What's so cool about "analog"? - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / beginners

author: dastructhm
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: May 14, 2022, 01:32:54 am
content: I never understood why people seem so fascinated with "analog".There is a company called "Analog Devices".A guru named Jim Williams worked in the field of "analog circuits".I even subscribed to a YouTube channel called "Kiss Analog".So... I guess analog must be really cool?! Otherwise people would name these "digital"?Would anyone please explain to me why they love "analog"? I always thought digital IC's are better. Right?!

author: rstofer
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 14, 2022, 01:42:27 am
content: Analog computing for a visual representation of differential equations.

author: TimFox
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 14, 2022, 01:43:24 am
content: When digital hardware malfunctions, the reason is often analog in nature.

author: BeBuLamar
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 14, 2022, 01:56:44 am
content: If you compare the number of things people call analog vs those people call digital I think there are more digital stuff than analog. But well analog computing is cool.

author: ataradov
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 14, 2022, 01:57:23 am
content: Why is everyone is raving about oranges, but apples are clearly better. What gives?Also, AD was funded in 1965 when the "digital" was pretty bad.And also, how would we know why you subscribed to some random YT channel?

author: SiliconWizard
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 14, 2022, 02:02:39 am
content: Quote from: dastructhm on May 14, 2022, 01:32:54 amUh?

author: xrunner
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 14, 2022, 02:07:30 am
content: Quote from: TimFox on May 14, 2022, 01:43:24 amQuote from: dastructhm on May 14, 2022, 01:32:54 amWhen you get down to it there's an analog response in digital circuits, consider a simple TTL digital gate -QuoteSo understanding analog is a basic need for all types of electronic circuits and devices even if they are "digital" !

author: pqass
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 14, 2022, 02:10:39 am
content: I'm not sure if you're trolling....If not see intro ofhttp://twanclik.free.fr/electricity/electronic/PDFDONE2/Analog%20Circuit%20Design.pdfIf you are see attachment.

author: Jay_Diddy_B
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 14, 2022, 02:41:41 am
content: Hi,We live in an analog world. Digital circuits become analog design problems when the frequency increases. Wires are no longer conductors, they become transmission lines. Impedances have to be match to avoid reflections. You can argue that digital is a subset of analog.I have spent a lot of my career working with switching power supplies. You could argue that they are digital, the switches are either on or off, but there is is a lot of analog circuitry from EMC to controlling the output. You could use an ADC, but as the name implies you are converting from Analog to Digital.Analog circuit design can be very challenging. Take a look at the thread on the LTZ1000:https://www.eevblog.com/forum/metrology/ultra-precision-reference-ltz1000/Here a group of talented people have been chasing ppm accuracy for several years.I am sure digital has it challenges too, you have to find your passion.Jay_Diddy_B

author: Terry Bites
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 14, 2022, 01:01:06 pm
content: Everything.It improves your character and helps you make freinds.It challenges you to be able to count more than 0 and 1.https://preview.redd.it/x3kqir25s1iz.jpg?auto=webp&s=3811175aa16838fb10da2afbfa0b2b00b9f4b594Digital circuits are a sub species of analog not just booloean boxes.A good undertsanding is necessary for interfacing digial systems to the real world. Without it you cant measure anything.All radio/ wireless systems are analog as are audio, power supplies, motors actuators, Lidar, Radar, gyros, accelrometers.....etc, most stuff thats not just inside a cpu.You cant get an electrical engineering degree without it. You cannot trouble shoot a digital system at board level without good analog knowhow.Its a big and boming industry "Apr 26, 2022 (The Expresswire) -- Increase In Demand (2022) : At 6.3% CAGR, The "Analog IC Market"Size is expected to grow from 63360 million USD In 2020, to reach 97640 Million USD by 2026" so you need to get on board!Computer chips represent 30% of the silicon market. A minority interest.If you want to be a software writer then do that and forget electronics.Labview is not electronics.

author: Brumby
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: May 14, 2022, 03:33:44 pm
content: Quote from: Jay_Diddy_B on May 14, 2022, 02:41:41 amNo argument necessary.It is.

author: Rick Law
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 14, 2022, 05:42:34 pm
content: Nature itself is digital (quantize) thus there is no such thing as an analog device.

author: TimFox
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 14, 2022, 05:51:39 pm
content: An oscilloscope shows that the input voltage to a digital gate is a continuous function of time, therefore there are no digital (binary) devices.

author: T3sl4co1l
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 14, 2022, 06:06:35 pm
content: I can't say I've actually been paid to build an analog circuit, of any greater complexity than a mere AFE (analog front end), or SMPS. And even then, they're largely solved by ICs. (Which is fine, analog doesn't stop at the IC pin; there is good reason why they give block diagrams for such components. Op-amps and etc. are building blocks, in the same way as digital hardware uses gates, adders, latches, etc. in an RTL diagram.) But my study of the subject has greatly informed my design of everything else. Example: transistors (BJT or MOS) as glue logic, clamping, switching, etc., for both signals and power application.Or, since that's work, maybe it isn't "cool"; well, there's always this:https://www.glensstuff.com/videopong/videopong.htmOr, take basically any classic synth, a jam session on one of those is impressive as heck.But really, one need not seek approval for what certain others consider "cool". Some people just like doing things for the sake of doing them. Whether that's painting figurines or building electronic circuits. Or playing an instrument, or constructing an instrument; or collecting stamps, or watching sports; or...Tim

author: devinatkin
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: May 14, 2022, 06:12:43 pm
content: Digital circuits will get the job done, but analog circuits are beautiful. A really good analog circuit is a kind of elegance that you never see in digital. ANDs, NANDs, ORs, NORs, NOTs, and XORs. Once you understand how to reduce a logic function it's really just a matter of balancing the degree of custom to generic and then relying on node shrinks to get better performance. Analog circuits, regardless of it they're RF or not require so much thought and care that they are gorgeous.I'm sure to some they can find something elegant in a digital circuit, and I can see that at the software level, but I've loved analog since I started.

author: Siwastaja
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 14, 2022, 06:22:00 pm
content: Talking about bad metaphors, do note that:* Nature is not digital (numerical), but* Nature also is not voltage or current signals (analog electronics)Both are human-made systems todescribethe nature.Forinformation processing, it has become obvious that digital domain with exact numeric representation of natural phenomena is the way to go, at least currently, to the foreseeable future. Specifically, implemented using binary signalling. But this mindset ignores input/output.Realistically, you can't go from natural phenomena to direct binary digital numbers; voltages, currents, charges are needed as intermediate states. Enter analog devices!For example, when a photon hits a CMOS sensor, it is converted into electric charge, amount of which is sensed by an amplifier, and then converted into digital number using an ADC. A lot of modern, complicated, high-tech analog circuitry. Then, even when this ADC outputs a digital value, it still usesvoltagesin its digital interface, and having correctsignal integrityin that "digital" signal is paramount, and this is again ananalogmatter.In the end, everything ismixed signals. If you want to be a capable EE, there is no way around understanding both digital domain, and classic analog electronics. This does not mean you need to be a wizard in designing analog filters.

author: TimFox
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 14, 2022, 06:31:01 pm
content: Before retiring, the "cool" parts of my own career involved low-noise analog circuitry (DC to 100 MHz), although the final result was digitized for data processing.I let others handle the latter "less cool" part of the systems.

author: james_s
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 14, 2022, 06:34:15 pm
content: The world is inherently analog, humans are analog, even digital circuits are, at the most basic level, analog. It's not that analog is "better" than digital, but it is unavoidable, and a lot of the problems that come up in the design of digital circuits are analog. Sometimes too an analog solution is just simpler and easier.

author: TimFox
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 14, 2022, 06:40:32 pm
content: Quote from: james_s on May 14, 2022, 06:34:15 pmIt has been suggested that the total number of baryons in the universe is (roughly) 1x1079, which is less than one googol = 1x10100https://web.stanford.edu/~savas/papers/BaryonNumber-of-the-Universe.pdfTherefore, since analog stuff typically runs somewhere around 1x10-6due to noise, etc., we can neglect the inherent census of particles in the universe.

author: tggzzz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 14, 2022, 07:00:09 pm
content: Quote from: dastructhm on May 14, 2022, 01:32:54 amUnless you are involved in femtoamp or photon counting circuits (and a few others), your circuitsareanalogue.So-called digital circuits merelyinterpretanalogue quantities (volts, amps) as digital signals.Digitalsignalsare anabstractionof what happens physically.As for "better", is a car better than a bike?

author: tggzzz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 14, 2022, 07:05:01 pm
content: Quote from: james_s on May 14, 2022, 06:34:15 pmNah, the world is quantised, the relevant quantums being photons and electrons. Hence nature is digital

author: Nusa
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 14, 2022, 07:07:23 pm
content: Even electric cars still use analog wheels for some reason. Perhaps digital isn't for everything?

author: TimFox
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 14, 2022, 07:20:07 pm
content: But hexadecimal wheels (16 sides) would be more efficient than octal wheels (octagons), and the mathematical limit of a polygon is a circle...

author: free_electron
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 14, 2022, 08:06:31 pm
content: digital is just a very narrow field of analog.

author: dastructhm
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: May 14, 2022, 09:53:35 pm
content: so...all sensors are of analog, and only CPU's are digital devices?

author: TimFox
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 14, 2022, 10:00:05 pm
content: No. Amplifiers (which may not be connected to digital systems), oscillators, etc. are examples of truly analog systems.

author: tggzzz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 14, 2022, 10:08:04 pm
content: Quote from: dastructhm on May 14, 2022, 09:53:35 pmCPUs are analoguedeviceswith individual transiators operating in saturated mode, that process digitalsignals.

author: AlfBaz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 14, 2022, 10:55:42 pm
content: Analog istrendingtoward cool as now "non-binary" is becoming a thing

author: Doctorandus_P
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 14, 2022, 11:01:48 pm
content: Some people are working on analog computers to simulate neurons and build ai networks.It makes sense, as each "unit" does not have to be very accurate and can be very simple, so a lot can work in parallel.

author: SiliconWizard
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 15, 2022, 12:19:38 am
content: Quote from: tggzzz on May 14, 2022, 07:05:01 pmBut the wave functions must be continuous, at least as far as I understand QM (that is, only a little bit.) So you tell me if that means the universe is analog or digital. Considering wave functions, I'd be tempted to lean towards the former. That's probably material for a 100-page long thread, and counting.

author: chris_leyson
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 15, 2022, 12:52:25 am
content: QuoteAll digital ICs are based on analogue design principles and that is why analogue design is cool. If you look into the history of digital logic families like DTL, TTL, ECL and MOS you will learn that they are all based on analogue design principles. For example ECL or emitter coupled logic is a family that doesn't saturate to get high speed. Nice lecture herehttps://youtu.be/MqidrO1TPvQYou can't make sensitive low noise amplifiers with digital ICs, they're all analogue.On the other hand you can do some things where digital is better, for example DSP or digital signal processing where you can mathematically model analogue filters. You still need analogue electronics like A to D and D to A converters to swap between the two.Perhaps if you explained your reasoning as to why you think digital ICs are better than analogue ICs that would help.

author: tggzzz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 15, 2022, 08:02:13 am
content: Quote from: SiliconWizard on May 15, 2022, 12:19:38 amI think the best answer is "mu", as inhttps://csarven.ca/mu

author: TimFox
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 15, 2022, 02:02:11 pm
content: It's worse than that: wave-function solutions to Schrödinger's equation must be complex functions. Note the "i" in that equation.This is not the same as "j" in electrical engineering, but a physical "i".

author: aneevuser
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: May 15, 2022, 02:50:49 pm
content: Quote from: SiliconWizard on May 15, 2022, 12:19:38 amI suspect that the original comment was tongue-in-cheek, but if not, it's certainly not true to say that the world is "digital" because of quantisation - for example, the energy spectrum of an unbound state (e.g. that of a free electron) is continuous. So we could equally well argue from QM that the world is continuous.

author: Rick Law
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 15, 2022, 05:22:42 pm
content: All those "nature is digital" and/or "nature is analog" are tongue in cheek. We do rely on certain quantum effects for our nature to be the way it is, but the nature we know is far too macro for quantum effects to be dominant, at least for the most part. We not only live in a macro world, we live in a statistical world. Statistical effects are the dominant ones in our day-to-day life. Even with people: A person can be very unpredictable where as a group of people will follows very predictable behavioral paths.What make analog more interesting is that you can see what is going on. From the days of vacuum tubes to today's ICs, you can trace this input to that vacuum tube to do whatever, then to the next component-configuration to do whatever, follow the line all the way to to output.Digital is more abstract. Worst is of course MCU and the likes where you can have the same component doing entirely different things depending on the software that you can't see. They are "black boxes" that do their magic and you don't exactly know how it was done, or what else might have been done. So there are plenty of unsolved mysteries looking at MCU based circuits and some you can never solve unless you are given the software to look at. Personally, I don't like unsolved mysteries. I like to understand things. But that is personal choice and yours may well be different, or not.But, digital and analog are often mixed making a much more interesting world. Look at Pianos. The old pure analog ones, you can see the key press linking to the striking hammer against the piano-wire of specific tune. The digital ones? You really cant be sure how the sound is made. And then there are the mix: real analog Concert Grands with real piano-wires, sound wood boards plus digital record and edit capability using the real piano hammer striking real piano wires. Actually, I would not mind one of those... But may be not. If I do have one of those, I would be likely be editing most of the time rather than playing it most of the time.

author: Nusa
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 15, 2022, 08:34:20 pm
content: Any discussion of music has to recognize that human ears are analog devices.

author: tggzzz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 15, 2022, 09:00:08 pm
content: Quote from: Nusa on May 15, 2022, 08:34:20 pmFunctionally you can't separate the ear from the brain. Nerveimpulsesare inherently digital.

author: SiliconWizard
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 15, 2022, 09:25:01 pm
content: 42.

author: tggzzz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 15, 2022, 09:31:29 pm
content: Quote from: SiliconWizard on May 15, 2022, 09:25:01 pm"Mu" is better.

author: SiliconWizard
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 15, 2022, 11:19:02 pm
content: Quote from: tggzzz on May 15, 2022, 09:31:29 pmBut 42 is even.

author: fourierpwn
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: May 16, 2022, 01:09:22 am
content: This thread is dumb, as is my response.

author: TimFox
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 16, 2022, 02:03:04 am
content: Quote from: tggzzz on May 15, 2022, 09:00:08 pmActually, the ear is a Fourier analyzer, and the nerve bundle to the brain is frequency encoded.

author: tggzzz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 16, 2022, 08:06:42 am
content: Quote from: TimFox on May 16, 2022, 02:03:04 amThe amplitude of each frequency is digitally encoded as a pulse density modulated bitstream signal. Yes, I know that's abitsimplistic, but it is not abaddescription.

author: coppice
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 16, 2022, 08:55:39 am
content: In the 70s it was cool to be digital, as it was really hard to do things digitally. Gradually it became easier to do a wide range of things digitally, the stuff most engineers found really hard (like DSP) became reusable packages, and there was something of a revitalisation of analogue as the clever stuff only a niche group of engineers was good at. Its surprising how few semiconductor vendors really excel at analogue any more, and its usually for places digital can't go, like super low noise signal conditioning. Still, they are enough to serve the market.

author: tggzzz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 16, 2022, 09:02:58 am
content: Quote from: coppice on May 16, 2022, 08:55:39 amTry finding a new high frequency PNP transistor; the old ones were better. Even JFETs are becoming rarer.

author: Capernicus
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: May 16, 2022, 11:03:47 am
content: digital computers put log complexity on what analogue does.Analogue works in a single bus, to do its arithmetic, you can do multiplies with voltage dividers, takes up alot less space.It makes way more sense to make an analogue computer than a digital one when it comes to space takeup.Analogue pong is 10 times smaller than digital pong.

author: m k
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 16, 2022, 12:19:46 pm
content: Quote from: TimFox on May 15, 2022, 02:02:11 pmSo the wave function is not real.Can two low energy photons that can't release an electron become one high energy photon that can?

author: TimFox
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 16, 2022, 01:36:47 pm
content: That would not conserve charge.

author: m k
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 16, 2022, 03:32:47 pm
content: What is a free electron then, and how close is closest of really close?

author: TimFox
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 16, 2022, 03:33:51 pm
content: Quote from: m k on May 16, 2022, 03:32:47 pmCould you rephrase that?The question sounds like a Monty Python sketch.

author: m k
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 16, 2022, 04:00:22 pm
content: Maybe it is.It tried to elevate a casual reader thinking what is isolated system and how a boson is not occupying a space.And then finally you explaining it all.E,time something.

author: coppice
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 16, 2022, 04:11:56 pm
content: Quote from: tggzzz on May 16, 2022, 09:02:58 amThe only individual transistors any serious resources are put into these days are power devices. Transistors you can't get that you could before probably stopped selling well. Whether its digital or analogue design, almost all serious circuit design these days is at the IC level.

author: CatalinaWOW
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 16, 2022, 04:52:18 pm
content: Digital has taken over electronics because the cost of building and connecting transistors and to a lesser extent diodes, resistors and capacitors has dropped through the floor. A single transistor in a large CPU or memory chip literally costs less than a millionth of a cent. As a result many of the problems which used to be done "analog" are cheaper and easier to implement in digital form.But analog remains cool. Many of the reasons have been enumerated in prior posts. Another which has not been mentioned is that with enough creativity and effort complex results can be achieved with very simple circuits. If you are willing to embrace non-linear effects much can be accomplished with one or two transistors. Only rarely will these solutions be widely applied because large scale manufacture is difficult. But nothing can replace the satisfaction of doing something unique.

author: free_electron
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 16, 2022, 04:56:20 pm
content: the problem with analog is power consumption. all these half states burn energy.digital ( between clock transients ) consumes next to nothing

author: SiliconWizard
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 16, 2022, 06:29:16 pm
content: Quote from: coppice on May 16, 2022, 08:55:39 amWas it? Every idiot can count to one.

author: coppice
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 16, 2022, 07:42:47 pm
content: Quote from: SiliconWizard on May 16, 2022, 06:29:16 pmYet hardly anyone could do anything complex digitally, and most analogue people were scared to even try. Doing DSP in the 1970s had most analogue people treating you like a wizard.

author: TimFox
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 16, 2022, 08:30:33 pm
content: Years ago, when analog computing was just getting good and digital computing was still clunky, there was a saying that a digital computation was fast to set up and slow to operate, but that an analog computation was slow to set up (pots, jumper wires, etc.) yet gave the result almost immediately.Back in 1968, one of my professors set up a vacuum-tube Heathkit analog computer (simple 6AN8 op amps) to show a ball bounce across the screen of an X-Y oscilloscope. Since the negative excursion was clipped, the ball flattened when it touched the imaginary floor.

author: RJSV
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 19, 2022, 12:23:49 am
content: I'm thinking, (bot or no), that WORD maybe got hijacked, to mean in current day:'Something contrary, to social trends and technology,and often associated with counter cultural music.'Makes me recall, the whole 1996 Seattle grunge thing. In this sense, the technology definition gets lost, I.E. the continuous nature, of analog signals.

author: boB
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: May 19, 2022, 01:11:28 am
content: Quote from: Nusa on May 14, 2022, 07:07:23 pmUnless you get a flat tire. But even then, they are only digital on one side

author: schmitt trigger
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 19, 2022, 01:51:55 am
content: Quote from: boB on May 19, 2022, 01:11:28 amThey become stuck in a low state.

author: Capernicus
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: May 19, 2022, 02:40:05 am
content: Quote from: CatalinaWOW on May 16, 2022, 04:52:18 pmI still think if its home made, analogue is the way to go, digital is actually harder if ur doing it yourself... if u know how to do it analogue, its less parts.Maybe its more taxing on the mind tho? and counting to 1 is easier mathematically.

author: ataradov
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 19, 2022, 02:43:14 am
content: Quote from: Capernicus on May 19, 2022, 02:40:05 amShow us the most complicated analog design of yours or stop spreading this nonsense.Analog is only less parts for absolutely trivial stuff.

author: Nothing
author_rank: Newbie
timestamp: May 19, 2022, 02:57:27 am
content: I'm not sure where you're seeing people raving about analog. Or what analog circuits in particular you're talking about. Whether it's in the context of audio, which I can understand. Or if it's just in terms of whether analog circuits are better than digital circuits in general. In which case I say apples and oranges. There are some applications that analog circuits are better suited for and likewise there are applications digital circuits are better suited for. You're probably not going to be a digit differentiator or integrator. And likewise, an analog logic gate is not very practical. (analog computers don't use any such logic in, general.

author: Capernicus
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: May 19, 2022, 06:07:02 am
content: Quote from: ataradov on May 19, 2022, 02:43:14 amcompare an analogue divider to a digital divider. i rest my case.as long as its a mathematical operation, analogue will completely destroy the digital equivilent, its only when the compute becomes boolean where they are the same.

author: ataradov
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 19, 2022, 06:10:46 am
content: What case? What divider? You are a just a troll.

author: Capernicus
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: May 19, 2022, 06:19:04 am
content: if you just have two wires, some of current goes down, and some goes down the other in 2 weighted components of the original amount of electricity.And some could possibly say... it could be a division, not just a virtual division, but a division in the practical universe. happening actually physically, something has divided!And u can take advantage of that, to compute things with.And thats the what the difference is, between hardware and software.

author: tggzzz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 19, 2022, 07:31:48 am
content: Quote from: coppice on May 16, 2022, 07:42:47 pmOr stating that what you were going to achieve was impossible. Classic example was using a signal that was buried in the noise - or at leastlookedthat way if you didn't understand the meaning of signal in Shannon's equation. Still looks like magic on a scope

author: rsjsouza
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 19, 2022, 10:53:08 am
content: Quote from: tggzzz on May 16, 2022, 09:02:58 amThe golden parts still exist but are inside ICs, where it is easier to refine a circuit when you have complete control of all its surrounding parts as well.

author: tggzzz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 19, 2022, 11:44:35 am
content: Quote from: rsjsouza on May 19, 2022, 10:53:08 amif you can't see and use a tree in a forest, does it exist? Or something like that

author: rsjsouza
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 19, 2022, 12:33:26 pm
content: Quote from: tggzzz on May 19, 2022, 11:44:35 amThey are mere projections on a wall, where you can only see their effects but not interact with them directly...

author: Siwastaja
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 19, 2022, 12:45:44 pm
content: Quote from: ataradov on May 19, 2022, 06:10:46 amI don't think it's a troll, it's either a computer program (a bot) or a mental health case, and the fact this auto-nonsense-generation bot is still running after more than a year of non-stop nonsense, tells a lot about the nonexistence of moderation on this forum.

author: tooki
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 25, 2022, 01:30:45 am
content: Quote from: Capernicus on May 16, 2022, 11:03:47 amUtter nonsense. You can do digital pong in a single IC these days if you want. Implemented as an ASIC, it could be small enough to be nearly invisible.If analog computers made any sense any more, we’d still make them. On the contrary, they went extinct decades ago.

author: vk6zgo
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 25, 2022, 01:53:25 am
content: Quote from: tggzzz on May 16, 2022, 09:02:58 amAnd try mentioning MOSFETs to the youngsters of today, & they think you are referring to big, clunky power switching devices. Most of my old ham stuff has a multitude of dual gate MOSFETs in the RF/IF.

author: SL4P
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 25, 2022, 03:12:16 am
content: Think,of analog TV vs digital…You remember the ‘ghosts’ of multi path reception..?Moving to digital brought the ‘digital cliff’ which introduced the concept of it works, or it doesn’t.The signal integrity is guaranteed from end to end with digital, but may be compromised in a million ways with an analog signal.Apart from reflections, consider noise, gai and other transient interruptions and distortion if the input signal before it gets to the output.

author: james_s
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 25, 2022, 03:53:12 am
content: Analog TV was in many ways superior, I haven't watched broadcast TV in quite a few years but I played with it when digital first appeared and marveled at the picture quality when conditions were ideal but when they are not ideal the picture drops out completely or gets severely distorted with the audio cutting out and that is far more annoying than a little snow. It's largely the reason portable TVs are not really a thing anymore. Given most people don't even know you can receive HD channels over the air I think they should have just kept the analog broadcasts going and used digital on cable and satellite services. Billions of perfectly good devices were rendered next to useless when analog was switched off and for what?

author: Nusa
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 25, 2022, 05:53:38 am
content: Quote from: james_s on May 25, 2022, 03:53:12 amThe real business goal here was to reclaim the large amount of bandwidth that analog channels required for many more digital channels.As for perfectly good analog-only devices, the irony here is that basic cable boxes still support them! Digital to the box and tuner, analog to the TV.

author: james_s
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 25, 2022, 06:38:01 am
content: Quote from: Nusa on May 25, 2022, 05:53:38 amSure but most of what I'm talking about are all the portable TVs, digital is useless for portable for the reasons I mentioned. Then there is the annoying slow tuning, younger folks might not remember how you used to be able to rapidly flip between channels, now most TVs/boxes take a second to a few seconds to lock after each tuning step, it's annoying.

author: tggzzz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 25, 2022, 07:24:04 am
content: Quote from: SL4P on May 25, 2022, 03:12:16 amNot quite. Poor signal integrity occurs for, amongst others, the reasons you mention in your last paragraph.Digital fails when there is poor signal integrity, even if there is good signal strength; hence the "signal strength" and "signal quality" indicators.It is normal to use analogue measurements to assess and assure signal integrity in a system, and once assured, flip to using digital measurements in the digital signal domain.

author: tggzzz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 25, 2022, 07:28:43 am
content: Quote from: Nusa on May 25, 2022, 05:53:38 amIt was noticeable that, when TV companies had a choice between improved pictures and more channels, they mostly choose more channels. That's because in their mind, more channels => more advertising slots => more revenue.That was shortsighted of course, since it opens the door to other industries with higher resolution pictures. Fortunately in the UK there are eight free over-the-air HD channels available.

author: Siwastaja
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 25, 2022, 07:31:37 am
content: Quote from: james_s on May 25, 2022, 03:53:12 amIt's the usual story of greed. I remember the early days of DVB here, in early years of 2000. During late 1990's, analog cable services replaced terrestrial at higher rate anybody expected, except for countryside of course. Analog TV picture quality was at its peak in year 2000. (Here, compared to the USA, it helps to know PAL has a tad higher definition and absence of color shifts, compared to NTSC; at the expense of more flickery picture due to only 50Hz refresh rate.) Picture quality was basically just fine. Only SD, but equivalent to approx. 500x550 pixels, and with absolutely no compression artifacts.But exactly because the lack of compression, analog requires so much bandwidth. With digital, you can do all fancy tricks like runningmacroblocksthroughdiscrete cosine transformationto remove a lot of data with only minor perceivable difference. Better yet, you can compare adjacent frames and calculatemotion vectorsso that full image data doesn't need to be stored in every frame. Compared to analog, this is quite some UFO tech. Those days, the compression standard was called MPEG-2, and the bottom line, as shown by the official DVB design documents, it could squeeze the required bandwidth down by 50%-66%, enabling one TV channel to be replaced by 2-3without perceivable degradation in image quality. That's just HUGE.But then, enter the greed. Instead of 5-6 channels (for a small country) with mediocre to good content, what if we come up with 10-15 channels more, they can just broadcast teleshopping infomercials and other crap you can get broadcasting rights to for basically free because no one wants to watch it.So we ended up with bundles where one analog TV channel was replaced with 8-10 MPEG-2 DVB channels, for which the system was not engineered for. So the image quality dropped to something comparable to avideo CD, or early day Youtube, and it did not take many years to Youtube actually surpass the TV image quality.Simultaneously, enter massive technical problems regarding soft subtitles, screen aspect ratios, reliability in general - and of course people who cared about technical details (for example, wanted to enjoy a good movie) were extremely pissed - the whole DVB transition made the televisiontechnically worsethan what analog was.And it was all because of greedy management and their stupid ideas - not digital transmission itself.

author: jonovid
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 25, 2022, 07:41:41 am
content: if the world was digital it would be like minecraft only at a higher resolution.

author: magic
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 25, 2022, 08:01:05 am
content: Quote from: tggzzz on May 25, 2022, 07:28:43 amDo you mean the channels you are forced to buy when they find out that you own a TV?

author: tggzzz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 25, 2022, 09:09:10 am
content: Quote from: magic on May 25, 2022, 08:01:05 amAny device used as a TV, actuallyMost people - other than politicians - are grateful for them and think they are an important part of local culture.I made a mistake; there are 9 freeview channels, 5 of which are not BBC.

author: tooki
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 25, 2022, 11:03:22 am
content: Quote from: vk6zgo on May 25, 2022, 01:53:25 amOh please. I hate hearing people talk down about young people. There’s no reason to make that assumption. I think it’s reasonable to assume that anyone learning EE now is going to learn that the CMOS technology practically all modern ICs are made with are based on the MOSFET.

author: m k
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 25, 2022, 12:17:18 pm
content: Quote from: magic on May 25, 2022, 08:01:05 amHere we pay also for their web content.Taxman is collecting and it's a separated line in tax assessment.It's also progressive so lowest income folks are not paying but I wouldn't say they are avoiding it.And broadcast signal itself is still analog, and contains parallel data.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orthogonal_frequency-division_multiplexinghttps://rfmw.em.keysight.com/wireless/helpfiles/89600b/webhelp/subsystems/wlan-ofdm/content/ofdm_basicprinciplesoverview.htm

author: rsjsouza
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 25, 2022, 12:23:08 pm
content: Quote from: tooki on May 25, 2022, 11:03:22 amI agree. You would be surprised of how many interns and new hires on my company have deep roots in analog design.

author: coppice
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 25, 2022, 03:21:48 pm
content: Quote from: SL4P on May 25, 2022, 03:12:16 amI'm not sure of your point there. In the last years of analogue TV they used DSP techniques, akin to echo cancellation, to remove the ghosts from analogue TV signals, so it became a non-issue.

author: james_s
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 25, 2022, 06:15:28 pm
content: Quote from: rsjsouza on May 25, 2022, 12:23:08 pmA few years ago I interviewed at a place that was having a great deal of trouble finding young grads with any analog background. I ended up pulling out due to the commute it would have been, and I was surprised they sounded disappointed and said I was easily the most qualified candidate despite not being a degreed engineer. Maybe things have changed but for a while at least finding young people with an interest in analog really was difficult. Everyone wants to play with microcontrollers.

author: coppice
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 25, 2022, 06:17:33 pm
content: Quote from: rsjsouza on May 25, 2022, 12:23:08 pmHow does an intern have deep roots in anything? Do you have middle aged interns?

author: snarkysparky
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: May 25, 2022, 07:59:59 pm
content: One thing about digital. A signal can be transmitted noise free for any arbitrary distance. It just needs repeaters to reliably recover the data stream from the acquired noise and retransmit a brand spanking new fresh copy.I don't actually think this is true but it's sonethin to think about

author: TimFox
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 25, 2022, 08:02:27 pm
content: Quote from: snarkysparky on May 25, 2022, 07:59:59 pmFor digital transmission down a long noisy path, some type of error correction is required to recover and re-transmit the data reliably: this can reduce the error rate to an acceptable level (but not zero).

author: rsjsouza
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 25, 2022, 08:27:31 pm
content: Quote from: coppice on May 25, 2022, 06:17:33 pmHahahaha! I guess I used the wrong expression. What I meant was that not only they had their feet wet in analog (worked in labs and had discrete design experience) but had the eagerness to learn on that area.Quite a few mentioned they liked analog simply due to digital exhaustion: it seems that, sinceeveryonewas talking digital, they saw this as an opportunity to have a differentiated expertise.One detail, though: the number of "analog" new people was still a fraction of the "digital" people.

author: james_s
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 25, 2022, 08:33:13 pm
content: Quote from: Siwastaja on May 25, 2022, 07:31:37 amI remember the first time I saw a PAL-50 TV I *really* noticed the flicker, but I suppose it's one of those things you get used to when you see it all the time, and I have always been sensitive to flicker. The PAL color encoding was arguably superior, although in practice by the 80s or so TVs had gotten good enough so as to make this much less of an issue, NTSC analog TVs could have very good color, and once you set the tint control properly it was stable and not something you had to mess with again. PAL still had the advantage of not having this adjustment at all and not needing it but all things considered I don't think one system was clearly superior to the other, they both did the job.I have noticed that with digital as well, instead of offering a high definition picture they tend to cram in more channels. The same is true of the "HD Radio" in the USA which is largely a scam, not being high quality at all, but just allowing more channels to be crammed into the same bandwidth, and the kicker is that here it is a totally closed proprietary system that never really caught on outside of car radios.

author: daqq
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 25, 2022, 08:40:25 pm
content: Quote from: dastructhm on May 14, 2022, 01:32:54 amIf you have to ask the question, you wouldn't understand the answer.

author: vk6zgo
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 26, 2022, 01:22:03 am
content: Quote from: tooki on May 25, 2022, 11:03:22 amIt was a bit "tongue in cheek", harking back to "The Three Yorkshiremen", but I was referring to discrete MOSFETs.Over the time I have been on this forum, I have not seen any reference to MOSFETs in that context here, (apart from when I have referred to them), other than the power devices.

author: Siwastaja
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 26, 2022, 09:06:19 am
content: Quote from: james_s on May 25, 2022, 08:33:13 pmYeah, I guess the "Never The Same Color" issue was pretty much solved, well enough for casual viewer anyway. There was also PAL60, basically with North American B&W timing (resolution and refresh rate) but with PAL color system. And my TV supported it so I did some side-by-side visual comparisons. The 50Hz flicker wasn't so bad IMHO, and I really liked the better resolution of PAL. In digital terms, NTSC content was produced in 640x480, and PAL content in 768x576.I could guess that CRT tubes designed for 50Hz market used slower phosphors to compensate for the flicker, but I'm not sure. In any case, a computer CRT monitor at 60Hz seemed to flickermorethan a CRT TV at 50Hz - definitely a phosphor difference!I think, IIRC, different countries also had different bandwidths (and different color carrier frequencies) for the picture, affecting horizontal resolution, UK being the best where good analog signal really was pretty close touncompresseddigital 768x576. So digital television was a real image quality degradation for many, which lasted for a long time before HD channels become commonplace. And still with HD, greed dominates and bitrate might be just too slow - looks great for stationary images, but add a lot of movement, changing texture like rain, and the quality totally breaks apart below the old analog TV.

author: tooki
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 26, 2022, 11:48:37 am
content: Quote from: vk6zgo on May 26, 2022, 01:22:03 amWell, honestly, isn’t that completely sensible? Where else would you use a discrete MOSFET these days? Even the smallest modern MOSFETs can switch surprisingly large currents, and for signals, you’re unlikely to use a discrete transistor (of any kind). Ham radio is a vanishingly small part of electronics these days. Heck, outside of digital wireless protocols (Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, cellular, lorawan, etc), all of which we implement using off-the-shelf modules, radio is of practically no importance in modern electronics.

author: tooki
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 26, 2022, 11:52:21 am
content: Quote from: Siwastaja on May 26, 2022, 09:06:19 amMaybe, but I doubt it. I think it’s more that the types of images we viewed on computer CRTs — documents, data, user interfaces — make us notice the flicker more. Video masks flicker to an extent.

author: tooki
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 26, 2022, 11:55:26 am
content: Quote from: Siwastaja on May 26, 2022, 09:06:19 amNo. Digital NTSC video was 720x480.

author: Siwastaja
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 26, 2022, 01:40:19 pm
content: Quote from: tooki on May 26, 2022, 11:55:26 amNo. Digital video has always been produced in many different resolutions, including 640x480 (NTSC), 720x480 (NTSC), 720x576 (PAL) and 768x576 (PAL) being some of the most typical. There is no single resolution.The purpose of my comment, which you took outside of context, was to explain the bandwidth difference in digital terms. PAL has higher video bandwidth which also translates into slightly better horizontal resolution, so using more pixels for it makes sense. 640x480 (NTSC) and 768x576 (PAL) happen to use square pixels for 4:3 material, which makes them less confusing. Their horizontal pixel count difference also roughly captures the analog performance difference.Towards end of the SD video era, most formats and processed converged to 720x480 or 720x576. Neither have square pixels.

author: tooki
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 26, 2022, 03:40:43 pm
content: Quote from: Siwastaja on May 26, 2022, 01:40:19 pmSorry, I know what I’m talking about, and you’re also wrong about the history of the resolutions.Don’t confuse the square-pixel display resolutions on computers with the actual resolutions used in NTSC and PAL digital video formats. FYI, the “display” pixel ratios are called the “display aspect ratio” and the ones actually stored are the “storage aspect ratio”.The first digital video formateveron the market was D1 videotape (1986), which used 720x486 for NTSC and 720x576 for PAL, in both cases a storage aspect ratio of 5:4. Only much later, when digital videodistributionon computers became common, did any square-pixel formats become commonplace. But in production, the actual native storage aspect ratios are used.768x576 is thedisplayresolution when scaling the non-square storage pixels of 720x576 up to 4:3 aspect ratio using square pixels and keeping the 576px dimension untouched. Many computer video playback apps don’t report the storage resolution, instead displaying the already-scaled display resolution, which is why people mistakenly think that 640x480 NTSC and 768x576 PAL are a thing. It didn’t help that when converting to most compressed video formats, the compressor often scales to square pixels and then compresses that. But again, those were never the production resolutions.Note that the resolutions are defined in broadcast standards, likeSMPTE 259M. “There is no single resolution” is fundamentally incorrect.If you calculate the horizontal x vertical resolution x frame rate to get a pixel rate per second, you’ll find that 720x486x29.97 and 720x576x25 are very, very similar. 768x576x25 would require about 25% more.(Many later digital video standards did adopt 720x480 for NTSC, dropping 6 lines to get a number cleanly divisible by 8. 576 is already divisible by 8 so it was left alone.)

author: Siwastaja
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 26, 2022, 04:02:57 pm
content: Yet I did own a fairly expensive A/D D/A digital video interface card, for digital video production, that used 768x576 with hardware MJPEG codec, somewhere mid-1990's. Definitely not SMPTE 259M, but why does this matter? Is there a law which defines what "digital video production" means? I have done a lot of digital video production in whatever resolutions. Now for interfacing with others, the choice will be more limited, but I said production, not distribution. So you are just plain wrong.There are as many official standards, and industry standards, as one wishes.But I understand your issue. I originally was unclear, with the intention of discussing the effect of BW put in digital terms - much like one says "C cassette is 6 bits" without it actually having bits -, but I was not clear enough that I meant this. Then you aggressively reply, and posting in a hurry, make a factual mistake in process, which I correct just for fun, but then you are too proud about your experience that you forget that maybe others also know what they are talking about.But don't worry. It doesn't matter. I know very well you know what you are talking about. I know it because I know what I'm talking about, too. And thanks for good additional information.Edit:QuoteAnd, surprise surprise, PAL has 5.0MHz of video BW, whereas NTSC has 4.2MHz; PAL has 19% more. This is exactly the point I was making with the resolutions. 640x480 vs. 768x576 reflects the difference in amount of pixels actuallyneededto represent the analog BW, and they arealsoresolutions that were actually used in video production, albeit not the most common ones. Heck, I used them in video production. One example is enough to prove they were used.

author: Terry Bites
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 26, 2022, 05:07:32 pm
content: The notions of logic and digital are not necessarily interchangeable terms. Logic is philosophical idea with a mathematical expression, while digital refers to a technology made of real stuff. So just because something is logical doesn’t imply its digital in nature. The universe has logic in the "laws" we have contrived to understand it, but that doesn't make it digital. Analog clocks are not illogical. Logical bits are an abstraction- they don't have a mass a charge a location in spacetime or any other physical property. Freaky.On its way to our screens data has only ever existed as an analogue in stuff. Which is stuff made of atoms made of atom gizzards made of fluctuations in fields, all real stuff.Analog technologyuses analogues of real stuff with other real stuff. Then the stuff performs mathematical operations. It doesn't use numerical methods to approximate a result. I'm likely prejudiced against of digital systems because being more than a little dyslexic, I can’t code for shit. Still horses for courses.Thisisthe immersive experience in the analog Matrix right here, right now.Just sayin'

author: vk6zgo
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 27, 2022, 03:12:22 am
content: Quote from: tooki on May 26, 2022, 11:48:37 amSo you have become "module jockeys?"Free to air broadcast radio & TV still exists, & Transmitters have long lifetimes, so for people involved in that industry, there is quite a lot of "legacy" stuff, still using some discretes.Signals can be surprisingly high power, & RF power amps still in use from 2000 to 2014 or so definitely used discrete LDMOS devices, usually as twoseparatedevices in the same package.The two amps are connected in parallel, then the outputs of several of those pairs are in turn paralleled & so on.I had occasion to work on some 2kW transmitters which were used in a SIMS application. I had to individually sweep each discrete amplifier, & match the frequency response to within 1dB, or they would kill the combiner unbalance loads-----AAAARRRRGGGGHHH!

author: tooki
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 27, 2022, 03:07:40 pm
content: Quote from: Siwastaja on May 26, 2022, 04:02:57 pmI wasn’t aggressive, I was simply direct. (Something you do all the time, and it’s fine.) You made a statement that NTSC was produced in ONE resolution which is NOT the resolutionwithin the digital standards for that analog broadcast standard.That’s what I am disputing. You didn’t say “was often” or anything like that. You made a 1:1 association, and that’s incorrect. CertainlyIam not “just plain wrong” because you then had to backtrack to a mushier definition of what you meant.As for the issue of resolvable image detain within a frame (what you apparently meant to say, but wasn’t what you actually said), of course you’re absolutely right: PAL has more than NTSC.

author: tooki
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 27, 2022, 03:11:30 pm
content: Quote from: vk6zgo on May 27, 2022, 03:12:22 amSo… you’re complaining that young people think of discrete MOSFETs for power applications, and now you’re explaining that one still encounters modern and legacy discrete MOSFETs in… power applications? What am I missing here? What’s bothering you, if young people are only talking about discrete MOSFETs in the situations where one encounters them?!?P.S. Why are you accusing me of becoming a module jockey? I’m not a kid, far from it.

author: vk6zgo
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 28, 2022, 02:14:53 am
content: Quote from: tooki on May 27, 2022, 03:11:30 pmYes, you are right---I should have qualified that by saying "Power switching" situations.Except for those talking about legacy audio, (& even that is rare, many of the analog "audiophiles" seem to be tube enthusiasts) I haven't seen anyone mention MOSFETS in any analog capacity, as distinct from switching, on this forum for years."Module jockey?"-------well, you did use the term "we", so I assumed you were one of the group of people who use modules, "kid" or not!In any case, I am a very "Old Fart", so you would probably seem "young-ish" to me!

author: tooki
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 28, 2022, 08:09:32 am
content: Quote from: vk6zgo on May 28, 2022, 02:14:53 amOops, my mistake! When I said “we”, I was thinking (but didn’t state) “we” the electronics industry today, as a whole. I should have been clearer!Well, according to others I do look young for my age, so thanks! :p (I’m 42 now, but around 3 years ago, on my last real travels, some drunk girls thought I was 25! Oh, what beer goggles can do! 🤣 But I do get routinely pegged at early 30s.)As forMOSFETs, I don’t think there’s any doubt that the vast majority of them today are optimized for switching applications. Both asa cause and consequence of that, as we do more things with switching (e.g. how both power supplies and audio amps have gone largely switching), MOSFETs operated in the ohmic region become rarer and rarer. (Ironically, the 20 year old Sony (linear) power amp right next to me is MOSFET based.)I’m partway through a formal electronics program right now (one year and change to go) and it surprises me how much focus is placed on BJT calculations (both linear and switching applications), while in practice we encounter (switching) MOSFETs much more often. (We also did linear JFET calculations.)I suppose that with the efficiency gains from switching operation and the relative cheapness of digital circuitry to control it, linear is going to get used even less in the future, though it certainly won’t ever disappear. I mean, who would have predicted 50 years ago that it would make sense at all, never mind becheaper, to perform radio reception in software?

author: magic
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 28, 2022, 08:26:29 am
content: Quote from: vk6zgo on May 28, 2022, 02:14:53 amPower MOSFET oscillators or attempted dummy loads appear every few months

author: AndyBeez
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: May 28, 2022, 09:11:15 pm
content: Quote from: dastructhm on May 14, 2022, 01:32:54 amI've been pondering all week how to reply to the OP?I could mention the analog/analogue joy of superheterodyne receivers or, the harmonic enigma of the lissajous figure drawn on a pure analogue oscilloscope. But there is a thing that analogue does that digital will never do better.This......the moving iron VU Meter. Stick it on any front panel and it saysclass.VU Meter:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VU_meterSuperheterodyne Receiver:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superheterodyne_receiverThe Lissajous thing:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lissajous_curve

author: Tomorokoshi
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 29, 2022, 03:47:01 am
content: marantz VU meter.

author: rsjsouza
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 29, 2022, 11:50:19 am
content: Not as great of a picture (photogram of a short clip of mine), but a parallel association of four in a reel-to-reel quadraphonic deck is quite an analog beauty. Looking at a Reel-ro-reel in operation is also quite the sight - I am pretty sure you can find various Techmoan videos (this short clip of mineshows the aforementioned Akai in operation).

author: coppice
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 29, 2022, 12:15:31 pm
content: Quote from: rsjsouza on May 29, 2022, 11:50:19 amIts strange how many of those quadraphonic reel to reel machines were made without the simul-sync switches that Teac used to make their recorders great for semi-pro music recording. Most quadraphonic machines sold in tiny numbers, but the Teacs had that ace up their sleeve that gave them access to a much bigger market.

author: rsjsouza
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 29, 2022, 01:45:35 pm
content: Quote from: coppice on May 29, 2022, 12:15:31 pmCoppice, thanks for the mention of Simul-sync - I had to look it up.The GX-270D-SS has a similar feature but named Quadra-sync, which I recall let us do quite some interesting mixing, and even letting us play tracks in reverse to find out about those subliminal messages in popular music.I recall that my dad had some ancient (for the time) mono tapes with four sides. Good times.

author: Bud
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 01, 2022, 02:36:48 am
content: Quote

author: tooki
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 01, 2022, 10:42:55 am
content: The fact that that’s only slightly harder than for software and embedded makes me think it’s not actually that hard compared to the MCU-based digital stuff the analog graybeards like to complain about so much.

author: tggzzz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 01, 2022, 10:55:53 am
content: Quote from: tooki on June 01, 2022, 10:42:55 amIt is, of course, also helpful to know the absolute number of vacancies as well as the relative number.