Question for Hoffman: Half-speed + DMM

This is for Hoffman and anyone with experience in cutting LPs:

I read in an earlier thread that you don't like DMM because the cutting amplifiers need use too much power when cutting into copper metal. This lead me to think that using half-speed mastering together with DMM would be a good thing. According to MFSL:

"...The master is played back at half-speed allowing the maximum amount of information to be extracted by the tape machine. At half-speed, the cutting amplifiers use 1/3 to 1/2 the amount of power thereby running cooler, lowering distortion and achieving greater transient response. Additionally, our half-speed technique provides the cutter head twice as much time to direct-cut the complex groove into the master lacquer. Giving the cutter head more time, detailed cutting accuracy is substantially improved."

The thing about the cutting amplifiers using less power during half-speed mastering, would that not compensate for the extra power required to cut into copper metal with DMM? In theory it seems using half-speed and DMM at the same time would be the ideal way of cutting lacquer. Please enlighten me....

 

Damn...this one went all the way back to Page 3. I just bumped it so that Hoffman could see it, and hopefully reply.

 

Welcome Kylix


Call him Steve, he doesn't mind

Good questions, too!

 

Do you always call people by their last name?

 

Not always. Only people I do not know personally. I feel uncomfortable refering to people by their first names when I have never even met them before.

 

Very interesting experiment. I would love to try it if I had access to the necessary equipment and the knowledge to operate that equipment. Maybe I can find someone who is willing to do it, and then I can look over his shoulder. All I would be able to do is to use my ears to hear which version is closest to the original tape. Do you know anyone who has the time and patience to carry out such an experiment?