Can we finally put Reel to Reel out of its misery? Put it to rest people.

Welcome Roberto, welcome Torino,

This is to be able to "read" the numerous tapes still present in their archives, digitize them in order to have a security back up.

They waited until 2019?

The reel recorder is not "dead" or even in agony.

Nothing wrong with enjoying R2R, but "digitize them in order to have a security back up" actually implies an agony.

glupson

Nothing wrong with enjoying R2R, but "digitize them in order to have a security back up" actually implies an agony.

It's not having backups of important content that's agonizing. Creating quality backups is just good practice.

That Analogplanet surely looks like the place to send your R2R to. Those guys seem to be serious. Impressive, at least to an amateur.

cleeds,

I agree, but do notice that tapes were not backed up to another tape but to entirely different (even allegedly inferior) format. That is saying something.

Maybe 10 years ago, a few more or less, I asked a person at the radio station to copy a reel of tape with some of the music my friends made in high school (pure nostalgia, nothing spectacular). Basically, to transfer the only existing record of that into some other format.

"Great, you came at the last moment. If you came five years from now, I probably could not do it. We have transferred all that we have into digital just in case and tape machines have been dying in the process. We have only one that is good now."

Sure, he could have them fixed, but it seems that they had, more or less, abandoned the format. By the way, it is a well-funded and quite serious radio station. Not a garage project.

glupson

... notice that tapes were not backed up to another tape but to entirely different (even allegedly inferior) format. That is saying something

Backing up the tapes to digital makes perfect sense, because dubbing them onto another reel will only add noise.

Maybe 10 years ago ... I asked a person at the radio station to copy a reel of tape ... "Great, you came at the last moment. If you came five years from now, I probably could not do it. We have transferred all that we have into digital ... "

...  it seems that they had, more or less, abandoned the format. By the way, it is a well-funded and quite serious radio station.

In the US, broadcasting is a business, even for non-commercial stations. Analog tape is an inefficient, expensive, cumbersome format for radio, so of course most stations abandoned reel-to-reel. The industry has also mostly abandoned cart machines (remember them?) and analog tape for phone delay.