Al writes:
I have been using conventional drives for 1/2"
tape recovery.
John Bordyuik's web site at one point described the system he uses,
which has a modified M4 data tranport fitted with an IBM 3480 16 track
magnetorestrictive head and modified read electronics. In either case
the tape transport is conventional.
His current website is different than the old one but he's got
some good techie tidbits mixed in with technical whiz-bang and
very satisfyingly shows recovered data and graphical representations
of analysis techniques and post-processing for application
specific data, along with a heavy sales pitch at:
http://www.johnbordynuik.com/sites/default/files/tech_briefing.pdf
Tim.