>Yeah, that's what they said and what would have become the big problem.
>Nobody thought that a computer would work after 200 years or whatever.
>Somebody would have to sponsor an everlasting organisation keeping the
>recordings updated to the current formats.
>
>But if that could not be arranged (which is a bit difficult, no
>understatement...) they recommended the magnetic tape.
>At the Swedish Radio they claimed that magnetic tapes could be stored in
>such ways that they would never loose anything. They even recommended to
>bury a Nagra with the tapes, with headphones and all.
For what it's worth: In 1980, while on two month trip to the
Antarctic to record orcas, I was exploring an abandonded US field
station and found what appeared to be a dark object buried in a block
of ice. The helicoptor was waiting and the pilot was screaming over
the roar of the cavitating rotors that he was pulling out in five
minutes because of changing weather and that he would leave me if I
didn't get my lardy butt on board. But I kept chipping away with my
trusty Swiss army knife as the perfectly preserved leather case of a
Nagra 3 began to reveal itself. I hauled the thing from the ice
(where it had been left to rot a full ten years before) and scurried
to the helicoptor just as the pilot was about to take off. When I got
back to McMurdo, I dried it out with a hair drier, put some new
batteries in it, and switched it on. Except for some worn heads, it
worked perfectly (I didn't know Dan Dugan, then, or would have
brought it back for repair and to add to his museum).
While on a film shoot in N. California one year, we were on board a
helicoptor doing a long shot of a couple riding horseback down a
beach. I was sitting on the edge in the open door with my legs
dangling over and the cameraman shooting over my shoulder, when the
'copter lurched and the Nagra IVs, formerly sitting on my lap,
disappeared some 15 meters, wires and all, onto the beach below. With
only a slight crack in the plastic cover, all else was fine, except
for a little sand.
Suggest trying either of those tricks with a Portadisk or a Sony TCD
D10 Pro II or my PowerBook G4.
Bernie
--
Wild Sanctuary, Inc.
P. O. Box 536
Glen Ellen, CA 95442
707-996-6677 tel
707-996-0280 fax
http://www.wildsanctuary.com
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