erjoyed when, in 1981, Sony released the much smaller PCM-F1 processor. The PCM-F1 was a small unit, roughly the size of a hardcover dictionary volume. When mated with a VCR (as the recording device), it enabled engineers to build a digital recording system for less than $2,500 - in the era when the alternatives cost more than 10 times as much.
A few years later technology advanced even further, enabling the VCR and digital processor to be reduced considerably in size and to be integrated. The conception of the DAT recorder signaled the end of the Sony F1 era, but we must not forget that its parents were the PCM-F1 and the VCR.
Although this is a Retro Review, I continue to use this vintage product almost daily. Thank you, Sony for pioneering low-cost digital recording, for providing an upgrade path for improving its sound and, most importantly, for building a digital recording system in the '80s that is still running reliably in late 1999.
Dr. Fred Bashour holds a Yale Ph.D. in Music Theory, and is a contributor to Pro Audio Review.
I owned one of these devices myself and was involved in persuading colleagues at London University, to consider the use of the product to download and store, the massive amounts of digital data that the new satellite communications systems, of the day, were generating at the time. This was the first piece of technology on earth, which provided EVERY musician with the capability of storing their music in digital form, for its distribution to ALL that would hear it, without the "permission of the 'LORDS and MASTERS' of the Music Industry"; and the opportunity to cut their musical creation to a compact disc [CD] for distribution to whomever they were pleased to do so. THE TITLE • TV Screen Shot above, was grabbed from a recent episode of Deutschland 83, revolver and all, which I deemed suitable to illustrate the potentiality of the positive use oftechnology, in the face of ALL conflict in space, time and culture. This photograph of my son Jamie was taken at the Old School House in Tackley. The Panasonic Professional Videotape machine was the first of its kind in Tackley and all of our children's friends used to come around to watch in awe, the videotapes of the likes of ET and Starwars; and the SONY kit sits between it and our Artemide "HELMET" Lamp.
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Added by Michael Grove at 13:25 on February 14, 2016
in 1997 • when the world had already accepted at COP2 in Geneva the scientific findings on climate change, proffered by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in its 1995 second assessment • and the Kyoto Protocol was signed by 150 Nations to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions, whilst also being required to prepare policies for the agreed upon reduction in same • as well as his inability to influence George Bush's rejection of the Kyoto Protocol and his subsequent COP involvement as the representative of the peoples of all the nations of the the UK, which culminated in the Bali Action Plan that acknowledged unequivocally that climate cutting emissions and mitigation of climate change was strongly needed • Tony Blair's influence on the global powers that be, with respect for and regard to THE URGENT ACTIONS that needed to BE TAKEN, was insignificant at best, whilst he stuffed his pockets with tax payers cash, for the benefit of himself and his family.
... here we are today in commensurate consideration of the very real ramifications of our nation's actions according to the script of MR. TONY BLAIR, faced with the very consequences of nature's climate crisis and the UK Government's response to nature's SARS pandemic response • at a [TIME] when pensioners are faced with a doubling of their home heating/cooking expenditure • [BE]ing advised that our Lords & Masters will be appointing our ex-PM MR.TONY BLAIR as a Knight Companion of the Most Noble Order of the Garter, the oldest and most senior British Order of Chivalry.
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