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From: rees@apollo.uucp (Jim Rees)
Newsgroups: sci.electronics
Subject: FM audio recording?
Message-ID: <3746d52b.b8ab@apollo.uucp>
Date: Mon, 14-Sep-87 14:25:00 EDT
Article-I.D.: apollo.3746d52b.b8ab
Posted: Mon Sep 14 14:25:00 1987
Date-Received: Tue, 15-Sep-87 06:49:57 EDT
Organization: Apollo Computer, Chelmsford, Mass.
Lines: 12

(Maybe this belongs in rec.audio, but I don't want to trigger a
long discussion.  I just want the facts, ma'am.)

How come FM was never widely used for audio recording?  It seems like
FM would be the ideal way to overcome the inherent non-linearities
and noise of magnetic tape.  You could do away with the bias circuitry
and the sensitive adjustments that depend on the type of tape.  It
would even be relatively insensitive to saturation and variations
in tape output.  And erasing would be incredibly easy.  You wouldn't
even need a separate erase head, I claim!  It seems so obvious, there
must be something wrong with it.  FM has long been used for
instrumentation and video recording for these reasons.