All information in these pages is copyright (c) 1989-2003 by Roger Nichols.
All rights reserved. Permission for personal reference only, and may not
be reproduced by any method without written permission.
I Am My Own Big Bang
by Roger Nichols
I was down in my basement a couple of days ago when my wife Connie wandered
in to ask me something. I was transferring 1630 tapes to Sound Designer
II and then burning some CDs with Toast CD-DA. Anyway, as she approached,
I was looking for some piece of equipment that I had set down on my work
bench just six months ago, and I couldn't seem to find it. She said "This
room looks like an expanding Universe". I was stunned for a second,
like right after the initial TASER jolt when you approach some girl you
thought you knew in a poorly lit parking lot. I replied, "Yeah, I guess
I am my own Big Bang". I looked around and everything I owned seemed
to be multiplying and spawning some new piece of gear that it needed to
perform better.
A good example would be adding a Yamaha ProMix 01 to your studio. By itself,
it is a pretty awesome piece of gear, but the digital output is 48 kHz.
I want to mix to 44.1 kHz, so I have to get one of those Z Systems sample
rate converters. Snapshot automation is cool, but I have some guitar solos
and vocals that need continuous riding to sound their best, so I have to
get some type of MIDI sequencer to record and playback all of the moves.
I want the moves to be in time with the audio that I have recorded on my
ADAT, so I have to record SMPTE on one channel for synchronization. My sequencer
doesn't read SMPTE, so I have to get a SMPTE to MTC interface so that the
sequence runs in time with the music. I now discover that I really need
the eighth track that has been storing the SMPTE, so I have to either purchase
the BRC remote that handles time code without using an audio track, or I
could get one of the JL Cooper boxes that generates MTC and SMPTE from the
ADAT control track. Get the picture? You could start this type of scenario
starting with just about any piece of equipment.
I guess I ultimately owe all of this to Stan Freeberg, a comedian that was
famous in the 50s. He had an album titled The Child's Garden of Freeberg.
On this particular album was the saga of Herman Horn, Son of hi-fi. Herman
had turned his whole house into a giant speaker. His stereo cabinet rolled
around on Mink wheels. The turntable (remember them?) was packed in a mythical
material called iderup, which was twice as soft as iderdown. His kids had
to do without new shoes because he needed some new stereo gear. Well, Herman
Horn is who I wanted to be when I grew up, and I guess I am almost there.
The only part of the Big Bang theory that bothers me is that my Universe
is supposed to be expanding. The equipment is multiplying, all right, but
my house is still the same size it was when I moved in. Get Stephan Hawking
on the phone, something is wrong here.
Close, But No Cigar
Symetrix sent me their new 622 20 bit A/D converter for review. I got a
chance to play with it a little bit during the mixing of the Steely Dan
Live album, but I have been too busy to stop everything and concentrate
on their converter. I mentioned a little about it in an earlier column,
and I was impressed enough to want to hang on to it until I had a chance
to give it my undivided attention. Symetrix said I had it long enough and
wanted it back. Well, too bad, it probably would have gotten a swell review
based on my preliminary tweaking. I like to give gear a good test under
actual conditions in the studio. Using any piece of gear under fire is much
better than testing it on a bench. It's a shame that I didn't fit their
schedule.
Speaking Of Cigars
By the time you read this I will have been to Cuba and back to record the
Gloria Estefan concert. Gloria has here own engineer, Eric Schilling, who
will fix and mix, but because there was only going to be one show, and I
had just finished recording the Steely Dan stuff the same way they wanted
to record Gloria, they asked me to come along and help out. Thanks Eric,
I have wanted to go to Cuba for a long time, and being a Gloria fan makes
it even more fun that work.
In case you forgot, or didn't read that issue, the recording setup is pretty
simple. The front of house board for the show was a Yamaha PM-4000. I have
checked out the mic preamps with my Meyer SIM machine, and they are pretty
flat. (I listened to them, too). I connected the inputs of the Sony 48 track
digital machine to the direct outs on the PM-4000. Each mic module was switched
so that the direct signal came before the main fader. There would be no
level changes in the signal recorded on the 48 track. To monitor what was
being recorded on the 48 track, I connected the output of the 48 track to
three Yamaha ProMix 01s. The output of the three ProMix boards fed a Rane
stereo eight channel mixer and a Rane headphone amp. I used my in-ear monitors
to listen to what was being recorded. I hope Eric sends me a copy after
he mixes it.
Yamaha 02R
Yamaha's new addition to the digital console market will make it's debut
at the AES show in October. I got to see it at the Summer NAMM show in Nashville
in July. I am going to be putting together the demo tape for Yamaha to use
at the AES. That is the only way I could get them to let me play with the
first one in the U.S. Hey, it's a Gear Slut thing.
The 02R has all of the features that everybody wanted added to the ProMix
01; eight busses, digital in, more inputs, more EQ, more of everything.
It is also more money, but when you talk Bang for the Buck (there comes
that Big Bang thing again), Yamaha looks like they have another winner.
Copy Protection, Again?
Let's talk about SAFE SECTorS for a second. I would really like to CONDEMn
(pun intended) manufacturers who go too far in their copy protection schemes.
The MAC IICi has been the basic workhorse of the MIDI community for quite
a number of years. With software applications getting bigger and slower,
and with fewer and fewer MACs offering expansion slots, many IIci owners
have upgraded their systems by purchasing the Daystar Turbo 601 Power PC
accelerator card. This card essentially turns your IIci into a bolt of greased
lightning. Everything that runs on the Power PCs runs on the Turbo 601 board...
except Digidesign's new software.
With the shipping of Pro Tools 3.1, Digidesign has changed their method
of copy protection. Pro Tools 3.0 ran fine. Pro Tools 3.1 crashes with "AUTHORIZATION
ERROR", and in the process eats the 3.1 install and your old 3.0 install.
Masterlist CD uses the same copy protection scheme with the same results.
When I called Digidesign, they said "you are the first person who has
had this problem, it must be the Turbo 601 board". That is as far as
I got. A friend of mine in Miami had the same problem. When he called Digidesign,
they told him the same thing, "you are the first person who has had
that problem, it must be the Turbo 601 board". I guess they forgot
about my calls.
Anyway, it is not the Turbo 601 board. I had a time bombed review version
of Masterlist CD that worked just fine. I liked it so much I bought a copy
of Masterlist CD and MEZZO MASTER for making DDP (Exabyte digital audio
masters) tapes. The copy I bought was copy protected with the new scheme
and crashed with the ugly results. I had to buy a copy of Toast CD-DA to
get my work done.
I see the manufacturer's side of the story, software gets copied for someone
else to use. Well it seems that with Digidesign software you aren't going
to have many people running the software without having purchased the hardware.
There has to be a better way.
Right now I have 3476 applications on my hard disk that require "installs"
in order to run. Because I always have some new whiz bang software running
that may "eat" my hard disk, I stand the chance of losing all
of my installs and having to scramble for the original disks. Oh yes, I
almost forgot! I own more than one copy of Sound Designer II. I brought
a set of master disks with me to New York in case something happened. I
had to replace my hard disk, so I proceeded to un-install Sound Designer
II. The un-install program complained "this is not the master disk
that installed to this hard disk, so your software cannot be un-installed.
What the hell was that? I was away from home, I had my master disks, I had
a legal copy and Digidesign wouldn't let me un-install to a different master
disk. What difference does it make. I went out and bought Logic Audio to
finish the project.
Logic Audio uses a "dongle" for copy protection. A dongle is a
device that connects to the keyboard port and incorporates a hardware serial
number. Before the software will run, it looks to see if the dongle is plugged
in. I think that this is a much better method of copy protection because
there are no "installs" that must be placed on the hard disk and
risk the chance of damage. The bad part about dongles is that you could
end up with 37 dongles hanging from your keyboard. I have an Idea.
After you buy your first dongle protected software you would know the dongle
serial number. When you buy the subsequent pieces of software you would
call the vendor and tell them your dongle serial number. You would then
enter a code that would let your new software work in the presence of your
dongle. You could then have copies of your software at work, at home, in
your car and at your Mother-in Law's, but the only one that would work would
be the one with the dongle plugged in.
I am so serious about this that I would be willing to pay extra for "dongle
privileges" over the current install type of system. It would save
me a lot of money in the long run.
War Birds
I have always wanted to be a private detective. Finding the lost guitar
solo or missing DAT tape just doesn't quite get it. It turns out that Donald
Fagen's wife Libby is missing 14 World War II fighter planes and tons of
spare parts. Right up my alley. Her father, who passed away in 1993, was
Ed Jurist, a famous importer of Hawker Sea Furys. Before his death it seems
that many of the planes and parts got scattered around the U.S. and sold
without Ed knowing about it. I have been flying around looking and have
found three of them so far. I get to play with computers searching the FAA
files for aircraft registrations, I get to use my new GPS for navigating,
I get to use my Bose ANR headsets while flying, and I get to play Jim Rockford.
What a way to spend your days off. If you see any Sea Furys with N numbers
ending in SF, like N35SF or N62SF, send me a note. There is a reward and
I will take you for a ride in one.
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