Topic: Bad Dats

[Professor chaos]

I taped the Black Crowes last night and during the second set everything seemed ok, but when I got home there was now music on the set two tape. I've had this happen before. Is this possible that this was a bad dat tape?

[Brian Skalinder]

Sounds like a classic DAT recorder misload.  What DAT recorder are you using?

[Professor chaos]

pcm m1

[Brian Skalinder]

Yeah, it happens sometimes in M1s, too.  If you had a D8, there's a start-up workflow that will tell you whether the tape has loaded properly or misloaded, but I know of no such startup workflow for the M1.  Only 100% sure-fire solution of which I'm aware:

• load the tape
• record a brief snippet
• play it back to make sure it recorded
• don't let the deck unload or "sleep" before you start recording ("sleep" mode unloads the tape)

If your tapes are misloading more than only very rarely, you might consider [1] a different brand of tape, [2] a DAT deck check-up / repair from Pro Digital, Inc.

[Professor chaos]

it has only happened to me twice in the six years that i've had the deck. thanks for the help. T+

[jpschust]

the m1 from what ive found can be somewhat finicky about tapes.  if you use the sony audio grade tapes, little more pricey, you will rarely have problems like this.  as a matter of fact ive never seen them with the sony audio grade tapes.