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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 6 ต.ค. 2020
- Thirty years ago, no studio would be without the Atari ST: it’s role in music represented a tour de force of design, low-cost and reliability. I even used one at university to do 16-bit audio editing: there was an added massive hard disk drive of 200 MB (0.2 GB or 0.0002 TB!). It did take a while to do edits though, with its 8 MHz clock speed being a little on the slow side...
Put it with Cubase version 2 however, and get it to do its MIDI duties, and it stands up to modern computing, a bit like the Morris Minor of 1949 keeping up with modern traffic conditions...
In this video, I do a quick recording session, where the keyboard goes into the computer via MIDI, and then the computer outputs the piano data on any of the 16 MIDi channels. The output of the computer feeds a multi-timbral sound module, where any of the instruments built in can be assigned to any of the 16 channels. The resulting audio comes out of two jacks, left and right, and there you have your sounds.
Later on in the session, I decide to record audio (vocal mic), but of course the Atari can’t do that: instead, it outputs MIDI time code (MTC), which can be read and understood by a hard disk multitrack recorder, in this case the veritable Fostex D-160. The Fostex recorder sees the time on the Atari and locks itself to it. The setup is then 16 MIDI channels and 16 audio channels. That’s quite enough for most purposes.
To cap it off, the overall mix is sent to an analogue reel-to-reel tape recorder, which was what happened back in the day...
Enjoy and Share!
To all those over 40: reminisce, while those under 40 will say “why would you use this stuff today?”. My answer is that to fully understand modern DAW, one needs to know where we came from...
www.danbaker-music.com
www.music-recording-experienc...
#Atari
#AtariST
#AtariCubase
#danbakermusician - เพลง
OMG, iam so thankful for this Time Journey....!
Almost 40 Years ago ive bought my first Atari
with Cubase 1 ! It was a Dream for me and ive
composed many Tracks with my KORG M1 Synth.
That was pure magic (: Many Thanks my Friend.
😀😀😇😇😇😇💫💫💛💛💛👌👌🙏🙏
I feel the pain. I remember my Atari ST as a major upgrade. I actually started writing music for a C64 game in 85... I did not keep the gear, my mistake. Thanks for the good memories...
Wow great memories.. I was a Sound Engineer in the early 90s. We used this sort of system a bit but it quickly turned into DAW with Sound Tools / Pro Tools and recording digitally on things like the Alesis 8 track SVHS machines. Later I worked on tv shows were we used SMPTE code for everything. All syncd video machines and analog tape machines. Worked pretty reliably day to day.. somehow.
I began my music / audio career back in 1989 on the Atari 1040 STE! Happy days! :)
I bought the Atari ST in 1986, and I bought some horrible MIDI software (can't remember the name), but the world changed when I got Cubase and the beautiful monochrome monitor. The advent of the timeline was so obvious once it appeared, but someone had to make it happen. I think that was Steinberg, but it was certainly the first time I'd seen anything like it, and it felt like science fiction.
It was Steinberg who was first doing that tapemachine timeline with bars thing.
@@Magnus_Loov Yeah, it was Cubase I think. It was all so long ago!
I much prefer the software GUI on the ATARI ST and old MAC machines from the late 80's/early 90's (MAC Plus/SE/Classic/II series). So much more inspiring and exciting. I could look at those monochrome graphics all day, I love them. There seemed to be much more advanced interfacing with hardware synthesizers and samplers than exists with today's machines. The ST's built in MIDI ports, combined with its sequencers which in most cases concentrated almost solely on MIDI, had vastly superior MIDI timing than any new DAW and newer MIDI interface.
Except the interfacing is much, much more advanced today with great built in support for an extreme amount of controllers, editors in vst-instruments for hardware Synths etc.
I loved Cubase & my Atari ST. Was into making dance music from my bedroom. Never got anywhere but hours of fun.
It was amazing;C65,Pro16,Atari St with Pro24 and Cubase....until now with Cubase 11 on Pc´s....great Ideas,better times!
This vid is pure gold. Really an awesome demostration. Greetz from Chile.
As a non-musician who used to be a synth nut back in the 80s I really appreciate this bit of insight into how this stuff actually worked.
Yep. I remember having to do all that. I started doing it again a couple of years ago, syncing Pro Tools as a slave to time code striped on my Reel to Reel to get that 'tape vibe' on my bass and some drum tracks -- until the plugins got so good at replicating that sound that there's really no point in doing it anymore! IK's tape plugins are amazing.
My atari 1040 stf with MIDEX+ and cubase 3,1 was synced to a g24s fostex 1 inch 24 track tape machine! And ofcourse many synths, samplers and modules! Beautiful years with real hardware stuff!
Mad how Mj Cole made sincere on this & cubase 🔥
A delight from start to finish. The nostalgia for the days of Atari STs etc. I am amazed what you achieved with 3 MIDI tracks and a vocal. Since I first owned an STFM, I had intended to have a go but never really got around to it. More fool me!
I love how you look like a kid in a lolly-shop with those facial expressions
.... I still have all my ATARI gear circa 1989 & I'm guilty of being one of those ummm, 'hoarders' who doesn't want to let it go.
Good presentation as usual mate
... Joe all the way from Tasmania/Australia
I worked for about 5 years with ST and Cubase in my own studio, producing music and some more. Was amazing!
wasnt in the 80eeeez though probably 1989, or early 90ies? correct?
@@techreviewz87 thats right! Late 80s, early 90s...
@@FeedBackMain Very late 80:s. Cubase was released in the summer of 89...
I don't think you've looked so happy in a video before Dan, you are loving it!!!
Great job.
Atari forever!
Awesome...the quantize brought me here, wishing for older days when todays ableton quantize isn'tt 1/10th of what oldschool cubase quantize was....utter shit. So simple so good!
Boy didn't I churn out tracks with my Atari Mega STe running Cubase. Rock solid system. And a massive upgrade from Dr T's KCS on an Amiga 500.
awsome thanks for sharing some of how the magic is made
Will definitely try this out with my own Atari ST, some MIDI keyboard and maybe an MT-32. :)
Thank you for taking the time to record these! 100yrs from now, we’ll have your time capsule to look back on.
Edith Bunker voice..."those were the days". Had the 1040st, the matching monitor, running cubase. motu midi interface and Korg O1/Wfd, Roland XP80, printing to a Tascam 8 track machine. Made my first album on this set up and felt like a pro and ahead of the times since most kats making music didn't have anything more than a drum machine to make music at that time. Good times for sure!
Good times and creative times. All the decisions that had to be made along the way....
There's something romantic and inspiring about recording the old way. Add an Akai sampler, gated reverbs and a Juno and you got yourself an 80's hit.
I have spent so many hours behind one of these,nice to seeing you again my old friend
Great demo!
Good video, Dan. Makes me thankful for modern-day DAWs
ATARI should remake the Falcon ST cheaply using a single board computer with all the original MIDI and other inputs/outputs . Just for the musicians . It should sell well .
That was a cool insight to old tech cheers
THANK YOU!
It was thanks to the Atari I got into this.
In the "Pre DAW" aera I was using an Atari a MIDEX synchronizer, a Tascam DA-88 and an Akai S-2800...
I was doing the sound editing on the Akai... in the radio play days I recorded 3 minutes of audio into the sampler to clean it up and run it in synch to the DA-88. I edited like 2 hour radio shows that way.
I think we have too many possibilities today and those "too many possibilities" block our creativity...
Remember, when you had to work with an 8 voice synthesizer back in those days?
But it was so much fun... I also still have my Akai, Atari, Midex and I think I am going to fire them up again after seeing this video.
The count-in click from Cubase is legendary... :-)
I was one of the first people in Edinburgh to get an Atari ST1040, having had an Atari 800 from its introduction into the UK before that. I was very anti-Apple back in those days! But not quite so much nowadays. I used Cubase for creating and playing backing tracks. I had a full library of popular tunes in midi format on floppy disks. Could've done with some of those now!
Thank you!
Marvellous. Thanks for bringing me down memory lane with CB and my 1040STe ;) Cheers!
Brilliant vid - Brings back memories of my old ST MIDI'd to Alesis HR16 drum machine, Yamaha PF1500 piano and various synths and sound modules. I even had a Philip Rest MIDI splitter/booster thing, to help with latency and MIDI signal strength. It was a faff, but did work and at the time was the best we could do in a home/medium sized studio setup :-)
Awesome vid mate, just to hear that metronome count in was enough! Happy days :)
Great video Dan
Great vid. Planning on picking up an ST myself soon
Hi Dan,
I used the Atari and Sound Canvas all the time in my school in Staffs. I ran courses for other teachers in the LEA in the ‘80s and at that time there were only about three of us in Staffordshire that could see the potential of it all!
I still have the Roland SC and use it with my DAW sometimes. The best thing though was Cubase Score (PC) which had many uses at school.
I love all the stuff that you present on TH-cam and you have rekindled my interest in music technology with your GARAGE BAND tutorials.
My collage music lab; two bridged Teak real-to-reel (4 tracks), a monstrous Sinklavier, and an Arp Odyssey. lol, not to mention full compliment tape splicing stations. I then I bought a Mac+ and ‘Mark of the Unicorn’s premier app “Performer” when it came out with my student loan of all things lol, Dan, I never looked back. Actually I helped my theory and comp profs ‘get with the times’ and even earned a GA in doing so. Great content my friend, thank you for the memories! 😉👍🏻
i had the atari 1040ST,and my version of cubase was the 12 track,couldnt afford the 16 track version,like you said Dan,this brings back memories,and going back even further,my first computer was the sinclair spectrum 48K "speccy" ;-)
Doing the same thing right now with a Fantom X as MTC master :-). I trust hardware like this enough to be able to focus on just creating music. Not the same feeling with DAWs. I must be old.
This was not the only way we worked. You could also use an ADAT synchronised with a device called DATA SYNC and then do the stereo mix with a DAT. I still have my Atari ST and two screens, monochrome and colour, but the monochrome one no longer works. The Adat also ended up dead because of the constant work it had to do... Thank you for the video!
The Fostex D-160 he has is more akin to the sexy Alesis "ADAT" HD24, which I believe can also chase MTC right on the machine!
Great video. I’ve since moved on, but still have my Atari STe and Cubase (and dongle) and do still use it from time to time, just because I can (and because latency remains awesome). Usually with my Roland MKS-80, JV-1080 and 707. I do record the individual tracks as stems into logic and throw them through a reverb and delay and Ozone though 😂 Think some artists still use the ST these days. I know the entire PSB album Very Relentless from 93 was all ST and Notator. Pete Gleadall (their MD) talked about it on a video last year on the Facebook thingy.
Yes - latency isn’t a thing here!
Plus points were, midi timing ( clock straight from cpu on hardware level unlike PC's) , no monthly updates of software, no crashes from a vst , no glassy soundquality from in the box , and most important making music with your ears instead of drawing modulation lanes
Interesting video!
I just found my dad's Atari 1040ST with Cubase 2. I use old gear like the Akai S950, so might look into it and try to use it!
It’s all properly good stuff!
got a ST and a Falcon030 with cubase audio at the time . .. good computers, and no bugs :) ... Still on cubase now on pc with cubase 12
awesome work and great hat :)
Awesome. This is just awesome!
Atari=fun!
Things like that hard disc recorder is what I call 'forgotten era' audio devices .. like ZIPDISC drives LOL .. every rushed to buy them thinking it would be the next big thing, not knowing that they would be obsolete in less than a decade and everything would be done on the PC itself . Indeed I'm sure that many music stores had to throw gear they had bought for hundreds of thousands in the bin due to it becoming worth less than the shelf space it was taking up in the short time it was in the stores.
Excellent video! Always wondered what the early DAWs looked like
It is not a DAW though, just a MIDI sequencer with no Audio in it.
Had the Ste Mega 4 and pro 24 and sound tools
So much fun
It won't be worthless in about 30 years, keep hold of that stuff it'l be worth a pretty penny!
Cubase 3 for Atari ST is the best Cubase ever
Anywhere I can purchase it please? I mean the Cubase 3.0 for Atari.
This guy's sync problem was opposite to mine when experimenting with a Fostex and a PC - MTC wouldn't work, SMPTE did. So I did as I did with my Fostex tape deck and had the PC sync to the outboard recorders from an audio time stripe.
I remember upgrading my 520STFM from a single sided floppy drive to a double ... luxury! Had a sampling cartridge too, great fun. We take much for granted these days, good to be reminded of how tech has moved on sometimes. From a ZX81 for me, not much music in that ...
STFM had a double-sided drive as standard. The ST and STM had a single sided.
@@TheOriginalCoda Interesting maybe my memory fails me. Must have been an STM then. Great machines.
@@MatthewJohnCrittenden Yep they were all great, happy memories, (failing or not!) 😁
@@TheOriginalCoda I had an mislabeled STM, the decal said STFM but it didn't have the built in floppy :-P
Atari did a lot of goofs with their Atari's. Been missing the old fekker, sold it for next to nothing 😞
I'm going to get a new Atari soon, altho a STE that's pimped the shit out of with a gotek or similar.
Gonna go with a Monocrome monitor for it because it's just so much crisper.
Biggest concern is probably the yellowing in the plastic.
@@vertitis Yeah I also gave away my STe to a friend when we all got 386's 🤦♂
Just so you're aware, the mono monitor is just for apps, not for games, for that you'll need a working TV or monitor that can support RGB/Composite at TV frequencies.
Bugger. I just sold all 8 of my ataris. But… you know… 25 years was enough. Synced to a cassette tape four track. Then a mini disc 8 track and finally, how grandiose, a Roland 2400 cd 24 track with… gasp.. flying faders. Great to see this though. I fought off the DAW beasts for so long. But now I am happy with colour, ease and the knowledge that I will never again have to clean the little contacts in the mouse. Bye bye 1040 STEs it was good while it lasted.
This was my introduction to making music I bought an Atari SD 10 40 out some dude for £40 and had lots of different daws with it cubase was the only one I could use
I like you. Subscribed.
I m just looking to do the same with the mac nobody give an answer how to do that but i believe is the same the midi out...to the sound module ...i have an mac lc475 ...an akai cd 3000...and an roland mc 8 midi controller..thanks for the video
Sweet
I think in germany the SC-880 was sell from 1998 to 2000
There is such a benefit to hardware or real world interfaces. Moving real things is much more satisfying. As for modern OS's comapared to hardware systems or even the ST OS, no contest, the former wins.
Yep I had an Atari ST bought second hand. I'm so glad to have Logic 10 now it was such a hassle then.
me trooooo! this wasnt 80ieezz tho, more like early 90ies right>?
Fun fact: Logic is the descendant of Notator, another Atari ST softwre rival to Cubase. Apple bought Emagic (which was called C-Lab until 1992), which produced Notator, which was renamed Logic in the meantime.
@@alexisdufrenoy1573 Thanks for this info I love things like this to give me a full history of subjects.
Which was your favourite Cubase version?
Mine was V 2.06 with MROS (Music real-time operating system) which enabled the Atari to run several programs in Multitasking mode using a software called switcher...
Now imagine that it was possible then to tweak your synth sounds and record the system exclusive messages into Cubase, while Cubase was playing back the arrangement.
Due to the lower resolution of the recording you had to "hide" the systemexclusive messages between the notes to avoid glitches... Oh... that was so much fun.
With version 3 of Cubase that was all finished...
I only got back into Cubase on V. 5 VST on the PC.
After I got over the frustration that the old arrangements were no more compatible with the PC Cubase versions I quit Steinberg in favour of Reaper.
The Atari ST is more than capable of beautiful colors but the reason you are stuck in black & white is because the mode your running CuBase in. To get the highest resolution you only can run that mode in black & white, which is preferablw because the higher resolution is all you need for recording music. Games for example run in a lower resolution and were full color.
😍🙌🏻🙌🏻🙌🏻🙌🏻🙌🏻🙌🏻🙌🏻
You forgot to insert the required program change and volume events at the start of each MIDI track. If you didn't do that and you had used your SC880 for another production, you'd end up with the wrong sounds and had to manualy select the right sounds and mix on your Roland again ;-)
Nice to see it work you should have 4 ram inside it:)
I had the STE 1040 1MB of RAM whooo 🙌😂
Also, use Steinberg pro 24 that came with it until Cubase one illegal floppy disk arrived. LOL
Ha!ha! , i had PRO24 , at that time it was much better than anything on PC!Nice Video!for me it was 55 years ago...
I think standalone multitrack HDRs are already a bit obscure, and while the popular ones like RADAR and mackie HD24 will maintain some following, there's plenty of early- to mid-90s units that came of age in the pre-web world of magazine reviews and don't seem to have a lot of online representation these days. I think these are going to remain more usable long-term than the digital tape units like the DA88 and ADATs.
So cool, what midi software did you use on your Atari, I just found mine in the attic
Hi, what if now in that config i want to ad another synth as or module, the 16 midi channels are already used by our nice SC_880 ?
There is a way to use the SC-880 fx parts wiih externals devices i mean guitars or synths ?
Tatung Einstein was the only machine I used with a midi chip 😎
Hi Dan I really enjoy your videos. I have invested in a retro music set up and am currently writing a track using a st and cubase 2. Is there an easy way to trim all the note lengths at same time? Say I have a chord and the notes are all a bit off length wise. Is there a way of highlighting the chord and do a fixed length?
Also whilst I'm here haha ....how do you write in the automation lanes? Say I want to automate a pitch bend etc? Sorry for all the questions but instructions about this online are limited. Cheers mate. Justin
I got it working on my MiSTer 😀😀👍👍 just need to figure out how to get it to play through a real sound module and not the synth running on the ARM!
LegacyPixels makes super low latency MIDI adapter for that. I have one and it works fine for sending and receiving note messages but I haven't gone too deep trying sysex stuff with it yet. Hopefully once I spend a bit more time learning the ins and outs of ancient Atari software i'll able to edit and back up samples from my old Akai X7000 just using my MiSTer
I was hoping you'd explain the SMPTE code and synchronisation.
I would love a series of videos on syncing sequencers and recorders (tape, HD, or even external DAWs together.)
Watching big reel-to-reel tape decks lock up in sync seems like wizardry.
So, the latency from midi to "concole" is instant like? Like 2 ms?
Thats fucking amazing.
Take a ryzen 16 core or intel from 2021. It won't do 2 ms via onbaord or a simple 9.1 surrround card. We need asio cards for that.
Amazing.. I'm impressed!
The first engineer I apprenticed under back in the Atari Era once told me that if the external gear hadn't sync'd to Atari Time by ~3bars then that meant there MUST be a problem somewhere, and it was time to troubleshoot.
Bad cables usually!
what you remind me now~~~~~~~~~
Hello Sir, I am Joseph and an Atari fanatic. Kindly help me solve a problem. I have an M1 Korg workstation keyboard and an Atari 1040/520 st running on Cubase v 2.0. I would like to have a step by step instructions on how to make them work in my studio please.
a guy told me that in a bar... I didn't believed him. thougt he makes fun of me. but hell yeah this is great
Love it. Except the 16 track HDD recorder is a bit out of place, but that's okay. I was doing similar but with a Fostex R8, 8 track reel to reel. I striped track 8 with smpte and chased the computer. Man, those were the days! You had to work for your music. You had to be creative!
Hi there - totally.. I have an R8 and a unitor, but it’s not too good now.
Where can i find this old rubbish? Love it! Makes more sense than shit they put out these days!
I didn't think Cubase was a DAW as far back as 1992. But it required special hardware. First time I used a DAW was about a decade later.
They had a very basic Cubase Audio that basically was crap. Really buggy. It didn't become useable until a later version released in 1994.
They also had the Atari Falcon that was released in 1992 and later on also got some version of Cubase Audio.
Only Audio tracks and no plugins and very limited in the number of tracks and extremely expensive in the hardware required (special soundcards from Digidesign, I think).
First version that was not hyperexpensive (worked with more cheaper audiocards) and had plug-ins was Cubase VST, which was released in 1997 for the PC.
@@Magnus_Loov I sold my Atari 520ST around 1989. Did it because I acquired a Roland LAPC-i card and built a PC for it.
Yep, thats how i started. ST and JV1080, power outage and - 5 hours of programming down the drain. Floppies saving forever.
Are the Atari 260’s ok for installing Cubase 2 and sequence a bunch of gear or should I go for a something like the 520 or 1040 st? What’s the minimum memory recomended? Thnx
Hi, for the C-lab Notator/Creator midi sequence programs the minimum memory requirement is 1 megabyte, Atari ST 1040 needed.
And monochrome monitor Atari SM 124. ( works on color medium resolution but looks like shit, not useable.
I looked it up in the manual ;). I have been using this since 1987. kind regards Joakim
Dear Sir greetings from Vancouver Island Canada
I have an Atari Mega ST2 with a lot of old tracks on.
I would like to transfer these tracks to Cubase Pro11 on a windows 10 computer
May I ask is it possible to sync up to enable the transfer track from the Atari to the Cubase track allowing me to use the latest sounds on Cubase Pro11 and remix in there.
I look forward to your help in this
Many Thanks Kevin Wilson
As Con Job says: the MIDI protocol hasn’t really changed since its creation in 1983. It’s possible to find a floppy disk drive with a USB connection, which should be a case of a simple transfer.
How much gB does the fostex D160 has ? I've seen a guy with 16Gb but does these disc capacity exist back in 1989 ??!?
The D-160 was from 1999 and has a 20GB drive..
How was the connection made from the Atari to the recorder if there were only one in/out port on the Atari??
I used a MIDI merge box, which allows two MIDI inputs to go to one output.
if the SC-880 has a thru, it could continue on to the recorder. (or if the recorder has a thru, it could be first in the chain.)
if thru is implemented electronically as opposed to running through a microprocessor, added latency is negligible.
I used cubase with Atari from 1994 to 1997. I Made 3 CDs. Then I thought I Must Change to a more Modern system. But that was more complicated and Not so easy to handle Like Cubase on Atari. So, No more CDs .....😨
I should keep on going with my Atari....
Did anyone manage to successfully translate the old Cubase ST arrangements to Logic X by any chance ?
I have not got the Atari anymore unfortunately but loads of old floppy disk cubase arrangements that I would like to redo , 25 years later . thanks in advance. great memory lane trip btw.
I reckon there’s a simple way to do a MIDI transfer from floppy to PC. An older PC with a floppy drive and modern Cubase would probably do it...
Thanks Dan, I have an older PC ( 95ish with windows xp ) with a floppy disk drive but still does not recognise the ST's floppy disks. I think the only way is to get hold of an old ST and reload the cubase arrangements, save them as midi files only and then email them to yourself apparently , Logic should then load them up . From what I have read anyway. Cheers for your videos.
There's no problem with the display. Your camera isn't synced up with the monitor's display rate, that's all. Atari STs in Britain outputted 50hz.
It was an odd one because I did set my camera rate to 50Hz, but it was even worse!
@@DanBakerMusic The hi res black and white mode on the ST actually runs at 70hz. That's why it required a special monitor
@@prufrockrenegade Yep only the colour monitors ran at 50hz. For mono you can actually use a VGA LCD monitor with the correct adapter. Not all LCD monitors like it, but most will work.
So this was the first daw from 80 s before Cubase?
Basically!
I hope someone disliked this by accident as it is just brilliant. Ty sir
The screen is flickering because you record with 60Hz and the display is 71Hz. Not because it's old.
Yeah. I found that out afterwards! 71Hz is rather an arbitrary figure though...
I got round the worst of it by mixing two of the same video together, one delayed by a frame and then 50% transparent...
it wasnt in the 1980 ieeess..it was in 1989 when it started , so basically 1990 lol..I couldnt afford this til 1995 , usedas a kid...so its really not that lomng ago...when u say 80ieeess pople would think 1983/1984 lol, when in fact all this was a bit later.
He meant 35 years ago, not 25 lol....
Cool, but dont acept UAD plugins! 😂😂😂😂😢