Why does ATAE remanufacture classic Studer A80 and A820 analog recorders into expensive new machines that don't record?

We build our reproducers for those cases where using a recorder for tape playback would be undesirable. Imagine that you have an important heritage master tape. Many older tapes have undergone chemical degradation that has rendered them fragile and highly vulnerable to damage. Using a recorder to play back something that’s priceless and irreplaceable would be reckless and irresponsible. For this critical work you’ll want to use a precision reproducer.

Or, perhaps you simply insist on only the highest quality tape playback. A recorder cannot deliver this. You’ll need a dedicated reproducer.

When did ATAE begin making precision reproducers?

Development work started in 1987 after observing under microscopy the playback-inflicted damage to tapes afflicted with sticky shed syndrome, a binder chemistry breakdown seen on many PET-based tapes of the time. Older, cellulose acetate-based tapes had their own set of issues and were sometimes literally crumbling away during playback. It seemed obvious that specialized hardware was needed to safely play these tapes going forward, especially the higher-value ones.

What does your specialized hardware do?

Principally, it greatly reduces the frictional stresses on tapes that result from being pulled through the transport path and headblock. Those stresses can easily cause permanent tape damage, or even a tape’s destruction. (This damage can also occur with playback on popular "pre-view" machines used in today's “AAA” vinyl disk mastering.)

A tape played on our precision guidance transports is subjected to less than one-half of the tension it would see on any other machine (often far less). There’s no forced-guidance, stationary guides or pin lifters found anywhere on the A80 or A820 machines of course, yet significant additional benefits result from our SHRO headblock and transport modifications.

Further driving our efforts has been the fact that using a recorder for playback won’t let you hear a recording in its highest fidelity. ATAE SHRO reproducers have remarkably low scrape flutter. Only purpose-built playback platforms like these can deliver the lowest broad band time-base distortion, which in turn affords the highest fidelity playback. It’s clearly audible.

Why use an ATAE precision reproducer?

1. To prevent damage to irreplaceable master tapes

2. To reveal how good a tape recording actually sounds

If you work with high-value tapes and are interested in the science behind our state-of-the-art reproducers, get in touch and ask for our list of technical briefs.

Learn about the effort to preserve heritage master tapes at: recordedmusicpreservation.org