Sony PCM-1600 Digital Audio Recorder
The Sony PCM-1600 is a professional digital audio recording system from the very earliest days of commercial digital mastering. Little formal documentation survives for this model beyond its period advertising. Those ads ran from 1979 into 1981, and they show what Sony was promising.
Studio Sound (July 1981, p.95) ran a full-page ad claiming a dynamic range greater than 90 dB, harmonic distortion below 0.05 %, and wow and flutter "beneath measurable limits." The same ad pointed out that the BVU‑200A deck was already familiar to broadcast and production houses. That was a practical selling point for studios thinking about going digital. Earlier ads in DB Magazine (November 1979, p.29) and Recording Engineer (October 1979, p.61) used the tagline "Direct-to-disc quality without direct-to-disc limitations." They positioned the PCM‑1600 as a real-time digital alternative to the then-dominant direct-to-disc mastering method.
The ads don't give exact dimensions, weight, frequency response figures, original price, or production run length.
Known specifications culled from period sources:
- Dynamic range: >90 dB
- Harmonic distortion: <0.05 %
- Wow and flutter: below measurable limits
- Recording medium: U-matic videotape (via BVU‑200A deck)
- Processor dimensions and weight: not recorded
If you own a PCM‑1600 or have service documentation, the Archive would welcome details to fill in this thin record.
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