Portable digital audio recording

[Queso]

So i've scoured the internet for hours.

 

i'm looking for something to record outdoors with that's portable, as well as affordable.

the only thing i could find was this...

http://www.edirol.com/products/info/r1.html

edirol r-1.

the thing is, it's just over 400$

i was hoping i could find something a little cheaper than that...that's ridiculous.

can anybody help me out?

[Tormod]

Do you need all the bells and whistles? I know a lot of people use minidisc players for this purpose. Or a good harddisk based MP3 player. The minidisc will give the best results, though.

[Queso]

all i need is something with relatively low noise when recording, and i could hook a microphone up to it. i didn't know you could do that with mp3 players...hmmm...

[Tormod]

my Creative MP3 has a mic input. Most minidisc records have mic inputs these days.

[Queso]

how's the quality?

i had a minidisc player once, and i remember the thing HISSED like crazy, it totally killed the music listening experience for me. are they different nowadays?

[Queso]

and is there any way to adjust the gain?

[Tormod]

Quality is of course dependant on the microphone and the quality of the inputs - the recording in itself is fine with my MP3 player.

 

I have a gain control on my MP3 player, and also input monitoring. I have the Creative Jukebox JB3 20 Gigabyte. It can record straight to wav without compression.

 

Your minidisc player must have been faulty - minidisc was used for professional recording, particularly sampling, before harddisk became as cheap and big as they are now. Only real difference between CD and minidisc is the sampling rate (48kHz for the minidisc). Audiowise it would be difficult to hear a difference.

[Queso]

yeah, wow. thanks tormod.

[Queso]

hm...what sort of microphone do you suggest that fits into a 1/4 or 1/8 cable instead of an xlr. i'm not even sure if they have xlr to 1/4 converters, do they?

[Tormod]

For field recording you don't need a very advanced mic, so you could buy a mic that comes with a normal jack and then just use a mini jack converter.

 

Or get one of these...

http://www.csctoronto.com/store/product_info.php?products_id=1487

[Queso]

thanks a lot for the help. i tried looking for the Creative Jukebox JB3 on the web and couldn't find any, weird....but this is a way more affordable solution, and i'll be checking into this soon.

[Tormod]

I think people are wary of selling them. They were quite expensive back in 2002 when they were all the rage...now the iPod and other tiny MP3-players have made the market rather uncomfortable.

 

Here is one on eBay:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=75464&item=5756444634&rd=1

[Tormod]

Found this discussion on field recorders - both the Creative JB3 and the Fostex are mentioned. Maybe you can pick up some advice on mics etc here:

 

http://www.groupsrv.com/movies/post-173075.html

[Tormod]

LOL, there is even a discussion group for using JB3 in the field:

 

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/njb3tapers/ :Alien:

[Queso]

hah, perfect. i'll be picking one off ebay in a matter of days.