Carl Haber, a researcher for the University of California's Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, holds a cracked and spotted, moldy cylinder. Much too fragile now to be played with a record needle, as it was intended. He put the old Edison cylinder under a microscope and pointed out the grooves that were still visible underneath the green mold and other damage. "We might be able to fix that," said Haber, "There is still information there."
They can read this cylinders grooves with sensors that are able to detect the passage of a single subatomic particle released inside a high-energy particle accelerator. Little shiny aluminum plates just a few inches across, interface with custom microchips that are able to record where and when the particle was detected and send this information to central computers. The surfaces structure or geometry is predictable. Dust, an aborration, is ignored. Kind of a subatomic pop and hiss remover. With powerful computers and custom software, this system can deliver a reproduction of it's original sound, without ever touching the material. They say it sounds great. Sounds like science fiction, but it is real.
"This is exactly the kind of innovation that sound archivists need," said Hannah Frost, a media preservation librarian at Stanford University who is familiar with the pair's work. "If we don't have to physically touch the surface of the fragile materials but can find an alternative way to read them, it has great implications for preservation." "I think the tools that they're developing will really help the sound-archiving community turn a corner into the 21st century," said Mark Roosa, director for preservation at the Library of Congress. "We know the concept works. Now, it's a question of refining the tools and the software, and then developing a prototype." In theory, the process could be used much more widely--perhaps even on the vast collections kept by record companies of original masters and outtakes from recording sessions. But Haber said he and his colleagues are sticking with the archives for now, not wanting to get involved with copyright or ownership issues.
"With all the stuff going on with record industry, I'm not going there," he said. |
The process is explained in better detail in the article. The end result of scanning these damaged cylinders, results in a digital file that is superior to the original recording. It makes you wonder what is possible, even in the near future. 100 years from now, if you think that a DVD will be able to be read, the chances are it won't be with a laser. People will look at that technique as we look at a needle scratching a groove now. What will we see in the future? How will they read that optical antique?
Source: C|Net Asia
