WORK ON TAPE RECORDERS

New Zealand Listener, Volume 28, Issue 715, 27 March 1953, Page 18

WORK ON TAPE RECORDERS

DOCUMENT composed by the Boffins — otherwise Backroom Boys-of_ broadcasting recently came under The Listener’s notice. It was not marked Top Secret, but at first glance it might as well have been. Headed ‘"Adjustment for Standardised Response Characteristic," it began: by asserting: "It is well known that recording with constant current in the record head and replaying with an ‘ideal’ reproducing head results in an overall frequency response curve that rises with increasing frequency at the rate of 6db per octave over a major part of the audio frequency range... " Diffidently, The Listener asked one of the Head Office engineers to translate. The AFSRC, it seemed, was quite straightforward. It simply ‘meant that the NZBS was, by international agreement, standardising its tape recorders. Hitherto, makers of tape recorders had built to no set standard. The result was that a recording made on one machine was frequently unsatisfactory when played back on another. This had impeded the exchange of tapes between one'country and another, and often between different stations within the one

country. To remedy this, the International Radio Consultative Committee (CCIR) in 1951 proposed standardisation. New Zealand, in common with other Commonwealth countries -and the U.S., agreed. Methods of adapting each make of recorder in service with the NZBS were worked out at Head Office Engineering Section, Wellington, and detailed instructions (AFSRC) were sent to the various stations, By the end of March the job of adapting the Service’s 28 tape recorders will be complete, and New Zealand will have fulfilled its obligations in one of the lesser known fields of international co-operation. To the listener, the change will not be very noticeable. Tape recorders have been in use for several vears; in fact more than 50 per cent. of NZBS recording is done on tape. But the occasional unsatisfactory performance of a tape will be eliminated. And, as tapes more and more supplant disc recordings, the general level of sound fidelity in ' ‘broad: casting will be improved: Standardisation also means economy. Tapes are more portable, and less easily damaged than discs; they can be mailed for a fraction of the cost and their playing life is almost indefinite, whereas a cut (as distinct. from a pressed) disc lasts for only six or seven playings. In addition the change over of the recorders has involved changing the recording speed from 30in. per second to 15, which means that double the quantity of programme can be recorded on the. same amount of tape.