Topic: Vobbly tapes during transfer: cassette --> harddrive

[Jonas Karlsson]

Hey everybody!

Thought I give a last try to transfer my old cassette-recordings (1992-1998, SONY WMD3) to my harddrive, but the tapes are either worn out or the tapedeck is.

At the beginning (first 5-10 minutes) of almost every 90 min. cassette I get a "vobbly" sound, where it goes like a rollercoaster - up and down with the treble and so on.

Anything one can do about it? I've included a sample from one of the worst sounding tapes.

Every piece of advice is welcome! I really need to save these in good shape! Don't care about hiss and so on, this is what disturbes me...

/Jonas Karlsson, Sweden

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=6ETNUKL4

[Jonas Karlsson]

Found this answer to a similar question on the web: "when our tapes used to play wrong. my dad used to wind them up because sometimes they had got loose. try it, it used to work for us. not on rewind do it with the two white circle bits on the tape." What do you think? Could it help? I could rewind all of my master cassettes with this tecnique a couple of times before it stopped. Perhaps I should try with this, if nobody else has another tip?

/Jonas

[beatkilla]

Try adjusting the azimuth.May have spelled it wrong. Try another tape deck and adjust the azimuth.

[Jonas Karlsson]

Thanks for the tip beatkilla!

Although, I've been told that the azimuth adjustment will help if the tapes sound low on the high end, but it won't help the vobbly beginnings... I don't own a cassette-deck at the moment but will get a used one soon for the transfer.

I hope the "winding-up" will do the trick, unless someone has more tips n' tricks? 

/Jonas

[nl]

Check the belts on your cassette deck. That could cause speed issues.

[Jonas Karlsson]

The belts? Not really sure what that is 

[kirk97132]

Long story short odds are that your playback deck needs servicing to correct the issue you are having

[flipp]

Could be the tape stock itself has stretched. I have a bunch of Denon D8 cassettes (I think that's the "model" designation) that all have a nasty sound for the first 2-3 minutes because the tape stock has stretched. Pulling a small loop out of the case shows the stock is narrower and has a slight "ripple" to the surface that isn't found in the middle of the spool, only at each end. Maxell, TDK and Fuji do not exhibit this characteristic and since all were recorded and played back on the same equipment I'm sure it is bad stock and not the decks.

[runonce]

Both the Sony D3 and D6 were notorious for not tracking properly at the beginning of tapes.

You may have to resort to some sort of auto-azimuth deck...

[Jonas Karlsson]

Both the Sony D3 and D6 were notorious for not tracking properly at the beginning of tapes.

You may have to resort to some sort of auto-azimuth deck...

Ok, this was news to me. I found an old Walkman now and played one tape that was really bad and wobbly and voila' - it does sound better, but not perfect.

Do you have any suggestions for the "auto-azimuth deck"? Google'd it and found nothing other than expensive Nakamichi models...

/Jonas

[Frequincy]

I think the Nakamichi Dragon is the only auto-azimuth deck Nakamichi built. I have a prestine one. I don't know if other manufacturers built decks with that feature or not? It might just be bad tape stock as stated up above and not even the greatest deck can help with that.

[Jonas Karlsson]

Seems like the NAD 6325 also has some settings for azimuth... they call it play trim. Also it got 3 heads and I can get one really cheap... should I go for it? Not used very much the owner says.

/Jonas

[runonce]

Seems like the NAD 6325 also has some settings for azimuth... they call it play trim. Also it got 3 heads and I can get one really cheap... should I go for it? Not used very much the owner says.

/Jonas

The wobblyness likely happened during recording - its recorded onto the tape.

You need a deck that can follow that wobbly track...so you will truly need a deck with auto-azimuth.

A Manual azimuth deck wont help...

have you played these on another deck to see if they have the same wobbly effect?

[Jonas Karlsson]

The wobbly effekt was actually reduced a lot when I winded the tapes up with a pencil. It sounds much better, even on a crappy Walkman.

Will be getting a tapedeck soon, probably the NAD 6325, to see what it can produce.

I can't afford the Nakamichi Dragon or whatever (they cost up to $1000!!). Will be looking into any chance of renting one of of those though, to see if I spot any difference!

/Jonas

[kirk97132]

Without hearing the tape it is hard to tell exactly what is wrong.  What it seems you are describing is an effect from the tape speed not being constant.  A condition that can be caused by various things but the common culprits are belts, the belt drive wheels and the pinch roller.  Basicly all the parts that have rubber on them.  The fact that a tape  sound "clears" up once you have played it some is due to the lessening of the weight of the tape that the machine has to pull.  You might try a few FF & rewinds also to unpack the tape and get it aligned on the spools. A misaligned tape on a spool creates extra drag that can affect playback.  Since you say the tape sounds better on a different deck AND better once you rewound it it does appear that your home deck is probably the cause.  But Azimuth is only the alignment of a head.  That alignment can vastly improve a tapes sound during playback but in most cases it is a setting that can be made and then left alone.  The misalignment problem described on the D5 & D6 is one that they did not match up with other decks. Not so much that they changed during playback.  After having gone through a few D6's I speak from experience.   A condition like that where the Azimuth is way out you can hear the other track playing backwards, but that is an extreme case.  The Nak Dragon does the adjustment automatically, but it can be done on most higher end decks by hand.  I'd see if you can't just borrow a friends deck first and see if the problem goes away.   This problem is also more prevalent on 100 min tapes and even more so on 110 minute tapes.  They were made of a thinner Mylar and are known to stretch easily, like the tape width problem described earlier.  There is also a possibility that the tape has this effect recorded on it and there is no way to fix that other than load it up in a DAW and adjust pitch for each little section.  If ti is a speed problem that happened during recording then it is a tough one to try and fix, but since it seems to disappear on other decks it might not be.