Onkyo Tape Deck, TA-RW99, 1987

GOAL: capture tape saturation EQUIPMENT: Onkyo TA-RW99 tape deck METHOD: record T3K-sweep-v3.wav onto stereo tape, with one track pushed loud to saturation, and the other track kept just soft enough to stay mainly in linear range to serve as reference. In practice, this meant setting the relative channel input levels, and then increasing the input signal to both until the reference channel was just barely hitting peaks in the red. Then played back the recorded tape, and captured in Audacity. Normalized both tracks in audacity to peak of -1 db. Note that both pre-amp and tape saturation are captured with this method and cannot be resolved. DETAILS: --> reference channel input level set from 01 to 03 --> saturated channel input level set from 08 to 10 The method to get signal to the tape deck influenced noise but also maximal loudness. Noisiest / loudest: USB audio interface --> 1/4" jack/cable --> 1/4" jack on the tape deck. Lower noise / but maximal loudness limited: USB audio interface --> RCA output --> RCA input on back of tape player. For very high gain track, optionally used noise gate in Audacity. Threshold -18dB, cut 30 dB sound, 5 ms attack, 15 msec hold, 15 msec decay. But resulting nam is not very useful. NAMs listed in order of milder to stronger saturation.