Fostex MR-8

[Bobby Vanzandt]

Can anybody tell me anything about the new Fostex MR-8?
I am looking at the MD8 or the new MR-8. I need somthing for under $400.00 for demo work befor going into the Pro studio net Feb.
Thank you
Bobby

[JR#97]

The MR-8 looks kicks ass. get one.

[Bobby Vanzandt]

Yes it looks like it could br the real deal. But I don,t know if I can link it up to my older Mac. I think I need some kind of USB card. I don,t know much about that stuff!!!

[Sinner]

I just heard about this thing today. I was looking at a used Tascam 488 Mk.II cassette 8 for the same price but this thing looks pretty cool. Looks like it only has a 2 band EQ whereas the 488 has mid sweep.

[SurfMonster]

I am looking very seriously at the MR-8 as well. It looks to be killer at the $300 price point. I am a guitarist / vocalist and want it for some demo / hobby recording. I have a Yamaha QY100 (awesome too) that I used for drums / backup synths / composition, so I don't need any integrated drum / rhythm backup.

My only current "concern" with the MR-8 is lack of compression as an effect. I have not seen anywhere that the MR-8 has compression built in it's effects libraries or associated mic sims (does it and I am missing it?). I have been told that compression is important for vocals. I won't be doing any direct miking of drums, so I am not too worried about dynamics issues in that regard. How important then would compression on vocals be to get a pro sounding recording ... or do I need an outboard mic pre-amp with compression built in?

Thanks !

[JR#97]

another option is get a used FD-8 for $300-350. 3 times the machine.

[Sinner]

Originally posted by SurfMonster

My only current "concern" with the MR-8 is lack of compression as an effect. I have not seen anywhere that the MR-8 has compression built in it's effects libraries or associated mic sims (does it and I am missing it?). I have been told that compression is important for vocals. I won't be doing any direct miking of drums, so I am not too worried about dynamics issues in that regard. How important then would compression on vocals be to get a pro sounding recording ... or do I need an outboard mic pre-amp with compression built in?

Thanks !

I think it only has reverbs and delays as effects, along with cab and mike simulations. You should just get a stand alone compressor for vocals, that's a must.

[gomanvangough]

I am anxious to hear some MR8 user reports. I wonder if you can transfer a wav file from PC to the MR8?

[SurfMonster]

After further cursory review, here are my comments about the MR-8 O(that perhaps someone else can correct me on if I am wrong) ... and a couple of questions. Note, I have not demoed an MR-8 yet, but wish to / will.

For perspecticve / priorities:

1. I am a guitarist / vocalist. Looking to do CD or near CD quality demos. My mixes will be simple, but I am looking for high quality audio with natural dynamics as a priority

2. I have a dedicated sequencer / good synth with a high quality drum module to create a stereo backing track for drums / bass / keyboards. I won't be recording these backing on separate tracks / just as a dry stereo mix.

3. I am not entralled with PC based recording and do not have a dedicated PC w/ high quality sound card for my home studio. I do have a 550 Mhx PIII w/ 256 Mb PC in the house that is capable, but it is my office PC and I doubt it would work well in terms of final mixdowns if I I am adding some cursory reverbs, etc. . I don't want to spend $$ upgrading this PC significantly.

Comments / observations:

1. The ease of use factor for the MR-8 is a value point, especially for someone like me who is a newbie and just wants to lay down some high quality / CD quality demos, not have alot of tracks to deal with, don't want to spend days / weeks learning how to used the thing.

2. The Flash card and USB make transfer to a PC a snap for archival of tracks / final mixdown (?). You do not have to deal with S/PDIF optical interfaces / zip drives (lower capacity than the Flash card ?), other higher cost solutions.

3. Integrated effects are a big plus for an all in one. It would really depend on how good the effects are though. I would not expect them to be outrageously good, but who knows these days?.

4. With the 128 Mb Flash card, the MR-8 will hold only 25 track minutes at high / CD quality If my calculations are right, this will allow you only a hair over 4 minutes for a song if you want to do final mixdown on the MR-8. If you need to record a song over 4 minutes, the MR-8 will not cut it UNLESS you buy a 256Mb flash card, which will run you in the neighborhood of $140 ... getting you well into the range of say a fostex Vf-80 or many other pretty good used / new HD recorders.

This 4 minute limit would be for a song that is laid down by doing say a stereo backing track with bass / drums off a sequencer / synth, and then adding dry rhythm and lead guitar on separate tracks. The 4 can then be mixed down to a dry stereo track. You would then have to DELETE the original 4 tracks (or presumably be able to save them off to your PC) which would give you additional tracks for vocals. Then the 4 new tracks could be mixed down to a final stereo mix with effects added in the process.

Questions:

1. How good would the quality be on the MR-8 in the extended mode (22 Khz / 16 bit) vs. say a Tascam 424 MkIII ? I am guessing much less natural than the Tascam and probably not really usable for a high quality demo.

2. Will there any loss of dynamics in the mixdown process? I have seen a couple of comments about this re: the VF 80.

3. Anyone have any experience with built in Fostex effects on other machines? Are they truely usable?

4. Would a 550 Mhz PC w/ 256 Mb RAM, 80 gig high speed drive cut it for final mixdown using say Cakewalk Sonar or am I just dreaming ?

5. What are true alternatives at this price point / I have considered a used Tascam 424 MkIII ($225) and use my home stereo cassette deck for final mixdown taping. I do have a outboard effects box (Behringer DSP1000 pro for reverbs). It is adequet for my purposes. Would I be happier with the Tascam for now until I determine if I want to get into this much deeper with a good HD recorder with more $$$ later?

Sorry for the long post, but I think the MR-8 is an interesting product at this price and deserves more discussion !

[Sinner]

4 minutes??!! I thought it was 25 minutes, I didn't understand that whole "track minutes" thing. I'll pass on this one. FD-8 used is probably my best bet.

[SurfMonster]

For the MR-8, total track time in high quality is 25 minutes. Using the scenario that I posted having 4 tracks mixing down to 2 gives you 25 / 6 = 4 minutes / space per track.

As for the FD-8, I have some questions:

1. W/O internal / external HD, it seems that the Zip drive option would have the same track time limitations for uncompressed audio (i.e. 250 Mb is 250 Mb). True?

2. I believe FD-8's with HD go for $350-400 and higher on eBay?

3. I have heard the FD-8 is complicated to use.

4. What are the distinct advantages of the FD-8 in terms of audio quality, other over the MR-8 ?

Thanks !

Ed

[gomanvangough]

I’d like to add another question to the mix, what about noise from the hard drive? The noise from the hard drive on my PC is noticeable when it’s in the same room where I am recording. I got some long cables and put everything but the video monitor and keyboard in another room but then I got 60hz hum induced from the monitor that I didn’t have with short cables. That’s one of the reasons I am interested in the MR8. I record mostly nylon string acoustic guitar and rarely have a 2 channel recording exceed 80mb. Looks like 12 minutes of 2 channel at 44 kHz.

[JR#97]

Originally posted by SurfMonster
For the MR-8, total track time in high quality is 25 minutes. Using the scenario that I posted having 4 tracks mixing down to 2 gives you 25 / 6 = 4 minutes / space per track.

As for the FD-8, I have some questions:

1. W/O internal / external HD, it seems that the Zip drive option would have the same track time limitations for uncompressed audio (i.e. 250 Mb is 250 Mb). True?

2. I believe FD-8's with HD go for $350-400 and higher on eBay?

3. I have heard the FD-8 is complicated to use.

4. What are the distinct advantages of the FD-8 in terms of audio quality, other over the MR-8 ?

Thanks !

Ed

1. True. I've managed to get 24 tracks uncompressed onto a 250mb zip. Although I dont' recommend recording to zip. It's not fast enough and can skip on you. Use the zip for back-up. It's a godsend as a back-up. You can pick up an external scsi HD for cheap.. cheaper than a zip250.

2. I paid $350 for FD8 and scsi zip250 plus 3 disks. I picked up 3 external scsi HD's for a total of $50.

3. How complicated is the FD8?... it's not any more complicated than any fostex cassete multi-tracker. The manual isn't the most intuitive, but once you realize the manual's methodology, you'll be fine.

4. The FD-8 has one of the best analog mixers you can get in a multi-tracker. The specs are excellent and sound rivals most of the small format mixers I've ever used. 16/44.1 is better than 16/22.. that's just simple math. Even using the compressed mode sounds better than 16/22.


Someone also posted saying their pIII 550mhz won't cut it? That's false. I've done 24 tracks on a PII 350 before. The main factor being the usage of plug-ins. A PIII 550mhz should be able to get 16 tracks with plug-ins no problem. I've heard people quote 64 tracks on a PIII processor before. Also, since Sonar was mentioned, Sonar uses some pretty nice programming in order to cut down on latency and raise efficiency.

Another advantage of the FD8 is the adat I/O... which allows you to interface with a PC for transferring tracks easily to and from the PC or for simply syncing to the PC.

It might sound complicated, but it's not. I'm an idiot, and I can get it work.

[JR#97]

Originally posted by gomanvangough
I’d like to add another question to the mix, what about noise from the hard drive? The noise from the hard drive on my PC is noticeable when it’s in the same room where I am recording. I got some long cables and put everything but the video monitor and keyboard in another room but then I got 60hz hum induced from the monitor that I didn’t have with short cables. That’s one of the reasons I am interested in the MR8. I record mostly nylon string acoustic guitar and rarely have a 2 channel recording exceed 80mb. Looks like 12 minutes of 2 channel at 44 kHz.

MR-8's don't use HD's. they use memory cards.

Or are you asking about the FD8 hd? I've never heard the internal HD's, but my external's are kinda whiney. So I bury them in a little box and use pillows and blankets over it leaving room for the fan as to not overheat. I don't have any noise problems if I do that. I also record quite a bit of nylon string, as well as steel string. Mostly fingerstyle, so I need a lot of quite in order to get good tracks.

[SurfMonster]

JR#97:

Thanks much for the reply! The FD-8 should be considered. One question on the external HD's ... I am assuming the HD price of $50 does not include enclosure or power supply. Also, is there a partition / total external disk size limitation with the FD-8?. I guess my only thoughts after that are what the the actual costs of the FD-8 route would be:

Used FD-8 w/ internal zip drive $325
External HD $ 50
External zip drive* $ 40

Total $415 + ebay shipping

* for moving mixes / tracks to my PC. I do not have a zip drive on my PC.

Basically, I would be looking at an expenditure of at least $100-$150 more vs. the MR-8. Am I correct here? At that point, why not look for a used VF-80 ? Am I smoking the wrong stuff here ?

[JR#97]

Originally posted by SurfMonster
JR#97:

Thanks much for the reply! The FD-8 should be considered. One question on the external HD's ... I am assuming the HD price of $50 does not include enclosure or power supply. Also, is there a partition / total external disk size limitation with the FD-8?. I guess my only thoughts after that are what the the actual costs of the FD-8 route would be:

Used FD-8 w/ internal zip drive $325
External HD $ 50
External zip drive* $ 40

Total $415 + ebay shipping

* for moving mixes / tracks to my PC. I do not have a zip drive on my PC.

Basically, I would be looking at an expenditure of at least $100-$150 more vs. the MR-8. Am I correct here? At that point, why not look for a used VF-80 ? Am I smoking the wrong stuff here ?

Just fyi, the zip doesn't allow you to move tracks to the PC. However, a zip is necessary for updating the FD8 OS.

I picked up three 4 gig scsi HD's for $50. Two of which came in enclosures with internal power supplies and one even had a terminator. All used. I've seen new 9 gigs for as low as $30 with enclosure. The FD8 can handle up to 30 gig HD's. No partitioning needed. 4 gigs is actually quite a bit. I have yet to fill one of them.

The VF80 or even the VF08 would be a good deal at $400 and definitely worth a look.

[SurfMonster]

One further clarification ... with the FD-8, connection to PC would be via S/PDIF ? Optical or coax ? Have to get to my PC for mixdown and / or CD burning.

Have you had any issues with the FD-8 in terms of loss of dynamics when bouncing or mixing down ?

Thanks Again !

[JR#97]

Originally posted by SurfMonster
One further clarification ... with the FD-8, connection to PC would be via S/PDIF ? Optical or coax ? Have to get to my PC for mixdown and / or CD burning.

Have you had any issues with the FD-8 in terms of loss of dynamics when bouncing or mixing down ?

Thanks Again !

I've moved tracks to/from my FD8 to/from my PC using analog and ADAT optical. The FD8 optical can be set to either ADAT for 8 channels or SPDIF for 2 channels. I haven't noticed any loss in dynamics when bouncing or mixing down. However, I've never done more than 1 bounce internally. Even though the FD8 is a digital multi-track, the mixer section is analog, so when you bounce tracks internally, you're going from digital, to analog, back to digital. Having said that, the analog mixer has a excellent headroom... something like 105db... which I haven't seen on too many mixers ever... so the difference in quality is pretty minimal. All of the edit functions stay in the digital domain. I've also bounced and mixed down to the PC all in the digital domain and bypassed the analog section all together. I also have the VM200 digital mixer, so I can bounce/mix down through that and still remain in the digital domain.

[SurfMonster]

Thanks again for the insight!

Summing up. I think the VF08 is probably the best value "deal" out there in this general range (less than $400 for a lightly used one) and is a better value than the MR-8 in terms of overall flexibility for more than just casual compositions. I think where the MR-8 has one faily significant cost advantage is the ability to transfer in the digital domain to a PC w/o needing a ADAT or S/PDIF interface on your PC ($200 ?) ... You can transfer either via the Flash card or USB (cannot determine if it is USB 2.0 from Fostex site). Thus the real cost of the VF08 solution if you want to do mixdown on your PC is $600. Correct? ... or is there a way with a simple SCSI interface ?

The MR-8 still looks to be a great way to go digital if $$$ is a big concern. I think Fostex will have a winner here

I wonder why you do not see USB 2.0 used more on digital audio workstations ? 480 Mbps is not bad.

[JR#97]

Originally posted by SurfMonster
Thanks again for the insight!

Summing up. I think the VF08 is probably the best value "deal" out there in this general range (less than $400 for a lightly used one) and is a better value than the MR-8 in terms of overall flexibility for more than just casual compositions. I think where the MR-8 has one faily significant cost advantage is the ability to transfer in the digital domain to a PC w/o needing a ADAT or S/PDIF interface on your PC ($200 ?) ... You can transfer either via the Flash card or USB (cannot determine if it is USB 2.0 from Fostex site). Thus the real cost of the VF08 solution if you want to do mixdown on your PC is $600. Correct? ... or is there a way with a simple SCSI interface ?

The MR-8 still looks to be a great way to go digital if $$$ is a big concern. I think Fostex will have a winner here

I wonder why you do not see USB 2.0 used more on digital audio workstations ? 480 Mbps is not bad.

You'd think the flash card could be used with a pc flashcard reader. I know the zoom, boss, and korg units can do that.
The vf80 or vf08 are great. They have dropped so much in price the last year. When I bought my FD8 six months ago, the lowest price you could find used was still over $400. Anywho.. have on ebay.

[Bob C]

The only literature I've seen on the MR-8 was in the new Musician's Friend catalog. Is that where you guys read up on it?

It appears to be in direct competition with the Boss BR-532. I know it's listed as an 8 track, but stereo tracks 5/6 and 7/8 are for bouncing and mixdown.

The track time question is a biggie. I thought a 128MB card would do a little better. Is a flash card the same as a smartmedia card?

For $100 less than the Boss unit, the MR-8 has the bigger card and power supply included. But no built in mic or drum tracks. (Metronome though, right?) And what about the vocal effects, or lack of (no compression - true?)?

Does anyone have an opinion on which of these two units is a better machine, in terms of features, sound and perhaps most importantly, durability?

Thanks,

Bob

[Bob C]

I guess I was wrong about a couple things: the MR-8 DOES have a built in mic and 8 playback tracks (if you send them to your PC, or whatever).

No virtual tracks, like the Boss/Roland stuff though.

Anybody actually seen this thing yet?

[junplugged]

http://www.fostex.com/Support/pdf/MR8_OM_E.pdf

There are some answers in here.

256 MB flash is definitely something to think about.
I wonder if I need to consider compatibility with brands of them.

Still expensive, maybe in a few months they'll come down more.

Meantime, I may need to get this thing.

-j.

[SurfMonster]

I think if the MR-8 came with 256 Mb flash for $300, I might be there. I think with 128 kb you will be somewhat limited in a time sense, unless you just deal with the 22 KHz sampling rate option (I don't want to). To resolve this recording time issue, add another $130 or so for 256 Mb high speed flash and you are now edging into Fostex VF80 territory $$$-wise and more $$$ than a used VF08, both with significantly more functionality. Still with a MR-8 and 256 Mb flash, digital transfer to a PC is "free", where with a VF80 you still need an optical S/PDIF or ADAT interface on your PC (I have neither right now). Imagine when 1G flash cards will cost $25 in a couple of years ??? Anyone have an idea what the max addressability of the MR-8 flash slot / reader is?

[SurfMonster]

Thanks for the manual reference !

I just skimmed the manual and may have come across a limitation. It seems that the compact flash data can be transferred to your PC "for backup only" ...i.e from the PC you cannot extract the digital audio from the flash based backup file or files . If you transfer vial the USB port you apparently transfer .wav file data from tracks 7 and 8 only. Thus it appears that there is no way to get all MR-8 tracks separately to the PC in .wav format for final mixdown on a PC. Someone correct me if I am wrong, but this seems strange that Fostex would design it this way.

Also, the manual does not make note of flash cards above 256 MB, but does not specify a maximum capacity either.