Ultimate Multitrack Analog to Digital Transfers

THE SONICRAFT A2DX LAB TEAM

Sonicraft A2DX Lab was designed to meet a specific need in the professional audio community: to provide the ultimate in multitrack analog-to-digital transfers. Here is information on our staff, and those who have helped us and contributed to building and maintaining the facility.

SONICRAFT STAFF

Steve Puntolillo

Sonicraft president Steve Puntolillo is the owner and driving force behind the creation and evolution of Sonicraft A2DX Lab. To learn more about Steve, two bios are available:

For a quick one-page bio, click here. For Steve's informal bio in his own words, click here.

Kevin Pryzbylowski - Chief Transfer Engineer. Kevin is expert in all aspects of digital audio engineering and analog tape machine setup and operation. Over the past four years, he has successfully transferred countless miles of analog tape into the digital domain to the consistent delight of our clients. He has a great ear and his attention to detail and superior organizational skills make him the ideal transfer engineer.

John Chester - Chief Design and Maintenance Engineer. John is an absolutely brilliant person seasoned by decades of practical audio design and repair experience and the kind of ear that can take over where the best test equipment leaves off. He started his audio career working as chief sound engineer at the famous Fillmore East and was on the technical staff at Woodstock. Since then his accomplishments are many including design of everything from sophisticated analog and digital circuits to software and computer networks. We are proud to have John consulting for us on a regular and ongoing basis.

Perry Polletta - Digital Audio Archivist. Perry is our resident digital audio workstation expert. He can be found hard at work, turning complex Pro Tools (and other) projects into safe and stable industry-standard archives that can be opened and played on any digital audio workstation.

Dennis Drake - Grammy Award-winning Dennis Drake has a lifetime of engineering experience. He has been a studio VP for Polygram Records and concert sound engineer for The Beach Boys. Dennis has mastered hundreds of pop, jazz, country and classical albums for companies such as Time-Life Music, BMG, Verve, Mercury, Polydor, Brunswick and Vee-Jay. He has the ultimate transfer credentials from his work on the original Mercury Living Presence reissues on CD. Dennis is available to supervise your transfer work by request.

Bob Ligotino - Literally thousands of squeaky clean connections, new capacitors and impeccable soldering points later, here we are. If not for Bob, we'd still be looking at a pile of parts. A true renaissance man, Bob is also an accomplished engineer and mixer in both the analog and digital domain and when engineering a transfer, draws from a deep practical knowledge of using and maintaining multitrack analog tape recorders.

Mike Harrison - Besides his singular talent as a voice actor, Mike has extensive training and experience in analog and digital engineering. He is on call for those times when additional manpower is needed.

David Weiss - PR and Marketing. David is a partner in the international communications firm Mojo Working International. He is also the NYC editor of Mix magazine, the world's leading pro audio publication as well as an internationally published freelance journalist with work appearing regularly in many major publications. He co-authored the book "Music Supervision: The Complete Guide to Selecting and Licensing Music & Sound Design for Media", published by Schirmer Trade Books.

OTHER CONTRIBUTORS - (Alphabetical Order)

We're happy to credit the host of talented and dedicated individuals who are part of the team that built and maintains Sonicraft A2DX Lab.

Nejat Bakin - Audio Technologies - Nejat is an audio design guru with a line of world-class custom built tube gear. Since a machine's power supply is the foundation of how it sounds, to make sure it was done right, I asked Nejat to do all of the restoration on the power supplies and filtering in the A2DX MM1200s.

Carl Farruggia – Crimson Pro Audio - Carl is an ace at fixing equipment and worked his magic on several of the lab's restorations. He's not afraid to tackle anything.

John French - JRF Magnetics - John is primarily known for his outstanding ability to custom build, recondition and modify analog tape heads and assemblies. However, his contributions to the A2DX Lab extend far beyond this. We could never have built the lab without his experience, support, insight and generous outpouring of knowledge.

Philip Jost - Audio Technologies - Phil is a man with a passion for clean power and what that can do. Starting where the power enters the building, he went through the entire lab installing isolation transformers, line filters and upgrades to the AC wiring and connectors to make sure the power is clean. Sometimes he kept right on going all the way into a machine's power supply and beyond.

Michal Jurewicz - Mytek Digital - Michal designed and built all of our A2D and D2A converters. He personally modified our 24 track rack of A2D to give us mastering grade stepped gain and attenuation on each channel. We have learned a lot about the ins and outs of A2D and D2A conversion from this kind and brilliant man.

Bob Katz - Digital Domain - Bob has been incredibly generous with his vast knowledge of the practical considerations of ultra high-end analog and digital reproduction.

George Laforgia - Formerly Ampex Tech Support and Quantegy – Besides being a crackerjack troubleshooter for both transports and electronics, he's probably baked more tapes than anyone else in the world. George has been a wonderful teacher, tech mentor, and repair wizard.

Greg Orton - Flux Magnetics - Greg has designed and hand-crafted many of the incredible heads used in the lab. His work is impeccable. Greg has gone the extra mile, providing expert consultation and guidance on modifications and upgrades to erase, record and repro circuitry.

Paul Prestopino - Record Plant Remote - 'Presto' is a legend in the business and knows the MM1200 inside and out. He is best known for his technical work at the Record Plant and with Record Plant Remote. Paul provided indispensable guidance when we were first getting started by making sure we were pointed in the right direction.

Bill Schlegel - Bill is responsible for the truly wondrous rebuilding and updating of the MR70 transports used in the A2DX Lab.

Mike Spitz and Andrew Bingham - ATR Services Inc. - Mike and Andrew are the wizards who improved and rebuilt our Ampex ATR102. Also, Mike was the first person we know of to ‘rollerize' the MM1200 tape path with the countless benefits that provides.

Bob Starr - RTZ Professional Audio - Besides providing expert advice on component selection for restoration work, Bob designed and hand-built the wonderful RTZ discrete Class A record and playback amplifiers used at the Sonicraft A2DX Lab.

THANK YOU:

Besides the contributors listed above, others who have helped us are perhaps countless, and we thank them all whether listed here or not. Here are just a few of them in alphabetical order:

Mark Berger - Dreamhire, Mike Bogen - Dale Pro Audio, Cary Cornett - Cornett Technical Services, Mark Donahue - Soundmirror, Jeff Gilman - MDA Precision Motor Works, Eric Haney - Future Electronics, Dana Hathaway - Access Audio Services, Richard Hess - Vignettes Media, Jim Hildenberger - Analog Brothers, John Klett - Tech Mecca, Inc., Bill Lund - formerly 3M, Dale Manquen, - formerly Ampex & 3M now MANCO, A T Michael MacDonald - AlgoRhythms NYC, Jay McKnight - formerly Ampex now Magnetic Reference Laboratory, Larry Miller - formerly Ampex, David Ollard, Andrew Roberts - Purple Audio Inc, Howard Sanner - Ampex Mailing List ... and a host of other incredible people met through the internet who generously shared their knowledge and sometimes dug up impossible to find parts. We wish we could list every one.

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