Roland

Roland DM-800

1993 8-track digital audio workstation

Description

The DM-800 packs a hard-disk recorder, digital mixer and non-destructive editing into a sub-6 kg box. As a sound engineer, I see it as an ancestor of the DAW: eight real tracks, 300 virtual tracks and an automated 12-channel mixer, all without an external computer, at a time when multitrack was still overwhelmingly analogue.

Technical

Specifications

Inputs / Outputs

Digital IoBus de communication ADAT optionnel (interface DIF-800) ; interface RS-422 optionnelle

Processing

Bit depth16 bits

Surface

Physical faders8
Motorized fadersNo
TouchscreenNo

Recording

Onboard recordingNo

Networking

Networking & protocolsADAT
Redundant PSUNo
Redundant networkingNo

Other

RecorderEnregistreur 8 pistes sur disque dur, 300 pistes virtuelles
FormatEnregistrement linéaire 16 bits ; échantillonnage sélectionnable 48 / 44,1 / 32 kHz
MixerMixeur numérique 12 voies : 8 faders dédiés (gain + pan), 2 retours aux stéréo, 1 fader master stéréo
EqEQ semi-paramétrique 2 bandes 24 bits, automatisé, sur toutes les voies
EditingÉdition non destructive, compression temporelle, sortie écran vidéo, MIDI

Editorial & artists

Our take