Building a Pro Tools TDM Rig. As a young teen I remember all the Sound on Sound magazines I read, and how so many of my favorite artists were using TDM hardware for their productions. This was a dream setup for myself back then, and even today.

While I have been curating information for a show on historic DAW, it dawned on me after trying to figure out what the turning point in the daw revolution was, it pointed pretty strongly to the TDM platform developed by Digidesign in the mid 90s.

Pictures is 3x ADAT Bridges giving a total of 56 channels of audio (have another ADAT bridge that I need to install). One 888/24 as a preview interface for Sound Manager applications (no tracking) 8 Mix Cards 2 SampleCell II cards.

I see some people kind of meh about it, but hey, OP. If it was something you dreamed about having and you’re happy, I’m glad you were able to put this together. It feels awesome to fulfill something you’ve dreamed of since you were a teen.

Wow that takes me back! That’s basically the exact rig I had in the nineties - the Akais, e-4s, mackie 32:8, the biggest TDM rig you could stuff into a Magma NuBus chassis, three SampleCell II cards with the TDM daughterboards, plus a Video Slave Driver, SMPTE Slave Driver, and a Horita black-burst generator.

Used it on a bunch of records by White Zombie, Rob Zombie, Manson, Prong, Killing Joke, and of course NIN. It’s also the rig that TR had in the main NIN studios (with a big SSL instead of the Mackie of course) and was used for The Fragile album, although he had an Apogee AD-8000 which most of the tracking was done through (Soft-Limit FTW!)

I loved that setup. Never let us down.

Yes, MacOS 9.2.2 rides again! Way to go. You could open a nice little side hustle converting old sessions and sd2 files.

Nice server rack... Can not recognize hw, but if it require that external fdd it should be kinda hoary) Almost all units has displays and lot of buttons - it should be not very comfortable to reach it and configure.

Does those powerpc macs suport ultrawide resolutiion or monitor can handle multiple inputs in splitscreen?

Power consumption?

I used to have an 888 and two cards with a Mac Pro G3 I think it was called. But uh…

I gotta be honest. I’m truly baffled. This is weirder than going to back to ADAT cassettes.

I get people wanting to got back to a more analog workflow, and I do see you console there, but why would you make yourself go back to PT proprietary hardware is beyond me besides the fact that it’s cheap. I couldn’t hardly give my 888 away almost 10 years ago.

This isn’t like tape. These don’t have a vibe or sound to them. Like I said, I’m baffled, but fuck everything I just said and follow your happiness I guess.

I just sold a Tascam 688 for 1200$. WTF is wrong with you people?! I expected offers at least, but no, it just sold right out the gate. I serviced it myself, so I know it works and he’s been happy, so fuck it. 1200$ is alot for something you have to either know or learn how to service, maybe he did his homework, but he didn’t even expect it to be heavy, so I doubt it.

I’ll always have an analog front end to shape the sound before it hits my sound card, but you can’t pay me to have to go back to tape when I can just pull up a multitude of templates I’ve made on Reaper.

That doesn’t mean I don’t love cassettes as a format, but I had two of these big things and all mechanical/electronics will eventually wear out and need replacing.

I actually collect cassettes, fix 4 track recorders/decks, and R2R recorders. I used to collect vinyl, but fell on hard times and sold everything, and when I decided I wanted physical media of my favorite music, it was obvious cassettes were way cheaper. I could record my own compilations and sometimes they sound better, I can generally service my own equipment, and if I want, I have a platform I can master to in my own studio and make copies with DIY inserts. I can’t do any of that with vinyl.

So, I kinda get it. Do whatever inspires you.