Cassette tape restoration workflow

[Drew]

Hello all;

It's been awhile since I have posted here and need some advice. I have a client who has 8-9 tapes that he wants converted to CD's. I have not done any tape restoration in years and was looking for workflow ideas to start with.

What the client has are recordings of his grandfather telling stories and general ramblings about his childhood done on what sounds like a portable, handheld recorder.

His voice is rather thin and boxy sounding and a quick listen to one of the tapes shows a couple dropouts on one or both channels here and there, and a general lack of intelligibility of his voice at times. Other than that, the tapes seem to be in good condition.

Any advice or ideas would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

-Drew

[Marc Hildebrant]

Drew,

As a first step, I would check to see if any "Dolby" EQ was used. For cassette tapes, a "B" or "C" type was sometimes used and with playback you should apply the correct EQ or the sound will be off.

Marc

[Dan McDonald]

after transfer, I'd check to see if the dropouts were in one channel only. If they were, just use the 'good' channel as a mono source.

If the dropouts are in both channels, there will me more work to do.

In general, I do quite a few cassettes and do the following:
clean the tape machine
Transfer the tape
check for proper speed (60 Hz signals) and fix it if it needs it
Equalization as needed. Usually some restoration of lost signals with harmonics, etc.
Noise reduction.
Chop into tracks.

I have some of my great uncle recorded in the 1950s on an open reel and they sound similar to yours. I didn't do much with them in terms of 'improving' the sound because I tended to make it worse instead of better. I ended up with just eq to add some highs, then some noise reduction.

[Drew]

Thanks, guys.

Marc; I don't think "Dubbly" was used on these recordings. They were recorded in the early '80's, it sounds like.

Dan; Yeah, I am getting the same feeling on these. I'm thinking along the same lines as just some EQ to make the voice more natural sounding and general CNF noise reduction.

-Drew