Eventide MTR-90
Two inches of cast alloy deck plate, and a nameplate that doesn't belong on it.
Overview
First, the problem with this page. The MTR-90 is an Otari, not an Eventide. Every source document that actually names the machine attributes it to Otari Corporation of Belmont, California. It's the MX-80's bigger sibling, a 2-inch multitrack built around a constant tension tape transport, a 2-inch thick cast alloy deck plate, and heavy-duty swing arms and motor shafts sized for the acceleration characteristics of a professional machine. Otari's own advertising for the line named the MX-80 and the MTR-90 together. The "90" was the machine you graduate to and the "80" was the one you start on. The MTR-90 was sold in 8, 16, and 24-channel versions. The Series II was a microprocessor-controlled recorder designed to interface with SMPTE-based video editing systems, machine controllers, and synchronizers. None of that is Eventide's work.
The MTR-90 ended up filed under Eventide because of a cataloging artifact. Eventide shows up in the same period trade listings and studio equipment rosters as the Otari machines. Mix magazine's October 1985 studio roundup (p.189) lists an Otari MTR 90 alongside a Neve 8128, an Adams-Smith synchronizer, and Eventide outboard in a single facility inventory. A November 1982 Mix facility announcement (p.113) pairs an MTR-90-24 with an Eventide H949 harmonizer in the same room. Those co-occurrences are how the two names landed next to each other in a database. They are not a manufacturer relationship. Anyone looking for an Eventide tape machine should be looking at the H910, the H949, or the Instant Phaser instead. Anyone looking for the MTR-90 has found it, just under the wrong brand heading.
On its own terms, the machine was a workhorse. Otari's copy for the line stressed the parts you can't see: the cast deck plate, the transformerless balanced inputs and outputs, and proprietary integrated circuitry that the company claimed reduced service time. The transport used constant tension technology for what Otari described as high performance with gentle tape handling, and the punch-in/punch-out was digitally timed and gapless. For post-production work, the capstan motor was designed to be speed-slewed, and external control connectors let the machine interface with time-code-based synchronizers, editors, and machine controllers. The MTR-90's own advanced EC-101 chase synchronizer was the accessory Otari offered for that job.
The Series II is the revision most surviving documentation describes. Otari framed it as a second-generation machine, refined in consultation with industry users, that extended the performance and capabilities of the original while keeping the same transport philosophy. The Series III followed, and the period trade coverage of it is specific. It could shuttle tape at speeds of up to 2,400 feet in 82 seconds, came in 24- and 16-channel 2-inch versions, and added an automatic shut-off that detected tape load errors plus an automatic sensing function to prevent tape damage at the end of reels. The Series III also electronically conformed its tensioning and ballistics to reel sizes from 14-inch metal down to 7-inch plastic. Its EC-101 internal chase synchronizer let the system servolock to a master source in forward and reverse at play speeds from 0.2-times to 2.5-times normal playback.
Period pricing shows what class of tool this was. A used-gear broker listing in the trade press quoted an Otari MTR90 II at $27,000, against an MX-80 at $21,000, a Studer A800 MkII at $38,000, and an MCI JH24 at $18,500. That put it squarely mid-pack among the serious 2-inch machines of the day. Dealers in the same pages advertised new MTR-90 Series II 24-track units with full warranty, alongside used examples described as excellent condition. By the early nineties resale had softened considerably. A UK dealer listing in Studio Sound (October 1992, p.94) advertised an Otari MTR90 MkII with low hours at £12,950, and a 1994 US classified offered an MTR-90 24-track with locator and remote at $15,000. A late-eighties broker sheet in the trade press listed a one-year-old MTR 90 as "call" while quoting an Otari B-116 autolocator at $700 on its own.
Anyone chasing one today should know what they're buying. The transport is the reason to own it. Constant tension handling, the cast deck plate, and the synchronizer interface are the parts that made these machines the backbone of rooms that cut to picture. The parts that fail are the same ones that fail on every machine of this vintage: motors, heads, and the microprocessor control sections that the Series II and III depend on. The MTR-90 was a production tool rather than a boutique item, so service documentation and parts machines exist, which is more than can be said for a lot of its contemporaries. It is still a 2-inch tape machine, though, and tape stock, alignment, and head wear are ongoing costs.
A note on the archive itself. This entry is filed under Eventide because the source material groups the names together, and the page says so plainly. The MTR-90's history, its specs, and its reputation belong to Otari. For Eventide, the H3000, the H910, and the Instant Phaser are the machines that carry that nameplate.
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