We're steadily losing the ability to play back old media on modern equipment, but here's one success story. I managed to resuscitate an old Edison Diamond Disc using nothing more than a normal turntable and a computer.
Brilliant! I know that Technics come with a -8 to +8 pitch slider, so if you know a DJ, or are one, I think you could hack that part analog. I believe the 16 units are in terms of %. I wonder to do a complete analog hack, if you could get a crazy long stylus, bend it at 90 degrees (long enough that it clears the side of the head), then play it with 2 record players at right angles to each other, one spinning, and one amplifying. You would need a player that has a free arm, like a Technics. Kind of madness, but fun to consider.
Not much difference between 78 and 80 rpms, I'd bet the average listener who was familiar with a song wouldn't even notice. 45's played at 33 are very noticeable, but also a sometimes enjoyable novelty. I work with two guys who like playing 45's at 33 rpms, sometimes it's fun other times it drives me nuts. My buddies tape label has a whole album of 45's at 33 Heavy Curtains. You can listen to the tape online, it's fun enough. The wife and I recently inherited a jukebox and I don't know how many 45's (a few hundred maybe?). When I told my work mates about it they both said "bring em in so we can play em at 33.
Unrelated question: what's with the linked "st" character that the author uses, and why does it copy as one character but paste as two?
It's a typographic ligature — basically a fancy way of writing two characters so they're joined up in some way. It's used in printed books all the time, although they're usually so subtle you don't notice them. I wanted to use the "st" ligature on my blog because it's a slightly old-fashioned flair that I've always liked. How they copy might depend on your browser (i.e. whether it treats them as one glyph or two joined glyphs), but they should always paste as two separate characters. The joining all happens in the font, so the text itself is made up of regular "s"s and "t"s — no funky Unicode characters required.
Nice work with the hack to both you and your YouTube adviser. I had never heard of an Edison Diamond Disc before and was curious to see one in action. I'm guessing you may have already seen this video while conducting your research, but for others interested, it's a great tour of the machine used to play the "Diamond Disc." The Reed Orchestra "Whispering Flowers" song sounds like it should only be listened to while on a carousel. Cool post as always.