[QuadList] What is it????
Chill315 at aol.com
Chill315 at aol.com
Sat May 14 06:02:17 CDT 2011
Bill
Very interesting history. I have used a few different models of the EIPD
machines. 7000, 7500, 5000 series and a 7800. They were decent but had
issues. When IVC came along, a number of us wished that one could combine
the Ampex electronics with the IVC transport because it held interchange a
whole lot better. Actually we were complaining about the swing arms in the
EIPD machines.
The TBC designed for the 7900 was interesting. I still wonder why that
path was chosen for the design. Was it because it was so early in the
digital age that the cost was too high to produce a TBC? Was it too early for
the engineering skills? Was there a time issue to get the product for
market? Or was the culture at Ampex such that it had lost its way.
I remember being told about the letter for the discontinuance of
InstaVision. It said something like "Due to the unprecedented success of
Instavision, we are discontinuing the product." A fellow by the name of Doug Mumley
was working for EIPD here in Detroit and saved the letter.
Chris Hill
WA8IGN
In a message dated 5/14/2011 1:00:00 A.M. Eastern Daylight Time,
wcarpen107 at yahoo.com writes:
Hi Folks,
In answer to the some of questions that this Great quiz created, I must
give some vital history.
I moved to California, in 1971, and arrived in August. The group from Elk
Grove, where placed in two old Fairchild buildings, at the corner of
Middlefield & Wisman roads in Mountain View, Ca ( 12 southeast of Redwood City,
down historic HY101) and engineering was also combined with some of the
engineers from the Los Gato's lab which was still designing the Instavideo
1/2" Consumer product.
I was there for three months, and early in November, we got the word that
we were ( Ampex Corp) in Big financial trouble, at the Fiscal 1/2 Year, we
were losing 40Million$ on a projected 240M$ in sales. I was the only
product manager for all products from Elk Grove and Carlos Kennedy was product
manager for Instavideo.
The only good part of the job in Mountain View, was the Wagon Wheel Bar &
Restaurant, diagonally across the street where it was said the IC concept
was born, many years earlier.
We bailed out of those buildings by early January, and I moved to Redwood
City.
They closed down major operations, wrote off everything they could, laid
off everyone who wasn't needed.
Those days created the basic statement, "That only the Optimists brought
their lunch at Ampex", since many questioned whether they would still have
a job by noon!
So this was the environment that was driving the Broadcast Div of Ampex
when in late 1971, the TBC790 & the (Quad that never was, the VR-1400) were
conceived. No extra effort or redesign was expended, and even the DTBC
effort was on shaky ground.
I moved from the Helical (Elk Grove Products) products group to the Quad
group, because a product manager in the Quad group could not get along with
the Manager of Product management.
I had only looked at a few quad schematics, messed with an Amtec/Colortec
while trying to make them work with the VR-7900. I had never operated a
Quad.
So I had the VR-1200's, the VR-3000, and all quad accessories and the
"Nova" engineering project that became the AVR-2
So, we were in a desperate survival mode, cutting every corner, not
spending an extra dime on anything.
So, that's why some of the things that were done in that period may not
have made good sense, or even seemed like being done the "Ampex
Way".
OBTW, the loss that was reported at the end of the Fiscal Year in May of
1972, was really 90 Million$ on sales of 240M$ which was bad news for a
publicly held company.
I survived, introduced the AVR-2 @ NAB 1974 in Huston, Tx and at 1976 at
the Board of Directors meeting, the Chairman of the Board, leaned on the
AVR-2, and said that this machine had brought the company back in two years,
farther than he thought we would be in 5 years.
So, that's a little slice of Quad History from almost 40 years ago.
Bye for now, Bill & Gewyn & Ginger (whoof...whoof)
--- On Fri, 5/13/11, Don Norwood <dwnorwood at embarqmail.com> wrote:
From: Don Norwood <dwnorwood at embarqmail.com>
Subject: Re: [QuadList] What is it????
To: "Quad List" <quadlist at quadvideotapegroup.com>
Date: Friday, May 13, 2011, 8:08 PM
And once again, Chris is the winner!!!!
Bill Carpenter told us about a mini buffer (TBC) that was designed for the
VR-1400, a VR-1200 fitted with the new TBC to replace
Amtec/Colortec/Velcomp/ProcAmp, but the machine never became a product due to the development
of the AVR-2. However, the TBC design went on to become the TBC-790,
intended for use with the VPR-7900.
Ampex used some of the modules from the AVR-1 as well as some newly
designed modules, but the card cage design of the TBC-790 was different in
several respects from the AVR-1. For one thing, there were coax connectors in
the AVR-1 back plane, but not in the TBC-790, so the coaxial connections that
would normally have mated with connectors on the rear of the modules were
instead routed to connectors on the front panel. I suspect that was done
to save cost, however, another difference has always puzzled me. For
whatever reason, the card frame in the TBC-790 is "upside down and backwards" as
compared to the AVR-1, so the re-purposed cards (which were not
re-labeled) have connector pin numbers that are opposite of what you would expect.
Otherwise, the mechanical design of the modules is unchanged except for
the extruded aluminum handle that runs the length of the module instead of
the "loop" handle on the AVR-1. It's the same design as used on the AVR-2,
VPR-7900 and VPR-7800. Here's a pic of the module installed in a TBC-790
with jumpers between modules taking the place of the back-plane connectors in
the AVR-1.
Interestingly, in the TBC-790 manual, for the modules that were "borrowed"
from the AVR-1, there was no re-working of the drawings to match the new
configurations for the TBC. The pages from the AVR-1 manual were simply
copied, ignoring the changes in the mechanical design and the pin numbering!
Don Norwood
Digitrak Communications, Inc.
_www.digitrakcom.com_ (http://www.digitrakcom.com/)
----- Original Message -----
From: _Chill315 at aol.com_ (mip://076e43e8/mc/compose?to=Chill315@aol.com)
To: _quadlist at quadvideotapegroup.com_
(mip://076e43e8/mc/compose?to=quadlist@quadvideotapegroup.com)
Sent: Friday, May 13, 2011 10:37 PM
Subject: Re: [QuadList] What is it????
Then there is only one answer. It is for the TBC that was designed for
the VR-7900 type A machine.
Chris Hill
In a message dated 5/13/2011 10:25:51 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time,
_dwnorwood at embarqmail.com_ (mip://076e43e8/mc/compose?to=dwnorwood@embarqmail.com)
writes:
Hi Chris:
No, I didn't say it was for a quad, just that it was "firmly rooted in
quad history". You got part of that answer right! And Park got the 1" TBC
part right. And Bill Carpenter told the whole story not too long ago
including how this fits with the "quad that never was". I figured one of you
guys would put the pieces together!
Don Norwood
Digitrak Communications, Inc.
_www.digitrakcom.com_ (http://www.digitrakcom.com/)
----- Original Message -----
From: _Chill315 at aol.com_ (mip://076e43e8/mc/compose?to=Chill315@aol.com)
To: _quadlist at quadvideotapegroup.com_
(mip://076e43e8/mc/compose?to=quadlist@quadvideotapegroup.com)
Sent: Friday, May 13, 2011 10:13 PM
Subject: Re: [QuadList] What is it????
Yes I did notice that the module was missing the pull handle. The card
does have the 28 pin connector that the AVR-1 used. The 63.5 micro second
delay line is used in the drop out compensator of the AVR-1.
The front connectors are what throw me for a loop. So I am at a loss.
It is for a quad you say so that does not leave much left.
Chris Hill
In a message dated 5/13/2011 10:09:05 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time,
dwnorwood at embarqmail.com writes:
Hi Chris:
Almost a winning answer, maybe the best so far.....but you'll notice that
this module design (mechanical, not electrical) is slightly different from
the AVR-1.
Don Norwood
Digitrak Communications, Inc.
_www.digitrakcom.com_ (http://www.digitrakcom.com/)
----- Original Message -----
From: _Chill315 at aol.com_ (mip://076e43e8/mc/compose?to=Chill315@aol.com)
To: _quadlist at quadvideotapegroup.com_
(mip://076e43e8/mc/compose?to=quadlist@quadvideotapegroup.com)
Sent: Friday, May 13, 2011 9:54 PM
Subject: Re: [QuadList] What is it????
This is the one line delay module that was used in the AVR-1 / ACR-25.
Chris Hill
WA8IGN
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