DA-38 and 2408 - timepiece absolutely necessary?

**richnew2** · 08-24-2002, 09:29 PM

This weekend I will be connecting a Tascam DA-38 to my MOTU 2408mkII. I have read through the manuals but have not found a concise explanation of what I should expect in terms of phase accurate and sample accurate sync'ing. I realize that having a Digital Timepiece greatly INCREASES the accuracy, but is it absolutely necessary?

Does anyone have experience capturing 8 channels from a DA-38 through MOTU 2408 to a computer?

Any advice is appreciated.

BradLyons · 08-24-2002, 11:10 PM

If you are syncing multiple tapes via one machine or need to send the audio from the 2408 back to the DA38 across more tapes than machines you have, then it is a must. Why? The DA38 is a moving-head based mechanism which is physical moving parts or a transport. The Digital Timepiece has sync onboard that contols the physical transport of the DA38. If you do not need to sync in-time with sample-accurate sync, it will be okay without it. Do you have a single DA38? What does your setup consist of?

**richnew2** · 08-25-2002, 12:09 AM

Currently the setup is a PC (Win2K), 2408, PCI-324, and what I think will be two DA-38's. Rumor has it the band only used 8 tracks (1 DA-38) but there's a possibly they employed the other one as well. The goal is simply to suck all 8 or 16 tracks into Sonic Foundry Vegas for mixing and editing. I think I am OK - eg., there won't be any bouncing tracks back to the DA-38's.

BradLyons · 08-25-2002, 05:40 AM

If you are simply dumping the tracks in for editing and mixing, you're fine... you don't need the DTP. Even if you have only one machine, it's simple to do a second pass and line up the audio. I owned (5) ADATs at one time and later had to dump 40-track projects into my PARIS system (years ago) 4-channels at a time so DON'T COMPLAIN DANGIT!! :-) haha However, I would strongly suggest a different program for your audio. Vegas is okay, but if you were to get something like Nuendo..... you'd love it for audio production!

**richnew2** · 08-25-2002, 08:34 AM

Many thanks for your advice, I feel much more comfortable going into the project with this info. I'll take you up on looking at Nuendo. I've heard good things about it. Over and out.