes

KaiS wrote:

If well maintained a professional tape recorder like your Otari MX 5050 has a very exact frequency response.

Fully agreed. Problem with old tapes is that you never know if calibration was taken seriously at the time of the recording. There may well be a need for processing with tools like izotope RX. This cannot be done in DSD. You need to convert to PCM and convert to DSD after processing.

DSD is not well suited for production and archival purposes.

  • KaiS
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Re: ADI-2 Pro FS R BE to Vinyl Studio for DSD256 recording Master tapes

joachim.herbert wrote:

DSD is not well suited for production and archival purposes.

I totally agree.

Funny enough DSD is best suited if you have analog ins and outs only, and just use it as digital inter-step for storage.
In fact, this is what it was meant to be in the first place, a consumer end format, only to be transformed to analog.

Besides, that PCM can serve the same purpose, while maintaining all options.

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