Most liked posts in thread: What's new Pussycat too?

See Celtic triumphed, mate, and the loud cheers from the Red Devils fans I was sat with this afternoon were matched only by the Sunderland Mackems rejoicing in the defeat of those fat black and white bloaters who thought by taking over Trafalgar Square and many of the London bars, that was enough to guarantee em victory...PMSL!! ;-)

Q)
How many years now since the Geordies won owt and will they have to go another 50 odd years until they get anywhere near again?

Answers on the beer gut of a fat Geordie...



and how Eddie Howe had a reet selection "headache" in the days leading up to the cup final:



PMSL!!!

 

Hehe, reet cracking video that

Good results all round then Andy mate. And got to say, very glad that Howe didn't come to Glasgow last year, big Ange has became an absolute legend amongst us Celtic fans.

 

Further play with the PS Vita and the two things that strike me are the quality of the display, even this non-OLED version. Really sharp and with very nice colour reproduction. The other things is the sound, very good with excellent stereo effects for such a small device. Not been overly fussed with any of the actual Vita games yet but it plays my PSP, SNES, Pc Engine and Atari 7800 titles perfectly

 

Great to hear, Al.
Sounds very impressive.
Please send a link or two to any You Tube clips that demonstrate some of your fave titles being played when you get chance.
Great win tonight for the Codheads, btw, winning 2-1 in the Cup away at Southampton.
Get in there, Harry the Haddock!



https://www.grimsbytelegraph.co.uk/sport/football/match-reports/grimsby-town-pull-mammoth-fa-8204126

 

Blimey, I remember when Ian Saint john was still playing..

I don't know too many Scottish clubs, but when I was still at school in Marlow, one of the petrol giants (think it was Esso) was doing a set of embossed club badges that you collected with every purchase of petrol. Being kids we pestered the garage staff for free ones. I remember liking Celtic and Kilmarnock's badges, don't think I'd actually seen the clubs play back then (pure English league on TV).

 

I'm laying in bed with a stomach bug today and in between bouts of dashing to the loo I'm kind of browsing a book I picked up from my local library. It's a massive collection of all the Panini football sticker albums from the late 70's into the 80's. Brings back lots of memories.

 

Commiserations, Al, with yer bad guts but it did get you out of work and instead yer head into a good book in bed instead so not all bad news, my mate.
I will post my collection incl my FULL 1978 Football League album which I must have spent £30-40 on as a kid (a bloody fortune back then) and also mention the story of my mate Dave Robbo who has ever since been known as "The Jew" for also managing to fill his... without ever buying a single 5p packet as they were in those days
Nice work, Al.
Another post bringing back the ACE memories!



Hehe, Archie Gemmill n co - these boys should've gone all the way in Argentina but fate conspired otherwise...

 

So no new bits & pc's this week as I've been laid low with the stomach bug. It has given me a little bit more time with the Vita though, and I'm still impressed with it. N64 emulation is pretty good as well. Runs Ridge Racer 64 nicely.

Also been reading the book of GamesMaster, all about the TV show. I wasn't a big fan of it back in the day but it's an interesting read none the less and gives you an insight into the show and how it was produced. Need to finish it this week though as it's loaned from the local library and has to be back by next weekend....

 

I think Diamond has calmed down a lot these days. He has been to an Edinburgh retro club a couple of times and came across as a lot nicer than he did back in the day. Wouldn't be hard I know lol. He is very honest in the book that he was a bit of a t*t back then and frequently high or drunk.

Stomach feeling a lot better now Paul, thanks. Although currently having problems sleeping instead. Ah well, lets me catch up on email I suppose.

 

Just finished the book before returning it to the library today. It's actually made me feel like watching a few episodes now I have some of the back story. Recommended read even if you aren't a fan of Diamond.

 

In fact this will probably be a bit of a retro reading weekend as I catch up on the latest Crash, Amtix and Fusion magazines. I subscribe to Readly and they are included in the monthly sub, not sure if I'd buy them individually. Unless they bring out an A8 or ST version that is.

Also hoping that the latest issue of Pixel Addict is in the newsagents. Great magazine and I really enjoy the monthly trip to WH Smiths to pick up the latest issue.

 

The weather has been pretty good here, only a little drop of snow. I even went out for a bike ride on my vintage Raleigh this morning and it was fine. Probably take one of the other bikes out tomorrow morning before I go and pay a visit to my best friend growing up. He managed to come off his new mountain bike last week and eded up with broken collar bone/ribs/nose and collapsed lung! Told him, we're getting too old for this sh#t!

 

Strange thing is Paul, I checked out his bike when I was over and it doesn't have a scratch on it!

I try not to go out cycling when it's icy, just too risky. Saying that I haven't bmx'd or road cycled for years, nowadays it's all about leisure and state of mind. And coffee and cake

 

My bike usage was going through forests doing semi BMX stuff or just casual bike riding along tow-paths up to my mate's place, just casual biking. I used to ride from East London to west London via the West End for a couple of years, but it got so dangerous I stopped. I'd be wary to ride on roads now. I actually had a polish guy ride out of a blind turning without looking, straight in front of me, I was only doing about 22mph so stopped sharply, but he was just so "oh well" about it. A few mph more and I'd have hit him square on, one sec the road was empty and then he pops out from behind a lorry without a care in the world, no edging out, just rode straight out of the T junction without waiting to see if there was traffic.

He got lucky, most people use that bit of road like Brands Hatch, he best think about what nearly happened, or he's brown bread sooner rather than later. What with these stupid electric scooters and the 'youth' who now walk out in to the road making you slam on the brakes, it's too mad on the road.

 

It's been a minute since I've posted about any new purchases in my favorite thread of show-and-tell. But it's also been a bit since I've spent frivolously on my hobbies. I have only purchased a few electronic components for a few dollars for a few repairs in recent weeks or months. Nothing to brag about, the parts and repairs were for my Dreamcast and two 3DO consoles.

But, I currently have a tidy bit of kit headed my way and expected by weeks end.

This includes 4 used Metal Type IV cassette tapes from 3 different sellers, but from the best companies most premium versions and once properly erased with my tape deck's proper tape erase system, they will be as good as new for recording. Metal tapes don't stretch like the Type I and II cassette tapes that are plastic and sprayed with the magnetic recording medium. Metal tapes are, well magnetized metal. They also have higher quality cases and tape mechanisms for smoother recording and playback and less distortion introduction. NOS of these same tapes are selling for $50-100 each, used $25-50, so I got a great deal on these at an average of $12 per tape, including shipping costs. Now I can back up my high-end DMM vinyl records to another analog medium that is capable of recordings with the same fidelity and clarity along with my tape deck's noise reduction system, as the original LP's. And it didn't cost me as much as the actual LP's themselves! These are 90 and 100 minute tapes, so I will be able to fit a full album per side of tape, so I can back-up 8 of my LP's with these 4 tapes.



I also was on a waiting list to be notified when some Rush remastered audiophile reissue EP LP's were back in stock, and several of them are, so I bought one of them already. Again, these are the super-high-end quality ones produced by the now legendary Acoustic Sounds Studios and manufactured across the street at the sister company Quality Records. The same I posted a documentary video about a couple pages back, if any of you took the time to watch the very interesting behind the scenes look into a modern LP and tape company that settles for nothing less than the best possible quality all around, eclipsing original release print quality of the original albums. Rush commissioned them to do all the limited edition and anniversary box sets of their LP's. These are incredibly reasonably priced LP's selling new with production and print quality that eclipses the original LP prints, for half the price of what the original LP's sell for in used but good condition! $25-35 dollars! I couldn't find this particular album, even used, for less than $150 on eBay or Discogs.

https://store.acousticsounds.com/index.cfm?get=detail&Title_ID=103725





I'm also expecting a new Atari Jaguar game I ordered from the Atari Age Store this week. But I'll show-and-tell about it when it arrives, along with a custom rotary controller I made from a jaguar controller that will work with the new game and Tempest 2000 and a couple other free homebrew games.

 

Nice one Matt, you have your audiophile hat on and those tapes look great, have fun with the LP's. I think I saw an article yesterday saying that Metalica sold soo many LP's last year that they are opening their own pressing plant. All power to vinyl..

 

Wonderful, Matt.

Great news to have you back with news of your "what's new" items - those metal tapes sound like the dog's dangly bits - absolutely top taping, mate, and I can hear the enthusiasm as you type as you can't wait to blank em and then back up your rich LP collection, incl Rush of course, to handy sized cassette mega metal media!

And then you've some new Atari Jag game arriving with a custom built controller (like a paddle, by the sounds of it?) that you've adapted to work with software - it's all happening again and we're thrilled to hear it.

Nice work, fella - you've been sorely missed around these parts... (stobbit, Paul, you know what I mean!)

Titter ye not!

Great to have you back, Matt - much missed, matey.

 

Yep, people aren't just rediscovering the living sound of analog, but also vinyl that is being produced with the totally new Direct to Metal Master (DMM) manufacturing style along with many being double LP, which means the same music recorded over twice as much vinyl which allows more space for the grooves so the grooves can be recorded with more dynamic range. Sort of like the difference of the old video tape recordings where you can choose SP or LP recording and fit more video on a tape at lesser quality, or less at higher quality. If we were younger I'd say "this is not your father's LP technology," but in our case we would be the father.

This is analog tech approaching reel-to-reel tape recording which is still the ultimate (if manufactured to highest quality and standards) recording medium, still even better than any newer-than-CD digital audio medium. Is the new LP tech better than SACD or media formats better than MP3? Maybe not, but it's better than standard CD or MP3. It's just something that many won't believe about today's LP's until they here them for themselves on top audio equipment.

Again, they have to be the more expensive audiophile quality LP's; you can still buy new standard quality LP's made like they were 30 years ago too, so you have to look for the 180-200g DMM versions, even better the top quality double LP's in the format. And also make sure the description says "remastered from original master recordings" or at least "made with original master recording" at minimum, sometimes the original masters were mastered well enough that remastering won't make them better...if they don't say this, it's a strong possibility that the LP's were recorded from digital sources which defeats the whole purpose of being produced on an analog medium because it's not the living analog sound, but a lot of shysters do it.

Rush's best selling album 'Moving Pictures' was a triple-platinum status album until they released the remastered LP's and CD's and box sets over the past decade as each album reached it's 40th anniversary. 65% of new sales are LP and 45% CD and 'Moving Pictures' became 4x platinum in sales due to this, recently. Of course this boost in sales can also be attributed to the fact the band retired and the best drummer in the world, Neil Peart of Rush died in 2020.

LP sales have been so huge for Rush that they licensed out the record manufacturing rights to several vinyl LP manufacturers around the world to produce them. I now only by from Acoustic Sound/Quality Records company as after watching the documentary and seeing reviews of their records, and now owning a Rush LP made by Quality Records previous to this latest purchase, I now know they are the be the best of the best at what they do, to ensure the highest quality on every record sold...meticulous all the way to the special made shipping boxes for protection, and actually about half the price of other manufacturers!

 

It was a beginners turntable Paul (with 5 easy Amazon payments). I'm still tempted as there are one or two country albums I'd like that are only on vinyl or tape but I'm a bit of a lazy git and don't like the idea of getting up and turning over the record halfway through the album! The thing that really appeals is the size of the packaging. Maybe they should start putting cd's in LP sleeves

Like you though I find the new manufacting methods that Matt speaks about fascinating. I had no idea about any of it.

 

If you like the size of the packaging, then a laserdisc player and laserdiscs would be right up your alley too. The exact same size; I store my laserdiscs and LP's next to each other, LD's to the left and LP's to the right, all standing vertically of course...though that's only for the safety of the LP's as laserdiscs can be stacked without risking damage, but it's still more convenient to access them standing vertically like books between bookends.

I suggest looking into those country albums before you spend a wad of cash, to see if any of them have been remastered on 180-200 gram DMM LP's. Though even traditional records sound better and better, the better your turntable, needle and Hi-Fi stereo get too. But that is true to an extent no matter the media; the better the player and sound system, the better it all sounds.

Though I've mentioned that DMM is better than traditional record mastering, below is an in depth description of the technology used:

DMM Principle

Separation of DMM master plate and nickel stamper
DMM transcribes audio coming from a workstation or a master tape into a copper plate using a diamond cutting stylus (the copper that is being cut into is a plated layer on a non-magnetic steel substrate). This creates an original "positive" (master/mother) disc that is used to create a "negative" stamper in an electroforming galvanic process. Stamper is then attached onto a pressing machine and is used for a mass replication – pressing of vinyl records.

In comparison with lacquer cutting, lacquer is cut into a nitrocellulose layer coated on an aluminum disc using a heated sapphire cutting stylus. Because nitrocellulose is not electrically conductive it needs to be sprayed with a thin layer of silver in order to be usable in a later electroforming galvanic process. The traditional lacquer processing which includes three copies: "negative" (father), "positive" (mother), "negative" (stamper). These added steps and processes can each introduce flaws in the final product that is completely avoided by the DMM process.

DMM production process advantages:

*more accurate reproduction of high frequencies (16kHz up)
*DMM allows for thinner groove (less noise, longer playtimes)
*better signal-to-noise ratio (even on a groove of the same width, DMM has about 7-10dB better S/N compared to lacquer)
*reduced print-through sounds (pre-echo, post-echo) between adjacent grooves. Double-spaced grooves of a double LP record eliminates this completely. Though there are 2 records and four sides per album doubling the cost of production and higher end price (but well worth it to audiophiles)
*only one subsequent electroforming step

Pre-production VMM mastering:

VVM mastering, improvement to DMM cutting process

VVM (Vinyl Visual Mastering) is software tool designed specifically for needs of a vinyl mastering engineer (ME). It includes a state-of-art computer simulation of the mastering process that allows setting up cutting parameters and simulating the cutting process before the actual cutting is performed.

Consider a CAD system that is aiding an architect and is able to identify critical parts of the construction and address them specifically. That is what VVM achieves for a mastering engineer.

VVM allows for these main critical features:

A very accurate virtual simulation which will find critical parts in supplied audio before the actual cut. Every cutting system needs to employ protections against critically high electrical current fed into the cutting head or critically high acceleration of the cutting stylus to avoid damaging the cutting head or stylus. In most cases this is done using an electrical circuit breaker and an acceleration limiter. Simulating the cut allows to address these critical conditions in a more sensitive and controlled manner with better results in the cut audio.
Each order has individual settings, which can be adjusted for arbitrary parts of audio. There is a direct two-way communication between the computer and the cutting lathe
Differential sound and graphic analysis can play or show differences between original audio and processed signal, feedback or vinyl record signal.

Vinyl measuring system - geometric, physical, dynamic and load measurements in time or frequency domain.
Groove processor - controls groove pitch, groove width and warps audio signals to compensate possible cutting and playback distortion. Every cut can have a different groove pitch strategy.
Mathematical model of stylus and groove – the software computes a virtual groove based on geometric dimensions of a defined cutting stylus and can compare it visually with a real groove photo from a microscope.
High quality non-destructive signal processing with unique vinyl algorithms. The original audio data remains untouched for a future use.

Then, of course, if the records pressed from DMM masters are pressed onto the thicker, heavier and more rigid 180-200 gram vinyl, it virtually eliminates vinyl record warping that can cause distortion on your turntable and less chance of the record getting bent or broken with use.

 

Great posts on using quality analogue audiophile gear again and sharing the listening pleasure. It is very much appreciated by us all who lurve our sounds - wonderful pure sounds and of course the chance to again wallow in nostaligia as the rock and the country and the synth/disco/funk etc, propels us back in time, in our time machines, to a time when... we didn't ache so much or spend so much time being ill and down the docs...
I briefly explained to Alex Drito this week, I have been really poorly but didn't want to harp on about it, but in a nutshell I've had acute stomach pains, in and out of A&E twice this week (spending nearly 15 hours in there on intravenous drip painkillers) and also to and from my surgery seeing a locum doctor who one day said he couldn't take bloods, and then the next said he could... wish he would make up his mind. Anyhow, I'm on a dose of antibiotics and a shedload of other anti stomach inflammatory/cramp/acid tabs... keep you posted, guys, but suffice to say I'm tired out, sore, achy and have chucked up more times this past week then I have in the past 10 years. At least I hit the bowl.
Take care one and all and stay safe and well, folks.

 

My goodness Andy, sounds horrible, have they got you on Omeprazole, seems the go to anti inflammatory / gastro reflux jobby.

Have they x-rayed? The chucking up and acute stomach pains are not a great thing.

Me and Serena live on Omeprazole, me as a side effect of other meds and Serena because of her reflux.

 

Only one new piece of gaming and not even retro! I picked up Wreckfest on the PS4 now that it has came down to £10 in CEX. Just waiting on Tetris and Arkanoid reaching that magic price point now and my PS4 collection will be complete. I only have about 12 games on it but that's more than enough to keep me busy, what with my short gaming attention span

Been doing a bit of wheeling and dealing and as well as the 7800 I've moved on a few other bits this week (tv's, more Subbuteo, bike etc but they've all been replaced with a new Android tablet for watching movies and reading my PDF's on, along with a particular special edition single speed bike I'd been keeping my eyes open for over the last while.

And finally saw one of my A8 'Grail' items on EBay. The Track and Field controller along with the game on cartridge. Seller is also in Glasgow but he has it up at a very unrealistic price of £120 Looking at his other listings most items seem to be well overpriced. I've made him a very cheeky starting offer of £30 and will see where it goes from there, but I won't offer any more than £50.

 

That's the best thing to do Paul. My offer has just been declind (surprise!) but I'm going to leave it as is for now.

Competition Pro's are great sticks, don't think I've ever tried a mini version though. Was that designed for Jeremy Beadle?

I have Competition Pro's on my 800XL and a usb version on the A500 Mini. Then Zip Stick Professionals on the STFM and 800. They don't make 'em like they used to, that's for sure. I also use a Retro-bit USB Saturn controller on my pc. It's brilliant for Saturn (of course), Megadrive, 7800 and NES/SNES.

What controller do you use on the PC when emulating the Playstation 2?

 

Hi Folks

Here is the link to tomorrow nights online meet. Time is UK GMT.

Easter Atari Owners Meet
Monday, 10 April · 8:00 – 9:00pm
Google Meet joining info
Video call link: https://meet.google.com/ipp-mfiv-ycj