[sdiy] Re: DAT-recorder controlling

[Stephen Lenham]

Hi Michiel, 

This sort of thing is done a lot in the radio industry to allow standard 
playback machines to be "fader started" (playback starts automatically when 
mixer fader is raised) or to create "snoop" recorders (which automatically 
record what a DJ says but not the music he plays). 

What we used to do is really quite low-tech - we opened up the machines and 
soldered the transistor of an optoisolator across the relevant front-panel 
button(s). We then brought the connections for the optocoupler LED out of 
the unit. This has the big advantage that it works in any machine and you 
don't need to care about what the internal scanning circuitry is - the 
machine simply thinks a button has been pressed. The only thing to watch out 
for is that the transistor will probably only work one way around - you have 
a 50% chance of guessing correctly! 

Having done that you simply need a facility for driving a few logic signals 
from your PC. I'm not an expert here, but would think that either the 
parallel port (if you still have one!) or any GPIO unit/card would do. Of 
course, you need to source software to drive it... 

Hope this helps, 

Steve L. 

makoot at gmx.net writes: 

> Hello everyone,
> I have this DAT recorder (Sony TCD-D100) which I'd like to connect to a
> computer and record the sound from it into the computer. 
> No problem for that matter, but the thing is that I need to controll the
> play,rewind etc. functions by using the computer running some sort of program or
> anything which controlls the DAT. 
> The DAT is connected to the computer via an optical (TOC) cable, so there
> should be a way to do this, at least I've heard that it's done before.
> Does anybody may have some experience with this or maby knows some URL's,
> books etc. where I can find information about this? 
> 
> Thanks in advance,
> Michiel K. 
> 
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