Looking For Your Experience With Digital Multitrack/ Field Recorder(s)

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Doctor Varney

Cave dwelling Luddite
I'm looking towards possibly purchasing a digital multi-track recorder which will be used to capture voices for audio books and plays. I'm interested to hear from anyone with direct experience with these units. Reviews/ pros and cons of different brands/ types and the efficiency of various methods of data storage & transfer, that sort of thing.

Thanks in advance

Dr. V

Please note:
This is not intended to become a debate about digital field recorders vs. computer DAW recording - so staying on topic as far as possible will be appreciated. Thank you.
 
Hey again.

At the low end you're already there. In the middle there's Sound Devices (which I use). Extremely high quality, pricey. And then there's Zaxcom. OMFG. Sound Devices tops off at the 788T-SSD 8-Channel Portable Solid-State Audio Recorder, Zaxcom comes in just below that with the Nomad and then heads for the stratosphere. You better be driving a Bentley Azure and parking in the B pool at 5555 Melrose if you're going to be dropping any serious coin on Zaxcom gear.
 
Thank you, Wheelema.

Well, my budget is going to be under £300. I suppose with an average spend of about 2-250 if I can find a used bargain (that's British Pounds, by the way). At present, there's no fixed requirement on the amount of XLR inputs but the more the merrier.

But for the sake of reference, it's interesting to see what lies at the top end and might give some insight into how things scale down into the budget solutions. I won't be looking to spend as much as those you've listed.
 
Doctor Varney said:
Thank you, Wheelema.

Well, my budget is going to be under £300. I suppose with an average spend of about 2-250 if I can find a used bargain (that's British Pounds, by the way). At present, there's no fixed requirement on the amount of XLR inputs but the more the merrier.

But for the sake of reference, it's interesting to see what lies at the top end and might give some insight into how things scale down into the budget solutions. I won't be looking to spend as much as those you've listed.
Click to expand...

At your price point Zoom is close to the only game in town given the number of tracks you need. Here's the (almost) complete selection that B&H carries.

Digital Recorders & Players| B&H Photo Video
Portable Digital Recorders| B&H Photo Video

Naturally this isn't a comprehensive list of everything that's on the the market. You won't find Zaxcom at B&H for example.
 
I'm a great fan of the Zoom range and have seen some of their smaller ones used professionally. Have a look at the R16.
 
These things look great! Thanks for the listings. When you've had some disappointments with gear (as I have) it's inspiring to have something to look forward to. I'm just digging around for reviews at the moment... The Zoom stuff seems to be quite popular.
 
What about Gemini rack-mount designs? I've seen an inexpensive one here. Any opinions on those?
 
Saw a Fostex in a second hand shop while I was out today. Obviously, I'm not going to buy it. But it's interesting to see how affordable they are second hand. What's the betting the owner sold it to buy a computer and sound card? Heh... Well, one man's meat, etc... It was fairly bashed up and I'd want to know it came from a good home. But it filled me with hope, as I feared they might be considerably more expensive.

The Gemini rack mount units are very affordable brand new, though.
 
Parts fail on the budget digital recorders - controls/switches, displays, power input circuits. With a used one, you're half-way to failure.
 
Good point. I guess parts can fail on a lot of things, as I've found out. You're right, I probably would be safer buying brand new.
 
I tested the Zoom R8 and the Boss BR-800 extensively and went with the Boss. It's an amazing lil box if you can live with its considerable (and baffling) shortcomings:

Only 1 channel of Phantom Power:facepalm:
Roland mt2 compression (unless used in "sketch" mode)
Lightweight plastic
RCA outs
USB 1.1

Soundwise the Boss is better than the Zoom IMO (although Zoom probably has the better built-in mics). The COSM and other effects are way better than the Zoom, or at least fit my tastes better. The Zoom is a good unit and I don't think you can go wrong with it, and .wav files are much easier to deal with ( Boss has a "wave convertor" to turn their files into .wav). In the end, I felt that the Boss was a better choice for me. I have an electric violin and the COSM effects sound great with it. The pre seems to be slightly better than the Zoom, although that's all subjective.
 
Brilliant. Thanks, David!

When you say the Zoom has 'better mics', do you mean the built in condenser or the inputs? I guess it can only have one built in condenser as this would seem rather weird, trying to multi-track without separate, external mics. It's really the inputs that count as I'll be using external mics. Or mic (until I can afford more).

Right now, I'm using my old Olympus dictaphone for line bashing. I find it easy and reliable to work with. Of course, it doesn't have the quality for audio production, this is just for me. Just out of interest though, it will be interesting hear what the WAVs sound like when I eventually get them uploaded to the computer.
 
Doctor Varney said:
Brilliant. Thanks, David!

When you say the Zoom has 'better mics', do you mean the built in condenser or the inputs? .
Click to expand...

The built-in mics (each unit has 2, left and right) sound better on the Zoom IMO. When I used a condenser mic (AT2020), the Boss sounded better. Where the Boss is considerably better is in areas like reverb, there's a pretty big difference between the two. My original idea was to get the Zoom because of the 2 channels of phantom power and the .wav files, but the Boss was worth any hassles due to the sound quality.
 
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