Tag: tape machines

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Magnecord Publications

Magnecord Historical Archive Material: Part IV

This week we’ll conclude our series of archival material courtesy of Magnecord founding partner John Boyers.  John’s son D. graciously scanned every page of every available issue of the company publication “Magnecord INC,” which was published between 1950 and 1954.

If anyone out there has any issues that we are missing, please chime in and let’s figure out a way to get them online.  Magnecord was a crucial developer of tape-recording and pro-audio hardware whose contributions have been largely forgotten in the modern era.  I use a Magnecord PT6 at our studio Gold Coast Recorders to make the occasional ‘old-time’ recording and it’s a testament to the skill of engineers like Mr. Boyers that the machine still works great SIXTY years after it rolled out the Chicago plant.

The ‘Magnecord INC’ publications are fascinating because they reveal the dawn of the high-fidelity audio-recording age.  Remember that these (and certain of the AMPEX machines of the era) were portable audio-recorders with 40hz- 15kz frequency response.  These facts opened up world of possibility for audio capture.   Reading through these old issue of “Magnecord INC” opens the door to a time when the world was first figuring out all of the things that could be done with a portable machine that could capture and playback sound to the near-limits of human hearing ability.  Many of the then-novel tape-recording tasks described in these publications may seem mundane; but many are surprising and quite odd applications which never really caught on past a few enthusiastic early-experimenters.

Without further ado, here are the issue from 1950.  More to follow tomorrow.  Download and enjoy.

Magnecord_INC_Feb1950

Magnecord_INC_Mar1950

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Uncategorized

Better Living Through Auto-Reverse

Well alright…  Cheryl from the Madison office is finally coming over to the condo for dinner.  I think she said she liked John Denver and Jim Croce…

Gonna make pretty much the ultimate mix…  man this is really gonna set the mood…

OK it’s almost 8…  let’s get this tape up on the deck. Thanks to TEAC Auto-Reverse technology, the tape will play over and over and over and over again all night, regardless of how long the night ends up being.

What a fox.  Oh yeah?  Like the music?  Yeah I love these guys too… Saw them at the OysterFest a few years ago…  oh yeah, glad you dig it…

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I am not making any of this up.  This is an actual TEAC print-ad from January 1976.  It features single-people in their mid-30s having a romantic evening at the gentleman’s home (condo).   The selling proposition of this product is ‘Auto-Reverse,’  AKA, you don’t have to flip the tape over when the side ends.  When we were growing up in the cassette-tape era, Auto-Reverse was still a premium-feature of the higher-priced tape players.  I actually don’t think I ever had an auto-reverse walkman; they were just too expensive. Flipping the tape was just part of life.  Good thing i was too young at the time to have any ladies to entertain.  By the time I started dating, the CD was already in-play.  ‘Repeat’ is of course a feature of all CD decks.

Anyhow, this advert is a good example of the ‘lifestyle-benefit’ advertising that consumer electronics manufacturers employed in the 70’s.  Set a little stage, tell a little story, allow the consumer to insert themselves into the scenario.  This was in some contrast to much electronics advertising of the 40s to 60s, much of which was focused on ‘fidelity’ and ‘value.’  By the 70s, 20-20k performance (OK, 30-15k) was a given in most equipment; transistors and PCBs had made this stuff affordable to most working-class folks; so the benefit of one brand over the other needs to be demonstrated in other ways.  In this case, the increased romantic-potential of a dinner-date.

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Magnecord Pro Audio Archive

Magnecord Complete Line Catalog Circa 1953

From the personal archive of John Boyers, founding partner of Magnecord INC, we present the complete circa 1953 Magnecord INC catalog. Click the link below to download the eight-page PDF:

DOWNLOAD: Magnecord_Catalog_Circa1953

Products covered, with text and photos, include: Magnecord PT6-A Recorder Mechanism, PT6-R line-level input amplifier and PT6-J Mic-level input/output amplifier; PT63-A three-head recorder and companion PT63-J amplifier; the full line of PT6-series accessories, including the PT6-HT ‘turnover’ panel, PT6-IM3 and PT6-IM4 microphone-level input mixers, PT6-M ten-inch reel adapter mechanism, PT6-EL continuous loop panel (really confused as to how on earth this thing works).  Also includes the Magnecord PT7-A, PT7-M, PT7-C series of recorders/amplifiers, which offered slightly improved audio specs relative to the PT-6 series.

Click the ‘Magnecord’ link in the right-hand ‘Categories’ column of the homepage to see much more Magnecord coverage on PS dot com.

 

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Uncategorized

British Broadcast Tape Recorder Circa 1935: The Marconi-Stille

The development of magnetic tape recording is generally credited to German scientists.  It is their Magnetophone that provided the inspiration for the Ampex recorder, which was the first truly high-fidelity tape machine.  From Wikipedia:

Early magnetic tape recorders were created by replacing the steel wire of a wire recorder with a thin steel tape. The first of these modified wire recorders was the Blattnerphone, created in 1929 or 1930 by the Ludwig Blattner Picture Corporation. The first practical tape recorder from AEG was the Magnetophon K1, demonstrated in Germany in 1935.

Although lesser-known,  the British Broadcast industry had a similar machine in use in that same decade.  The following account is given in the May 1954 issue of “Audio.”

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Magnecord

Magnecord, INC, company history from John Boyers, Founding Partner

D. Boyers, son of Magnecord, INC founding engineer John Boyers, has once again presented Preservation Sound with an incredible collection of rare documents from this seminal pro audio manufacturer.  (click here to read the previous installment)

Over the next few weeks I will work on getting all the material online.  To start things off, here’s a written history of the Magnecord organization as related by J. Boyers in 1980.  Boyers discussed the company’s early products leading up to the introduction of the PT-6 tape machine and the PT-63 binaural (aka Stereo) tape machine.  Fascinating to learn how much trial and error was involved in these pioneering efforts.  Enjoy –

Click the link below to READ ON….

Continue reading “Magnecord, INC, company history from John Boyers, Founding Partner”
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Pro Audio Archive

Audio Engineering Magazine Pt 6: audio equipment

The earliest advertisement for the Magnecorder tape machine that I have seen. BTW get ready for a large collection of original Magnecord, INC documents from one of the company founders: on this site: soon.

In the sixth and final installment of this survey of pro audio of the 1940s, as related through the pages of Audio Engineering magazine, we’ll look at some of the more interesting pieces of equipment on offer.

1948: Altec announces the 604 duplex loudspeaker. The 604 would become a staple in recording studios well into the 1970s.

…and Ampex announces the tape recorder that would change the world.  in 1948 it offered performance that would not be outdated until the 1980s.

The Arlington EA-2 ‘Audio Compensator,’ an early active EQ.  Well, maybe ‘active’ is the wrong word, but unlike other equalizers of the era, it functioned without insertion loss.  I would love to see the schematic for this unit if anyone has one to send over…

The Presto 41A limiter and 89A amplifier.  These units were intended for master-disc cutting.

RCA jacks, panels, stands, and racks of the late 1940s.

OK this scan really sucks but I was excited to find an ad for my beloved BA-2 preamp.  My advice: buy a UTC A25 on eBay and build a BA-2.  Simple and excellent.




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History Magnecord

Magnecord INC Historical Archival Material Part 1

From the personal collection of D. Boyers, son of Magnecord founding partner John Boyers, PreservationSound is excited to be able to offer several rare documents and historical reminiscences.  The Magnecord PT6 was one of the very first broadcast-quality tape recorders ever made – 1948 – and you can still find working (or repairable) examples.  If you have been following this site for a while, you will know how much I like these machines.  See this link and this link for some examples of recordings I have done recently with the PT6.

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PT6 Maintenance and Engineering manual:

DOWNLOAD: MagnecordPT6_MaintenanceNotes

The user-manual and schematics for the PT6 tape machine has been readily available on the internet; try this link if you need a copy.  The Maintenance Notes are harder to find.  Great information if you need to perform mechanical service on the unit.

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Four-page “Magnecord, INC” Company Newsletter, July 1952:

DOWNLOAD: MagnecordInc_July1952

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John Boyers was one of the founders of Magnecord.  He is now 95 years of age.   His son D. provides these notes regarding John’s career and contributions to recording history:

“I wouldn’t be too surprised to learn there are some (PT-6s) still in use, probably in some third-world broadcasting station somewhere. My first PT-6 was an engineering sample put together prior to the start of manufacturing. I still have it, and it still works, (although I make that claim having not tried to fire it up for 30 years!)
Dad is still with us, although he is the last survivor of the original group, at age 95… One of Dad’s favorite stories… is the time he couldn’t make payroll, but the man at the bank gave him the funds he  needed because of the trusting relationship he had built with the bank.

 

Dad’s interest was mostly engineering. He designed the heads, experimenting with various metals and ways to make the recording gap smaller and smaller. Back then, the
heads were built one at a time, by hand. One of the handiest features of the “6” was the
ability to do instant playback head alignment with that little 4/40 screw and spring
tensioner. …I don’t remember if that was a feature of the production machines or if it was just something  they built into the sample I have. Oh, here’s another story you might enjoy knowing about: Dad and one of the other guys in the shop had a brainstorm and decided to build a “binaural” (ed: Stereo) transport just for fun. They  got it working and took it down to the Illinois Central train station and made a recording of a steam locomotive going by.
I remember hearing the recording, with the locomotive coming in one channel and going out the other. The binaural recorder was the hit of the audio trade show in Chicago that year. According to Dad, the crowds around the little Magnecord booth were huge and the buzz of the show was all about the unbelievable train recording. I asked Dad why they didn’t get a patent on it and he says that it wasn’t patentable. It had been  done before, although not commercially, and it didn’t meet the “new and novel” requirement of patent law. I’ve often wondered if they weren’t just working with the wrong patent attorney.”

Thanks to D. for sharing this history.  We will leave you today with the remainder of a set of Magnecord-Factory photos circa 1950.

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Pro Audio Archive

The Fostex A-8 multitrack tape machine

Download the original 2-page product sheet for the Fostex A-8LR tape machine.

DOWNLOAD: FostexA8LR

Billed as being “about the size of twenty albums stacked together,” the A-8LR differed from the more common A-8 by virtue of 8-track simultaneous recording (as opposed to 4-track simultaneous on the A-8).  We had one of these machines in the house briefly when we were kids and it did not sound very good.  The A-8 records on 1/4″ reel tape.  It is certainly very small for an 8-track machine.

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Pro Audio Archive

The Fostex B16 tape machine

Download fourteen pages of early-80s publications regarding the Fostex B16 1/2″ sixteen-track tape recorder.

DOWNLOAD:FostexB16

You will find in the package: a complete pricelist; a lengthy ‘test report’ as published in ‘Modern Recording and Music’ Nov 1984; plus an original 6-panel full-color product sheet.

The B16 was the flagship product-offering from FOSTEX in the 1980s; it was available in 3 models.  The base model had a belt-driven system and was capable of 7.5 ips or 15ips operation.  The B16D was direct-drive and offered a number of additional ‘professional’ features, including 30ips operation.  The B16DM was a 3-head version, which I have never seen or heard of outside of the literature that I am offering here.

Anyone using one of these things?  impressions?

Follow this link for earlier PreservationSound dot com coverage of the FOSTEX B-16, featuring Christine McVie.

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Manufacturers Pro Audio Archive The 4-Track

What’s a Fostex?

Download the 4pp circa 1984 Fostex Full Line (condensed) catalog:

DOWNLOAD: Fostex1984

Fostex was the yin to Tascam’s yang in the home-recording 80s.  What does this mean?  What is the sound of 4 tracks of noise reduction with no recorded signal?  ANYway…  I always imagined Fostex equipment to be just a little bit flimsier and crappier than the similar Tascam products…  although in retrospect I think they were about equal.   The two pieces of ‘pro’ tascam/fostex gear that i owned back-to-back (balanced-input CDR recorders) both failed completely in 2 years each, so clean slate there.

Fostex 250 cassette 4-track machine

Is someone out there collecting examples of every 4-track machine from the 80s?  (the pre-ADAT era)?  Likely.  If you are that weirdo, blogging away about the relative merits of each, do drop a line.

I seem to have a massive amount of early-80s FOSTEX ephemera piled up here, so I guess this gonna be FOSTEX week at PS.  First stop: The B16 1/2″ 16-track machine.