Hess Hodge writes:
quoted 3 lines DAT tape (the same way information is recorded on a CD). The DAT sounds> DAT tape (the same way information is recorded on a CD). The DAT sounds
> better because there is a lot of error-correcting going on in the digital
> to analogue conversion.
that is a pretty gross oversimplification. there's lots more than
"error correction"... in fact, most of the time error correction
doesn't even come into play at all (you can verify that by using a pro
DAT which shows you error counts).
wow and flutter - cassettes are mechanically pretty unstable. shake
your walkman around (while it's playing) and see what happens. dats
are threaded like tapes in your VCR and are much more immune to wow &
flutter.
noise - if the only difference between dat and cassette was the
analog/digital thing, you'd be in good shape (after all, mulitrack
work for years was done on big analog tapes and that sounded great -
even today many people still prefer it to digital). unfortunately
there are a combination of factors that make cassette really crappy.
the thin width of the tape track and the slow speed of the tape drive
are the two biggies.
i'm not even sure where hiss comes from, but all that dolby noise
reduction crap that just really makes things worse is supposed to
cancel it out when in reality it just winds up lopping off your high
end. digital is amazingly linear in response all the way from the
bottom of its range to the top. if you hear hiss, that's because you
put it there when you recorded the tape.
there are a lot of reasons why DAT sounds good... "digital" is just
one part. the bottom line with today's technology is that it is
easier to build a really good sounding sound chain with digital
technology at low prices. yes, you can do better than CD and DAT but
you gotta spend tons of $$$ to do it.
--
Jon Drukman jsd@gamespot.com SpotMedia Communications
...I was an infinitely hot and dense dot...