Old skool turntables (pre Technics etc) split from OTT thread

[kaza]

@General Lighting 515350 wrote:

it was that particular turntable I was referring to which was definitely made in Swindon, although EQ was only standardised by the RIAA in the 1950s – until then each country or label (including the BBC) had its own standards.

Anyone below 35 might be too young to remember Garrard but they were still commonly used in pro-audio especially radio broadcasting, and the sort of “industrial grade” record players used in schools.

Garrard in Swindon | History of | SwindonWeb
Garrard, Swindon – a set on Flickr

I remember Thorens and from what I recall they were pretty much the standard in high end turntables… not British or American but Swiss.

Although i believe it’s us Brits who had the patent for stereo record (thanks EMI) among many other things, so not meaning to take away from our achievements (even if the first stereo system was French, as was the first system for recording audio.)

Not sure whether to apologize for continuing off-topic or if it’s possible the best direction for this thread….

[General Lighting]

I’ve split this into the Audio Visual section.

With radio studios in the UK there was a “Buy British” policy for both the BBC and IBA/ILR which persisted into the 1980s, but Garrard had folded by then as its then owners Plessey hadn’t invested in the company and had diverted its best staff to other defence/aerospace projects.

The British have actually made many achievements in AV technology but not taken them forward as it was seen as frivolous (I noticed this attitude myself even as late as the 1990s when I was briefly at University).

[kaza]

@General Lighting 515356 wrote:

I
The British have actually made many achievements in AV technology but not taken them forward as it was seen as frivolous (I noticed this attitude myself even as late as the 1990s when I was briefly at University).

Not sure how much I can agree with that, the taking them forward part that is, especially with the prevalence of the PAL system worldwide. Purely audio it is less, but still a fair amount of involvement with both early and current digital audio.

[General Lighting]

@kaza 515359 wrote:

Not sure how much I can agree with that, the taking them forward part that is, especially with the prevalence of the PAL system worldwide. Purely audio it is less, but still a fair amount of involvement with both early and current digital audio.

The Germans invented PAL, but worked closely with the BBC. Getting PAL television sets affordable across Europe was a joint effort of companies in NL / DE / DK / UK, with Phillips(NL) and Pye(UK) working together, as well as the EBU coordinating the efforts of the broadcasters. The famous PM5544 testcard was developed in DK rather than NL though (I didn’t realise this until recently!)

Lots of old boys here hoard and restore vintage TV sets as they were made in South London, Essex and Lowestoft.

PAL was developed by Walter Bruch at Telefunken in Germany. The format was unveiled in 1963, with the first broadcasts beginning in the United Kingdom and West Germany in 1967[1]—the one BBC channel initially using the broadcast standard was BBC2 which had been the first UK TV service to introduce “625-lines” in 1964. Telefunken PALcolor 708T was the first PAL commercial TV set. It was followed by Loewe S 920 & F 900.

PAL – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[kaza]

Yeah the Germans had a lot to do with PAL but the fact the UK broadcast using it a whole 4 years before they did must say something!

SECAM on the other hand is possibly even more flawed than NTSC but for different reasons. IE editing composite SECAM is not really possible and composite vision mixers in France (and other SECAM countries) actually run in PAL. Although obviously most professional systems would use component anyway.

[General Lighting]

about 4 weeks rather than 4 years,

UK – 1967-07-01 Wimbledon Tennis Championships

DE – 1967-07-25 special broadcast

[yt]B3Ci9MjybjA[/yt]

I did look for a youtube of the Tennis broadcast but could not find one…

Got a scan of a entire engineers notebook bookmarked somewhere from a then young German chap who was working with BBC Radio when they were exchanging audio content in 1977 using the EBU circuits for a classical music concert (all analogue in those days) and a Siemens/Halske “circuit ideas from 1971/1972 databook” (I was born in 1972) when colour telly was a new thing – its amazing how much even in my lifetime technology has progressed.

I used to work for a company making broadcast signal processing and distribution kit, and for the reasons you mention many European facilities in SECAM countries were also early adopters of component video but there was transcoding enroute to the TX site, often overseen by the telecoms companies who owned the TX sites. Especially in France any amount of this kit would go spectacularly wrong, and I got used to grown men ringing me up and actually bursting into tears when this happened, and I’d have to try and reassure them in my best French…

[kaza]

At least we’ve got DVB-T now…

[General Lighting]

I’m sure I’m not the only one who has been reading about “white space devices” on the vacated UHF TV channels and been wondering if its possible to hack the firmware and make the kit put out a DVB-T signal 😉

[kaza]

I’ve forgotten what the proposed plan for the freed-up space is (although freed up isn’t quite technically correct, the difference with interference of the digital signals means these spaces can be used a lot more than they could with the analogue signals there. Wasn’t there also a band/number of channels that were being retired countrywide and reissued as well? Should really pay more attention but find it hard to care so much these days…

[General Lighting]

I have to still remember things like this even for my paid work (often you get these activities coordinators at the homes for the elderly who sing old cockney knees up songs and use wireless mics, but there is also a DVB-T coax network throughout the building for TV sets in residents’ rooms), and if any of this kit plays up folk tend to ask me if I can do anything to sort it out (I look after all the IT, telecoms and other kit found in these healthcare facilities)

the reallocations are EU-wide and this link contains the main documents for much of North Europe…

http://www.partyvibe.com/forums/sound-engineering/54299-eu-mcs-vocalists-aware-frequency.html

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