Hi, I was thinking of getting one of these and wondered what people thought of it.
wanted it to make recording of live band so they can use it to review there performances
Any advice greatly appreciated
Thanks

I don't think this is the best choice at the price now that the M-Audio MicroTrack 24/96 has come out.



The MicroTrack even has proper balanced ¼" jack mic. inputs with phantom power.

I would think the MicroTrack would be the one to look at - and it's about the same price as the R-1.

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John - Sound-Link ProAudio
President - Federation Internationale des Chasseurs de Sons

John did you say you were going to be reviewing one of those soon?

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Yes, good, very good, but everything LOUDER!

yea but the r1 has two condenser mic's already built in that explains its price. it is a very popular recorder and quite flexible. If you want one for recording form another source then go for the M-audio one if you want to record straight from your pocket without hauling mic's etc.. with you then go for the edirol.

Quote Gary M:

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. . . but the r1 has two condenser mic's already built in . . .

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But so has the MicroTrack as far as I know.

Info I have seen suggests it comes with a small plug-in stereo mic. (it also has a 3.5mm mini-jack with plug-in power for such a mic.)

I am still waiting for my review sample, unfortunately.

The R-1 does seem to have effects built-in, though.

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John - Sound-Link ProAudio
President - Federation Internationale des Chasseurs de Sons

I ve heard that edirol's own mics are noisy. Cant remember exactly what but i researched this a while ago and there were comments about noise levels.
Apart from that it looks so ugly...

The M audio seems promising. In the mean time i am using a small HiMD to record uncompressed PCM audio at 44Khz/16bit and its sound great. The HiMD disks are a bit expensive at about £5 each for 1Gb of space but 1Gb of space on smart media costs about £80 so i think this makes a huge difference. I ve got one HI MD disk and i am just using that by re writting it. I bought some cheap normal MDs which you can still use them to record at PCM uncrompressed, they just wont fit so much as a 1GB HiMD disk.
Tranfer to PC is done using USB 1 (unfortunatelly this is the only bugger as its slow). The Sonic Stage software is pretty easy to use and with a few clicks you get your files tranfered while you enjoy a cup of coffe (make a two if got a lot of data!). Then Sonicc stage converts them to wav files.
In addition you can store any other kind of data on the HiMD disk like a portable HD. U can also tranfer MP3s on the disk to listen on the move but they have to be converted into SONY atrac system. The tranfer software does that for you.
As far copywrite protection hassles i am not sure whats going on but for what i do, i.e. record on MD using mic in or Line in and then tranfer to PC i had no problems.
As said they only downside is the USB connection being type1 and not 2.
I picked my MD from Amazon at an offer price £109 last June. It was the top of the range model MZ-NH1 or something. Now sells for over £289 and i cant believe how i got it for £109. But the story goes on and after it got stolen i got the MZ-RH910 for £130 or so. I found both models have their pros and cons usually in practicalities.

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Has anyone tried the Sony MZ-M100 or MZ-M10 yet?
Impressive specs, records uncompressed PCM @ 44.1k onto HiMD. They've been on sale in the States for a while AKAIK but no sign of them in UK/Europe yet.

Quote chriscarter:

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Has anyone tried the Sony MZ-M100 or MZ-M10 yet?
Impressive specs, records uncompressed PCM @ 44.1k onto HiMD. They've been on sale in the States for a while AKAIK but no sign of them in UK/Europe yet.

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But the price is almost the same as the R-1 and MicroTrack and both those do 24-bit.

Not a contender, I would say.

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John - Sound-Link ProAudio
President - Federation Internationale des Chasseurs de Sons

Well I am shocked! I have been wanting something like this for a long time ( as have many people I am sure) From the spec it appears I should be able to plug in my Apogee Mini-Me into the SPDIF socket for some high quality field recording. Anyone know how what size flash it will take 2gig perhaps? The only thing that had interested me before was the Sound Devices 722/44 but I cannot afford them. Whilst I know the M-Audio wont quite be as 'PRO' I do hope it is built to withstand the rigours of recording in some reasonably challenging conditions. Now I need to start saving!!

yea edirol will take the 2 gig (slower speed 20x, not fast 40x) flash, the mic's are not all that bad on them and i have never heard a bad word against them. there are no moving parts as its flash and you can check out what it sounds like on their web page.

I think my choice would be the MicroTrack for the price.

As memory cards are getting larger and larger and cheaper and cheaper, I would have thought it a very short-sighted manufacturer that would limit the CF card to anything less than 32 or 64GB.

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John - Sound-Link ProAudio
President - Federation Internationale des Chasseurs de Sons

Having seen an Edirol unit that's been in the field, I'd go for the M Audio. The edirol is an ugly bulky unit in comparison the M Audio unit, and things like the little jog wheel are easily snapped off.

The MicroTrack certainly looks good but the USA M-Audio site lists it at $499 (that's £272@ current xchange rate) while the UK M-Audio site lists it at £349 . That's a pretty big £77 discrepancy. Even if you factor in VAT to the US-to-UK price the figures don't add up. Does anyone know where to get it cheaper in UK/Europe?

Quote chriscarter:

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The MicroTrack certainly looks good but the USA M-Audio site lists it at $499 (that's £272@ current xchange rate) while the UK M-Audio site lists it at £349 . That's a pretty big £77 discrepancy. Even if you factor in VAT to the US-to-UK price the figures don't add up.

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Don't forget shipping and import duty - I would say that the price is quite fair.

No doubt it will be discounted, though.

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John - Sound-Link ProAudio
President - Federation Internationale des Chasseurs de Sons

The MicroTrack offers phantom powered preamps but do I understand correctly that these will be via 2xTRS? That will mean some clumsy and relatively heavy cables adapters, no? And if phantom power is on, won't there be a potentially damaging short as the plugs are inserted and removed? And I hope it's 48v rather then some 12 or 15 volt supplies that have been included on some lower end hardware.

That aside, it may be the best thing for me that's come along is some time. And it even comes with rechargeable batteries.

On another note, though: MAudio combinations of hardware and software have not been at the top of most people's list for reliability. And, especially so for Mac side of things. Since this is a completely self contained device, though, I would hope none of those problems would exist.

Anyway, I hope it's great. I'd love to buy something like this.

For John and other Fostex and/or flash users: There have been a number of reports of frequent file corruption (especially with the Fostex) and am wondering about your experience so far with the Fostex recorder and other flash hardware.

For those considering the Sony PCM minis: Make sure you read all the fine print very carefully. Much of the function of this unit relies on Sony proprietary software. Mac users are left completely in the dust. Pay very close attention to exactly what can be transferred digitally. It seems Sony has crippled most everything a pro or semipro user would want to do. I have a friend who owns of these, and has owned several older units. He's owned so many because they have all quit working despite light use and good care. The current 1 gig unit also gets files bungled up and much of the information has not been retrievable. As always, though, I'm sure there's a large number of folks who have done very well with these mini-discs.

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Much of the function of this unit relies on Sony proprietary software. Mac users are left completely in the dust.

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The new Sony MZ-M100 and MZ-M10 HiMD PCM recorders come with Mac OSX software for transferring audio, although only in WAV format.

I must agree that the MicroTrack does look good but I'm still kind of undecided on it. M-Audio don't exactly have the best reputation for reliability and this is a new kind of product for them. But I have a Sony Pro Walkman that's still working fine after 10 years and an aging/battered MZ-R MD recorder that's never given me any trouble either.

I think I'm going to let a few adventurous early adopters be field testers before splashing out cash.

Quote Jeraldo:

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The MicroTrack offers phantom powered preamps but do I understand correctly that these will be via 2xTRS?

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Yes, but it also has a 3.5mm mini-jack with plug-in power. The phantom power is switchable if you have dynamic mics.

Quote Jeraldo:

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That aside, it may be the best thing for me that's come along is some time. And it even comes with rechargeable batteries.

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It looks good to me, but I am still awaiting my review sample.

Quote Jeraldo:

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For John and other Fostex and/or flash users: There have been a number of reports of frequent file corruption (especially with the Fostex) and am wondering about your experience so far with the Fostex recorder and other flash hardware.

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The only file corruption I have had is when you eject media from the Fostex FR-2 without stopping it first.

The audio files are NOT corrupted and it's easy to pop the CF card or PCMCIA drive into a laptop, copy all the sound files accross and then re-format the card. Re-format again in the FR-2 and all is fine.

Annoying when it happened the first time, but not any more, now I know the solution.

Quote Jeraldo:

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For those considering the Sony PCM minis: Make sure you read all the fine print very carefully. Much of the function of this unit relies on Sony proprietary software. Mac users are left completely in the dust. Pay very close attention to exactly what can be transferred digitally. It seems Sony has crippled most everything a pro or semipro user would want to do. I have a friend who owns of these, and has owned several older units. He's owned so many because they have all quit working despite light use and good care. The current 1 gig unit also gets files bungled up and much of the information has not been retrievable. As always, though, I'm sure there's a large number of folks who have done very well with these mini-discs.

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Something to avoid then

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John - Sound-Link ProAudio
President - Federation Internationale des Chasseurs de Sons