Hard Disk Delema

[brodgind]

I am trying to decide which recorder to run with. The Alesis HD24, or the Mackie HDR24?? Any help here??

[Ford Van]

Originally Posted by brodgind

I am trying to decide which recorder to run with. The Alesis HD24, or the Mackie HDR24?? Any help here??

HD24 for sure. Make sure you get a Fireport if you plan to edit tracks on the computer.

Check your spelling!

[xstatic]

Why HD24 for sure? The Mackie recorders also work very well and sound just as good. The fireport is great for transfering compared to the Mackies outdated USB 1 jack, but the Mackie offers a little bit more flexibility in routing and makes better use of hard drive space. Both are excellent little HD recorders. I have owned and/or used both on numerous occasions.

[brodgind]

Originally Posted by Ford Van

HD24 for sure. Make sure you get a Fireport if you plan to edit tracks on the computer.

Check your spelling!

RIGHT!!!!!!!!!!! DILEMMA!!!! Two M's, and an I!!! Thanks, I just had six ADAT's crash at once. I think the power dropped a phase and we went brown for a while when I left the machines on for formating. Bummer. All kinds of weird things... distortion in record mode on one, power supply shot on two more, they won't record, even with track's armed and rollin, they don't record!@!! 5g's on power upgrades and a completly new tracking set-up is in order!!

[xstatic]

That sucks about the ADAT's. since they are ADAT's though, this whole thing may be a blessing in disguise

Anyhow, both machines function well and sound pretty good (decent converters). The Mackie that you are looking at probably costs more, but offers extra features. It should allow you to plug a mouse and a monitor and keyboard directly into it and has an OS capable of editing in. Depending on how you like working, this can be a very handy feature, or completely useless. I have found that the Mackie is a little easier to get between features on, but not different enough to make that a selling point in my opinion.

[brodgind]

I found some Mackie's at about $1500, so with the firewire adapter for the Alesis, they are comparable in price point. I do like that I could work directly on tracks from the Mackie. Any idea's about the Tascam 2424, or the Mackie SDR24? I would like to have 32-48 tracks availble so I will be using two of something, but I was only going to get one 24/96 machine and one at 24/48.

[xstatic]

One thing to consider is which Mackie's are still in production. I believe that of the three versions, there may only be one still in production. You may also want to be aware that projects are not completely sharable between the SDR and HDR versions, so mixing them may turn out to not be so useful. The SDR also does not allow the integration of a mouse, keyboard and monitor, so you will not be able to edit in that same fashion. One nice thing about the SDR, and the Alesis HD24 is that they both come stock with the full compliment of I/O. They each have 24 analog inputs and outputs, and 24 channels of ADAT I/O whereas the HDR I believe does not come fully loaded, so add on cards must be purchased. The mackies also use DB25 plugs for the analog I/O. Personally, I like this, but if you already have all the cabling you need in the form of TRS, that could prove to be a deal breaker.

The Tascam machines are really nice as well, but if I remember right, are considerably more expensive than the Alesis and the SDR. The alesis also offers two removable bays. In many ways I really do like the Alesis better, but the Mackies are just as capable as far as sound quality goes, and offers a slightly better routing system. It seems to me that if you can live without the standalone editing functions, the Alesis is probably the better way to go (or the SDR) as opposed to the HDR. However, if you like having the ability to edit directly from the machine then the HDR is probably the best bet. I would check with Mackie though to see what features you may lose if you pair an HDR with an SDR. You may be able to have all of the features with that pairing if you treat the HDR as the master, but I personally am not sure about that.