The Studer A-810 is a GREAT machine...
The transport is killer, the audio electronics well designed
and overall it's perhaps the best small portable 2 track machine Studer ever built.
It is NOT the best 2 track Studer ever built, but it's a good solid
machine, and is selling for reasonable prices on the used market
BUT...
Almost all of the Studer A-810 machines need work
Here are some helpful tips I've found over the past years working on Studer A-810 machines...
First off, there are a number of EPROMs inside the machine, and these
can and will go bad - causing a complete machine failure.
Somehow, there was a flaw in the Studer 'self-test' programming, so if one
of the EMPROMs fails, the 'self-test' can go through it's entire cycle
and finish up telling you that the machine is in perfect condition - even
though you can't get the transport to do anything.... or it starts
acting crazy.
So if this happens to you, it is most likely one of the EPROMs, just order them from Studer
and replace all of them... if you're lucky that will solve the problem.
Personally, if I owned a A-810, I'd buy a new set of EMPROMs right away
to insure I had the latest version (1.810.999.24)
== there were 2 kinds of EPROMs used in versions of the A-810 ==
You MUST order the correct EPROM set for your own version machine!!
Note the current (as of 01/18/08) price for the set of EPROMs for the A-810
is $ 291.00 - that's really too expensive !!!
BUY A SET OF SPARE EPROMS
from Studer if your machine is acting strange...
Have a copy made of your EPROM set for a back-up
All A-810 machines MUST have their internal Battery changed ASAP !!!
We sell these for $ 25.00
Almost ALL Studer A-810 early version machines MUST have their Motherboard
power supply caps replaced ASAP.... the Franko brand caps are now failing and
will often explode inside your machine - not a nice sound to hear - or will
open up or short out one of the power supply rails.... thus rendering your
machine unuseable.
The Philips caps are lasting much longer than the Franko brand ones, and
there is no need to rush out and have them replaced - wait until your machine
needs service and have your tech replace them when you need other work done.
Next you want to make sure that you do NOT set the wind or play tensions too high...
use the basic specs for tension given in the manual and have the tensions checked
once in a while. Tensions set too high will cause your heads to wear out fast.
Next you need to learn the 'feel' of the transport control buttons -
they have a tendency to go bad now and then, and you need to know when one is about to fail...
there should be a good solid 'click' to the button, and it should bounce back after being pressed.
Note that the A-810 is a micro-processor controlled machine....
it's basically a computer, but it's getting OLD... it's a 10 year old computer now,
and chips do fail, EPROMs loose their memory, and strange things can start to happen.
Make a list of the various chips in the control system, and make sure that
you have a couple chips of each kind sitting around... some you may find hard to find,
but it's better to try and find them now, then when the machine's not working...
some chips will take hours of searching to find, but do it now!!
Studer A-810 used Reel Tables for sale !
with GOOD reel spindles !
Cost: $ 75.00 per unit 1 available
Studer still has SOME the parts for the A-810
Note that the cost of Studer heads is high -
too high for most studios to afford to replace heads once they're gone....
so make sure that the tape lifters are pushing the tape away from the heads in wind modes!!
Finally make sure that when you set the audio parameters, the setting Hex Codes between the
Right and Left channels are somewhat close together... if you find one channel
requires a significant increase in level or high-frequency EQ or bias,
swap the audio cards and see if the needed increase (or decrease) follows the card
or stays with the channel. You will need to swap cards one-at-a-time.
Finally, almost ALL Studer A-810's need to have their Audio and Power Supply
caps replaced.... and there are a bunch of caps that are hard to get to !!!
See my 'What Bad Caps Look Like" page :
| Bad Caps !! |