Of course, if you have machines that you need to sync up, then one will become the master while all others in the chain will be slaves. This means that the speed of the master will designate the speed of the slaves, as well as when they all start and stop. The process of forcing a slave to change its playback speed to match that of a master is called resolution. You first need access your equipment for their limitations, and then decide which one will be the master. For example, if you have an analog tape deck that you are trying to sync up with a computer, then the tape deck must become the master unless it has the ability to receive and react to sync from an external source.
Synchronization is accomplished by the use of different sync signals.
You can think of these signals as codes or pulses sent from the master that inform the slaves of the overall sync speed so that they can keep up. Of these, LTC, Midi Sync, Superclock, Word Clock, and MTC are the most commonly used with audio today. Since VITC is used for syncing up video signals, I won't be covering it here. Suffice it to say that VITC can be converted to most of these other signals by a converter box, and then integrated with your audio systems. In understanding how each of these signals work and how to use them within your system, I would like to focus first on LTC and the information that it carries, as it will help to explain the other signals in the next article.