Record in stereo or mono?

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chuckadam

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I just bought a Tascam DR-05 to record live music. Does it make any difference in recording quality of the sound if I record in stereo or mono? It seems to me that it should not, because in mono I would think that both mics send the same exact sound to one channel. I can get more space on the card this way. Later on I can convert the single channel sound into two identical sounds on the L & R channels and save it as a stereo file.

I am I right or wrong?
 
Well... That's because there's a diff between a 'stereo file' and stereo sound.
A stereo file really only means two tracks under one roof.
If there is no differences in what's on those two 'tracks' it's still mono (and yes twice the size.
Now if you're thinking that your two mics don't have enough differences (Left-to Right) to have recorded stereo sound (but that's prbably not the case), then yes record one side.
 
The internet has killed individual initiative and experimentation. I would have simply tried it both ways and found out for myself if it made any difference, which I in fact did sometime back in the pre-internet era.

OP, the two mics do not pick up the exact same sound. They pick up more sound in the directions they are aimed and so the sound is different. If you record to mono you combine the two different sounds into one sound that you can never separate back into the two original sounds.
 
so if you do decide to record in mono (nothing wrong with that) there's is absolutely zero point in saving it as a stereo file with identical files on each channel. You may as well just keep the one file and pan it center which will result in the same thing.
 
Yes, you're wrong. I agree with bouldersoundguy. Why don't you try to see the difference, there is something to learn there not just accept what we say. According to Geoff Emerick, the Beatles sound engineer, some of the Beatles songs sounds better in mono and it will never sound right in stereo, but it was recorded to be played in mono systems, decades ago. Today when we thing about recording and the final product, we thing at least of stereo.

DR-05 with 2 mics can capture the space, ambience that will never show in mono.

Also, you have at least 2GB of memory that is room enough to record hours of wav stereo tracks.
 
Stereo is just a passing fad ............. It won't last. :)
 
Thanks for input

I appreciate the input from everybody so far. I just logged on this morning to read replies to my original post from 3 days ago. In between I spent quite a bit of time experimenting with multiple recordings of sound from my computer's speaker system -- 4 songs, 1 minute segments from each in wav 16 bit stereo & mono, wav 24 bit stereo & mono, mp3 stereo & mono, and then saved the mono files to stereo files with Goldwave. To be honest, I'm not hearing differences on the channels recorded in stereo, but there might be some slightly improved quality of the sound recorded in stereo as opposed to that same sound recorded in mono and saved to stereo. So far I've only studied one of the 4 songs this way, and I will do the rest and post my conclusions.
 
chuckadam said:
I appreciate the input from everybody so far. I just logged on this morning to read replies to my original post from 3 days ago. In between I spent quite a bit of time experimenting with multiple recordings of sound from my computer's speaker system -- 4 songs, 1 minute segments from each in wav 16 bit stereo & mono, wav 24 bit stereo & mono, mp3 stereo & mono, and then saved the mono files to stereo files with Goldwave. To be honest, I'm not hearing differences on the channels recorded in stereo, but there might be some slightly improved quality of the sound recorded in stereo as opposed to that same sound recorded in mono and saved to stereo. So far I've only studied one of the 4 songs this way, and I will do the rest and post my conclusions.
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recording music played thru your puter speakers simply isn't going to tell you much. You need to do the test with live music like what you intend to record with this unit.
For one thing you puter speakers might not have great seperation themselves.

But if you DO record in mono you're simply throewing away memory for absolutely no purpose if you save a mono file to stereo. You only need to save a mono file to mono and pan it center.
Half as much memory ... exact same sound.

But to determine the usefulness of stereo recording you need to go record some live music. I have a DR-5 and I use it for live recording all the time and there is absolutely a large difference between what the two sides capture.
 
Lt. Bob said:
...But to determine the usefulness of stereo recording you need to go record some live music. I have a DR-5 and I use it for live recording all the time and there is absolutely a large difference between what the two sides capture.
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I'm familiar with the Zoom H2 which are cardioid XY a few of my friends are using on our acoustic get togethers. I see the DR' uses omni's. Is there much stereo separation with the way they're configured?
 
mixsit said:
I'm familiar with the Zoom H2 which are cardioid XY a few of my friends are using on our acoustic get togethers. I see the DR' uses omni's. Is there much stereo separation with the way they're configured?
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enough that I treat them as seperate tracks when 'mixing' the results.
 
So ok, the question I guess though is do they make for a fairly narrow image?
 
mixsit said:
So ok, the question I guess though is do they make for a fairly narrow image?
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not that I've noticed.
Like most of those portable recorders I find that the results sound a lot like what you'd hear if your head was where the unit was.

As for one company saying its mics are omni and another saying they're cardioid .... meh. They say what they think will get someone to buy it. I personally doubt that with those little mics stuck on the end of a recorder that there's a lotta difference between the soundstages of the two units. I could be wrong but that's kinda my thinking on it right now.

Regardless , nothing about the imaging has grabbed my attention or made me think it was narrow.
In fairness I can't say that i've really thought that hard about it though.
The separation is good enough that if guitar is off to one side it's clear on the recording that that's the case with the git being significantly louder on that side.
 
Lt. Bob is dead on live sound ; at much higher db than your computer speakers putting out, will bounce around a room , phase in and out and generally behave unpredictably . This is what our ears hear and what the mics on your machine should pick up. If you want to hear what the recording will sound like in mono simply turn sideways to the stage and plug one ear.
 
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