Looking for a portable recorder

[Christoffer Glans]

I', looking for a portable recorder that could be used for atmospheric sound recording. I found this which I think is very good in this price range.
http://www.zoom.co.jp/english/products/h4n/


Or does someone know a similar device that works with timecode as well?

 

[Adam Eden]

The zoom product is very good for the price and pretty hard to beat.

 

[Christoffer Glans]

Alright it's settled then
I hope the internal mics are good enough, though I got a Neuman 185 as an external mic if I need it.

 

[oleg kaizerman]

if you are looking for small handheld uni - the zoom is excellent but need good preamp in front to get it deliver good signal to noise ratio .
if you have a bit more and do thinking about use it as double system i will recommend you look at dr-680 from tascam , no tc as well , but for 760 us in B@h you get 6 good preamps and 8 track recording capability .

 

[Christoffer Glans]

Well, I bought the H4n and I'm not really happy. It has alot of noise, even if I push the mic volume to max it doesn't really take in alot of sound. There's this enormous noise over everything.
And when using an external mic with Phantom Power you can hear electronic "beep" sounds.

I'm trying to understand how the hell this thing got so many good reviews... it's useless on the field with these type of noises and sounds.
Are there any other in the same price range? Who at least gives you the basics of letting you record other things then noise and beep-sounds?
The DR-680 is good, but too expensive, I'm not after having alot of tracks, I'm after a device that let me use my external mic and has an internal stereo mic for recording atmospheric/ambience sounds.
I saw this http://pro.sony.com/bbsc/ssr/product-PCMD50/
but it is a little over my budget. Sound isn't my primary area, but I still need a device better then the H4n, at least not that much noise and screwy other things.

Any other devices?

 

[scott tebeau]

Apparently many have had excellent results with H4N and I would agree for quality price and performance it is difficult to beat. I've owned the zoom for a few months now and have had nothing but problems with its reliability, dropping tracks, corrupting, etc.

I lost the majority of my sound from a heavy dialogue day a couple of months back. It's a little difficult to explaining to a new client that the day has been ruined. I would encourage any new owners to do a fair amount of testing...

best of luck.

 

[Christoffer Glans]

Apparently many have had excellent results with H4N and I would agree for quality price and performance it is difficult to beat. I've owned the zoom for a few months now and have had nothing but problems with its reliability, dropping tracks, corrupting, etc.

I lost the majority of my sound from a heavy dialogue day a couple of months back. It's a little difficult to explaining to a new client that the day has been ruined. I would encourage any new owners to do a fair amount of testing...

best of luck.

So scott, you would recommend the PCMD50 instead? Or is there any other recorder without an internal mic but which has great XLR inputs with phantom power and low noise?
I understand the dr-680 from tascam, but it's a bit pricey...

 

[Adam Eden]

We use the Zoom every time we record TV commercials with a Canon 5d or 7d. We have on air currently 25 major ads on television in Australia currently and the audio from the zoom is perfect.

We are using lectrosonic radio microphones that are plugged into our SQN field mixer. The SQN is then plugged directly into the Zoom H4 via balance line level and there is no noise issue ever.

You also need to use high speed SD cards otherwise it will drop frames.

I bought our Zoom h4n from a proper professional audio company and they set it up correctly for us. I suggest you take your mics and gear back to where you bought the Zoom from and get them to set it up as it has heaps of different ways of setting it up.

I know more than 6 people using the Zoom H4n the same way as me without any problems

 

[Marc Wielage]

The best small timecode-based 2-track recorder I know of is the Sound Devices 722t. I've seen many sound effects crews use this and/or its bigger brother, the 4-track 744t. Very quiet machines, great battery life, superb mike preamps. They're solid as a rock and have great battery life. A machine like this and a nice M/S stereo microphone (or X/Y if you prefer) can make world-class recordings.

The Sound Devices are a lot more money than the Zoom, but you get what you pay for.

 

[JohnF]

I', looking for a portable recorder that could be used for atmospheric sound recording. I found this which I think is very good in this price range.
http://www.zoom.co.jp/english/products/h4n/


Or does someone know a similar device that works with timecode as well?

if you are looking for small handheld uni - the zoom is excellent but need good preamp in front to get it deliver good signal to noise ratio .
if you have a bit more and do thinking about use it as double system i will recommend you look at dr-680 from tascam , no tc as well , but for 760 us in B@h you get 6 good preamps and 8 track recording capability .

Since it seems that cameras with TC out are just sending out LTC through the BNC just route that signal from camera to one of the audio tracks and you have a TC recorder. This is the advantage to having more than 4 tracks to record on. (like the dr-680)

There are many post apps that will read TC input like this. (as an audio signal rather than metadata) Though test this workflow before committing with a project especially your audio level settings for the TC track. (avoid distortion)


JohnF

 

[Michael Hastings]

We use the Zoom every time we record TV commercials with a Canon 5d or 7d. We have on air currently 25 major ads on television in Australia currently and the audio from the zoom is perfect.

We are using lectrosonic radio microphones that are plugged into our SQN field mixer. The SQN is then plugged directly into the Zoom H4 via balance line level and there is no noise issue ever.

You also need to use high speed SD cards otherwise it will drop frames.

I bought our Zoom h4n from a proper professional audio company and they set it up correctly for us. I suggest you take your mics and gear back to where you bought the Zoom from and get them to set it up as it has heaps of different ways of setting it up.

I know more than 6 people using the Zoom H4n the same way as me without any problems

Adam could you share what that setup is?

 

[JohnF]

Adam could you share what that setup is?

The important detail he mentioned was that he was sending a balanced line level into the H4n. This means that the H4n does very little in terms of gain. The onboard pre-amps, which is where most of the noise will be introduced, are thus pretty much bypassed or rather they won't add much noise to the signal as the off board and better quality preamps in the SQN are doing most of the gain. What's more the preamps will not be as exposed to the levels of cross-talk, RFI and poor gain characteristics that can be inherent to small electronic recording devices.

If you need decent mic level gain on a cheap recorder use off board pre-amps. Even relatively cheap ones can be much better than onboard mic pre-amps.

JohnF

 

[Adam C Lubkin]

The best small timecode-based 2-track recorder I know of is the Sound Devices 722t. I've seen many sound effects crews use this and/or its bigger brother, the 4-track 744t. Very quiet machines, great battery life, superb mike preamps. They're solid as a rock and have great battery life. A machine like this and a nice M/S stereo microphone (or X/Y if you prefer) can make world-class recordings.

The Sound Devices are a lot more money than the Zoom, but you get what you pay for.

Marc, any recommendations for a M/S mic?

 

[Ryan Lalonde]

We use the Zoom every time we record TV commercials with a Canon 5d or 7d. We have on air currently 25 major ads on television in Australia currently and the audio from the zoom is perfect.

We are using lectrosonic radio microphones that are plugged into our SQN field mixer. The SQN is then plugged directly into the Zoom H4 via balance line level and there is no noise issue ever.

You also need to use high speed SD cards otherwise it will drop frames.

I bought our Zoom h4n from a proper professional audio company and they set it up correctly for us. I suggest you take your mics and gear back to where you bought the Zoom from and get them to set it up as it has heaps of different ways of setting it up.

I know more than 6 people using the Zoom H4n the same way as me without any problems

If you could post your settings that would be great!

 

[Christoffer Glans]

So I returned the Zoom and I talked to the store about a solution. They tip me about this which they had one unit of in store: http://www.korg.com/mr2
I understand it has a unique file quality, but I'm not sure about the plastic quality and stereo mic fixed in a 90 degree position. The inputs are also a bit questionable.
I think that a unit like this, I like the Sony much more.

Still, a colleague of mine tip me about getting a pre-amp instead. He gave me a tip about this: http://www.sounddevices.com/products/mixpre-d.htm
I think I will get that if it's good and later get a recorder of some kind. I can still record to my laptop if I need. I think that if I really demand quality it's better for me to get an additional Neuman 185 mic and record stereo with this, that way I will get a clean signal and a stereo mapping of choice instead of fixed to the recorder.

Good? Bad?

 

[Ariel Weiss]

The MixPre-D recorded to a laptop with proper software like ProTools or something decent should give you absolutely professional studio quality. Just use good mics as well. If on low budget look into the
Oktava 012.

So I returned the Zoom and I talked to the store about a solution. They tip me about this which they had one unit of in store: http://www.korg.com/mr2
I understand it has a unique file quality, but I'm not sure about the plastic quality and stereo mic fixed in a 90 degree position. The inputs are also a bit questionable.
I think that a unit like this, I like the Sony much more.

Still, a colleague of mine tip me about getting a pre-amp instead. He gave me a tip about this: http://www.sounddevices.com/products/mixpre-d.htm
I think I will get that if it's good and later get a recorder of some kind. I can still record to my laptop if I need. I think that if I really demand quality it's better for me to get an additional Neuman 185 mic and record stereo with this, that way I will get a clean signal and a stereo mapping of choice instead of fixed to the recorder.

Good? Bad?

 

[Christoffer Glans]

I already have a Neuman 185 so with an additional Neuman I would really get a seriously good sounding stereo ambience.
It's settled :coolgleamA:

 

[Marc Wielage]

Marc, any recommendations for a M/S mic?

I'm a big fan of the Sennheiser MKH30 and MKH50 combination, in a Rycote M/S rig. It's a little bit bigger than an American football, and sounds great -- but it requires good preamps. I bet it's at least 10dB quieter than the VP88 (which I've tested), but again, it's a question of getting what you pay for. This is about a $2500 setup. You can probably rent one for around $50 a day if you're in a city with a pro sound rental company -- that would be much less expensive than buying one.

The MixPre-D recorded to a laptop with proper software like ProTools or something decent should give you absolutely professional studio quality.

That will work, but you have two major issues: 1) timecode -- you need a stable timecode source to avoid any possibility of sync drift, and 2) a laptop is not very portable and is relatively fragile on location. A self-contained recorder is something you can literally run or walk down the street with, and that's very hard to do with a laptop.

I have done film sound from a cart with a laptop, using Gallery Metacorder, and the good news about specialized software like this is that it'll let you name all the tracks and assign metadata (like notes, scene & take numbers, etc.) to every recording. It'll also record to two simultaneous drives, which is helpful in the event of a crash or technical problem. While it works, using a laptop for recording is tough outside, especially if you have issues with wind, sand, rain, or moving shots (car interiors, etc.).

 

[Adam Eden]

Sorry guys I have been really busy this week.

The main thing that you need to do is make sure you are recording at 48khz 16bit and don't use stamina mode as this overwrites all the other settings. For some reason the machine defaults to 44.1khz and when this is up converted to 48khz for normal broadcast, you can loose sync.

If you need more detail on where to do this I will post exactly how to do it next week as I am at home now and my gear is at the office.

What John F is saying is absolutely correct, you need a decent mic preamp, I use an SQN (they sound the best) but there are very cost effective ones like the sound devices or the WENDT.
The mics on the Zoom are fine for atmos but mic level is a different thing.

A good basic mic pre amp will cost about $450 for a single channel and about $700 for a dual channel and is required for any decent mic.

Maybe if you try a powered mic like the Senheisser ME66 with the K6 power module, that should work fine.

 

[Trailangel]

The Zoom and Senn ME66 is a perfect match for a RED 1.
I use this combo daily.