Finally! At the age of 52, I can patch any output to any input.........

[FredStembottom]

.....without plugging or un-plugging ANYTHING!

Synth or Sampler modules. Computer audio ins and outs. Phono output. Anything into MP3 and into my MP3 player (from audiobooks to old casettes to downloads). The 78's player is hooked in thru it's own pre-amp. A reel-to-reel gives and receives. I can route internet radio (or anything else) to the living room downstairs, the kitchen or the backyard (the bathroom is next!) The MP3 player plugs into my cars etc.

And no plugging and un-plugging of chords!!!!!! I'm in a kind of heaven!

And cheap! It's amazing what old, used eBay and surplus store stuff can do if you actually read the phone-book sized manuals and uncover buried functions that companies want to sell you all over again as NEW.

Here's a tune called Pickfair Drive I did with my old junk: http://soundclick.com/share?songid=3096747

[regnaD kciN]

1. And I thought that title had something to do...

...with legalized gay marriage in California.

:evilgrin:

[Crabby Appleton]

2. Crap, I thought This was going to be a sex thread. nt

[FredStembottom]

3. Nope. Geek thread.

x(

[Deja Q]

4. Telekinetic masturbation? Wow, WWJD?

What Would Jocelyn (Elders) Do? :evilgrin:

[DarkTirade]

5. Nice.

Couldn't have been a cheap setup, but I s'pose if you get it one piece at a time... :)

[FredStembottom]

7. Dirt cheap.

Stay about 8 years behind in technology and get it for pennies! The down side is needing some real geek-patience to get it all to talk to each other. Even the coputer was $88.00 NEW! (after a tour de force coupon and rebate performance by my wife)

Most of what I have is at the Household Electronics Recycling Center otherwise - but I have found hidden functionality inside this old stuff.

[grasswire]

10. that's the part that's priceless

...and I wish I had it. I'm going out of my mind trying to get scanner functionality -- it seems that flatbed scanners are out of favor or cost more than I want to pay, and the new scanner-copier-printer machines have too small a bed for my use. My two Musteks have finally failed to work. So I'm going to head to a place called free geek and see if I can get an old one that's working. But I'm sure I will run into technical glitches and then I'm sunk.

Lucky, lucky you.

[FredStembottom]

11. Well... being absolutely stumped for long periods is part of it.

I often find the answers to my old-junk communication problems at online forums of fellow geek-heads. It's often quite an obscure solution like: Be sure you have "module A" with Turbo and not "module A" with Beta-turbo and then edit this line of command >xl =(on)bit 23967 to read: >xl= (on)bit 23999.

That's the stuff I have no clue about - the computer command crap. - I just do exactly as the friendly helpers suggest.

For synth and sampler heads, the best geek help is is tweakheadz.com

[Tuesday Afternoon]

6. You are my Hero

:loveya:

[FredStembottom]

8. Am I?

What does that entail?:hi:

[hunter]

9. Cool.

The last new audio equipment I bought was a Sony Walkman cassette player on super clearance in a banged up package. Every once and a while I'll find some odd cassette at a junkstore, and if I'm in a hurry I can rip it directly to my laptop using the Walkman.

I'm not a purist at all. I've no interest in hanging out at the expensive bleeding edge. My audio and computer equipment is all reclaimed junk, and my software open source.

I've got three turntables that will faithfully recreate the audio technology of the 'fifties, 'sixties, and 'seventies because they are the technology of the fifties and sixties and seventies.

Congrats on having it all tied together like that! Some of us can only dream...

[FredStembottom]

12. That's the spirit, hunter!

I have an ancient (but once first-class) cassette deck tied in here, too. I dump old cassettes to computer - like you - as the oxide starts to come off the ones I still like (mix-tapes from my youth, mostly).

I have 2 turntables. A 1958 one with a crystal cartridge for transferring 78's (which I have listened to regularly all my life) and a late 70's/early 80's Yamaha (with a new Grado cart.)that is the exact model that was my 'dream" turntable back then. Something like $400.00 back then. $25.00 at a garage sale near me a couple years ago.

It's all fun.