DAT&MD to PC/Mac via SPDIF - transfer subcode?

[Solstace]

Hi everyone

 

Random question in case anyone here has ever had to do a similar thing...

 

I've just "inherited" a whole bunch of MD and DAT which needs transferring to PC for archiving to hard drive and possibly other computer storage formats. Many of the tapes are effectively CD masters with timings etc exactly as intended for the final CD, but they didn't always make the CD.

 

Being a bit naive, but what I'd love is to be able to connect either deck to a PC/Mac over SPDIF, hit "play" and get audio, timecode and start/stop/title information. Ideally I'd like to have the capture software either put markers into the WAV's, or split the WAV's automatically into separate files titled per the ID info.

 

I'd really rather not have to go to another carrier first, though with some logistics I might be able to stomach using a TASCAM USB/CF/SD recorder (SS-R100?) via SPDIF and transfer the files off the card when I'm done, if that works.

 

Thoughts from anyone who's been there before? (Apart from "don't do it!" that is!)

[chelgrian]

Being a bit naive, but what I'd love is to be able to connect either deck to a PC/Mac over SPDIF, hit "play" and get audio, timecode and start/stop/title information. Ideally I'd like to have the capture software either put markers into the WAV's, or split the WAV's automatically into separate files titled per the ID info.

 

For DAT what you'd need is 'TrackMarker' support. However it's a rather obsolete feature for an interface or recording interface to have.

 

RME certainly used to be able to do it

 

http://www.rme-audio.de/en_support_techinfo.php?page=content/support/en_support_techinfo_tms

 

But references some very obsolete versions of Samplitude and Wavelab as the only support software, if the current versions of RME's interfaces and these bits of software can do it is anyone's guess.

 

In terms of MD in order to get the text the only real option is tracking down a NetMD player then playing it out of that and recording it via the analogue 'hole'. Using software such as

 

http://winnmd.net/

 

Which controls the netmd player and plays it back and records it.

 

Unless you really have a large quantity of this kind of stuff or the contents is especially valuable it's probably not going to be worth your while tracking down the relevant hardware and software to make this stuff work.

[revbobuk]

If you have one to hand, the HiMD devices are a little more 'open' than the NetMD, which frankly don't help much when it comes to transfer. HiMD - some of them, at least - do have the potential to do diigtal transfer. There are some commercial outfits offering transfer, but they are expensive. Blame Sony - ATRAC and paranoia together caused MD to be doomed from the start, which it shouldn't have been.

[Solstace]

Arg - I'd feared from my own research this would be the furthest I'd likely get. I did see the references to RME stuff, but nothing more modern.

 

Guess I'll just do each tape in a single stretch and use the inlay-card info (Where we have any) to split out the tracks manually. Meh. Good news is, at least with SPDIF we can still easily get our hands on the raw audio data, and even the tapes back from 1992 (earliest DAT's in the archive) still played well.

 

I'm just hoping we don't need to get too involved with the U-Matic PCM-1610 and PCM-1630 masters ; I suspect the analogue reels will *muuuuch* be easier to deal with than those.

 

Thanks all!

[jamesperrett]

Being a bit naive, but what I'd love is to be able to connect either deck to a PC/Mac over SPDIF, hit "play" and get audio, timecode and start/stop/title information. Ideally I'd like to have the capture software either put markers into the WAV's, or split the WAV's automatically into separate files titled per the ID info.

 

 

The Zefiro ZA-2 card could do this with its Recdat program. This was one of the first digital audio cards for the PC and it could create .cue files for CD burning. The only problem is that it is an ISA card and the software only works under DOS. I keep meaning to resurrect my old Windows98 system with the Zefiro card and Turtle Beach Multisound so that I can transfer all my old DAT's without messing around placing start markers. However, CDWave makes it so easy to place markers that the time saving would be marginal.