Mallette Posted September 4, 2011 Share Posted September 4, 2011 The "Source makes a huge difference" thread touching on "touchless turntables" got me to thinking. There are "x" ways to read an LP without touching it, and even a dummy like me would consider a miniature surface scan radar, IR, very high res monochromatic video and the already demonstrated over 2 decades ago laser methods for reading the surface features of an LP. There are probably many more today. I recall posting one time my belief that someday LPs might be "played" by being read all at once by a very high res scanner. So, rather than my mindless meanderings, I'd ask Mike, or any others with science or engineering backgrounds to give some thought to available technology that might be used to produce an affordable and accurate "touchless" LP player. I'm thinking it hasn't happened mainly because the right person hasn't yet noodled on it. I'm thinking the solution could be either analog or digital, or both. Certainly any such solution could easily integrate impulse noise recognition and fix technology. Just some food for thought... Dave Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JJkizak Posted September 4, 2011 Share Posted September 4, 2011 I recall they had a laser player (into the groove) going for a while but it also picked up all the minute surfaces of the record which were not music. JJK Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oscarsear Posted September 4, 2011 Share Posted September 4, 2011 Curious that a digital read would in any manner be acceptable. Are not other digital reads comparable? Readily you solicit massaging away any noteworthy and subjective artifact so whatever result would not be original. Why not take the proposal a few steps further and look for a better recording medium as well as a reproduction method? Is this an exercise in archaic analog engineering or a panacea project intending to reproduce more accurate music? Records are nice, but to what ultimate end can they be milked? The ***** in their armor just starts with abrasion and they exist in a wide spectrum of qualities. If you are gonna invest the effort why flail the vinyl analog horse? I'd say start anew with an attempt to reinvent the audio wheel, so to speak. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mallette Posted September 4, 2011 Author Share Posted September 4, 2011 Laser player is 2 decades old and no further development after the CD. Curious that a digital read would in any manner be acceptable. Nothing I suggested would include that, nor do I know how it could be done. You have to read it analog via one of the methods I suggested or some other way before digitizing, which you might or might not do depending on various factors. Dave Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Malcolm Posted September 4, 2011 Share Posted September 4, 2011 ...technology that might be used to produce an affordable..."touchless" LP player. There is none because the demand is so limited the price would have to be high for it to be worthwhile for a manufacturer. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dennie Posted September 4, 2011 Share Posted September 4, 2011 Hey Dave, Off topic, sorry! I saw this and thought of you.... Didn't you have something similar? Anyway, back to your regularly scheduled program.... Dennie Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mallette Posted September 4, 2011 Author Share Posted September 4, 2011 There is none because the demand is so limited the price would have to be high for it to be worthwhile for a manufacturer. Remains to be proven. My take is nobody has addressed the idea lately. Hence this thread. Dave Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mallette Posted September 4, 2011 Author Share Posted September 4, 2011 Didn't you have something similar? Indeed. Still do. Waiting on the person restoring a vehicle of the proper vintage where it would be a jewel. Dave Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marvel Posted September 4, 2011 Share Posted September 4, 2011 Dave, I still think the idea has merit. Lots of reasons to have one. There are plenty of LPs that it would be nice to play without causing more wear on the vinyl. Bruce Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DrWho Posted September 4, 2011 Share Posted September 4, 2011 I recall they had a laser player (into the groove) going for a while but it also picked up all the minute surfaces of the record which were not music. JJK I would think the non-music information would be rather easy to filter out in a dsp? Do you know when these came out? They may not have had powerful enough cjheap chipsets back then to make it worthwhile? Btw, isn't the LP recording a 3-D encoding? Or is it just lateral encoding? I honestly don't know enough about it to engineer a direct solution. I've always considered LP's to be inferior to reel to reel... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WMcD Posted September 4, 2011 Share Posted September 4, 2011 Yes, it is a 3-D issue. IIRC. In Microgroove stereo there is a v-shaped groove. The left wall moves up and down toward 45 degrees and the right wall moves up and down to -45 degrees, from vertical. Then the pick-up sensors (typically magnetic dymanic) are at the same 45 degree angles or 90 degrees from each other. Very clever way to get two channels out of a single groove. IIRC, bass was mixed mono pretty much. Note that any mono would result in the goove becoming more and less shallow and thus you have up and down vertical modulation which could force the stylus out of the groove. The clever solution was to run the cutting lathe so that left and right were in reverse polarity (one to the other). Therefore strong mono results in the groove moving laterally. Of couse this out of polarity was reversed again in the wiring of the pick-up. Of couse all the above results in an average from a nominal center position of the cutter, groove, and stylus.. = = = = I can see that modern technology could be used to scan the entire surface of the disc to make a 3-D map. Then number crunch 'til you have a map of the the walls of the spiral track. I can't see anyone making the investment in a contact-less laser stylus. = = = Earlier this weekend I worked with a USB turntable to digitize some old records. Surface noise, scratches, and skipping reminded me of my early days. I know my brothers here love vinyl. I'll stick with digital. WMcD Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mallette Posted September 4, 2011 Author Share Posted September 4, 2011 Mike, I am not an engineer. Westrex encoding, the stereo used for decades in LP's, is 45/45 degrees in the groove walls with sum and difference between the walls used to provide about 35 db separation between channels. It's just a picture and should be readily decodable by a number of modern processes. Dave Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
russ69 Posted September 5, 2011 Share Posted September 5, 2011 http://www.elpj.com/ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DrWho Posted September 5, 2011 Share Posted September 5, 2011 http://www.elpj.com/ http://www.elpj.com/purchase/availability.htmlhttp://www.elpj.com/purchase/index.html 110 units per year at $15k each plus 70 at $10k each is some major dough....$2.5million of business? That's crazy. They'd be doing something wrong if it cost more than $1k to build each unit. Maybe it is a lucrative market? I wouldn't mind making $2million a year for a few weeks of work each year [] Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JJkizak Posted September 5, 2011 Share Posted September 5, 2011 The Laser Player I was speaking of was shooting a laser beam into the record groove. I also am very vague on wether it was available for sale or experimental. JJK Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mallette Posted September 5, 2011 Author Share Posted September 5, 2011 I mentioned the elp. 20 year old technology that has changed very little since it was concieved towards the end of the vinyl era. It's passed through a couple of hands, but never to an "enthusiast." Similar voyage to the post Commodore Amiga computer, perhaps the best OS of all time but never got into the right hands... The point of the thread was informed discussion of alternatives or improvements to a laser pickup. As I mentioned, I am not engineer enough to simply think through available surface scanning techniques for a candidate. Perhaps the laser is best, perhaps optical, perhaps IR or a miniature surface radar. Perhaps we should scan the whole thing at once on a very high res flatbed. Also, analog or digital? The laser pickup and several of the others I mentioned need not be digital, though some "hybrid" digital technology for noise elimination and/or dynamic range restoration would certainly be a good and easily accomplishable goal. If you want to look at the elp, fine, but look at it as "frozen in time" and with an eye towards better and cheaper. Again, I am no expert, but I don't think that device need cost as much as it does at this point in technological history. It could probably be rebuild with off the shelf components for a LOT less. Dave Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Don Richard Posted September 5, 2011 Share Posted September 5, 2011 I still think the idea has merit. Lots of reasons to have one. There are plenty of LPs that it would be nice to play without causing more wear on the vinyl. [Y] Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marvel Posted September 5, 2011 Share Posted September 5, 2011 Perhaps we should scan the whole thing at once on a very high res flatbed. There was a guy who was doing experiments scanning his LPs on a flatbed, and running the scan through some software he wrote that would actually play the music. His experiments were very rudimentary, very noisy playback, but it actually did work.Bruce Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mallette Posted September 5, 2011 Author Share Posted September 5, 2011 His experiments were very rudimentary, very noisy playback, but it actually did work. Guys name was "Edison," wasn't it? [] Seriously, the idea has great merit and just needs work. It will be done someday, though perhaps only when it's just a byproduct of some more pressing problem solution. Dave Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marvel Posted September 5, 2011 Share Posted September 5, 2011 Not Edison this time around... http://www.phys.huji.ac.il/~springer/DigitalNeedle/ The gain on his samples is really low and he didn't get very far to decode the 3D stuff, but there is some music in the background... Or check out the IRENE project: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laser_turntable#IRENE_project and the NPR story on IRENE... very cool: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=11851842 Bruce Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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