Will DAT last as a format? (honest...not a troll/flame) [Archive]

Dan Gruner

March 10th 04, 11:52 PM

"Thomas Bishop" > wrote in message
gy.com...
> "Erik" wrote in message
> > I'm a student about to enter a conservatory next year for classical
> > performance, and I'm looking at options for recording concerts, master
> > classes and other important events.
>
> I just sold my D7 and bought a Nomad Jukebox 3. Haven't really gotten
into
> it yet, but I think it will be a great replacement. Limitations of a DAT:
>
> Tapes. Switching tapes every 60 minutes is a pain if the concert lasts
> longer than an hour and has no good place to take the time to switch.
> Real-time transfer. With the Jukebox I can transfer via USB or Firewire,
> much faster than real time.
> Availability of tapes. There's nowhere in my town that stocks DAT tapes.
> No major electronics stores carry them either. I bought the last of the
> stock in BestBuy once. You can order them through mail order, but you'd
> better make sure you have plenty on hand at all times.
>
> The Jukebox will record in WAV format, so no worry about compression. A
20
> gig hard drive is enough to store at least a concert, and that's all I
ever
> need. There are several others such as the iRiver, CoreSound, and I think
> SoundProfessionals has one either out or on the way. I found the Jukebox
to
> be the most cost-effective.
>
>

One very important thing to consider if you go down the route of the
portable harddisk recorder such as The Jukebox is the quality of the A/D
(Analogue to Digital) converter inside them. I don't know a lot about The
Jukebox, but a professional DAT walkman is likely to have a very high
quality A/D inside it, maybe of higher quality than The Jukebox. It is
certainly worth giving this a high consideration, since all your signals
have to be converted into the digital domain.

DAT WILL be around for a good while yet, I don't think there is cause to
worry. It's certainly a format I like, although I mainly burn straight to
CD-R or CD-RW using an HHB Burn-IT and the quality is stunning - after all
its uncompressed audio like the DAT.

Good Luck!

Dan

nmm

March 11th 04, 12:23 AM

On Wed, 10 Mar 2004 6:43 PM, Bob Olhsson > wrote:
>Not very long in my opinion. Fuji is the last manufacturer making
>reliable
>tape and it is no longer used for data. I'd buy a CD recorder
>

What about HHB?

Is Zonal still around? I haven't seen any Zonal or Dic-Dats in a while.

Scott Dorsey

March 11th 04, 12:30 AM

In article >, nmm > wrote:
>On Wed, 10 Mar 2004 6:43 PM, Bob Olhsson > wrote:
>>Not very long in my opinion. Fuji is the last manufacturer making
>>reliable
>>tape and it is no longer used for data. I'd buy a CD recorder
>
>What about HHB?

HHB is around but not making DAT decks. They couldn't get the transport
mechanisms any more.

> Is Zonal still around? I haven't seen any Zonal or Dic-Dats in a while.

Zonal died about three years ago, sadly, just as they were starting to
get a hold in the American market. They made some really topnotch analogue
tapes too.

Thank god DIC// went out long before that. They made some of the worst,
most unreliable junk ever.
--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

Arny Krueger

March 11th 04, 12:33 AM

"Dan Gruner" > wrote in message

> "Thomas Bishop" > wrote in message
> gy.com...

>> "Erik" wrote in message
>>> I'm a student about to enter a conservatory next year for classical
>>> performance, and I'm looking at options for recording concerts,
>>> master classes and other important events.

>> I just sold my D7 and bought a Nomad Jukebox 3. Haven't really
>> gotten into it yet, but I think it will be a great replacement.
>> Limitations of a DAT:

>> Tapes. Switching tapes every 60 minutes is a pain if the concert
>> lasts longer than an hour and has no good place to take the time to
>> switch. Real-time transfer. With the Jukebox I can transfer via USB
>> or Firewire, much faster than real time.

>> Availability of tapes. There's nowhere in my town that stocks DAT
>> tapes. No major electronics stores carry them either. I bought the
>> last of the stock in BestBuy once. You can order them through mail
>> order, but you'd better make sure you have plenty on hand at all
>> times.

>> The Jukebox will record in WAV format, so no worry about
>> compression. A 20 gig hard drive is enough to store at least a
>> concert, and that's all I ever need. There are several others such
>> as the iRiver, CoreSound, and I think SoundProfessionals has one
>> either out or on the way. I found the Jukebox to be the most
>> cost-effective.

For maximum cost-effectiveness, pick up a refurbed NJB3 from CL on eBay -
under $200 with warranty when they are available. There are at least three
up for auction right now.

> One very important thing to consider if you go down the route of the
> portable harddisk recorder such as The Jukebox is the quality of the
> A/D (Analogue to Digital) converter inside them. I don't know a lot
> about The Jukebox, but a professional DAT walkman is likely to have a
> very high quality A/D inside it, maybe of higher quality than The
> Jukebox. It is certainly worth giving this a high consideration,
> since all your signals have to be converted into the digital domain.

No sweat in the case of NJB3. Its line inputs have about 85 dB SNR and
20-20 KHz response at less than 0.5
dB down if you optimize its input levels in a logical way - operate its
input at 0 dB gain. The NHB3's line inputs have good enough SNR and
sufficient gain reserves that some people turn up the gain, add a little
boost in the analog domain, and make relatively noise-free recordings of
louder affairs directly off of the output of high quality mics.

The NJB3 also has a optical digital input that provides even higher quality
operation with 3rd party external mic preamp/ADC component(s).

In the case of the NJB3 you've got a wide choice of formats. I needed to
make a recording at a banquet I was doing sound at, but I kinda-sorta was
somewhat unprepared (the band kept growing while I was doing the setup). My
NJB3 didn't have enough charge left in its battery to make me confident that
I could record the whole thing in Wav format. Sound quality was not an
overriding issue, so I made a 192 Kb MP3 which at least doubled the battery
life due to vastly reduced disk activity. This was at least as good as MD.

Normally, I can get about 8 hours record/playback of waf files on a pair of
batteries if they are fully charged. Power line operation extends maximum
recording time to absurd extremes.

As was previously mentioned, the NJB3 has both USB 1.1 and IEEE 1394
(firewire) interfaces. Over firewire .wav files transfer in a fraction of
real time. MP3 files really scoot!

Plus, you can always use a NJB3 the way most people use them, which is to
listen to a big library of tunes just about anywhere. I have several hundred
..wav files on mine, and still have a few gig left in reserve for recording.
This includes two complete cycles of the Beethoven symphonies, the hits of
Billy Joel, etc., etc.

BTW, if you are looking for some good 'phones for use with a NJB3, let me
recommend Sennheiser IE3s.

Mike Rivers

March 11th 04, 01:21 AM

In article > (remove writes:

> I'm a student about to enter a conservatory next year for classical
> performance, and I'm looking at options for recording concerts, master
> classes and other important events.

> I have a minidisc already, but I always
> cringe at recording one-shot performances with it due to the compression,
> and the difficulty at outputting digitally to the computer.

I would have suggested Minidisk. Are you planning to set up good
microphones in the right palce in a concert hall, or are these casual
recordings? If they're casual, the data compression won't beat you up,
and you can always to an analog transfer to your computer.

> I'm considering buying a
> copy-protection free recorder such as the Sony PCM-M1. However, before
> shelling out a ton of money for this recorder, how long is DAT anticipated
> to be around?

It's already in the coffin. There are no longer any companies
manufacturing DAT transports, and the only DAT recorders you'll be
able to find for purchase are either used (very bad idea) or new old
stock. I'm not sure who, if anyone, is manufacturing new DAT recorders
today. Tape is still available and will probably continue to be
available for a few years, but it's not a good place to start unless
your Dad will give you his recorder while you're going to school.
Also, there's no quick way to transfer a recording from DAT to
computer. You have to do it real time. If you have a S/PDIF interface
in your computer and have the strange cable that Sony uses on their
small DAT recorders, you can transfer digitally, but in real time.

Right now you're really in a hard place. Hard disk recorders seem to
be the way to go, but at the moment you don't have a lot of choice as
far as a recorder with one that has a usable mic input. I have a Nomad
Jukebox 3 that has essentially replaced my portable DAT recorder, but
I carry a separate mic preamp or small mixer since its mic input is
kind of a joke (unless you're recording very loud music). People have
been talking about one from iRiver, but I don't know whether its mic
input is usable or whether it records in an uncompressed format. Core
Sound has a cool audio interface that plugs into a PDA, and they have
a companion mic preamp for it that's quite good, but that's pretty new
technology, and recording on flash cards might get kind of expensive.

Today it's kind of a tough call. The pro audio industry is really
driven by whatever technology the consumer side feeds it, and it seems
that consumers today are interested in portable digital players, but
not all that interested in portable digital recordings. At the moment,
it seems that until you get into the range of equipment that's used
for location film sound (a few thousand up to maybe 20 thousand bucks)
you're going to have to live with some pretty non-pro stuff. There's a
new Minidisk format gleaming in someone's eye that has larger capacity
and offers an uncompressed data format, but I'll bet it will still
have the look and feel of a consumer product.

--
I'm really Mike Rivers )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me here: double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

NJD

March 11th 04, 01:29 AM

In article >, dontspam-
says...
> I'm a student about to enter a conservatory next year for classical
> performance, and I'm looking at options for recording concerts, master
> classes and other important events. I have a minidisc already, but I always
> cringe at recording one-shot performances with it due to the compression,
> and the difficulty at outputting digitally to the computer. My dad has a
> Sony DAT walkman, which I absolutely love, so I'm considering buying a
> copy-protection free recorder such as the Sony PCM-M1. However, before
> shelling out a ton of money for this recorder, how long is DAT anticipated
> to be around? I plan to use it for myself, probably digitally outputting the
> DAT to computer and burning the files to CD-R or DVD as a backup, then
> editing and burning CDs for friends and family. I just want to make sure
> media is available before I go down this route. Finally, I need something
> portable, so lugging a computer to concerts etc is not feasible. Any insight
> would be very much appreciated.

FWIW, I think DATs are obsolete. Look to other portable formats.

Just my 2 cents.

Geoff Wood

March 11th 04, 02:57 AM

Erik wrote:
> I'm a student about to enter a conservatory next year for classical
> performance, and I'm looking at options for recording concerts, master
> classes and other important events. I have a minidisc already, but I
> always cringe at recording one-shot performances with it due to the
> compression, and the difficulty at outputting digitally to the
> computer. My dad has a Sony DAT walkman, which I absolutely love, so

Get a laptop, unless you are into stealth recording. I have DAT (records
direct 44k1, SBM, etc) and use my 2.2GHz laptop/ M-Audio Transit in
preference - why insert an extra stage (inluding the time to ttransfer to
computer), if that is your modus op.

geoff.

Mike Rivers

March 11th 04, 03:04 AM

In article > writes:

> One very important thing to consider if you go down the route of the
> portable harddisk recorder such as The Jukebox is the quality of the A/D
> (Analogue to Digital) converter inside them. I don't know a lot about The
> Jukebox, but a professional DAT walkman is likely to have a very high
> quality A/D inside it, maybe of higher quality than The Jukebox.

The Jukebox is remarkably good. If you wanted a better converter for
your Walkman DAT, you got the SBM-1 Super Bit Mapping accessory A/D
converter. I can't imagine that the stock Sony Walkman DAT converter
sounds better than what's in the Jukebox. It's no Prism, but it's no
slouch either. The worst thing about the Jukebox is the mini jack for
input. If they made it big enough to put a pair of 1/4" TRS jacks on
it I'd have no complaints at all.

--
I'm really Mike Rivers )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me here: double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

tferrell

March 11th 04, 03:13 AM

Geoff Wood wrote:

> Get a laptop, unless you are into stealth recording. I have DAT (records
> direct 44k1, SBM, etc) and use my 2.2GHz laptop/ M-Audio Transit in
> preference - why insert an extra stage (inluding the time to ttransfer to
> computer), if that is your modus op.

Yup...I have run thousands of hours of DAT tape and it took me a long time and
a considerable amount of money to give it up. I run to a laptop and firewire
drive now. It does take discipline in that you need to archive to DVD and/or
make CDs of two tracks or mixdowns to clear your drives. Can't be lazy and
just toss cartridges on a shelf. I did that for years and I'm terrified that
one day I'm going to put something priceless in the machine and all I'm going
to hear is zzzzzzzt!!!

If you're a taper and you stealth...yes, dat is more...um...portable. But
it's demise is only a matter of time. However, contrary to one poster's
assertion, you don't need to change tapes every hour. I have hundreds of 60 M
(meter) tapes that have proven reliable after five years. You can get two
hours on a 60 meter dat. For the truly brave, you can run 90 meters and get
three hours. Although, this tape is more prone to breakage, is thinner,
probably won't archive as long, and stresses transports -- particularly small
portable machines such as the D7, D8 and M1 Sony units. Also, definitely not
recommended in the HHB portadat (great machine). Man, I sure do miss running
in my Panasonic SV-255 though -- even without the timecode.

Go hard disk...

Tim

Kurt Albershardt

March 11th 04, 03:44 AM

Erik wrote:

> I'm a student about to enter a conservatory next year for classical
> performance, and I'm looking at options for recording concerts, master
> classes and other important events. I have a minidisc already, but I always
> cringe at recording one-shot performances with it due to the compression,
> and the difficulty at outputting digitally to the computer...I need something
> portable, so lugging a computer to concerts etc is not feasible.

Can you wait a couple of months? http://www.sounddevices.com/products/7.htm looks like the most likely candidate for pro DAT replacement, but with ~120 hour recording time and far better preamps than any DAT machine I've heard.

Geoff Wood

March 11th 04, 04:22 AM

tferrell wrote:
> Geoff Wood wrote:
> long, and stresses transports -- particularly small portable machines
> such as the D7, D8 and M1 Sony units. Also, definitely not
> recommended in the HHB portadat (great machine). Man, I sure do miss
> running in my Panasonic SV-255 though -- even without the timecode.

My first DAT was a D7. A particularly nasty little machine, with incredibly
grainy course sound. And horrible distortion if the signal went anything
above the -12 dot. On the other hand, my current DTC-ZE700 sounds great,
but is not portable.

My laptop/Transit sounds even better, as long as it is running off battery.
On PSU (SMPS) it put a buzz noise thru everythingat about -55dB.

geoff

Charles Tomaras

March 11th 04, 05:08 AM

"Bob Olhsson" > wrote in message
...
> "Erik" (remove dontspam but not
> spamstinks)> wrote in message ...
> >...how long is DAT anticipated
> > to be around?
>
> Not very long in my opinion. Fuji is the last manufacturer making reliable
> tape and it is no longer used for data. I'd buy a CD recorder
>
> --
> Bob Olhsson Audio Mastery, Nashville TN
> Mastering, Audio for Picture, Mix Evaluation and Quality Control
> Over 40 years making people sound better than they ever imagined!
> 615.385.8051 http://www.hyperback.com

Sorry to disagree Bob on the subject of tape stock. Maxell Pro DAT tapes are
outstanding and very affordable. Many of us have had this discussion on
rec.audio.movies.production.sound over the years and Maxell has been very
consistent for those who use hundreds of them a year in production sound
work. Personally I've used them for 10 years now and have NEVER had a tape
eaten or an ominous phone call from the post house at 2am.

Charles Tomaras
Seattle, WA

Charles Tomaras

March 11th 04, 05:09 AM

"Erik" (remove dontspam but not
spamstinks)> wrote in message ...
> I'm a student about to enter a conservatory next year for classical
> performance, and I'm looking at options for recording concerts, master
> classes and other important events. I have a minidisc already, but I
always
> cringe at recording one-shot performances with it due to the compression,
> and the difficulty at outputting digitally to the computer. My dad has a
> Sony DAT walkman, which I absolutely love, so I'm considering buying a
> copy-protection free recorder such as the Sony PCM-M1. However, before
> shelling out a ton of money for this recorder, how long is DAT anticipated
> to be around? I plan to use it for myself, probably digitally outputting
the
> DAT to computer and burning the files to CD-R or DVD as a backup, then
> editing and burning CDs for friends and family. I just want to make sure
> media is available before I go down this route. Finally, I need something
> portable, so lugging a computer to concerts etc is not feasible. Any
insight
> would be very much appreciated.
>
> Erik

If extreme portability is not a need, you may want to look at picking up a
new or used Alesis Masterlink recorder.

Paul Stamler

March 11th 04, 08:30 AM

Marantz CD-R recorder. About $650 street price, which you'll save in a year
or two on the difference in cost between DAT tapes and blank CD-R's. It has
microphone inputs, and I think it has phantom power too.

Peace,
Paul

david

March 11th 04, 09:48 AM

In article m>,
Thomas Bishop > wrote:

> Switching tapes every 60 minutes is a pain if the concert lasts
> longer than an hour and has no good place to take the time to switch.

Buy 120 minute tapes.

> Availability of tapes. There's nowhere in my town that stocks DAT tapes.
> No major electronics stores carry them either. I bought the last of the
> stock in BestBuy once. You can order them through mail order, but you'd
> better make sure you have plenty on hand at all times.

Jeez, how hard is it to keep a few extra around? Mail order is the best
pricing anyway.

As someone else also commented previously, unlike Bob O., I have not
had problems with the quality of dat tape. I kinda scratch my head when
I read him stating this time and again. I use only Quantegy tape and
Panasonic 3800's and have had only one problem, a slight drop out, in
the past 6 years.

It was however in the middle of a live concert I was recording on 2
dats. So I just grabbed the 1/4 of a second blip from the backup. It
sure made up for all of the lugging of the second 3800 to concerts and
never having to use the backup. Boy did I feel smart! ;>

I'd also add I am still able to play back tapes I recorded in the 80's.
(I'd always wondered if I would be able to still play them 15 or more
years out.) All my 456 1/4" and 2" has to get baked first. And the
machines aligned ...

That said, in-house I do dump my studio mixes from a converter (Waves
L2) directly into Sound Designer and only use dat while recording voice
over stuff for the redundency - it goes into SD at the same time -
while grabbing takes. Once the talent goes out the door I never wanna
have to bring them back cuz of something stupid I did.

If you keep a 3800 healthy and happy I have found it to be a very
reliable and simple to use format. Very reliable is check mark number
one if your recording important live stuff. More so if you're getting
well paid to do it.

Although I really like computers and the ones in my control room
literally don't crash or lose data running Protools and SD, I am still
not comfortable with the idea of grabbing live stuff only to a hard
drive. Cuz my head's the one on the chopping block.

David Correia
Celebration Sound
Warren, Rhode Island

www.CelebrationSound.com

Paul Rubin

March 11th 04, 11:14 AM

"Geoff Wood" -nospam> writes:
> Get a laptop, unless you are into stealth recording. I have DAT (records
> direct 44k1, SBM, etc) and use my 2.2GHz laptop/ M-Audio Transit in
> preference - why insert an extra stage (inluding the time to ttransfer to
> computer), if that is your modus op.

I don't need stealth for the stuff I'm doing, but I do need to record
long sessions with no AC power, so a laptop isn't really practical.
Any other ideas? I'll make another post about the NJB3 which is
almost but not quite what's needed.

Arny Krueger

March 11th 04, 11:33 AM

"Paul Rubin" > wrote in message

> "Geoff Wood" -nospam> writes:
>> Get a laptop, unless you are into stealth recording. I have DAT
>> (records direct 44k1, SBM, etc) and use my 2.2GHz laptop/ M-Audio
>> Transit in preference - why insert an extra stage (inluding the
>> time to ttransfer to computer), if that is your modus op.
>
> I don't need stealth for the stuff I'm doing, but I do need to record
> long sessions with no AC power, so a laptop isn't really practical.
> Any other ideas? I'll make another post about the NJB3 which is
> almost but not quite what's needed.

The big hole in the NJB3 is the lack of mic inputs.

Peter Larsen

March 11th 04, 12:53 PM

Scott Dorsey wrote:

> BUT, if you buy a DAT deck, don't buy anything with a
> half-sized head drum. They are no fun at all to work on.

Such have however been known to be able to play back tapes from
mis-aligned machines on two occasions known to me. Not having
mis-aligned machines is generally wise.

> --scott

Kind regards

Peter Larsen

--
*******************************************
* My site is at: http://www.muyiovatki.dk *
*******************************************

Richard

March 11th 04, 02:29 PM

Erik,

I've been using DAT for years. These days, I often take my Masterlink
with me on live situations, but frankly, I prefer DAT. Especially in
a live setting, you only get one chance to get the recording. DAT is
the most reliable format I've used. If something happens to a CD-R
while burning live, or if your computer crashes, for example, while
you are recording, you may very well lose some or all of the music.
However, if, for instance, you lose power to your DAT machine, (not
only do you often have battery backup) the tape is OK and you haven't
lost much if anything at all. Looking for a used DAT machine would be
a good investment. They're probably pretty much done depreciating; if
portability is important, you may want to look for something like the
Tascam DA-P1, which has, in my opinion, significantly better preamps
and converters than the Sony. Many people these days are saying that
DAT is a completely obsolete format, but in my experience, it's still
farily universal, which is important for dealing with other people.
Good luck in your search--keep us posted.

Regards,
Richard

"Erik" (remove dontspam but not spamstinks)> wrote in message >...
> I'm a student about to enter a conservatory next year for classical
> performance, and I'm looking at options for recording concerts, master
> classes and other important events. I have a minidisc already, but I always
> cringe at recording one-shot performances with it due to the compression,
> and the difficulty at outputting digitally to the computer. My dad has a
> Sony DAT walkman, which I absolutely love, so I'm considering buying a
> copy-protection free recorder such as the Sony PCM-M1. However, before
> shelling out a ton of money for this recorder, how long is DAT anticipated
> to be around? I plan to use it for myself, probably digitally outputting the
> DAT to computer and burning the files to CD-R or DVD as a backup, then
> editing and burning CDs for friends and family. I just want to make sure
> media is available before I go down this route. Finally, I need something
> portable, so lugging a computer to concerts etc is not feasible. Any insight
> would be very much appreciated.
>
> Erik

Brotherdave

March 11th 04, 03:52 PM

Nothing will last as a format.
DAT is dying.

Aside from the converters themselves, it will also be quite important how
you get the sound into electrical form to start with. What are you planning
on using for mics? What will you use as a preamp? What level of quality
are you trying to attain? How will you archive, the original recording or a
1:1 backup archive on CD/DVD/tape or whatever? Whatever you do it is best
to archive on a medium that has not had much use (for tape) and store it in
a well controlled environment. How portable does it need to be?

brotherdave

"Erik" (remove dontspam but not
spamstinks)> wrote in message ...
> I'm a student about to enter a conservatory next year...

Jay Kadis

March 11th 04, 06:38 PM

In article >, (Scott Dorsey)
wrote:

[snip]

>
> BUT, if you buy a DAT deck, don't buy anything with a half-sized head
> drum. They are no fun at all to work on.
> --scott

But sometimes they will play a DAT tape that full-size heads can't.

-Jay
--
x------- Jay Kadis ------- x---- Jay's Attic Studio ------x
x Lecturer, Audio Engineer x Dexter Records x
x CCRMA, Stanford University x http://www.offbeats.com/ x
x-------- http://ccrma-www.stanford.edu/~jay/ ----------x

Rob Reedijk

March 11th 04, 08:42 PM

Brotherdave > wrote:
> Nothing will last as a format.
> DAT is dying.

Very very slowly. As slowly as cassette. Much more slowly than LP, Beta,
and 8-track. Probably slower than analog multitrack. Probably slower
than harddrive recorders (yes, they are beginning to die as solid
state media start to become useable). Faster than paper.

I have harddrive recorders, and a pretty good standalone cd recorder.
I take my DAT or DA88 (when I need multitrack) out for location
recordings.

I feel confident that my digital tape recorders can take a lot more when
it comes to carrying them around on their sides, putting them in taxi
cabs. If there is a problem during recording, I won't lose the whole
thing. The only thing that can ruin my recording is if the machine
eats the tape and I can't get the tape out. (This can happen! It scares
me a lot.)

DAT will be dead when something comes along that can replace it, do it
better and or cheaper.

Personally, I wish I could have faith in standalone cd recorders.
It is easier to capture the audio to computer, or I can immediately
hand it to the client so they can listen as soon as they want.

Plus the media are much cheaper.

I don't know about your cd recorders, but if I have to switch cdrs on
the fly, mine takes a long time to check/test the cdr before I can
begin. I recorded a recital last Friday. I had to switch DATs.
I had enough time between pieces. I would have lost the first 30
secs of the encore if I had to switch cdrs. And if I had a 120min
DAT in there, instead of a 90min, I wouldn't have had to do anything.
Oh, the cdr only gives me 80 min.

Looking forward to DVD audio burners though. Ought to be able to do more
than 120 min.

Rob R. (who will probably still be recording on DAT in 5 years).

Arny Krueger

March 11th 04, 09:53 PM

"Rob Reedijk" > wrote in message

> I have harddrive recorders, and a pretty good standalone cd recorder.
> I take my DAT or DA88 (when I need multitrack) out for location
> recordings.

Apparently you don't have any of the DAT-replacement HD recorders/players
that several of us have been talking about.

> I feel confident that my digital tape recorders can take a lot more
> when it comes to carrying them around on their sides, putting them in
> taxi cabs. If there is a problem during recording, I won't lose the
> whole thing. The only thing that can ruin my recording is if the
> machine eats the tape and I can't get the tape out. (This can happen!
> It scares me a lot.)

Given that the the DAT-replacement HD recorders/players that several of us
have been talking about are about the size of a portable CD player,
coat-pocket and attache case transport is the rule. Basically, we're talking
convenient in-hand carry.

> DAT will be dead when something comes along that can replace it, do it
> better and or cheaper.

Better, check. Cheaper, check.

> I don't know about your cd recorders, but if I have to switch cdrs on
> the fly, mine takes a long time to check/test the cdr before I can
> begin. I recorded a recital last Friday. I had to switch DATs.
> I had enough time between pieces. I would have lost the first 30
> secs of the encore if I had to switch cdrs. And if I had a 120min
> DAT in there, instead of a 90min, I wouldn't have had to do anything.
> Oh, the cdr only gives me 80 min.

A 20 GB portable hard drive recorder is equivalent to about 30 audio CDs
laid end-to-end.

james

March 12th 04, 12:00 AM

In article >,
Paul Stamler > wrote:

>Marantz CD-R recorder. About $650 street price, which you'll save in a year
>or two on the difference in cost between DAT tapes and blank CD-R's.

How about the Marantz solid state recorder? The idea of no moving
parts, together with non-volatile media sounds delicious!

Scott Dorsey

March 12th 04, 12:30 AM

james > wrote:
>In article >,
>Paul Stamler > wrote:
>
>>Marantz CD-R recorder. About $650 street price, which you'll save in a year
>>or two on the difference in cost between DAT tapes and blank CD-R's.
>
>How about the Marantz solid state recorder? The idea of no moving
>parts, together with non-volatile media sounds delicious!

I worry about long-term storage of the novram. Not that I don't also
worry about long-term storage of the CD-R for that matter.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

Rob Reedijk

March 12th 04, 01:13 AM

Arny Krueger > wrote:
> "Rob Reedijk" > wrote in message
>

>> I have harddrive recorders, and a pretty good standalone cd recorder.
>> I take my DAT or DA88 (when I need multitrack) out for location
>> recordings.

>> I feel confident that my digital tape recorders can take a lot more
>> when it comes to carrying them around on their sides, putting them in
>> taxi cabs. If there is a problem during recording, I won't lose the
>> whole thing. The only thing that can ruin my recording is if the
>> machine eats the tape and I can't get the tape out. (This can happen!
>> It scares me a lot.)

>> I don't know about your cd recorders, but if I have to switch cdrs on
>> the fly, mine takes a long time to check/test the cdr before I can
>> begin. I recorded a recital last Friday. I had to switch DATs.
>> I had enough time between pieces. I would have lost the first 30
>> secs of the encore if I had to switch cdrs. And if I had a 120min
>> DAT in there, instead of a 90min, I wouldn't have had to do anything.
>> Oh, the cdr only gives me 80 min.

> A 20 GB portable hard drive recorder is equivalent to about 30 audio CDs
> laid end-to-end.

No good. I have to be able to fit it in the taxi.

Rob R.

Kurt Albershardt

March 12th 04, 01:48 AM

james wrote:
>
> How about the Marantz solid state recorder? The idea of no moving
> parts, together with non-volatile media sounds delicious!

How long do you need to record?

$425 for 4gB CF cards last time I checked, several times that for 8 gB.

In a couple of years I flash will be a more generally applicable option.

Paul Rubin

March 12th 04, 03:42 AM

"Arny Krueger" > writes:
> > I don't need stealth for the stuff I'm doing, but I do need to record
> > long sessions with no AC power, so a laptop isn't really practical.
> > Any other ideas? I'll make another post about the NJB3 which is
> > almost but not quite what's needed.
>
> The big hole in the NJB3 is the lack of mic inputs.

Every single one of the consumer HD recorders that I know of (NJB3,
Archos recorders, Pogo Ripdrive) seems to also lack mic inputs, so I'm
resigned to using an amplified mic or external preamp. So I wasn't
even counting that as an NJB3 hole.

The NJB holes for me are the proprietary file system and the
proprietary batteries. The proprietary file system may have been
reverse engineered by now, but is still a pain if I need special
drivers to use it with my Linux computer. Some other units use normal
FAT32 so I can just plug them in the USB port and access them like a
regular drive. I'd like to be able to record for a whole 3-day
weekend (say 10 hours a day) without needing any AC power; I'm ok with
carrying spare batteries to swap in, but it's not so good if they cost
$50 each. In some other regards, the NJB3 does sound nice.

Know of any units with mic inputs? Also, any idea if I can use the
NJB3 with an external power pack (four D cells or whatever)?

Thanks.

Paul Rubin

March 12th 04, 03:44 AM

(Scott Dorsey) writes:
> >How about the Marantz solid state recorder? The idea of no moving
> >parts, together with non-volatile media sounds delicious!
>
> I worry about long-term storage of the novram. Not that I don't also
> worry about long-term storage of the CD-R for that matter.

The novram (flash card) is so expensive that you wouldn't use it for
long term storage. You'd record your concert with it, then transfer
the bits to a computer, and to your favorite archive medium from
there.

Pooh Bear

March 12th 04, 04:11 AM

Erik wrote:

< snip >

> how long is DAT anticipated to be around?

Maybe film sound ppl will keep it going ?

Graham

Kurt Albershardt

March 12th 04, 04:18 AM

Paul Rubin wrote:
> "Arny Krueger" > writes:
>
>> The big hole in the NJB3 is the lack of mic inputs.
>
>
> Every single one of the consumer HD recorders that I know of (NJB3,
> Archos recorders, Pogo Ripdrive) seems to also lack mic inputs
>
> Know of any units with mic inputs?

The iRiver iHP-120 and iHP-140 have, well, sort of mic inputs. About like a MiniDisc.

> any idea if I can use the
> NJB3 with an external power pack (four D cells or whatever)?

The NJB3 wants 5V DC and will fry somewhere around 6.5V IIRC. I know people have cooked them with 6V SLA batteries.

Put a regulator on the battery pack--using a 6V pack you could use a 3-terminal linear job at some cost in wasted power. Use a switcher like a TI PT78HT205 with a 9-28V pack and you're home free.

Eric Toline

March 12th 04, 04:48 AM

Re: Will DAT last as a format? (honest...not a troll/flame)

Group: rec.audio.pro Date: Fri, Mar 12, 2004, 4:11am (EST+5) From:
(Pooh=A0Bear)
Erik wrote:
< snip >
how long is DAT anticipated to be around?

Maybe film sound ppl will keep it going ?
Graham<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<

DAT with time code is still the prevelent medium for film sound and for
double system use with the HD & 24p video cameras.

With 5 new hdnl recorders in the film sound market it's only a matter of
time before DAT is completely replaced. Best guess is 18-24 months.

Eric

"RAMPS @ NAB: 4/20/04: Napoleons Bar, Paris Hotel"

Paul Rubin

March 12th 04, 05:15 AM

Kurt Albershardt > writes:
> The iRiver iHP-120 and iHP-140 have, well, sort of mic inputs.
> About like a MiniDisc.

Oh cool, I heard of those but forgot. I'll check them out. I'll
guess that a Minidisc's mic inputs are about like my camcorder's,
which is good enough for my purposes. Do they have any big
shortcomings?

> The NJB3 wants 5V DC and will fry somewhere around 6.5V IIRC. I
> know people have cooked them with 6V SLA batteries.
>
> Put a regulator on the battery pack--using a 6V pack you could use a
> 3-terminal linear job at some cost in wasted power. Use a switcher
> like a TI PT78HT205 with a 9-28V pack and you're home free.

Thanks, this is very helpful too. I'm thinking in terms of a four
cell NiMH pack (9000 mAH D cells). Think that will provide enough
voltage? It might drop to 4.5 volts or something as the batteries
wear down. Do linear regulators still need to drop a minimum of 2
volts or so? Also, do you know how much power the NJB3 needs when
recording in PCM format?

nmm

March 12th 04, 08:40 AM

On Thu, 11 Mar 2004 11:11 PM, Pooh Bear
> wrote:
>
>Erik wrote:
>
>< snip >
>
>> how long is DAT anticipated to be around?
>
>Maybe film sound ppl will keep it going ?
>
>Graham
>

isn't the latest 'top of the line' Nagra a hard drive system?

I know HHB are touting a new portable hard drive system for fil recording.

Arny Krueger

March 12th 04, 12:11 PM

"Paul Rubin" > wrote in message

> "Arny Krueger" > writes:
>>> I don't need stealth for the stuff I'm doing, but I do need to
>>> record long sessions with no AC power, so a laptop isn't really
>>> practical. Any other ideas? I'll make another post about the NJB3
>>> which is almost but not quite what's needed.
>>
>> The big hole in the NJB3 is the lack of mic inputs.
>
> Every single one of the consumer HD recorders that I know of (NJB3,
> Archos recorders, Pogo Ripdrive) seems to also lack mic inputs, so I'm
> resigned to using an amplified mic or external preamp. So I wasn't
> even counting that as an NJB3 hole.
>
> The NJB holes for me are the proprietary file system and the
> proprietary batteries.

I feel your pain on count one, but I'd express it a little differently. The
NJB3 suffers from the proprietary file interface that is exposed via its
firewire and USB ports. A number of its competitors have figured out that
exposing an industry standard hard-drive like interface (such as we see with
USB flash memory key fobs) makes a lot more sense. I don't know if CL has
picked upon this wisdom in their newer products, but it appears like people
like iRiver have.

If you are a Windows or Mac user, the price you pay is that you have to load
CL or third party software to do file management and transfer with a NJB3. I
wonder if nomadness.com or notmad.com has a listing for a Linux NJB3
interface. Hmmm a little google searching and....

https://sourceforge.net/projects/njbfs/

Done!

The proprietary batteries are something I can accept, if only because it
seems like *everything* has em. They are 3.6 volt lithium ion cells for
which no generic equivalents appear to exist. I picked my second battery up
by surfing the web for about $30 as opposed to CL's $50 asking price. BTW,
my NJB3 came via eBay, NIB.

>The proprietary file system may have been
> reverse engineered by now, but is still a pain if I need special
> drivers to use it with my Linux computer.

I guess it's real macho to try to live with only Linux. I've always been of
the opinion that when in Rome... I'm so conservative that I'm contemplating
building another A64 machine for testing XP64.

> Some other units use normal FAT32 so I can just plug them in the USB
port and access them like a
> regular drive.

It's not FAT32 or the proprietary file system on the NJB3, it's the
firmware behind the USB port. AFAIK most USB flash storage devices
implement FAT12 or FAT16 or even subsets of them under the covers, but
expose a suitable file system interface via their USB ports.

> I'd like to be able to record for a whole 3-day
> weekend (say 10 hours a day) without needing any AC power; I'm ok with
> carrying spare batteries to swap in, but it's not so good if they cost
> $50 each. In some other regards, the NJB3 does sound nice.

There are 5 currently on sale on eBay, 4 purporting to be new. One has a Buy
It Now price of about $35.

I did some google searching and found listings at several online retailers
that don't seem to be visible if I come in the front door. eCost got my
money at around $30, but I don't know if the product listing is still
around.

> Know of any units with mic inputs? Also, any idea if I can use the
> NJB3 with an external power pack (four D cells or whatever)?

The supplied switching power supply is rated at 3.6 volts DC at 2 amps, I
believe. I suspect that the break down is that if you use the thing while
it's on the power line, about 1 amp runs the NJB3 leaving about 1 amp for
charging. There are a wide variety of ways to get something external that
puts out precisely the right voltage.

I've played with pressing the limits with other battery powered boxes. Based
on past experience, I suspect that the NJB3 has parts with 6 volt absolute
maximum ratings. Therefore, I'd never go there. But I might try 5 volts in a
pinch. Or, 5 volts with a couple of 3 amp silicon rectifiers in series, to
give a fairly low-impedance 3.8 volts or so.

Last time I needed 5 VDC at 1 amp or so, I cut the DIN plug off the power
supply that got scrapped when Comcast sent me a new cable modem. A VOM told
me which wire was which. The resulting handy accessory, a line-powered
Boostaroo for boosting this PC's line output to headphone levels, works
like a champ!

Yes, standard batteries are nice especially with devices like the Boostaroo
unlike the NJB3 lack power jacks. A couple of short lengths of 1/2" dowel,
1 #6 brass screw (+), 1 brass upholstery tack (-), a little soldering; and
that proprietary Comcast power supply had an industry standard interface!

;-)

Arny Krueger

March 12th 04, 12:14 PM

"Rob Reedy" > wrote in message

>> A 20 GB portable hard drive recorder is equivalent to about 30 audio
>> CDs laid end-to-end.

> No good. I have to be able to fit it in the taxi.

You don't have space in that taxi for something about the size of a portable
CD player (Creative NJB3), or smaller (IRiver iHP120)?

Last time I was in Canada, the taxis seemed larger than that!

;-)

Andre Majorel

March 12th 04, 12:51 PM

On 2004-03-11, Paul Rubin <> wrote:

> I don't need stealth for the stuff I'm doing, but I do need to record
> long sessions with no AC power, so a laptop isn't really practical.

I'm told that some Sony laptops have up to six hours of battery
life (possibly with additional batteries, I dunno).

--
André Majorel <URL:http://www.teaser.fr/~amajorel/>
Depuis Malraux, on n'a malheureusement jamais su trouver de
liens entre le monde intellectuel et la droite.
-- Jacques Chirac, cité dans le Canard Enchaîné du 2004-02-25

Scott Dorsey

March 12th 04, 01:46 PM

Pooh Bear > wrote:
>
>Erik wrote:
>
>< snip >
>
>> how long is DAT anticipated to be around?
>
>Maybe film sound ppl will keep it going ?

The film sound people are going fairly quickly to things like the Deva
in part because they can get more channels without having to carry anything
heavier.

But I think DAT will stick around in the film sound world for a bit longer.
There are still folks there running Nagra III machines here and there.
--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

Rob Reedijk

March 12th 04, 02:40 PM

Arny Krueger > wrote:
> "Rob Reedy" > wrote in message
>

>>> A 20 GB portable hard drive recorder is equivalent to
about 30 audio CDs laid end-to-end.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

>> No good. I have to be able to fit it in the taxi.

> You don't have space in that taxi for something about the size of a portable
> CD player (Creative NJB3), or smaller (IRiver iHP120)?

Think about it...think harder...

> Last time I was in Canada, the taxis seemed larger than that!

It only seems that way because the country is so small.

Rob R.

Mike Rivers

March 12th 04, 03:05 PM

In article <w474c.4047$uh.3863@fed1read02> writes:

> How about the Marantz solid state recorder? The idea of no moving
> parts, together with non-volatile media sounds delicious!

Both the initial cost and media cost are too expensive for what I
suspect are fairly casual recording applications. Either you spend a
lot of money on flash memory cards or disk drives in that format or
you have a continuous transfer job - as soon as the recording is
finished, transfer from the recorder's media to something else,
reformat, and re-use.

If you were going to keep an archive of flash media cards (assuming
you could justify the cost) how would you store them? There isn't
even enough clear space on the surface to write what's on them.

--
I'm really Mike Rivers )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me here: double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

Mike Rivers

March 12th 04, 03:05 PM

In article > writes:

> Know of any units with mic inputs?

I call them "virtual mic inputs." They have enough gain to move the
meters when you plug in a mic, but they're also very noisy when using
the mic input (at least this is the case with the Jukebox 3), about on
par with a dictation-grade cassette recorder. A friend brough an
Anchos around, wanting to try the mic input on that for interviews. It
worked better than the Jukebox with a tie-tack mic, but the mic input
is mono (only).

Also, any idea if I can use the
> NJB3 with an external power pack (four D cells or whatever)?

Power is power. The batteries have always lasted long enough for me.
The only reason I can see to use external D cells is if you'll be away
from AC power to recharge the internal batteries for several sessions.
The external power supply is labeled 5V, 2.4A. I doubt that the
recorder draws anything near 2.4 A when operating, but it may draw
significant current when recharging the internal battery, and it
always does that when necessary if the external power supply is
plugged in, even if the Jukebox is powered off.

You might find that you're using your external D cells to charge the
internal batteries, and that's not a good use for them. You'd have to
study the power drain characteristics more than most of us have in
order to determine whether or not this would be an effective strategy
for you.

--
I'm really Mike Rivers )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me here: double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

Mike Rivers

March 12th 04, 03:05 PM

In article > writes:

> Maybe film sound ppl will keep it going ?

They couldn't be rid of it fast enough. There were only a few time
code DATs made, so low budget film projects either used wild sync or
recorded in mono.

--
I'm really Mike Rivers )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me here: double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

Richard Crowley

March 12th 04, 03:14 PM

There was a recent discussion over on the film/TV sound
group: news:rec.arts.movies.production.sound entitled:
"Recorder used the most in Hollywood". It would appear
that they are well into a sea-change of conversion from all
tape formats (including DAT) to disk (recording on HD and
delivery via CD-R or DVD-R).

nmm

March 12th 04, 05:13 PM

On Fri, 12 Mar 2004 10:14 AM, Richard Crowley >
wrote:
>There was a recent discussion over on the film/TV sound
>group: news:rec.arts.movies.production.sound entitled:
>"Recorder used the most in Hollywood". It would appear
>that they are well into a sea-change of conversion from all
>tape formats (including DAT) to disk (recording on HD and
>delivery via CD-R or DVD-R).
>
>
http://www.nagraaudio.com/pages/professionalaudio.php?etat=2

I didn't realise that the portable "DASH" machines were popular. Do they
use 1/4" tape.

Arny Krueger

March 12th 04, 06:19 PM

"Rob Reedijk" > wrote in message

> Arny Krueger > wrote:
>> "Rob Reedy" > wrote in message
>>
>
>>>> A 20 GB portable hard drive recorder is equivalent to
> about 30 audio CDs laid end-to-end.
> ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>
>>> No good. I have to be able to fit it in the taxi.
>
>> You don't have space in that taxi for something about the size of a
>> portable CD player (Creative NJB3), or smaller (IRiver iHP120)?
>
> Think about it...think harder...

You lost me.

Eric Toline

March 12th 04, 06:31 PM

Re: Will DAT last as a format? (honest...not a troll/flame)

Group: rec.audio.pro Date: Fri, Mar 12, 2004, 12:13pm From:
(nmm)
On Fri, 12 Mar 2004 10:14 AM, Richard Crowley
> wrote:
There was a recent discussion over on the film/TV sound group:
news:rec.arts.movies.production.sound entitled: "Recorder used the most
in Hollywood". It would appear that they are well into a sea-change of
conversion from all tape formats (including DAT) to disk (recording on
HD and delivery via CD-R or DVD-R).
http://www.nagraaudio.com/pages/professionalaudio.php?etat=2

I didn't realise that the portable "DASH" machines were popular.<<<<<<<

You're referring to the Nagra D. A great machine that never gained
acceptance due to it's non-standard format and $25k price tag. It's
basically history now.

Do they use 1/4" tape.<<<<<<<<<<

The Nagra D used a very special digital 1/4" tape.

Eric

"RAMPS @ NAB: 4/20/04: Napoleons Bar, Paris Hotel"

Eric Toline

March 12th 04, 06:40 PM

Re: Will DAT last as a format? (honest...not a troll/flame)

Group: rec.audio.pro Date: Fri, Mar 12, 2004, 3:40am From:
(nmm)

isn't the latest 'top of the line' Nagra a hard drive system?<<<<<<<<<<<

That would be the Nagra V. Another mistake by Nagra. The V offers only 2
tracks for about $9k. The competition offers 4+ tracks for the same
price and in one case (the Sound Devices 744t) for less than half the
price of the V.

=A0=A0I know HHB are touting a new portable hard drive system for fil
recording.<<<<<<<<<<<

That would be the HHb Portadrive 8 tracks for $12.5k. 2nd highest cost
per track after the Aaton Cantar X at $18k for 8 tracks.

Eric

"RAMPS @ NAB: 4/20/04: Napoleons Bar, Paris Hotel"

Eric Toline

March 12th 04, 06:49 PM

Re: Will DAT last as a format? (honest...not a troll/flame)

Group: rec.audio.pro Date: Fri, Mar 12, 2004, 10:05am From:
(Mike=A0Rivers)
In article >
writes:
Maybe film sound ppl will keep it going ?

They couldn't be rid of it fast enough.<<<<

Not true. DAT is still the #1 medium for film sound recording. The
problem for hd is post production acceptance. It will take a while for
all telecine and post houses to get in sync with the new format.

There were only a few time code DATs made,<<<<<

There were two makers of professional DATs, HHb and Fostex. Together
they sold over 5000 units world wide.

so low budget film projects either used wild sync or recorded in
mono.<<<<<<<<<<

Mono has nothing to do with the issue as dialog tracks are always done
in mono. Not having time code on a dat unit is no problem, you sync
picture & sound to the slate clap just like we did before there was tc.

Eric

"RAMPS @ NAB: 4/20/04: Napoleons Bar, Paris Hotel"

Mr Layaway

March 12th 04, 09:14 PM

>Both the initial cost and media cost are too expensive for what I
>suspect are fairly casual recording applications. Either you spend a
>lot of money on flash memory cards or disk drives in that format or
>you have a continuous transfer job - as soon as the recording is
>finished, transfer from the recorder's media to something else,
>reformat, and re-use.

Yes, but what about "sampling artistes" that just want to record ambiant noises
from the cityscapes, machines, nature, people talking and things like that?

Kurt Albershardt

March 12th 04, 09:33 PM

nmm wrote:
>
> http://www.nagraaudio.com/pages/professionalaudio.php?etat=2
>
> I didn't realise that the portable "DASH" machines were popular. Do they
> use 1/4" tape.

They're not all that popular--the price scares off most potential customers pretty quickly and the post houses never really adopted them.

The Nagra D (and presumably the DII) use quarter inch stock and a rotating head, so they're not DASH (Digital Audio Staionary Head.)

The Nagra D was used for a fair bit of live music recording in the early '90s but I haven't seen one in some time.

Kurt Albershardt

March 12th 04, 09:37 PM

Eric Toline wrote:
>
> DAT is still the #1 medium for film sound recording. The
> problem for hd is post production acceptance. It will take a while for
> all telecine and post houses to get in sync with the new format.

(Of course Eric knows this but some of the group might not, so I'll elaborate a bit):

Most of the new NLR machines can (or will shortly) support some variant of recordable DVD. Since most all postproduction is now done on computer-based workstations and most all computers you buy these days can at least read a DVD, the barriers are coming down very quickly.

Scott Dorsey

March 12th 04, 10:59 PM

In article >, nmm > wrote:
>On Fri, 12 Mar 2004 10:14 AM, Richard Crowley >
>>
>>
>http://www.nagraaudio.com/pages/professionalaudio.php?etat=2
>
>I didn't realise that the portable "DASH" machines were popular. Do they
>use 1/4" tape.

The Nagra-D is NOT a DASH machine. It uses 1/4" tape but it has a helical
scan system and is not compatible with DASH recorders. It is a proprietary
format.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

Mike Rivers

March 12th 04, 11:10 PM

In article > writes:

> http://www.nagraaudio.com/pages/professionalaudio.php?etat=2
>
> I didn't realise that the portable "DASH" machines were popular. Do they
> use 1/4" tape.

DASH machines used 1/2" or 1/4" tape, but the Nagra D wasn't DASH, it
was their own four-track format.

--
I'm really Mike Rivers )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me here: double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

Mike Rivers

March 12th 04, 11:10 PM

In article > writes:

> They couldn't be rid of it fast enough.<<<<
> Not true. DAT is still the #1 medium for film sound recording.

It might be #1 with people who can't afford to replace it, and that's
understandable. But the industry is moving away from DAT (as post is
moving away from DTRS) at a steady and fairly rapid pace. It is a more
conservative branch of the industry, though, so there aren't the quick
turnarounds that you see in hobbyist and even professional recording
studios.

> There were two makers of professional DATs, HHb and Fostex. Together
> they sold over 5000 units world wide.

Sony was chopped liver? And I believe that TASCAM also made one or two
models of DAT with time code, but those never caught on with the
industry. Admittedly there weren't as many Sony time code DATs sold as
the Fostex because of both cost and portability.

> Mono has nothing to do with the issue as dialog tracks are always done
> in mono. Not having time code on a dat unit is no problem, you sync
> picture & sound to the slate clap just like we did before there was tc.

There's a trend to stereo dialog, and stereo ambience. Otherwise, why
would people want to use 4+ track recorders for film sound? You could
use a slate and resolve a Nagra to a time code reference or sync tone.
With cameras that use a crystal for speed reference you can get pretty
good wild sync with a DAT since both have such a stable time
reference, but still it's not synchronization, it's starting at the
right time and hopefully the picture and sound don't drift far enough
apart to worry about before the end of the shot.

We can both stop talking in absoutes now and recognize that there's
more than one aspect to the real world.

--
I'm really Mike Rivers )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me here: double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

Kurt Albershardt

March 13th 04, 01:27 AM

Mike Rivers wrote:
>
> There's a trend to stereo dialog, and stereo ambience. Otherwise, why
> would people want to use 4+ track recorders for film sound?

Separate tracks for the boom and each wireless, even for plant mics sometimes.

Paul Rubin

March 13th 04, 01:38 AM

"Arny Krueger" > writes:
> > The NJB holes for me are the proprietary file system and the
> > proprietary batteries.
>
> I feel your pain on count one, but I'd express it a little
> differently. The NJB3 suffers from the proprietary file interface
> that is exposed via its firewire and USB ports. A number of its
> competitors have figured out that exposing an industry standard
> hard-drive like interface (such as we see with USB flash memory key
> fobs) makes a lot more sense. I don't know if CL has picked upon
> this wisdom in their newer products, but it appears like people like
> iRiver have.

Most other vendors except Creative seem to export the standard
interface (i.e. just plain expose the HD) to the USB port, which
presumably means they use fat32 internally, which makes things easier
on everyone (most OS's support fat32 now).

> If you are a Windows or Mac user, the price you pay is that you have
> to load CL or third party software to do file management and
> transfer with a NJB3. I wonder if nomadness.com or notmad.com has a
> listing for a Linux NJB3 interface. Hmmm a little google searching and....
>
> https://sourceforge.net/projects/njbfs/
>
> Done!

I think that's just for the original Nomad and not the NJB3.

> The proprietary batteries are something I can accept, if only because it
> seems like *everything* has em. They are 3.6 volt lithium ion cells for
> which no generic equivalents appear to exist. I picked my second battery up
> by surfing the web for about $30 as opposed to CL's $50 asking price. BTW,
> my NJB3 came via eBay, NIB.

Well, $30 is better than $50, but the early Archos jukeboxes used
standard AA cells, which I find greatly preferable (AA NiMH cells are
as low as $1 each if you shop around). Do you know if the NJB3 works
ok with the AC adapter when there's no battery in the unit? Some
other devices won't.

> It's not FAT32 or the proprietary file system on the NJB3, it's the
> firmware behind the USB port. AFAIK most USB flash storage devices
> implement FAT12 or FAT16 or even subsets of them under the covers, but
> expose a suitable file system interface via their USB ports.

It would amaze me if USB flash storage devices knew anything about
what file system they hold. They just expose the raw blocks to the
USB port and the file system is handled by the host computer.

> > I'd like to be able to record for a whole 3-day
> > weekend (say 10 hours a day) without needing any AC power; I'm ok with
> > carrying spare batteries to swap in, but it's not so good if they cost
> > $50 each. In some other regards, the NJB3 does sound nice.
>
> There are 5 currently on sale on eBay, 4 purporting to be new. One
> has a Buy It Now price of about $35.

Any idea how long you can record on a battery charge, in WAV format?

> > Know of any units with mic inputs? Also, any idea if I can use the
> > NJB3 with an external power pack (four D cells or whatever)?
>
> The supplied switching power supply is rated at 3.6 volts DC at 2 amps, I
> believe. I suspect that the break down is that if you use the thing while
> it's on the power line, about 1 amp runs the NJB3 leaving about 1 amp for
> charging. There are a wide variety of ways to get something external that
> puts out precisely the right voltage.

> I've played with pressing the limits with other battery powered boxes. Based
> on past experience, I suspect that the NJB3 has parts with 6 volt absolute
> maximum ratings. Therefore, I'd never go there. But I might try 5 volts in a
> pinch. Or, 5 volts with a couple of 3 amp silicon rectifiers in series, to
> give a fairly low-impedance 3.8 volts or so.

That sounds like a three-cell external NiMH pack should work ok. If I
can remove the internal battery from the NJB3 then I won't be using up
external battery power charging the internal cell. This sounds
promising. Thanks!

Mike Rivers

March 13th 04, 01:46 AM

In article > writes:

> >Both the initial cost and media cost are too expensive for what I
> >suspect are fairly casual recording applications.

> Yes, but what about "sampling artistes" that just want to record ambiant noises
> from the cityscapes, machines, nature, people talking and things like that?

Well, what about them? The original poster was looking to record
lectures and concerts. The flash card recorder is making some progress
toward replacing the cassette for news reporting. The Marantz portable
cassette recorder was pretty popular in that field because it was
inexpensive, rugged, and easy to use. The Marantz flash card recorder
can be set up to be as straightforward to operate as a cassette, so
it's good for people who don't have time to think about modes and
menus.

--
I'm really Mike Rivers - )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me here: double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

Arny Krueger

March 13th 04, 01:57 AM

"Paul Rubin" > wrote in message

> "Arny Krueger" > writes:
>>> The NJB holes for me are the proprietary file system and the
>>> proprietary batteries.
>>
>> I feel your pain on count one, but I'd express it a little
>> differently. The NJB3 suffers from the proprietary file interface
>> that is exposed via its firewire and USB ports. A number of its
>> competitors have figured out that exposing an industry standard
>> hard-drive like interface (such as we see with USB flash memory key
>> fobs) makes a lot more sense. I don't know if CL has picked upon
>> this wisdom in their newer products, but it appears like people like
>> iRiver have.
>
> Most other vendors except Creative seem to export the standard
> interface (i.e. just plain expose the HD) to the USB port, which
> presumably means they use fat32 internally, which makes things easier
> on everyone (most OS's support fat32 now).

Agreed.

Funny story. Today a customer complained to me that he loaded a bunch of
files on one such device. He complained that wile the files were clearly
visible, he couldn't make them play. It turned out that the player had a
clearly visible folder named "Music", but he loaded the files into the root
folder instead.

>> If you are a Windows or Mac user, the price you pay is that you have
>> to load CL or third party software to do file management and
>> transfer with a NJB3. I wonder if nomadness.com or notmad.com has a
>> listing for a Linux NJB3 interface. Hmmm a little google searching
>> and....

>> https://sourceforge.net/projects/njbfs/

>> Done!

> I think that's just for the original Nomad and not the NJB3.

I don't think that there's a difference that matters.

>> The proprietary batteries are something I can accept, if only
>> because it seems like *everything* has em. They are 3.6 volt lithium
>> ion cells for which no generic equivalents appear to exist. I picked
>> my second battery up by surfing the web for about $30 as opposed to
>> CL's $50 asking price. BTW, my NJB3 came via eBay, NIB.

> Well, $30 is better than $50, but the early Archos jukeboxes used
> standard AA cells, which I find greatly preferable (AA NiMH cells are
> as low as $1 each if you shop around).

There's a substantial difference in terms of the capacity of the various
alternatives. SI'm not sure that NiMh AA's would duplicate the performance
of the proprietary batteries without making the device even bigger and
heavier.

>Do you know if the NJB3 works
> ok with the AC adapter when there's no battery in the unit?

It performs well enough as a player on just the charger, but I wouldn't
count on it being able to do a file transfer. I don't know why I would worry
about how it runs without a battery.

> Some other devices won't.

>> It's not FAT32 or the proprietary file system on the NJB3, it's the
>> firmware behind the USB port. AFAIK most USB flash storage devices
>> implement FAT12 or FAT16 or even subsets of them under the covers,
>> but expose a suitable file system interface via their USB ports.

> It would amaze me if USB flash storage devices knew anything about
> what file system they hold. They just expose the raw blocks to the
> USB port and the file system is handled by the host computer.

Could be.

>>> I'd like to be able to record for a whole 3-day
>>> weekend (say 10 hours a day) without needing any AC power; I'm ok
>>> with carrying spare batteries to swap in, but it's not so good if
>>> they cost $50 each. In some other regards, the NJB3 does sound
>>> nice.

>> There are 5 currently on sale on eBay, 4 purporting to be new. One
>> has a Buy It Now price of about $35.

> Any idea how long you can record on a battery charge, in WAV format?

I'd count on 5 hours, but 6-9 would be more like it.

>>> Know of any units with mic inputs? Also, any idea if I can use the
>>> NJB3 with an external power pack (four D cells or whatever)?

>> The supplied switching power supply is rated at 3.6 volts DC at 2
>> amps, I believe. I suspect that the break down is that if you use
>> the thing while it's on the power line, about 1 amp runs the NJB3
>> leaving about 1 amp for charging. There are a wide variety of ways
>> to get something external that puts out precisely the right voltage.

>> I've played with pressing the limits with other battery powered
>> boxes. Based on past experience, I suspect that the NJB3 has parts
>> with 6 volt absolute maximum ratings. Therefore, I'd never go there.
>> But I might try 5 volts in a pinch. Or, 5 volts with a couple of 3
>> amp silicon rectifiers in series, to give a fairly low-impedance 3.8
>> volts or so.

> That sounds like a three-cell external NiMH pack should work ok.

Agreed.

>If I can remove the internal battery from the NJB3 then I won't be using
up
> external battery power charging the internal cell. This sounds
promising. Thanks!

Remember the NJB3 has two battery bays. My comments are based on using both
of them.

Paul Rubin

March 13th 04, 02:18 AM

"Arny Krueger" > writes:
> >> https://sourceforge.net/projects/njbfs/
>
> >> Done!
>
> > I think that's just for the original Nomad and not the NJB3.
>
> I don't think that there's a difference that matters.

I looked into this stuff some time ago (a year or so ago), and at that
time, the docs were clear that only the original NJB was supported,
and not the NJB3, which needed further reverse engineering. But that
may not have been this exact same software, or some improvement may
have been made since then. I'll investigate again.

> > Well, $30 is better than $50, but the early Archos jukeboxes used
> > standard AA cells, which I find greatly preferable (AA NiMH cells are
> > as low as $1 each if you shop around).
>
> There's a substantial difference in terms of the capacity of the various
> alternatives. SI'm not sure that NiMh AA's would duplicate the performance
> of the proprietary batteries without making the device even bigger and
> heavier.

That's true, lithium ion cells are a bit smaller and substantially
lighter than NiMH cells with the same capacity. In my case I don't
care that much; I'm ok with a unit the size of my camcorder or TC-D5M,
which are both substantially bigger than an NJB3, but I understand why
they need to make the NJB3 small. Still, the Archos uses AA's and is
smaller than the NJB3. I'd expect they can extend the runtime by
improving the electronics, and I don't understand why they don't do
that.

What bugs me the most is units like the iRiver which have a permanent,
non-removable li battery inside the unit. You can't swap in spares
even if you're willing to buy them.

Proprietary batteries also have the headache that it gets hard to find
them after the unit is discontinued. So there's lots of orphaned
laptop computers, cordless tools, DAT recorders, etc. for which
batteries are no longer available. I'd be much happier if they used
some standard li ion battery, like a Sony camcorder battery or Nokia
cell phone battery, that's sold in such volume that supplies won't dry
up anytime soon.

> > Any idea how long you can record on a battery charge, in WAV format?
>
> I'd count on 5 hours, but 6-9 would be more like it.
>
> Remember the NJB3 has two battery bays. My comments are based on
> using both of them.

Hmm, that means maybe 4 hours per battery, so I need 7 extra batteries
at $30 each to cover 30 hours, i.e. I have to spend more on batteries
than the unit itself cost. I'll have to try the external pack thing
if I get one of these units.

Eric Toline

March 13th 04, 02:37 AM

Re: Will DAT last as a format? (honest...not a troll/flame)

Group: rec.audio.pro Date: Fri, Mar 12, 2004, 6:10pm From:
(Mike=A0Rivers)
In article

Sony was chopped liver? And I believe that TASCAM also made one or two
models of DAT with time code, but those never caught on with the
industry.

Admittedly there weren't as many Sony time code DATs sold as the Fostex
because of both cost and portability.<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<

Sony sold a ton of their professional time code DAT recorders. It was
sold as the HHb Portadat.

Eric

"RAMPS @ NAB: 4/20/04: Napoleons Bar, Paris Hotel"

Sergio Fucchi

March 13th 04, 09:36 AM

Hi,
Also I would know the best way to record music live. Also I had think to buy
a DAT walkman recorder,
but all the models I have found have not a manual recording level for each
channels (as my old Sony
TC-158SD Cassette recorder). Someone has written about HD recorder (as
Nomad), but these have
only line-in input and not also mic-in input and I should to preamplify my
stereo mic (Sony).
Tere are many Sony DAT walkman models and I do not know what is the best
choiche.

Sergio.

Scott Dorsey

March 13th 04, 12:44 PM

Kurt Albershardt > wrote:
>Mike Rivers wrote:
>>
>> There's a trend to stereo dialog, and stereo ambience. Otherwise, why
>> would people want to use 4+ track recorders for film sound?
>
>Separate tracks for the boom and each wireless, even for plant mics sometimes.

That way they can give the post guys even MORE crap to deal with. More
tracks means fewer decisions made on set and more decisions delayed until
post.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

Mike Rivers

March 13th 04, 01:59 PM

In article > writes:

> That's true, lithium ion cells are a bit smaller and substantially
> lighter than NiMH cells with the same capacity. In my case I don't
> care that much; I'm ok with a unit the size of my camcorder or TC-D5M,
> which are both substantially bigger than an NJB3, but I understand why
> they need to make the NJB3 small. Still, the Archos uses AA's and is
> smaller than the NJB3. I'd expect they can extend the runtime by
> improving the electronics, and I don't understand why they don't do
> that.

There's an advantage to using AA batteries - you can get them just
about anywhere, any time. If you're away from AC power for the weekend
and can't recharge batteries, you can get a pack of AAs at the 7-11
and reload. But of course they have a finite running time and you have
to shut down to change batteries. I have only one battery for my
Jukebox so I haven't tried changing batteries "hot", removing one
before they both die, replacing it with a freshly charged one, and
then replacing the second one.

Cellular phones are what have driven low power technology. I think
it's pretty amazing that an Archos can record for as long on a pair of
AA cells as the TCD-5 can on a pair of D cells. That's a pretty big
leap and I don't expect another leap that large for a while yet. The
next time they can do more with the available battery capacity, it's
more likely to be adding more features rather than increase recording
time.

> What bugs me the most is units like the iRiver which have a permanent,
> non-removable li battery inside the unit. You can't swap in spares
> even if you're willing to buy them.

This was a problem with the Apple iPod initially, too. Owners with
early battery failures discovered that Apple didn't even have a
battery replacement program. They do now, but I suspect that it was a
reaction to the uproar rather than something planned for about when
they figured batteries would start needing replacement.

> Proprietary batteries also have the headache that it gets hard to find
> them after the unit is discontinued. So there's lots of orphaned
> laptop computers, cordless tools, DAT recorders, etc. for which
> batteries are no longer available.

I've had NiCd battery packs rebuilt, but it's true, you can't buy
additional shells. I don't know if the battery rebuilding business has
changed with the technology or even if modern types of batteries are
built from standard replaceable cells like NiCds. On the other hand, I
have a TEAC DA-P20 DAT with a good (rebuilt) battery pack in it that
has a transport problem that can no longer be repaired at a practical
cost (which is why I have a Jukebox 3). I suspect that by the time I
can no longer get batteries for my Jukebox, much as I hate to do
things like this, I'll put it in the growing pile of stuff that
doesn't work any more but isn't worth fixing and get whatever is
available to fill the same function.

The Jukebox doesn't exactly fill the shoes of the DA-P20, but I've
learned to adapt, and am still looking for the ideal preamp mate for
it. I'll probably keep looking until it's obsolete.

> I'd be much happier if they used
> some standard li ion battery, like a Sony camcorder battery or Nokia
> cell phone battery, that's sold in such volume that supplies won't dry
> up anytime soon.

I wouldn't count on that. People throw away cellular phones a lot
faster than they throw away recorders. We thought that a Sony
camcorder battery pack would last forever, but it hasn't.

> Hmm, that means maybe 4 hours per battery, so I need 7 extra batteries
> at $30 each to cover 30 hours, i.e. I have to spend more on batteries
> than the unit itself cost. I'll have to try the external pack thing
> if I get one of these units.

I think they make an adapter for automobile power. Perhaps you could
adapt one of those if you don't want to carry your car with you.

--
I'm really Mike Rivers )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me here: double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

Mike Rivers

March 13th 04, 01:59 PM

In article > writes:

> Sony sold a ton of their professional time code DAT recorders. It was
> sold as the HHb Portadat.

Really? I remember the time code PortaDAT as a PortaDAT with another
PortaDAT sized box bolted to the bottom of it. The recorder part looks
a lot like the Sony TCD-D10 (and also the TEAC, which looked like the
Casio) but I never saw the bottom (time code) part anywhere else but
on the HHB.

I was thinking of the Sony tabletop/rack mount time code DAT. TC-D7060
or something like that.

--
I'm really Mike Rivers )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me here: double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

Eric Toline

March 13th 04, 03:31 PM

Re: Will DAT last as a format? (honest...not a troll/flame)

Group: rec.audio.pro Date: Sat, Mar 13, 2004, 8:59am From:
(Mike=A0Rivers)
In article >
writes:
Sony sold a ton of their professional time code DAT recorders. It was
sold as the HHb Portadat.
Really? I remember the time code PortaDAT as a PortaDAT with another
PortaDAT sized box bolted to the bottom of it. The recorder part looks a
lot like the Sony TCD-D10 (and also the TEAC, which looked like the
Casio) but I never saw the bottom (time code) part anywhere else but on
the HHB. <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<

The HHb portadat was originally offered as the PDR-1000 a non tc
recorder or as the PDR-1000TC a complete tc recorder.

You could have added on the tc unit but it would have added up to more
money than just ordering the complete tc recorder. Eventually HHb did
away with seperates and only offered the complete PDR-1000TC recorder.

This all a moot point now as HHb discontinued the p-dat about 2-3 years
ago and Fostex will stop making the PD 4 sometime this year.

Eric

"RAMPS @ NAB: 4/20/04: Napoleons Bar, Paris Hotel"

Eric Toline

March 13th 04, 03:43 PM

Re: Will DAT last as a format? (honest...not a troll/flame)

Group: rec.audio.pro Date: Sat, Mar 13, 2004, 7:44am From:
(Scott=A0Dorsey)
Kurt Albershardt > wrote:
Mike Rivers wrote:
There's a trend to stereo dialog, and stereo ambience. Otherwise, why
would people want to use 4+ track recorders for film sound?

(ka)
Separate tracks for the boom and each wireless, even for plant mics
sometimes.

(sd)
That way they can give the post guys even MORE crap to deal with. More
tracks means fewer decisions made on set and more decisions delayed
until post.
--scott<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<

Sorry Scott you're wrong. Post loves having options with iso'd tracks in
addition to the mono mix for dailys and editorial.

If the production mixer misses a mic cue in the mixed track it's still
there on an iso'd track

That's the reason the new Deva 5 from Zaxcom will have 10 tracks. The
mixers wanted more track availibility.

The new hdnl tc recorders offer from 4-10 tracks at prices from $4-$18k

Eric

"RAMPS @ NAB: 4/20/04: Napoleons Bar, Paris Hotel"

Mike Rivers

March 13th 04, 03:50 PM

In article > writes:

> >Separate tracks for the boom and each wireless, even for plant mics sometimes.
>
> That way they can give the post guys even MORE crap to deal with. More
> tracks means fewer decisions made on set and more decisions delayed until
> post.

Just like music recording. More tracks means fewer decisions as to
whether this was what we REALLY wanted it to sound like.

--
I'm really Mike Rivers )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me here: double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

Arny Krueger

March 13th 04, 03:51 PM

"Mike Rivers" > wrote in message
news:znr1079178215k@trad
> In article >
> writes:
>
>> That's true, lithium ion cells are a bit smaller and substantially
>> lighter than NiMH cells with the same capacity. In my case I don't
>> care that much; I'm ok with a unit the size of my camcorder or
>> TC-D5M, which are both substantially bigger than an NJB3, but I
>> understand why they need to make the NJB3 small. Still, the Archos
>> uses AA's and is smaller than the NJB3. I'd expect they can extend
>> the runtime by improving the electronics, and I don't understand why
>> they don't do that.

The NJB3 is a evolutionary descendent of a first-generation hard drive music
player that was assembled out of more-or-less off-the-shelf parts. The hard
drive is exactly a 2.5" hard drive from a laptop. The battery appears to be
a refugee from a camcorder. The electronics per se are not very highly
integrated but it doesn't matter because they are almost incidental when it
comes to size, weight and power use. The laptop hard drive really defines
the package - it set the size of the battery as much, if not more than
anything else. The batteries plus the hard drive pretty well define the size
of the whole package.

Smaller boxes like the iPod are based on two-generations later hard drive
technology. It is said that Apple scored exclusive rights to use the hard
drive for a certain amount of time, which delayed competitive products until
that time ran out, or someone else started building a comparable hard drive.

> There's an advantage to using AA batteries - you can get them just
> about anywhere, any time. If you're away from AC power for the weekend
> and can't recharge batteries, you can get a pack of AAs at the 7-11
> and reload. But of course they have a finite running time and you have
> to shut down to change batteries. I have only one battery for my
> Jukebox so I haven't tried changing batteries "hot", removing one
> before they both die, replacing it with a freshly charged one, and
> then replacing the second one.

Hot-swapping one battery at a time works. I've done it experimentally.
However, I use both batteries all the time because two batteries IME last
more than twice as long as one. The drain on one battery pushes it near the
edge.

> Cellular phones are what have driven low power technology. I think
> it's pretty amazing that an Archos can record for as long on a pair of
> AA cells as the TCD-5 can on a pair of D cells.

What defines this process is the fact that it only records MP3s. Hard drive
activity is the defining act. A .wav file requires 6-12 times as much hard
drive activity.

>That's a pretty big leap and I don't expect another leap that large for a
while yet.

Record MP3s on a NJB3 and the battery life leaps accordingly.

> The next time they can do more with the available battery capacity, it's
> more likely to be adding more features rather than increase recording
> time.

The road ahead has already been paved with smaller, less power-intensive
hard drives.

>> What bugs me the most is units like the iRiver which have a
>> permanent, non-removable li battery inside the unit. You can't swap
>> in spares even if you're willing to buy them.

Any battery pack requires that the battery have two extra layers around it.
One for the pack and one for the well it slides into. Space, space, space!

I think the most practical approach to long-term use of a NJB3 is an
external battery pack.

> The Jukebox doesn't exactly fill the shoes of the DA-P20, but I've
> learned to adapt, and am still looking for the ideal preamp mate for
> it. I'll probably keep looking until it's obsolete.

A NJB3 can be a small enough investment that it is almost a throw-away. I
mean, $175 won't even get you a really nice portable mic preamp.

> I think they make an adapter for automobile power. Perhaps you could
> adapt one of those if you don't want to carry your car with you.

A cursory DMM reading on my NJB3 says that there is negligible voltage on
the battery terminal. That probably means that there is a protection diode
in series with it, so figure on supplying at least 4.2 volts from that
external pack. 4.5 might work. No-load, my NJB3 charger puts out 5.15
volts.

Arny Krueger

March 13th 04, 03:51 PM

"Scott Dorsey" > wrote in message

> Kurt Albershardt > wrote:
>> Mike Rivers wrote:
>>>
>>> There's a trend to stereo dialog, and stereo ambience. Otherwise,
>>> why would people want to use 4+ track recorders for film sound?
>>
>> Separate tracks for the boom and each wireless, even for plant mics
>> sometimes.
>
> That way they can give the post guys even MORE crap to deal with.
> More tracks means fewer decisions made on set and more decisions
> delayed until post.

Not only that, but the decisions made in post can be made as many times as
it takes to get them right.

Arny Krueger

March 13th 04, 03:53 PM

"Mike Rivers" > wrote in message
news:znr1079186987k@trad
> In article > writes:
>
>>> Separate tracks for the boom and each wireless, even for plant mics
>>> sometimes.
>>
>> That way they can give the post guys even MORE crap to deal with.
>> More tracks means fewer decisions made on set and more decisions
>> delayed until post.
>
> Just like music recording. More tracks means fewer decisions as to
> whether this was what we REALLY wanted it to sound like.

It also means more opportunities to fix it in the mix. While we joke about
this, it's an advantage that can pay off artistically and it can be taken to
the bank.

Oleg Kaizerman

March 13th 04, 05:30 PM

"Eric Toline" > wrote in message
...

Re: Will DAT last as a format? (honest...not a troll/flame)

Group: rec.audio.pro Date: Fri, Mar 12, 2004, 10:05am From:
(Mike Rivers)
In article >
writes:
Maybe film sound ppl will keep it going ?

>There were two makers of professional DATs, HHb and Fostex. Together
they sold over 5000 units world wide.

the Stelladat was the only one who could record 4 tracks an tc , but they
doesn't count in numbers:-)

--
Oleg Kaizerman (gebe) Hollyland

Charles Robertson, Psy.D.

March 13th 04, 07:11 PM

I am cautiously optimistic about the new High Definition Mini Disc due out
from Sony in April. Anyone want to discourage me?
chuck
"Oleg Kaizerman" <kaizero > wrote in message
...
>
> "Eric Toline" > wrote in message
> ...
>
> Re: Will DAT last as a format? (honest...not a troll/flame)
>
> Group: rec.audio.pro Date: Fri, Mar 12, 2004, 10:05am From:
> (Mike Rivers)
> In article >
> writes:
> Maybe film sound ppl will keep it going ?
>
>
> >There were two makers of professional DATs, HHb and Fostex. Together
> they sold over 5000 units world wide.
>
> the Stelladat was the only one who could record 4 tracks an tc , but they
> doesn't count in numbers:-)
>
> --
> Oleg Kaizerman (gebe) Hollyland
>
>

Artie Turner

March 13th 04, 07:23 PM

Charles Robertson, Psy.D. wrote:
> I am cautiously optimistic about the new High Definition Mini Disc due out
> from Sony in April. Anyone want to discourage me?

RAP is sort of like "Home on the Range" - "...where never is heard, an
encouraging word, and the skies are all cloudy all day..."

AT

> chuck
> "Oleg Kaizerman" <kaizero > wrote in message
> ...
>
>>"Eric Toline" > wrote in message
...
>>
>>Re: Will DAT last as a format? (honest...not a troll/flame)
>>
>>Group: rec.audio.pro Date: Fri, Mar 12, 2004, 10:05am From:
(Mike Rivers)
>>In article >
writes:
>>Maybe film sound ppl will keep it going ?
>>
>>
>>
>>>There were two makers of professional DATs, HHb and Fostex. Together
>>
>>they sold over 5000 units world wide.
>>
>>the Stelladat was the only one who could record 4 tracks an tc , but they
>>doesn't count in numbers:-)
>>
>>--
>>Oleg Kaizerman (gebe) Hollyland
>>
>>
>
>
>

Oleg Kaizerman

March 13th 04, 07:49 PM

Keep drumming , those who came with mp-3 as a new way to hear Beethoven and
doing the worse audio hi end products in video world can only come with
another toy that will conquistador the idiots who willing to pay more for
the name.
sorry I see Sony going down in next generation
hd md :-)))
I more waiting to Panasonic p2 release. since the smart media cards will go
down in price and you will see tons of hdmd with out Sony name

Oleg Kaizerman (gebe) Hollyland

"Charles Robertson, Psy.D." > wrote in message
...
> I am cautiously optimistic about the new High Definition Mini Disc due out
> from Sony in April. Anyone want to discourage me?
> chuck
> "Oleg Kaizerman" <kaizero > wrote in message
> ...
> >
> > "Eric Toline" > wrote in message
> > ...
> >
> > Re: Will DAT last as a format? (honest...not a troll/flame)
> >
> > Group: rec.audio.pro Date: Fri, Mar 12, 2004, 10:05am From:
> > (Mike Rivers)
> > In article >
> > writes:
> > Maybe film sound ppl will keep it going ?
> >
> >
> > >There were two makers of professional DATs, HHb and Fostex. Together
> > they sold over 5000 units world wide.
> >
> > the Stelladat was the only one who could record 4 tracks an tc , but
they
> > doesn't count in numbers:-)
> >
> > --
> > Oleg Kaizerman (gebe) Hollyland
> >
> >
>
>

Paul Rubin

March 13th 04, 09:39 PM

(Mike Rivers) writes:
> There's an advantage to using AA batteries - you can get them just
> about anywhere, any time. If you're away from AC power for the weekend
> and can't recharge batteries, you can get a pack of AAs at the 7-11
> and reload. But of course they have a finite running time and you have
> to shut down to change batteries. I have only one battery for my
> Jukebox so I haven't tried changing batteries "hot", removing one
> before they both die, replacing it with a freshly charged one, and
> then replacing the second one.

With something like an Archos I'd use NiMH cells. There are frequent
enough breaks in the music that as long as I have reasonable warning
that the batteries are going flat, I can stop recording and change
cells between songs, so I don't really need to hot-swap, though it
would be nice.

> Cellular phones are what have driven low power technology. I think
> it's pretty amazing that an Archos can record for as long on a pair of
> AA cells as the TCD-5 can on a pair of D cells. That's a pretty big
> leap and I don't expect another leap that large for a while yet. The
> next time they can do more with the available battery capacity, it's
> more likely to be adding more features rather than increase recording
> time.

The Archos actually uses four AA's and not two, but anyway I'm ok with
its 4-5 hours of recording time as long as I can carry enough spare
batteries. The TCD-5 actually uses an awful lot of power, for reasons
I don't understand. The WM-D6 uses a lot less, and typical cassette
and CD Walkmen of today use a fraction of what the D6 uses.

> > I'd be much happier if they used
> > some standard li ion battery, like a Sony camcorder battery or Nokia
> > cell phone battery, that's sold in such volume that supplies won't dry
> > up anytime soon.
>
> I wouldn't count on that. People throw away cellular phones a lot
> faster than they throw away recorders. We thought that a Sony
> camcorder battery pack would last forever, but it hasn't.

Battery packs fail, it's just a fact. However, even those awful old
Motorola flip or brick phones that haven't been made in years, are
still easy to get batteries for, just because they made so many of the
phones. It's similar with Sony camcorders and the InfoLithium battery
system. Sony has built its last several generations of camcorders all
using the same batteries.

> I think they make an adapter for automobile power. Perhaps you could
> adapt one of those if you don't want to carry your car with you.

My concern is that will be similar to the AC adapter in that they
figure that there's unlimited power available from the car, so they
aren't real careful with it, and they use some of the power to charge
the internal battery. So that's why I wondered whether you could run
the unit on external power with the internal battery removed.

Charles Tomaras

March 13th 04, 10:05 PM

"Scott Dorsey" > wrote in message
...
> Kurt Albershardt > wrote:
> >Mike Rivers wrote:
> >>
> >> There's a trend to stereo dialog, and stereo ambience. Otherwise, why
> >> would people want to use 4+ track recorders for film sound?
> >
> >Separate tracks for the boom and each wireless, even for plant mics
sometimes.
>
> That way they can give the post guys even MORE crap to deal with. More
> tracks means fewer decisions made on set and more decisions delayed until
> post.

Actually Scott, most of the feature mixers are still supplying a mixed track
and using the multitrack to give post more options to fix the tracks that
got boned on set. Today's shooting style with multiple cameras and more
reliance on wiring up every actor has made on set live mixing of big scenes
much more difficult.

Charles Tomaras

March 13th 04, 10:22 PM

"Mike Rivers" > wrote in message
news:znr1079186987k@trad...
>
> In article > writes:
>
> > >Separate tracks for the boom and each wireless, even for plant mics
sometimes.
> >
> > That way they can give the post guys even MORE crap to deal with. More
> > tracks means fewer decisions made on set and more decisions delayed
until
> > post.
>
> Just like music recording. More tracks means fewer decisions as to
> whether this was what we REALLY wanted it to sound like.

Production Sound recording is NOT just like music recording. We really don't
want it to sound like the crap we are usually dealt on a set and are banking
on the ability of post to fix stuff.

Kurt Albershardt

March 13th 04, 11:24 PM

Paul Rubin wrote:
>
> The TCD-5 actually uses an awful lot of power, for reasons
> I don't understand.

At the time it was introduced, its battery life was laudable. The choice of two D-cells rather than a string of AA's or C's llike most products of its time made it economical to operate. The use of DC-DC converters was unusual for the time.

Mike Rivers

March 14th 04, 11:37 AM

In article > writes:

> A NJB3 can be a small enough investment that it is almost a throw-away. I
> mean, $175 won't even get you a really nice portable mic preamp.

This is exactly the problem. I can't see adding a $1000 mic preamp (or
even a $500 one) to a recorder that costs less than $200.

--
I'm really Mike Rivers - )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me here: double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

Mike Rivers

March 14th 04, 11:37 AM

In article > writes:

> I am cautiously optimistic about the new High Definition Mini Disc due out
> from Sony in April. Anyone want to discourage me?
> chuck

Yeah. Wait until you see one and check it out.

--
I'm really Mike Rivers - )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me here: double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

Arny Krueger

March 14th 04, 11:46 AM

"Mike Rivers" > wrote in message
news:znr1079215218k@trad

> In article >
> writes:

>> A NJB3 can be a small enough investment that it is almost a
>> throw-away. I mean, $175 won't even get you a really nice portable
>> mic preamp.

> This is exactly the problem. I can't see adding a $1000 mic preamp (or
> even a $500 one) to a recorder that costs less than $200.

To me the question would be whether or not the preamp was married to the
NJB3. If the pre was a general purpose tool I wanted that quality level, the
low cost of the NJB3 wouldn't cause me a problem.

I look at total equipment costs for the whole job, and if I can get a good
critical component for a cheap price, well it's only money...

;-)

However truth be known, I'm looking very hard for a small sub-$200 mixer to
front end my NJB3, not anything pricier.

Arny Krueger

March 14th 04, 11:47 AM

"Charles Robertson, Psy.D." > wrote in
message

> I am cautiously optimistic about the new High Definition Mini Disc
> due out from Sony in April. Anyone want to discourage me?
> chuck

It's so yesterday. After blowing all those bux on SACD, this would be at
least strike two.

Paul Rubin

March 14th 04, 12:21 PM

"Charles Robertson, Psy.D." > writes:
> I am cautiously optimistic about the new High Definition Mini Disc
> due out from Sony in April. Anyone want to discourage me?

It sounds crazy. Who needs proprietary compression in a serious
recorder? They are DRM freaks and if it's like the current minidisc
recorders, the only way to transcode will be to use the analog output
in real time. Blecch!

I see no point in minidiscs instead of an HD. Just have enough ram
buffer to not need to spin the HD constantly, and battery life should
be fine.

I don't understand why nobody is making a hard disk PCM-M1
replacement. There's just repurposed consumer gizmos like the NJB3 at
the low end, and serious professional gear that costs several
kilobucks at the high end. I'd like to see a $500-ish unit with:

- Unit should use standard AA battery power, or better yet D cells,
or InfoLithium L series camcorder packs if really necessary.
Batteries must be removable and replaceable, no internal
non-removable batteries please. If Infolithium, the pack should
go on the outside of the unit like a camcorder, so you can use the
big NP-F960 pack (7.2 volt 5400 mAH). Recording time with an
NP-F960 should exceed 30 hours with a 1.8" HD.

- Unit must be portable but doesn't have to be tiny. WM-D6 size is
fine (somewhat bigger than NJB3). TC-D5M size is acceptable.

- decent built-in mic preamps, record level meters (LED ok), mic
limiter, switchable AGC. For my purposes 3.5mm stereo mic jack is
fine, but you guys probably want dual 1/4" jacks. I can live with
those.

- A way to make index marks in the recording, i.e. you press a button
while recording and it adds a line to an XML file that it writes
alongside the WAV file.

- WAV file recording mandatory, Ogg Vorbis and MP3 desirable but
optional. FLAC would be nice too. Needs 16/44 and 16/48 recording
formats. Could probably add 24/48 and even 24/96 without too much
extra cost. I guess I'd use 24/48 WAV to avoid having to jump on
level controls all the time.

- Standard FAT32 file system, no proprietary nonsense. USB2 and/or
Firewire interface. Plug it into your computer and it just appears
as a normal external drive.

- Built-in speaker - optional, but a small monitor speaker is quite
useful.

None of this stuff seems terribly difficult to do, and since lots of
folks bought PCM-M1's and comparable DAT recorders, there must be a
market for a thing like this. Am I missing something?

Oleg Kaizerman

March 14th 04, 12:54 PM

That's remind me days when I used the SONY UMATIC hi band sp 150 as a
preamp to my nakamichi deck , the things were much simple those days :-)

--
Oleg Kaizerman (gebe) Hollyland

,"> However truth be known, I'm looking very hard for a small sub-$200 mixer
to
> front end my NJB3, not anything pricier.
>
>
>

Kurt Albershardt

March 14th 04, 07:01 PM

Paul Rubin wrote:
>
> I don't understand why nobody is making a hard disk PCM-M1
> replacement. There's just repurposed consumer gizmos like the NJB3 at
> the low end, and serious professional gear that costs several
> kilobucks at the high end.

http://www.sounddevices.com/products/7.htm is the closest we've seen yet. 2-channel version should street around $1600 I think. Meets all of your requiremtns below except the pricepoint.

> I'd like to see a $500-ish unit with:
> a 1.8" HD.

1.8" drives are still selling at a huge premium. The Sound Devices boxes are shipping with 2.5" drives initially since you get more storage for quite a bit less money. Swapping in a 1.8" drive would save some power and quite a bit of noise, plus improve the shock tolerance of the unit. Once 1.8" drives become commonplace it might make sense on a broader basis. Of course by then we may choose a 64G flash drive in that same formfactor instead.

Mike Rivers

March 14th 04, 07:50 PM

In article > writes:

> > This is exactly the problem. I can't see adding a $1000 mic preamp (or
> > even a $500 one) to a recorder that costs less than $200.
>
> To me the question would be whether or not the preamp was married to the
> NJB3. If the pre was a general purpose tool I wanted that quality level, the
> low cost of the NJB3 wouldn't cause me a problem.

In essence, to me anyway, it would be married to the JB3. While it
might work in the studio if I needed another preamp, I wouldn't use it
there generally. And hopefully the recorder that replaces my JB3 will
have usable mic inputs so I don't need an outboard mic preamp.

> However truth be known, I'm looking very hard for a small sub-$200 mixer to
> front end my NJB3, not anything pricier.

Since I already have a Mackie 1402 VLZ Pro, that's what I use when I
want to run mics into the Jukebox. I don't feel that a $500 preamp
that's 1/4 the size (and has 1/3 the inputs, should I need them) is an
expense that I can justify, particulary since that preamp will become
surplus (or I'll have to find another use for it) when I retire the
Jukebox.

--
I'm really Mike Rivers )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me here: double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

Mike Rivers

March 14th 04, 07:50 PM

In article > writes:

> It sounds crazy. Who needs proprietary compression in a serious
> recorder?

I believe that one of the features of this new Minidisk recorder is
that it will use a standard, uncompressed format (on a higher
capacity disk).

> I see no point in minidiscs instead of an HD.

Three words: "Immediately removable media." When you run out of disk
space or want to put a separate project in its own place, you don't
have to first hunt up a computer and move files.

> I don't understand why nobody is making a hard disk PCM-M1
> replacement.

They didn't sell enough M1s to justify the next generation. Simple as
that. I know what YOU want and maybe about 3,000 other people, but you
can't get what you want at the price you want to pay if they can't
sell 20,000 of them. And there just isn't that large a market for
portable recorders of music quality.

--
I'm really Mike Rivers )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me here: double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

Paul Rubin

March 14th 04, 09:57 PM

Kurt Albershardt > writes:
> http://www.sounddevices.com/products/7.htm is the closest we've seen
> yet. 2-channel version should street around $1600 I think. Meets
> all of your requiremtns below except the pricepoint.

Yeah, that's what I mean about serious professional gear costing
kilobucks (ok, $1600).

The Marantz PMD-670, <http://www.zzounds.com/item--MARPMD670> also
comes very close, and it's $699, which isn't that far from the $500
that I mentioned. Its shortcomings are

1) it uses a single CF slot instead of an internal HD. You can get
4 GB CF microdrives at sort of reasonable prices these days, but
I'd rather have 20+ GB.

2) It's quite power hungry, running for 6 hours or so on EIGHT aa cells.
But at least it uses normal AA cells. I could get a sack full of
NiMH cells to run it with, but would probably use an external D pack.
(Marantz sell their own rechargeable packs for it, but those aren't
ideal either).

I think it first came out about 3 years ago. Certainly technology has
improved enough since then that Marantz could come out with a new
model that does everything we're all looking for, at a similar price
level and without having to change very much. The PMD670 itself is a
successor to some similar older units, and there's a Marantz minidisc
recorder that looks like a close relative. I'd think of buying a
PMD670 if it weren't already so near-obsolete. I'd set it up with a
4Gb microdrive (about $150 with some horse trading) and be able to
record 24+ hours in 320kb/s mp3 format, which should be enough for my
purposes.

> > I'd like to see a $500-ish unit with:
> > a 1.8" HD.
>
> 1.8" drives are still selling at a huge premium. The Sound Devices
> boxes are shipping with 2.5" drives initially since you get more
> storage for quite a bit less money.

2.5" is ok if 1.8" is really that much more expensive. But iPod-like
players start around $300, so the drive cost is tolerable. Are the
Sound Devices boxes actually shipping right now? The web page makes
it sound like they're still a ways out.

Paul Rubin

March 14th 04, 10:21 PM

(Mike Rivers) writes:
> I believe that one of the features of this new Minidisk recorder is
> that it will use a standard, uncompressed format (on a higher
> capacity disk).

Thanks, I checked into it some more and it does look interesting.

http://minidisc.org/part_Hi-MD_Sony.html

It looks like it will use a 1 GB disk and record about 1.5 hours
uncompressed or 7.5 hours compressed (256 kb/sec ATRAC). The 1.5
hours uncompressed isn't that much an improvement over Mini-DV or DAT,
though of course the medium itself is nicer and the recorder is much
smaller and more civilized.

> > I see no point in minidiscs instead of an HD.
>
> Three words: "Immediately removable media." When you run out of disk
> space or want to put a separate project in its own place, you don't
> have to first hunt up a computer and move files.

With 1.8" HD's going up to 40 GB and laptop HD's going up to 80 GB,
I'd need an awful lot of MD media to not run out of space on the MD's
sooner. But yeah, for a serious unit, a removable HD would be a good
thing. Another idea would be a machine that records directly to
DVD-R.

> > I don't understand why nobody is making a hard disk PCM-M1
> > replacement.
>
> They didn't sell enough M1s to justify the next generation. Simple as
> that. I know what YOU want and maybe about 3,000 other people, but you
> can't get what you want at the price you want to pay if they can't
> sell 20,000 of them. And there just isn't that large a market for
> portable recorders of music quality.

I think they didn't sell enough M1's to justify the next generation
because the DAT format itself is obsolete, not because the concept of
a quality portable recorder wasn't popular enough. They sold enough
of the previous several generations of DAT units to justify building
the M1, after all. If they made an M1-like machine with an HD, I'm
sure it would do fine.

Eric Toline

March 15th 04, 01:30 AM

Re: Will DAT last as a format? (honest...not a troll/flame)

Group: rec.audio.pro Date: Sun, Mar 14, 2004, 1:57pm (EST-3) From:
(Paul=A0Rubin)
Kurt Albershardt > writes:
http://www.sounddevices.com/products/7.htm is the closest we've seen
yet. 2-channel version should street around $1600 I think. Meets all of
your requiremtns below except the pricepoint.

Yeah, that's what I mean about serious professional gear costing
kilobucks (ok, $1600).<<<<<<<<<

You want kilobucks? How about $18k for the Aaton Cantar X, an 8 track
HDNL portable recorder.

Are the Sound Devices boxes actually shipping right now? The web page
makes it sound like they're still a ways out.<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<

The SD 7 series will be officialy introduced at the NAB convention next
month. Shipment is expected to begin in May.

Eric

"RAMPS @ NAB: 4/20/04: Napoleons Bar, Paris Hotel"

Paul Rubin

March 15th 04, 02:39 AM

(Eric Toline) writes:
> Are the Sound Devices boxes actually shipping right now? The web page
> makes it sound like they're still a ways out.<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
>
> The SD 7 series will be officialy introduced at the NAB convention next
> month. Shipment is expected to begin in May.

Cool, any photos of units that are closer to the production models?
These things are still way too expensive for an amateur like me, but
they point the direction other units can go in.

Eric Toline

March 15th 04, 04:30 AM

Re: Will DAT last as a format? (honest...not a troll/flame)

Group: rec.audio.pro Date: Sun, Mar 14, 2004, 6:39pm (EST-3) From:
(Paul=A0Rubin)
(Eric Toline) writes:
=A0=A0Are the Sound Devices boxes actually shipping right now? The web
page makes it sound like they're still a ways out.<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
The SD 7 series will be officialy introduced at the NAB convention next
month. Shipment is expected to begin in May.

Cool, any photos of units that are closer to the production models?
These things are still way too expensive for an amateur like me, but
they point the direction other units can go in.<<<<<

www.sounddevices.com. Find the link for the 7 series. Only the 744T is
shown but you can get a very good idea of what the 722 will look like
from that. You should check out the specs there also.

Eric

"RAMPS @ NAB: 4/20/04: Napoleons Bar, Paris Hotel"

Paul Rubin

March 15th 04, 05:57 AM

(Eric Toline) writes:
> www.sounddevices.com. Find the link for the 7 series. Only the 744T is
> shown but you can get a very good idea of what the 722 will look like
> from that. You should check out the specs there also.

I think the units in <http://www.sounddevices.com./products/7.htm>
are prototypes and I hope the production ones won't look so much like
lab equipment.

nmm

March 15th 04, 07:00 AM

On Fri, 12 Mar 2004 1:40 PM, Eric Toline >
wrote:
>
>Re: Will DAT last as a format? (honest...not a troll/flame)
>
>Group: rec.audio.pro Date: Fri, Mar 12, 2004, 3:40am From:
(nmm)
>
>
>isn't the latest 'top of the line' Nagra a hard drive system?<<<<<<<
><<<<
>
>That would be the Nagra V. Another mistake by Nagra. The V
>offers only 2
>tracks for about $9k. The competition offers 4+ tracks for the
>same
>price and in one case (the Sound Devices 744t) for less than half
>the
>price of the V.
>
>
>=CA=CAI know HHB are touting a new portable hard drive system for fil
>recording.<<<<<<<<<<<
>
>That would be the HHb Portadrive 8 tracks for $12.5k. 2nd highest
>cost
>per track after the Aaton Cantar X at $18k for 8 tracks.

That Aaton Cantar looks rather nice, well it should for that price.

http://www.abelcine.com/Cantar/home.shtml

>
>Eric
>
>"RAMPS @ NAB: 4/20/04: Napoleons Bar, Paris Hotel"
>
>

So what are the standards these days for film location sound? You'd
figure that there would be some sort of generally accepted format. I
was trying to find something on the William F White site, but they
don't list what their audio recorders are/ what they rent out. Is that
usually an item brought by the sound engineer?

"Standards are great, we need more of them" - unknown AES member.

Eric Toline

March 15th 04, 07:30 AM

Re: Will DAT last as a format? (honest...not a troll/flame)

Group: rec.audio.pro Date: Mon, Mar 15, 2004, 2:00am From:
(nmm)
On Fri, 12 Mar 2004 1:40 PM, Eric Toline >
wrote:
Re: Will DAT last as a format? (honest...not a troll/flame)
Group: rec.audio.pro Date: Fri, Mar 12, 2004, 3:40am From:
(nmm)

So what are the standards these days for film location sound? You'd
figure that there would be some sort of generally accepted format.<<<<<<

Right now DAT with time code is the most used. More & more production
sound people are switching to new HDNL recorders.

The leader in that arena are the Deva recorders from Zaxcom. New players
in the last 9 months are the Aaton Cantar X, HHb Portadrive and the
Fostex PD-6.

The one thing that they share is the ability to record to both the hard
drive and to a DVD disc as the hand off media at the end of the day.

Eric

"RAMPS @ NAB: 4/20/04: Napoleons Bar, Paris Hotel"

Mike Rivers

March 15th 04, 11:02 AM

In article > writes:

> I think they didn't sell enough M1's to justify the next generation
> because the DAT format itself is obsolete, not because the concept of
> a quality portable recorder wasn't popular enough.

I think that market is about saturated. You're just jumping in about
ten years too late.

> If they made an M1-like machine with an HD, I'm
> sure it would do fine.

Maybe the Jukebox 4 will be what you want. Thing is that most people
who do casual location recording are perfectly happy with the sound of
a data-compressed recording. If that allows the use of removable media
that's inexpensive enough to store and not re-use, that's good for
collectors of recordings. I'd be surprised if more than maybe 10% of
the Jukebox 3 owners use them for live recording. There just isn't a
lot of it being done. The vast success of the MP3 players (and Walkman
cassette players before that) proves that.

--
I'm really Mike Rivers )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me here: double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

Eric Toline

March 15th 04, 05:26 PM

Re: Will DAT last as a format? (honest...not a troll/flame)

Group: rec.audio.pro Date: Sun, Mar 14, 2004, 9:57pm (EST-3) From:
(Paul=A0Rubin)
(Eric Toline) writes:
www.sounddevices.com. Find the link for the 7 series. Only the 744T is
shown but you can get a very good idea of what the 722 will look like
from that. You should check out the specs there also.

I think the units in <http://www.sounddevices.com./products/7.htm> are
prototypes and I hope the production ones won't look so much like lab
equipment.<<<<

I've seen & handled the prototypes. The picture shown is very close to
the final product if not the final production model. Don't know what you
mean by "looking like lab equipment".

Eric

"RAMPS @ NAB: 4/20/04: Napoleons Bar, Paris Hotel"

Paul Rubin

March 15th 04, 11:43 PM

(Mike Rivers) writes:
> > I think they didn't sell enough M1's to justify the next generation
> > because the DAT format itself is obsolete, not because the concept of
> > a quality portable recorder wasn't popular enough.
>
> I think that market is about saturated. You're just jumping in about
> ten years too late.

I can't believe the market is saturated. New users (I'm one) come
along all the time. With the appearance of PC audio tools, more
people than ever want to do quality live recording.

> > If they made an M1-like machine with an HD, I'm sure it would do fine.
>
> Maybe the Jukebox 4 will be what you want.

I'd expect the Jukebox 4 to be primarily a listening device just like
the NJB3, except maybe smaller. Recording will continue to be an
incidental function.

> Thing is that most people who do casual location recording are
> perfectly happy with the sound of a data-compressed recording.

Yes, the issue is not just possible sonic compromises, but also that
the MD compression is proprietary and codecs don't exist anywhere
except in the MD hardware. The HD minidisc holds about 7 hours at 256
kb/s compression. If I record 7 hours in mp3 format (say 14 sessions
of 1/2 hour each) on an NJB3 and then want to upload them to my web
site, I plug in the USB2 cable and transfer the data at the full speed
of the file system, 1 GB of mp3's in probably less than a minute if
the NJB3 firmware is any good, and presto, the 14 files are now on my
computer ready to go. If I want to do something similar with the MD,
I have to use the analog output to upload to an analog sound card,
transferring the entire 7 hours in real time, manually separating the
14 sessions from one another. Even if I don't mind the additional
quality loss of copying through my computer's noisy analog audio input
and then transcoding from one lossy format to another (ATRAC to MP3),
the inconvenience of needing 7 hours instead of 1 minute to copy the
disk is horrendous. Of course this would be cured if the MD recorder
could record in MP3 format.

> If that allows the use of removable media that's inexpensive enough
> to store and not re-use, that's good for collectors of recordings.

I think the opposite: most of my interest in digital recorders is
because storing piles of removable media is a pain in the neck, and
I'd rather have my whole collection on one centralized device (with
good backups, of course). Otherwise I'd still be happy to keep using
analog cassettes or videotapes, whose audio quality has been ok for my
purposes. But I hate having to juggle all the stupid tapes around
when I want to find something. I'd rather have it all on my computer
so I can index it at leisure and then just click on things to play them.

The popularity of the NJB is similar: I bet lots of people use them at
home to centralize their collections and they don't care about
portability. When I buy a new commercial CD at the store, the first
thing I do with it is rip it to a computer so I don't have to mess
around with bits of silver plastic whenever I want to listen to it. I
believe that's a pretty common practice (hence sites like freedb.org)
and some people even throw away the CD's after they've ripped them.

> I'd be surprised if more than maybe 10% of the Jukebox 3
> owners use them for live recording. There just isn't a lot of it
> being done. The vast success of the MP3 players (and Walkman
> cassette players before that) proves that.

Yes, that's probably correct, recorders are a different market, and
I'd expect that a quality portable recorder will be more expensive
than an NJB3 because of that lower sales volume. But the PCM-M1,
Marantz PMD670, and Sony TC-D5M (in today's dollars) all cost about 3x
what the NJB3 cost and that's about the upper limit of what a user
like me can stand. The Sound Devices machine at $1600 is 8x as
expensive as an NJB3 and for me at least, it's out of reach.

By the way, the Neuros Audio player/recorder (www.neurosaudio.com)
looks like another alternative to the NJB3 and iRiver, more or less in
the same category and with similar good and bad points.

Mike Rivers

March 16th 04, 11:42 AM

In article > writes:

> I can't believe the market is saturated. New users (I'm one) come
> along all the time.

Sure, but they just dribble in. The market for people who want to
record is miniscule compared to the people who want to listen to
playback. You're talking about a product that can only be as
inexpensive as your dreams if it has the sale potential of an MP3
player, and believe me (or not), a portable recorder doesn't have that
potential.

> With the appearance of PC audio tools, more
> people than ever want to do quality live recording.

Sure. 5000 as opposed to 50. Or something like that.

> I'd expect the Jukebox 4 to be primarily a listening device just like
> the NJB3, except maybe smaller. Recording will continue to be an
> incidental function.

This is the way it has to be in order to get the price down. Sorry.
There will be some nice serious portable hard disk recorders in the
price range of a respectable laptop computer and external interface,
but remember, the only reason why laptops are this cheap is because
it's the biggest selling computer configuration right now.

> Yes, the issue is not just possible sonic compromises, but also that
> the MD compression is proprietary and codecs don't exist anywhere
> except in the MD hardware.

So why is this a problem? You can record, you can play back. The only
thing you can't do is file transfer at computer speed. That's not a
function of a recorder. It may be convenient, but it's not a
requirement. You're not looking for a portable recorder, you're
looking for a portable file generator.

> I think the opposite: most of my interest in digital recorders is
> because storing piles of removable media is a pain in the neck, and
> I'd rather have my whole collection on one centralized device

Which will eventually stop working and your whole music collection
will be gone, or become an obsolete format. This is fine if you want
temporary storage of your music, but for me, recording is an entirely
different function.

> The popularity of the NJB is similar: I bet lots of people use them at
> home to centralize their collections and they don't care about
> portability.

I have no basis for this other than conjecture, but I'd disagree. I
can't imagine anyone using a Jukebox for this purpose. If I wanted to
centrailze my music collection and didn't care about portability, I'd
use a discarded computer. No question about it. I think most others
would, too.

> When I buy a new commercial CD at the store, the first
> thing I do with it is rip it to a computer so I don't have to mess
> around with bits of silver plastic whenever I want to listen to it.

I don't. If I think I might want to listen to it on an airplane, I'll
rip it to the Jukebox (before the trip) but otherwise, I'd rather have
that piece of silver plastic that I can play in my car, my living
room, my studio, or, yes, even on my computer. And I can put it back
in its nice storage case and maybe there're even some interesting
notes to read on the insert (though that's getting rarer and rarer)

> Yes, that's probably correct, recorders are a different market, and
> I'd expect that a quality portable recorder will be more expensive
> than an NJB3 because of that lower sales volume.

My point exactly.

> But the PCM-M1,
> Marantz PMD670, and Sony TC-D5M (in today's dollars) all cost about 3x
> what the NJB3 cost and that's about the upper limit of what a user
> like me can stand. The Sound Devices machine at $1600 is 8x as
> expensive as an NJB3 and for me at least, it's out of reach.

Tough darts. Go convince Sound Devices that there are 200,000 others
like you and maybe they'll figure out how to cut the price in half.

--
I'm really Mike Rivers )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me here: double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

Paul Rubin

March 16th 04, 12:36 PM

(Mike Rivers) writes:
> > I can't believe the market is saturated. New users (I'm one) come
> > along all the time.
>
> Sure, but they just dribble in. The market for people who want to
> record is miniscule compared to the people who want to listen to
> playback. You're talking about a product that can only be as
> inexpensive as your dreams if it has the sale potential of an MP3
> player, and believe me (or not), a portable recorder doesn't have
> that potential.

I agree that the sales volume will be lower and the cost will have to
be higher, but not 8x higher.

> > With the appearance of PC audio tools, more
> > people than ever want to do quality live recording.
>
> Sure. 5000 as opposed to 50. Or something like that.

Who's going to buy these HD minidisc recorders then? Those things
needed a lot more development (new media, new drive, etc.) than a hard
disc recorder would.

> > I'd expect the Jukebox 4 to be primarily a listening device just
> > like the NJB3, except maybe smaller. Recording will continue to
> > be an incidental function.
>
> This is the way it has to be in order to get the price down. Sorry.

For the price of playback units, sure.

> There will be some nice serious portable hard disk recorders in the
> price range of a respectable laptop computer and external interface,
> but remember, the only reason why laptops are this cheap is because
> it's the biggest selling computer configuration right now.

Nah, laptops are almost like desktops now, they're just a bunch of
standardized assemblies bolted together. If you wanted to make a
laptop in your garage, you could do so. A hard disk recorder is about
the same.

> > Yes, the issue is not just possible sonic compromises, but also that
> > the MD compression is proprietary and codecs don't exist anywhere
> > except in the MD hardware.
>
> So why is this a problem? You can record, you can play back. The only
> thing you can't do is file transfer at computer speed. That's not a
> function of a recorder. It may be convenient, but it's not a
> requirement. You're not looking for a portable recorder, you're
> looking for a portable file generator.

It's a significant usability win to be able to transfer the files quickly.
However, I agree that it's not absolutely vital.

> > I think the opposite: most of my interest in digital recorders is
> > because storing piles of removable media is a pain in the neck, and
> > I'd rather have my whole collection on one centralized device
>
> Which will eventually stop working and your whole music collection
> will be gone, or become an obsolete format. This is fine if you want
> temporary storage of your music, but for me, recording is an entirely
> different function.

Notice my mention of backups. The idea is also to move your archive
to new media as the old stuff becomes obsolete. MD is in much more
danger of becoming unusable with obsolescence, because the compression
format is secret. Once your MD hardware stops working, if it's not
being made any more, your collection is toast. While since the MP3
format is published, you'll always be able to run an MP3 codec on
whatever computers are being made after the current ones are obsolete.

> I have no basis for this other than conjecture, but I'd disagree. I
> can't imagine anyone using a Jukebox for this purpose. If I wanted to
> centrailze my music collection and didn't care about portability, I'd
> use a discarded computer. No question about it. I think most others
> would, too.

Yeah, probably true. OK.

> > When I buy a new commercial CD at the store, the first
> > thing I do with it is rip it to a computer so I don't have to mess
> > around with bits of silver plastic whenever I want to listen to it.
>
> I don't. If I think I might want to listen to it on an airplane, I'll
> rip it to the Jukebox (before the trip) but otherwise, I'd rather have
> that piece of silver plastic that I can play in my car, my living
> room, my studio, or, yes, even on my computer. And I can put it back
> in its nice storage case and maybe there're even some interesting
> notes to read on the insert (though that's getting rarer and rarer)

These days I have an MP3 CD player in my car but if I were doing it
again I might have just stayed with the factory FM receiver and bought
a Neuros, which is like an NJB3 but includes an FM transmitter for use
in the car. The MP3 CD player is pretty nice, though; I can put a
dozen CD's worth of MP3's onto one CD-R disc. I wouldn't want to
bring my only copy of a commercial CD on a car trip anyway (backups,
you know).

> > Yes, that's probably correct, recorders are a different market, and
> > I'd expect that a quality portable recorder will be more expensive
> > than an NJB3 because of that lower sales volume.
>
> My point exactly.

My exact point is that "more expensive" doesn't have to mean mean "8
times more expensive". The price point I mentioned is 2x or 3x more
expensive and I believe that's very feasible.

> > But the PCM-M1, Marantz PMD670, and Sony TC-D5M (in today's
> > dollars) all cost about 3x what the NJB3 cost and that's about the
> > upper limit of what a user like me can stand. The Sound Devices
> > machine at $1600 is 8x as expensive as an NJB3 and for me at
> > least, it's out of reach.
>
> Tough darts. Go convince Sound Devices that there are 200,000 others
> like you and maybe they'll figure out how to cut the price in half.

Are you saying that anything like 200,000 of those models have been
sold?! I'd expect the numbers are much much smaller. And the Marantz
is about half the price of the Sound Devices recorder despite being
made with 3-year-old technology. The PMD670 has everything I want
(and some things I don't have any use for, like balanced mic inputs
with phantom power) except hard drive capacity. I haven't looked at
the Sound Devices unit closely but it sounds like it's considerably
fancier than the PMD670. I don't know why Marantz went to a single CF
slot in the PMD670 from the full sized PCMCIA slot of the older
PMD680/690. Note that they apparently did sell enough 680/690's to
justify developing the 670.

Anyway, someone just sold a PMD670 for $425 on Ebay. If another one
shows up there at that price I might buy it, and live with the 4GB
(for now) capacity limit. My main hesitation is the feeling that
they're about due for a new model that's less power hungry and maybe
has a hard disk. If they simply did an updated PMD670 in the same
form factor that had a laptop-style PCMCIA type III slot (so you could
put in two 5GB Toshiba type II drives (currently about $120 each) or
some newer 20-40GB type III drive when those become available), had
updated electronics for longer battery runtime, and (preferably) ran
on two or three D cells instead of eight AA's, I think a lot of
r.a.p. regulars would be delighted.

Fostex and Denon also have recorders similar to the PMD670 that are
in the $1200 range.

Bob Olhsson

March 16th 04, 03:47 PM

"Paul Rubin" > wrote in message
...
>
> My exact point is that "more expensive" doesn't have to mean mean "8
> times more expensive". The price point I mentioned is 2x or 3x more
> expensive and I believe that's very feasible.

I don't!

The thing almost everybody misses is the fact that digital technology is
only cheap when mass produced.

EVERY reasonably priced "pro" digital audio device has been based on using
chips and media intended for mass-market consumer products. When the
underlying mass-market product goes away, so MUST the "pro" digital products
along with the parts support for them. This is now happening to DAT
transports and, if the flashing "PB condition" light on my Sony 7030 means
anything , most of the tape. It's a brave new world of utterly disposable
audio technology.

--
Bob Olhsson Audio Mastery, Nashville TN
Mastering, Audio for Picture, Mix Evaluation and Quality Control
Over 40 years making people sound better than they ever imagined!
615.385.8051 http://www.hyperback.com

Paul Rubin

March 16th 04, 03:55 PM

"Bob Olhsson" > writes:
> > My exact point is that "more expensive" doesn't have to mean mean "8
> > times more expensive". The price point I mentioned is 2x or 3x more
> > expensive and I believe that's very feasible.
>
> I don't! ... The thing almost everybody misses is the fact that
> digital technology is only cheap when mass produced.

Sure, a digital device like a microprocessor or a disk drive is only
cheap when mass produced. But if you buy a mass produced
microprocessor and a mass produced disk drive and screw them together,
you're not really producing a digital device, you're just making a
mechanical assembly more or less. You can do that in relatively small
quantity with reasonable economy.

> EVERY reasonably priced "pro" digital audio device has been based on using
> chips and media intended for mass-market consumer products.

Yes. The obvious way to make a digital recorder nowadays is with a
commodity microprocessor, commodity adc/dac, commodity disk drive,
etc. You need to make boards and enclosures, but you don't need any
special chips or media. When you do that, you should be able to make
a relatively cheap device without needing enormous production volume.
Marantz did it five(?) years ago (PMD680/690) and again three years
ago (PMD670). Why is it harder to do now than it was in back those
days? Technology has gone forward since then, not backward.

Kurt Albershardt

March 16th 04, 08:37 PM

Paul Rubin wrote:
>
> The obvious way to make a digital recorder nowadays is with a
> commodity microprocessor, commodity adc/dac, commodity disk drive,
> etc. You need to make boards and enclosures, but you don't need any
> special chips or media.

Which is basically what Sound Devices did.

> When you do that, you should be able to make
> a relatively cheap device without needing enormous production volume.
> Marantz did it five(?) years ago (PMD680/690) and again three years
> ago (PMD670). Why is it harder to do now than it was in back those
> days? Technology has gone forward since then, not backward.

Not much harder for a big company like Marantz who can afford the tooling for that plastic case and is addressing an existing customer base of cassette and DAT users with a similar-looking product.

Much more difficult for a small specialist company like Sound Devices who is entering a new product segment. I predict they are going to do quite well--they are positioning the 742 as a pro DAT preplacement and the 744T will be competing with products costing 2-4 times as much as it will.

Mike Rivers

March 16th 04, 08:50 PM

In article > writes:

> I agree that the sales volume will be lower and the cost will have to
> be higher, but not 8x higher.

Hey, it's all in the numbers. And it's not linear. It takes more than
8x the sales to bring the price down to 1/8.

> Who's going to buy these HD minidisc recorders then? Those things
> needed a lot more development (new media, new drive, etc.) than a hard
> disc recorder would.

Probably people who want even more capacity on a disk (I'll bet most
of them are used in the compressed mode, and that's where the
advertising will be focused - not on "True CD quality recording with
no copy restrictions" but on "store over 1,000 (or whatever it comes
out to bey) of your favorite CDs on a single disk."

Remeber the DAT legacy - it was originally introduced as a consumer
format. It flopped because of the delay in release because of copy
protection issues and consumer confusion, but professionals and
recording hobbyists eventually embraced the technology. If everyone
who had a cassette deck replaced it with a DAT, a Walkman DAT would be
$79, not $600 (and Sony would be making more money, as would the media
manufacturers).

> Nah, laptops are almost like desktops now, they're just a bunch of
> standardized assemblies bolted together. If you wanted to make a
> laptop in your garage, you could do so. A hard disk recorder is about
> the same.

I know lots of people who have assembled desktop computers on the
dining room table from parts, but I don't know of anyone who has
assembled a laptop. And certainly home "hard disk recorders" have been
built, but they look a whole lot like computers to me - complete with
monitors and keyboards. While the component parts may be available,
the integration, controls, packaging, and firmware are not. That's
what makes the product, and if you got a product that nobody else has,
you can choose your market and your price point.

> Notice my mention of backups. The idea is also to move your archive
> to new media as the old stuff becomes obsolete.

Isn't that kind of a pain in the butt? I haven't had to move my record
or analog tape collection to another format? I have both records and
tapes that are 50 years old which I can still enjoy. Understand that
surface noise and hiss don't make the music unlistenable or
unenjoyable to me as some people claim is the case for them.

> The MP3 CD player is pretty nice, though; I can put a
> dozen CD's worth of MP3's onto one CD-R disc.

That seems like a nice concept, but it doesn't play out in real life
for me. Somehow I just never seem to load up the Jukebox 3 before a
trip - or I scramble around and pick a few things at random at the
last minute. Perhaps those who are more into the MP3 thing are better
at this, or have favorite collections that they can listen to a few
times. I'm usually just as happy surfing the radio or singing to
myself. (fortunatly most of the time I travel alone)

> My exact point is that "more expensive" doesn't have to mean mean "8
> times more expensive". The price point I mentioned is 2x or 3x more
> expensive and I believe that's very feasible.

You have yet to prove this to a manufacturer. Remember that quality
isn't necessarily quantized. It probalby only costs a couple of
dollars more to make a respectable preamp than it does to make a
practically useless one. In fact, I was talking with John Oram at a
NAMM show last year and somehow we got around to the subject of
portable recorders or something. He told me that he was on call as a
consultant to Creative Labs and had given them a design for a mic
preamp that would hae increased the cost of the Jukebox by only a few
dollars and they chose not to use it (because of the cost). And put
XLR connectors on the case and the vast majority of potential
customers won't have a place to plug in their mics. Not only that, but
it won't fit easily in a pocket. So you take a really, really big
chunk out of the market.

> Are you saying that anything like 200,000 of those models have been
> sold?! I'd expect the numbers are much much smaller.

Only Sony knows for sure, but I don't think that's unreasonable. When
it comes to something like small format digital recording consoles,
that's where you're talking small potatoes, just a few thousand per
model, many well publicized ones not even breaking the 3000 mark.

The Greatful Dead and their taper section did a lot to sell portable
recording equipment, but still there might only be about 10,000 of
them.

> And the Marantz
> is about half the price of the Sound Devices recorder despite being
> made with 3-year-old technology. The PMD670 has everything I want
> (and some things I don't have any use for, like balanced mic inputs
> with phantom power) except hard drive capacity.

The Marantz isn't really designed for the service to which you want to
put it. It's not a contert-taper's machine, it's a news gathering
machine. It's for making very temporary recordings. The flash card
technology is good for that. While it will take a disk, I'll bet that
few are acutally used that way. The Sound Devices recorder is designed
for film sound recording. There's gotta be a good reason why no
company capable of making a consumer-level recorder isn't doing it. I
believe that reason is that their market research has shown that it's
not profitable to do so.

> Anyway, someone just sold a PMD670 for $425 on Ebay. If another one
> shows up there at that price I might buy it, and live with the 4GB
> (for now) capacity limit. My main hesitation is the feeling that
> they're about due for a new model that's less power hungry and maybe
> has a hard disk.

Hey, remember how long the Marantz portable analog cassette recorder
in the same form factor has been around. Don't hold your breath.

> Fostex and Denon also have recorders similar to the PMD670 that are
> in the $1200 range.

Yup, and priced about right, too. I'm waiting to get my hands on one
of the Fostex recorders. I think it might be a good replacement for my
TEAC DA-P20.

--
I'm really Mike Rivers )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me here: double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

Mike Rivers

March 16th 04, 08:50 PM

In article > writes:

> Sure, a digital device like a microprocessor or a disk drive is only
> cheap when mass produced. But if you buy a mass produced
> microprocessor and a mass produced disk drive and screw them together,
> you're not really producing a digital device, you're just making a
> mechanical assembly more or less.

And just where are you going to get the mass-produced case to put them
in? And the mass produced control panel? Or the mic preamps and
connectors?

It sounds like you're aiming toward something like the Core Sound PDA
recorder. You can buy a PDA for cheap, add the card, then add a mic
preamp (Core Sound's preamp/A/D is nice) and you've got your
microprocessor and other stuff screwed together. Only problem is that
now it's as thick as a Ruth Chris' steak and costs proportionally as
much.

--
I'm really Mike Rivers )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me here: double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

Marc Heusser

March 16th 04, 09:23 PM

In article <znr1079455199k@trad>, (Mike Rivers)
wrote:

> > And the Marantz
> > is about half the price of the Sound Devices recorder despite being
> > made with 3-year-old technology. The PMD670 has everything I want
> > (and some things I don't have any use for, like balanced mic inputs
> > with phantom power) except hard drive capacity.
>
> The Marantz isn't really designed for the service to which you want to
> put it. It's not a contert-taper's machine, it's a news gathering
> machine. It's for making very temporary recordings. The flash card
> technology is good for that. While it will take a disk, I'll bet that
> few are acutally used that way.

Why not? I routinely tape hours (ok, mp3 mono at 128 kbit/s since it's
good enough for what I do), but there's nothing to stop you doing
straight 16 bit PCM. Nice meters (including peak and margin), good
recording level knobs, lighted display, headphone out. Download via USB
to computer. Ilike it.
YMMV
Marc

--
Marc Heusser
(remove the obvious: CHEERS and MERICAL...until end to reply via email)

Paul Rubin

March 16th 04, 11:22 PM

Kurt Albershardt > writes:
> > The obvious way to make a digital recorder nowadays is with a
> > commodity microprocessor, commodity adc/dac, commodity disk drive,
> > etc. You need to make boards and enclosures, but you don't need any
> > special chips or media.
>
> Which is basically what Sound Devices did.

Yes but they made quite a high end product. I'm sure it's a good value
for professionals, but I think there's space for a product that does less
and costs less.

> > When you do that, you should be able to make
> > a relatively cheap device without needing enormous production volume.
> > Marantz did it five(?) years ago (PMD680/690) and again three years
> > ago (PMD670). Why is it harder to do now than it was in back those
> > days? Technology has gone forward since then, not backward.
>
> Not much harder for a big company like Marantz who can afford the
> tooling for that plastic case and is addressing an existing customer
> base of cassette and DAT users with a similar-looking product.

Well, you can make some pretty nice products without too much
expensive tooling. Marantz could even do a PMD670 successor with the
same tooling. Anyway I'm glad to hear it confirmed that Marantz
is in a good position to make this thing.

> Much more difficult for a small specialist company like Sound
> Devices who is entering a new product segment. I predict they are
> going to do quite well--they are positioning the 742 as a pro DAT
> preplacement and the 744T will be competing with products costing
> 2-4 times as much as it will.

The 742 is priced about the same as a pro DAT deck so I guess it can
do ok. I hope Sound Devices is successful, even while I also hope
that some company like Marantz will make something more affordable to
amateurs. So with luck, the Sound Device machine has enough pro
features to differentiate it from what Marantz is likely to do.

Paul Rubin

March 17th 04, 12:17 AM

(Mike Rivers) writes:
> > I agree that the sales volume will be lower and the cost will have to
> > be higher, but not 8x higher.
>
> Hey, it's all in the numbers. And it's not linear. It takes more than
> 8x the sales to bring the price down to 1/8.

Yes, I don't need to bring it to 1/8, it's ok to bring it to 1/3.

> I know lots of people who have assembled desktop computers on the
> dining room table from parts, but I don't know of anyone who has
> assembled a laptop.

It's not done as often, but you can get all the parts (cases, screens,
keyboards) from ads in trade rags. Most off-brand laptops are
basically built that way, buying assemblies from big manufacturers
like Compal.

> And certainly home "hard disk recorders" have been built, but they
> look a whole lot like computers to me - complete with monitors and
> keyboards.

Yeah, a laptop with a USB mic preamp does everything I want except
it's very power hungry and can't survive without an outlet or an
impractically large external battery pack or an awful lot of awfully
expensive batteries. I'm starting to wonder though, whether the new
Centrino laptops could run for long enough, if the screen and HD were
shut down most of the time (if you have 256MB or 512MB of ram, you can
buffer a lot of audio in it).

> While the component parts may be available, the integration,
> controls, packaging, and firmware are not. That's what makes the
> product, and if you got a product that nobody else has, you can
> choose your market and your price point.

If you're making a few thousand units, or even a few hundred units,
that stuff isn't so difficult. It's just not really feasible if you
only want one unit and aren't a hardware hacker.

> > Notice my mention of backups. The idea is also to move your archive
> > to new media as the old stuff becomes obsolete.
>
> Isn't that kind of a pain in the butt? I haven't had to move my record
> or analog tape collection to another format? I have both records and
> tapes that are 50 years old which I can still enjoy. Understand that
> surface noise and hiss don't make the music unlistenable or
> unenjoyable to me as some people claim is the case for them.

Huh? If you haven't moved your record or tape collection to another
format, you have no backup. And the reason you haven't moved it is
BECAUSE it's so difficult. What happens if your house gets flooded?
If your collection was on a hard drive, you could move the entire
thing to a newer hard drive by clicking a mouse a few times.

> > The MP3 CD player is pretty nice, though; I can put a dozen CD's
> > worth of MP3's onto one CD-R disc.
>
> That seems like a nice concept, but it doesn't play out in real life
> for me. Somehow I just never seem to load up the Jukebox 3 before a
> trip - or I scramble around and pick a few things at random at the
> last minute. Perhaps those who are more into the MP3 thing are better
> at this, or have favorite collections that they can listen to a few
> times. I'm usually just as happy surfing the radio or singing to
> myself. (fortunatly most of the time I travel alone)

I'm not really into the MP3 thing that much either, and I'm not
terribly organized about it. I just rip entire CD's to my HD, then
burn a dozen or so ripped CD's to a CD-R. That means I have three or
four CD-R's in my car instead of 30-50 CD's. With a hard drive
player, I'd just leave my whole collection on it all the time--no need
to load it up before a trip.

> > My exact point is that "more expensive" doesn't have to mean mean "8
> > times more expensive". The price point I mentioned is 2x or 3x more
> > expensive and I believe that's very feasible.
>
> You have yet to prove this to a manufacturer. Remember that quality
> isn't necessarily quantized. It probalby only costs a couple of
> dollars more to make a respectable preamp than it does to make a
> practically useless one. In fact, I was talking with John Oram at a
> NAMM show last year and somehow we got around to the subject of
> portable recorders or something. He told me that he was on call as a
> consultant to Creative Labs and had given them a design for a mic
> preamp that would hae increased the cost of the Jukebox by only a few
> dollars and they chose not to use it (because of the cost).

Right, if you can make an NJB3-like thing to begin with, adding the
decent preamp doesn't increase the cost that much.

> And put XLR connectors on the case and the vast majority of
> potential customers won't have a place to plug in their mics. Not
> only that, but it won't fit easily in a pocket. So you take a
> really, really big chunk out of the market.

The TCD-5M did ok with 1/4" mic jacks (there was a separate pro model
with XLR that I think they didn't sell anywhere near as many of). I
don't know if the Nak 550 had XLR. The WM-D6C was another popular
live taping machine and it had just a 3.5mm stereo jack, and minidisc
recorders are the same way. So I don't see XLR as a vital feature in
the kind of machine I'm talking about. In fact if you have XLR, you
probably also want 48V phantom power, which clobbers your batteries
some more.

> > Are you saying that anything like 200,000 of those models have been
> > sold?! I'd expect the numbers are much much smaller.
>
> Only Sony knows for sure, but I don't think that's unreasonable. When
> it comes to something like small format digital recording consoles,
> that's where you're talking small potatoes, just a few thousand per
> model, many well publicized ones not even breaking the 3000 mark.

I don't know what those recording consoles cost but I'm sure it's
perfectly feasible to make a device like I'm describing at the 3000
piece level at the prices I'm postulating. It might not look very
slick, but the Sound Devices thing doesn't look so slick either.

> > And the Marantz is about half the price of the Sound Devices
> > recorder despite being made with 3-year-old technology. The
> > PMD670 has everything I want (and some things I don't have any use
> > for, like balanced mic inputs with phantom power) except hard
> > drive capacity.
>
> The Marantz isn't really designed for the service to which you want to
> put it. It's not a contert-taper's machine, it's a news gathering
> machine. It's for making very temporary recordings.

Are we talking about the same box?? The PMD670 is a two channel
machine that can record in MP2, MP3, or WAV format, and has XLR inputs
with phantom power. Who wants that for news gathering?

> The flash card technology is good for that. While it will take a
> disk, I'll bet that few are acutally used that way.

This, I don't know. I do know they advertise microdrive capability
and they use fat32 (instead of fat16 which can't handle large file
systems), but it's only recently that 4gb microdrives have become
available. Maybe machines like the Mini Ipod will stimulate
microdrive development so we'll see 10GB microdrives soon. But I wish
they'd used a 1.8" slot (pcmcia type III), as described earlier.

> The Sound Devices recorder is designed for film sound
> recording. There's gotta be a good reason why no company capable of
> making a consumer-level recorder isn't doing it. I believe that
> reason is that their market research has shown that it's not
> profitable to do so.

Nah, it just means nobody has stepped up to fill the need.

> > Anyway, someone just sold a PMD670 for $425 on Ebay. If another one
> > shows up there at that price I might buy it, and live with the 4GB
> > (for now) capacity limit. My main hesitation is the feeling that
> > they're about due for a new model that's less power hungry and maybe
> > has a hard disk.
>
> Hey, remember how long the Marantz portable analog cassette recorder
> in the same form factor has been around. Don't hold your breath.

Well, the PMD680/690 weren't around that long before the PMD670
replaced them. I think we're about due for a 670 replacement.

> > Fostex and Denon also have recorders similar to the PMD670 that are
> > in the $1200 range.
>
> Yup, and priced about right, too. I'm waiting to get my hands on one
> of the Fostex recorders. I think it might be a good replacement for my
> TEAC DA-P20.

Sounds cool, I hope you post here about it when you get one.

Mike Rivers

March 17th 04, 01:26 AM

In article > lid writes:

> > > And the Marantz

> Why not? I routinely tape hours (ok, mp3 mono at 128 kbit/s since it's
> good enough for what I do), but there's nothing to stop you doing
> straight 16 bit PCM.

Time and money. What would you record hours of 16-bit PCM on? And then
what would you do with it? Nothing's stopping you since you made your
purchase decision. I'm just not into the record-then-store-it-on-my-
computer paradigm. I want to have media on the shelf that I can pull
out 20 years from when I recorded it and listen to it.

I'll give you the point that DAT may not play in 20 years, but I have a
relatively small collection of material recorded on DAT. I used it for
location recording for broadcast when I was doing more of that and
I rarely kept those recordings, just turned them over to the client who
did the editing and production, and probably tossed the original tape.
Or I used it for mixdown, handed the mix on DAT to the client, and he
took it from there, usually to mastering for replication. Most of the
recordings that I have in my collection are on 1/4" analog tape, and I'm
quite sure it will play for many more years, and I'll have something to
play it on. I can repair analog recorders. I can't repair my DATs, and
I surely couldn't repair a flash card recorder.

What do you do with your recordings?

--
I'm really Mike Rivers )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me here: double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

Paul Rubin

March 17th 04, 03:14 AM

(Mike Rivers) writes:
> > Why not? I routinely tape hours (ok, mp3 mono at 128 kbit/s since it's
> > good enough for what I do), but there's nothing to stop you doing
> > straight 16 bit PCM.
>
> Time and money. What would you record hours of 16-bit PCM on? And then
> what would you do with it?

Well, if it's encoded (losslessly) with FLAC, you can store 500+ hours
on a 300 GB disk drive, or alternatively about 9 hours on a 4.7 GB
DVD-R disc. With HD-DVD (about 30 GB per disc) that's on its way,
you'll get about 50 hours of lossless 16-bit stereo PCM on a disc.

> Nothing's stopping you since you made your
> purchase decision. I'm just not into the record-then-store-it-on-my-
> computer paradigm. I want to have media on the shelf that I can pull
> out 20 years from when I recorded it and listen to it.

I don't know of any audio media that does real well over such a long
stretch, except maybe vinyl records that are rarely played. My analog
cassettes from that era don't sound so hot any more.

> I can repair analog recorders. I can't repair my DATs, and I surely
> couldn't repair a flash card recorder.

What stops you? The flash recorder is just a computer, and people
repair computers (including vintage ones) all the time.

Mike Rivers

March 17th 04, 01:15 PM

In article > writes:

> > And just where are you going to get the mass-produced case to put them
> > in?
>
> From a catalog. Look at an Edirol UA-5 and imagine some computer
> stuff and a hard drive inside it. Or even get a case custom made with
> special injection molds.

> > And the mass produced control panel?
>
> Metal blank with holes punched in it. Call your local metal shop.
>
> > Or the mic preamps and connectors?
>
> From a catalog. See Edirol UA-5 again, how do you think they made it?

OK, so you can make yourself a $500 recorder. But put yourself in the
position of a manufacturer who has marketing costs and has to make a
profit. If your small scale purchasing lets you build it for $250, if
you don't sell it for at least $1500, you won't be making enough money
to be worth while. It's a good hobby project though. Give it a shot.

--
I'm really Mike Rivers )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me here: double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

Mike Rivers

March 17th 04, 01:15 PM

In article > writes:

> Huh? If you haven't moved your record or tape collection to another
> format, you have no backup. And the reason you haven't moved it is
> BECAUSE it's so difficult.

No, the reason I haven't moved it is because it's on a robust format
that has a proven lifetime longer than mine, it's not exposed to great
risk, and I don't even consider it important enough to back up. If my
house was destroyed by a fire or flood, sure I would probalby lose my
record or tape collection, and you might be able to salvage your files
backed up on CD. But that's life.

If I have a project in progress, I'll back up things while I'm working
on it becuase I don't want to have to start from the beginning again
(or **** off a client). But once a job's finished, it's either on the
shelf or out of here.

> If your collection was on a hard drive, you could move the entire
> thing to a newer hard drive by clicking a mouse a few times.

Assuming your computer survived the flood. I love some of the music
that I have on records and tapes, and it makes me feel good that it's
there, but it's not my livlihood and it's not my great comfort in
life. I would rather not worry about backups. That's my choice.

> That means I have three or
> four CD-R's in my car instead of 30-50 CD's. With a hard drive
> player, I'd just leave my whole collection on it all the time--no need
> to load it up before a trip.

I often take my Jukebox 3 on a trip, an use one of those adapters that
goes into the cassette player. But I find that it's a bit scary to
manage when I'm driving at 65 mph. I suppose I could construct a
playlist before I start driving, and have it just play for 8 or 10
hours, but I'm not brained in that direction.

> Right, if you can make an NJB3-like thing to begin with, adding the
> decent preamp doesn't increase the cost that much.

Not on the front end, but on the retail end, it might add $30-40 and
that's where the Marketing department steps in and says "Our customers
want to pay no more than $229 for this. If it's $259, they'll stop
selling." And that's $30-40 with a stereo mini phone jack for mic
connections. You can't phantom power through that, and if I want a
"professional quality" recorder, I don't want my mic plugs falling
out. Add a couple of XLRs and you have to redesign the case, and add
yet another $20 to the cost. Believe me, it just isn't going to work
with a manufacturer like Creative Labs.

> The TCD-5M did ok with 1/4" mic jacks (there was a separate pro model
> with XLR that I think they didn't sell anywhere near as many of). I
> don't know if the Nak 550 had XLR.

The Nakamichie 550 used 1/4" jacks, in fact it had 3 of them, one for
a center mic. They sold companion mics as a set of three. I have a
TCD-5M and I love it. It still works great. I use some short adapter
cables to connect mics to it. Unless I use it with a mixer, though, I
use dynamic mics with it because it doesn't have phantom power, and
that would be another box or two to carry. The TASCAM DA-P1 has
phantom power, as does the HHB PortaDAT. I don't rememember about the
Sony TCD-D10. But the TCD-5M was a pretty expensive cassette recorder
for its day, and the DA-P1 and PortaDAT were, too.

> The WM-D6C was another popular
> live taping machine and it had just a 3.5mm stereo jack, and minidisc
> recorders are the same way.

That's about the most significant reason why I never used one. And
it's the thing I like least about the Jukebox 3. But you can't modify
any of those machines to put XLR connectors on them. And using an
adapter only solves the electrical problem (half way), it doesn't
solve the mechanical problem, and that's what worries me most. One
thing about being professional is that your gear doesn't fail on you
when you need it to work. It's just too easy to pull out one of those
plugs.

> So I don't see XLR as a vital feature in
> the kind of machine I'm talking about. In fact if you have XLR, you
> probably also want 48V phantom power, which clobbers your batteries
> some more.

Right. But if you want a high quality recording, you need the
flexibility to choose microphones based on what you're recording, not
how long your batteries will last. You can always get more batteries.

> I don't know what those recording consoles cost but I'm sure it's
> perfectly feasible to make a device like I'm describing at the 3000
> piece level at the prices I'm postulating. It might not look very
> slick, but the Sound Devices thing doesn't look so slick either.

Do your market research. When you're concinved that not only can you
make it but that you can sell enough of them to get back your
investment in tooling, design, investment, and marketing, send us your
report.

> Are we talking about the same box?? The PMD670 is a two channel
> machine that can record in MP2, MP3, or WAV format, and has XLR inputs
> with phantom power. Who wants that for news gathering?

TV stations. They don't want their mic cables falling out when they're
runing up the court house steps trying to get a statement from Martha
Stewart's lawyer. And they don't want to funble with little buttons
and a tiny LCD screen, they want a big fat red RECORD button. And with
the Marantz, it's cool that you can put it in a mode where it keeps
a few seconds of audio in a FIFO buffer, so if you're a little slow on
the trigger, you don't miss the first couple of words. Do the
interview, rush back to the station, pop the flash card into the
computer, edit the story, and put it on the air.

> Nah, it just means nobody has stepped up to fill the need.

So far, you're the only one in this thread who has expressed a need.
You've gotta do better than that to get the interest of a
manufacturer. We know that Behringer is monitoring this forum and they
know how to make things cheaply. Maybe they'll come to your rescue.

> Well, the PMD680/690 weren't around that long before the PMD670
> replaced them. I think we're about due for a 670 replacement.

Geez, it's only been around for a year or so.

--
I'm really Mike Rivers )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me here: double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

Mike Rivers

March 17th 04, 03:06 PM

In article > writes:

> Well, if it's encoded (losslessly) with FLAC, you can store 500+ hours
> on a 300 GB disk drive, or alternatively about 9 hours on a 4.7 GB
> DVD-R disc. With HD-DVD (about 30 GB per disc) that's on its way,
> you'll get about 50 hours of lossless 16-bit stereo PCM on a disc.

That's numbers. I'm talking about my life. I don't have that much time
around something that plays music-as-files that I'd ever have need to
store that much.

> I don't know of any audio media that does real well over such a long
> stretch, except maybe vinyl records that are rarely played. My analog
> cassettes from that era don't sound so hot any more.

I'll bet they don't sound much worse than they did the day you
recorded them. Your standards have changed. Your compressed audio
won't sound as good in 20 years as whatever the current standard is
then either.

> > I can repair analog recorders. I can't repair my DATs, and I surely
> > couldn't repair a flash card recorder.
>
> What stops you? The flash recorder is just a computer, and people
> repair computers (including vintage ones) all the time.

Lack of documentation, knowledge, and access to parts, but mostly lack
of motivation. When we "fix" a computer today we either reload
software or replace large components. We don't trace a mother board
problem down to a surface mounted capacitor and replace that
capacitor, we replace the mother board (and usually the memory and CPU
chip too since we can't get one "old" enough to use the plug-in
components). People have scrapped Walkman style recorders because the
headphone jack was no longer available. Sure, you could solder wires
to the board, run them out the hole where the jack was, and connect
headphones that way, but that's not really repairing it, it's saving
it.

--
I'm really Mike Rivers )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me here: double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

Lars

March 17th 04, 04:23 PM

"Erik" (remove dontspam but not spamstinks)> wrote in message >...
> I'm a student about to enter a conservatory next year for classical
> performance, and I'm looking at options for recording concerts, master
> classes and other important events. I have a minidisc already, but I always
> cringe at recording one-shot performances with it due to the compression,
> and the difficulty at outputting digitally to the computer. My dad has a
> Sony DAT walkman, which I absolutely love, so I'm considering buying a
> copy-protection free recorder such as the Sony PCM-M1. However, before
> shelling out a ton of money for this recorder, how long is DAT anticipated
> to be around? I plan to use it for myself, probably digitally outputting the
> DAT to computer and burning the files to CD-R or DVD as a backup, then
> editing and burning CDs for friends and family. I just want to make sure
> media is available before I go down this route. Finally, I need something
> portable, so lugging a computer to concerts etc is not feasible. Any insight
> would be very much appreciated.
>
> Erik

I've heard that DAT tapes (of lower quality?) don't age very well and
can turn bad in 5 years or so. Steve Albini says it's "irresponsible"
to record to DAT for this reason.

From my own experience with DV tapes; if a digital tape turns bad, the
results are usually worse than the same degradation occuring to analog
tape. A little blurrier video is better than big white squares
appearing all over the screen. The same is perhaps true for audio; a
little noise is better than screeches and clicks.

I wouldn't bet that DAT will be around for another 10 years; but then
again, if you still have your player, what's the big deal? Just make
shure the A/D in the machine and your tapes are of good quality, so
that the recordings will be of good quality and stay well preserved
for a long time.

Scott Dorsey

March 17th 04, 04:29 PM

Lars > wrote:
>
>I've heard that DAT tapes (of lower quality?) don't age very well and
>can turn bad in 5 years or so. Steve Albini says it's "irresponsible"
>to record to DAT for this reason.

There was a serious problem with early binder failure on some of the
earlier Sony tapes. Also there was one brand, DIC/DAT, which was known
for both short term and long term problems. All of these problems are
long gone.

You can play back your tapes and check the error rate if you are worried.

>From my own experience with DV tapes; if a digital tape turns bad, the
>results are usually worse than the same degradation occuring to analog
>tape. A little blurrier video is better than big white squares
>appearing all over the screen. The same is perhaps true for audio; a
>little noise is better than screeches and clicks.

Yes, but in a pinch you can edit some of that out. In other cases it is
unavoidable and unsalvageable.

>I wouldn't bet that DAT will be around for another 10 years; but then
>again, if you still have your player, what's the big deal? Just make
>shure the A/D in the machine and your tapes are of good quality, so
>that the recordings will be of good quality and stay well preserved
>for a long time.

I would tend to agree. Do check your tapes now and then just to make sure
the error rate isn't creeping up... and don't forget to do that with analogue
tapes too. At least with the digital stuff you can dub it to another
generation without loss when it starts to go.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

Lars

March 17th 04, 04:31 PM

"Arny Krueger" > wrote in message >...
> It also means more opportunities to fix it in the mix. While we joke about
> this, it's an advantage that can pay off artistically and it can be taken to
> the bank.

Why would you ever want to "fix it in the mix", if the performances
are good from the start, and the engineer is competent enough to get
things right from the beginning. Hell, I don't even see a reason for a
"mix" given these two presuppositions. Just bang it straight to
2-track, if you have the guts to trust your instincts and the skills
to put them to work.

Paul Rubin

March 17th 04, 09:23 PM

(Mike Rivers) writes:
> I often take my Jukebox 3 on a trip, an use one of those adapters that
> goes into the cassette player. But I find that it's a bit scary to
> manage when I'm driving at 65 mph. I suppose I could construct a
> playlist before I start driving, and have it just play for 8 or 10
> hours, but I'm not brained in that direction.

Yeah, that's the main reason I went for an in-dash mp3-cd player
instead of having one on the seat that cost less. The in-dash mp3
player is actually less distracting than a normal cd player, since I
don't swap cd's in and out of it nearly as often. I don't make
playlist, I just dump whole cd's to cd-r, so the player is effectively
being used as a cd changer with 10-12 cd's inside.

> > Right, if you can make an NJB3-like thing to begin with, adding the
> > decent preamp doesn't increase the cost that much.
>
> Not on the front end, but on the retail end, it might add $30-40 and
> that's where the Marketing department steps in and says "Our customers
> want to pay no more than $229 for this. If it's $259, they'll stop
> selling." And that's $30-40 with a stereo mini phone jack for mic
> connections. You can't phantom power through that, and if I want a
> "professional quality" recorder, I don't want my mic plugs falling
> out. Add a couple of XLRs and you have to redesign the case, and add
> yet another $20 to the cost. Believe me, it just isn't going to work
> with a manufacturer like Creative Labs.

The instant you add XLR or even 1/4" jacks, you have a completely
different product. Note that the 3.5mm jack is already present and
doesn't need to be added.

> > The WM-D6C was another popular live taping machine and it had just
> > a 3.5mm stereo jack, and minidisc recorders are the same way.
>
> That's about the most significant reason why I never used one. And
> it's the thing I like least about the Jukebox 3. But you can't modify
> any of those machines to put XLR connectors on them. And using an
> adapter only solves the electrical problem (half way), it doesn't
> solve the mechanical problem, and that's what worries me most. One
> thing about being professional is that your gear doesn't fail on you
> when you need it to work. It's just too easy to pull out one of those
> plugs.

Yeah, professional gear has different requirements than
amateur/semipro gear and that's why the Sound Devices machine exists.
But the PCM-M100 and similar DAT's have just 3.5mm jacks and they're
certainly viable products for their market.

> > So I don't see XLR as a vital feature in the kind of machine I'm
> > talking about. In fact if you have XLR, you probably also want
> > 48V phantom power, which clobbers your batteries some more.
>
> Right. But if you want a high quality recording, you need the
> flexibility to choose microphones based on what you're recording, not
> how long your batteries will last. You can always get more batteries.

Batteries are the big obstacle to the recording I want to do, which is
multi-day events, i.e. tens of hours of recording with no AC power.
Otherwise I'd just use a laptop computer with a USB or PCMCIA A/D
converter. What's the deal with phantom power anyway? I used to have
a Sony condenser mic that ran for hundreds of hours on a watch
battery. Are there really microphones that really need 60 mA at 48
volts?! That's an enormous amount of power.

> > I don't know what those recording consoles cost but I'm sure it's
> > perfectly feasible to make a device like I'm describing at the 3000
> > piece level at the prices I'm postulating. It might not look very
> > slick, but the Sound Devices thing doesn't look so slick either.
>
> Do your market research. When you're concinved that not only can you
> make it but that you can sell enough of them to get back your
> investment in tooling, design, investment, and marketing, send us
> your report.

I'm going by your figure of 3000 units for the market size, though
that's probably pessimistic. I believe a thing like this can be made
and sold profitably if there's that many buyers. I've certainly
worked on electronic products of similar complexity that did fine at
that volume.

> > Are we talking about the same box?? The PMD670 is a two channel
> > machine that can record in MP2, MP3, or WAV format, and has XLR inputs
> > with phantom power. Who wants that for news gathering?
>
> TV stations. They don't want their mic cables falling out when they're
> runing up the court house steps trying to get a statement from Martha
> Stewart's lawyer.

They want to record in 48/16 WAV?

> > Nah, it just means nobody has stepped up to fill the need.
>
> So far, you're the only one in this thread who has expressed a need.
> You've gotta do better than that to get the interest of a
> manufacturer. We know that Behringer is monitoring this forum and they
> know how to make things cheaply. Maybe they'll come to your rescue.

Behringer might like to also look at the user forums on iriver.com or
neurosaudio.com. There's lots of folks clamoring for this kind of
recorder. The original recording features of the NJB3 were very
crude, and the current improvements (manual level control, LCD
pseudo-VU meter, bit-perfect copying) were just about certainly added
because of user demand, so Creative recognizes that market even if
they weren't willing to increase the unit cost with a mic preamp
(external preamp isn't so bad).

> > Well, the PMD680/690 weren't around that long before the PMD670
> > replaced them. I think we're about due for a 670 replacement.
>
> Geez, it's only been around for a year or so.

You may be right about that. I saw some web pages indicicating it
came out in 2001, but I may have misinterpreted that date. Still,
just imagine the PMD670 with a PCMCIA type III slot instead of the CF
slot. That really wouldn't have changed the cost significantly.

> Message-ID: <znr1079487115k@trad>
> OK, so you can make yourself a $500 recorder. But put yourself in the
> position of a manufacturer who has marketing costs and has to make a
> profit. If your small scale purchasing lets you build it for $250, if
> you don't sell it for at least $1500, you won't be making enough money
> to be worth while. It's a good hobby project though. Give it a shot.

It's not worthwhile as a hobby project, which means making a handful
or a few dozen units. It's certainly seems viable to me at the 3000
unit level given some existing design/manufacturing/marketing
capacity.

Arny Krueger

March 17th 04, 11:34 PM

"Lars" > wrote in message
om

> "Arny Krueger" > wrote in message
> >...

>> It also means more opportunities to fix it in the mix. While we joke
>> about this, it's an advantage that can pay off artistically and it
>> can be taken to the bank.

> Why would you ever want to "fix it in the mix", if the performances
> are good from the start, and the engineer is competent enough to get
> things right from the beginning.

I very much envy you in your completed pursuit of total perfection.

I'm of the opinion that goodness doesn't exist on a linear scale like a
thermometer. I see it as being something like the elevation of the surface
of a mountain, where there are a number of configurations that are in some
sense equally good, but that satisfy various people's sensitivities to
various degrees.

> Hell, I don't even see a reason for a
> "mix" given these two presuppositions.

BTW where do you find these absolutely perfect musicians and engineers?

> Just bang it straight to 2-track, if you have the guts to trust your
instincts and the skills
> to put them to work.

My pencils have erasers. Worn erasers.

Mike Rivers

March 18th 04, 01:38 AM

In article > writes:

> Batteries are the big obstacle to the recording I want to do, which is
> multi-day events, i.e. tens of hours of recording with no AC power.

Why is this a problem? Just take a lot of batteries with you. Take
along a friend to help you carry them. Solar cells to run your gear
and charge batteries during the day. John Lomax filled the Library of
Congress' archive using a disk recorder in the back of his car,
powered by batteries. He went on week long collecting trips to places
where he couldn't rely on electrical power even if it was there. Or
have you considered alternate power sources?

> What's the deal with phantom power anyway? I used to have
> a Sony condenser mic that ran for hundreds of hours on a watch
> battery. Are there really microphones that really need 60 mA at 48
> volts?! That's an enormous amount of power.

Your mic used the battery to power an impedance converter. The
condenser element was an electret (the electrostatic equivalent of a
permanent magnet) that does not require a voltage to polarize the
element. Phantom power is typically 48 volts (some mics will run on
lower voltage) at a maximum current of around 10 mA. Many mics draw
less, but some draw the maximum.

> I'm going by your figure of 3000 units for the market size, though
> that's probably pessimistic. I believe a thing like this can be made
> and sold profitably if there's that many buyers. I've certainly
> worked on electronic products of similar complexity that did fine at
> that volume.

Like I said, try it. Start a company, or put on your suit and go talk
to the marketing departments of the companies you think would be
likely candidates to build such a machine. I wish you luck. But I
won't be an investor.

> > TV stations. They don't want their mic cables falling out when they're
> > runing up the court house steps trying to get a statement from Martha
> > Stewart's lawyer.
>
> They want to record in 48/16 WAV?

They want something that they can slap into their workstations for
quick editing. They don't care what sample rate and resolution. It's
going out over the air in a few minutes and then it will be
yesterday's news.

> You may be right about that. I saw some web pages indicicating it
> came out in 2001, but I may have misinterpreted that date. Still,
> just imagine the PMD670 with a PCMCIA type III slot instead of the CF
> slot. That really wouldn't have changed the cost significantly.

I think the Fostex has a PCMCIA slot, and it's competitive in price
with the Marantz, I think.

--
I'm really Mike Rivers )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me here: double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

Scott Dorsey

March 18th 04, 01:48 AM

In article > writes:
>
> What's the deal with phantom power anyway? I used to have
> a Sony condenser mic that ran for hundreds of hours on a watch
> battery. Are there really microphones that really need 60 mA at 48
> volts?! That's an enormous amount of power.

Hey, I got microphones here that use more than an amp at 120VAC.
Life is like that. You don't even want to THINK about the tape deck.

You want good dynamic range, you gotta run the rails at high voltages.
You want good linearity, you gotta bias things well into the point where
they lose power through heating. You want quiet mixing, you need big
matrices with low value resistors and therefore high current amps to drive
them.

Low power and good sound are often very much at odds with one another, and
there are some VERY serious sacrifices made in portable gear to get everything
running on low voltage rails and using very little current.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

Marc Heusser

March 18th 04, 02:20 AM

In article >,
Paul Rubin > wrote:

> ... Batteries are the big obstacle to the recording I want to do, which is
> multi-day events, i.e. tens of hours of recording with no AC power.
> Otherwise I'd just use a laptop computer with a USB or PCMCIA A/D
> converter. What's the deal with phantom power anyway? I used to have
> a Sony condenser mic that ran for hundreds of hours on a watch
> battery. Are there really microphones that really need 60 mA at 48
> volts?! That's an enormous amount of power. ...

For the first point: My PMD-670 records for some 4 hours on 8 AA NiMH
batteries. It probably does about twice of that using alkaline
batteries. So just take a few batteries along. Or use a solar recharger
and such.

For the second: eg Sennheiser K6 series has the option to put a single
AA cell into the micorphone instead of using phantom power. It will run
some 100 hours on an alkaline cell.

HTH

Marc

--
Marc Heusser
(remove the obvious: CHEERS and MERICAL...until end to reply via email)

Paul Rubin

March 18th 04, 03:00 AM

(Mike Rivers) writes:
> > Batteries are the big obstacle to the recording I want to do, which is
> > multi-day events, i.e. tens of hours of recording with no AC power.
>
> Why is this a problem? Just take a lot of batteries with you. Take
> along a friend to help you carry them.

That stops being portable equipment after a while. The laptop I'm
currently using runs about 4 hours on a battery that I think is
something like 5000 mAH at 15 volts, equivalent to about 5 NiMH D
cells. So I'd need around 40 cells at 5 ounces and $10 each each to
run it for 30 hours, 12 pounds of batteries and $400, or less
expensive but even heavier lead acid pack. Or 8 or so of the laptop
vendor's proprietary li ion packs, weighing less but costing $200
each. Ouch.

> Solar cells to run your gear and charge batteries during the day.

Not practical, even outdoors the amount of solar panels needed would
be ridiculously large.

> John Lomax filled the Library of Congress' archive using a disk
> recorder in the back of his car, powered by batteries. He went on
> week long collecting trips to places where he couldn't rely on
> electrical power even if it was there.

Well, hopefully he had 12 volt power available in his car.

> Or have you considered alternate power sources?

Disk recorders like the NJB3, Marantz, etc. use much less power than a
laptop, making batteries practical for my application. That's why I'm
interested in them. I'm thinking about getting the Neuros Audio
player which is along the same lines as the NJB3. My main gripe about
the NJB3 is the proprietary file system, unless I can establish for
certain that Linux can run it.

> Phantom power is typically 48 volts (some mics will run on
> lower voltage) at a maximum current of around 10 mA. Many mics draw
> less, but some draw the maximum.

Oh ok. I saw somewhere else that up to 60 mA could be needed, which
sounded ridiculous to me. Even 20 mA (for two mics) is quite a lot
though.

> Like I said, try it. Start a company, or put on your suit and go talk
> to the marketing departments of the companies you think would be
> likely candidates to build such a machine.

I'm not a business guy and it's much easier for someone who has an
existing company (e.g. Marantz, Edirol, Behringer, etc., or even a
small shop like Core Sound) to make this product than for someone
starting a new company. There's lots of costs to getting a company
off the ground and it's not reasonable to count that as product
development cost.

I don't understand what my putting on a suit and talking to marketing
departments is supposed to accomplish. I don't have a business
proposition for them beyond an interest in buying one unit of a
product if they make it. However, yes, I do have some hope that
marketing departments follow this newsgroup, so my posts are intended
partly to know that users like me are out here.

> I wish you luck. But I won't be an investor.

Well, would you buy a unit? ;-)

> I think the Fostex has a PCMCIA slot, and it's competitive in price
> with the Marantz, I think.

The Fostex is around $1300 but I guess it's more capable than the
Marantz in some ways. Looks like it has a type 2 PCMCIA slot that can
handle the 5GB Toshiba type 2 disk. It would sure be nice to have a
type 3 slot since the MK4004GAH 40GB disk will hopefully be released
in type 3 format pretty soon (this is the disk in the 40 GB iPod and
similar devices--it's 8mm thick and costs about $200 retail right now).

Hmm, here's another recorder of possible interest (Tascam PS-5):

http://tinyurl.com/2vcg9

It's a 4-track mp3 recorder with mic inputs and a CF slot, costs $299
and runs for two hours on two AA cells. I don't know if it can use
microdrives though.

Paul Rubin

March 18th 04, 03:04 AM

Marc Heusser lid> writes:
> For the first point: My PMD-670 records for some 4 hours on 8 AA
> NiMH batteries. It probably does about twice of that using alkaline
> batteries. So just take a few batteries along. Or use a solar
> recharger and such.

These are indoor events (I'm just recording from the audience and
can't always sit near an AC outlet) so solar power isn't feasible.
Yes the PMD670 is acceptable in terms of power requirements, though I
think a microdrive would increase its power consumption somewhat. I'd
probably make a D cell pack for it.

How do you like your PMD670 in general?

Mike Rivers

March 18th 04, 01:14 PM

In article > writes:

> So I'd need around 40 cells at 5 ounces and $10 each each to
> run it for 30 hours, 12 pounds of batteries and $400, or less
> expensive but even heavier lead acid pack. Or 8 or so of the laptop
> vendor's proprietary li ion packs, weighing less but costing $200
> each. Ouch.

I think it's about time you told us what these extended remote
sessions are. I'm getting curious. I take it this is someplace where
you need to pack in several miles, or you're being sent up to orbit
the earth in a low budget rocket? Honestly, you have more excuses for
not doing what you want to do.

> > John Lomax filled the Library of Congress' archive using a disk
> > recorder in the back of his car, powered by batteries. He went on
> > week long collecting trips to places where he couldn't rely on
> > electrical power even if it was there.
>
> Well, hopefully he had 12 volt power available in his car.

He had a bunch of storage batteries in the back seat. And at the time,
cars had 6V electrical systems.

> Disk recorders like the NJB3, Marantz, etc. use much less power than a
> laptop, making batteries practical for my application.

But apparently not practical enough. So what're you gonna do? Wait, or
carry batteries with you?

> I'm not a business guy and it's much easier for someone who has an
> existing company (e.g. Marantz, Edirol, Behringer, etc., or even a
> small shop like Core Sound) to make this product than for someone
> starting a new company.

So what you're saying is that you can't do it yourself and that
someone else should be doing it for you. Hope you have a lot of
patience.

> I don't understand what my putting on a suit and talking to marketing
> departments is supposed to accomplish. I don't have a business
> proposition for them beyond an interest in buying one unit of a
> product if they make it.

In order for you to buy that one unit, they have to make lots of them.
If you're so convinced yourself that there's a market out there that
the company could be filling, maybe you could convince them that their
market research (that's been keeping them from making the product you
want) is incomplete. Obviously they've been down the path before and
made their decision. If you want them to change that decision you need
to convince them that they'd make money at it.

> Well, would you buy a unit? ;-)

Not if it had a mini phone jack on it and no useful mic preamp. I
already have one like that which is otherwise quite satisfactory. I
also don't have your need for extended operation independent of AC
power.

> The Fostex is around $1300 but I guess it's more capable than the
> Marantz in some ways. Looks like it has a type 2 PCMCIA slot that can
> handle the 5GB Toshiba type 2 disk. It would sure be nice to have a
> type 3 slot since the MK4004GAH 40GB disk will hopefully be released
> in type 3 format pretty soon

It's a good thing you're not going to a hanging. You'd never be
satisfied with the rope they're about to put around your neck.
Products can't be designed and built as quickly as digital technology
advances.

> Hmm, here's another recorder of possible interest (Tascam PS-5):

> It's a 4-track mp3 recorder with mic inputs and a CF slot, costs $299
> and runs for two hours on two AA cells. I don't know if it can use
> microdrives though.

Nope. It's designed to be an idea recorder. So how many AA cells would
you be willing to carry? And how many flash cards?

--
I'm really Mike Rivers )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me here: double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

Mike Rivers

March 18th 04, 01:14 PM

In article > writes:

> These are indoor events (I'm just recording from the audience and
> can't always sit near an AC outlet)

AAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG GGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!

You mean I've been wasting all this time over a ****ing indoor event?
To to Home Depot, buy a couple of 100 foot extension cords and a roll
of duct tape. Cost you less than $25.

Problem solved.

Next!

--
I'm really Mike Rivers )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me here: double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

Arny Krueger

March 18th 04, 01:27 PM

"Mike Rivers" > wrote in message
news:znr1079611512k@trad
>
>> Disk recorders like the NJB3, Marantz, etc. use much less power than
>> a laptop, making batteries practical for my application.

> But apparently not practical enough. So what're you gonna do? Wait, or
> carry batteries with you?

I'm losing patience with all the hand-wringing. For example, the NJB3 has
been disqualified based on a perception (no hard facts) that it won't
interface with Linux.

Yet, with one search with Google, I come up with this:

http://www.nomadness.net/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=471

which quickly led to this:

http://gnomad2.sourceforge.net/

Paul Rubin

March 18th 04, 03:27 PM

"Arny Krueger" > writes:
> I'm losing patience with all the hand-wringing. For example, the NJB3 has
> been disqualified based on a perception (no hard facts) that it won't
> interface with Linux.
>
> Yet, with one search with Google, I come up with this:
>
> http://www.nomadness.net/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=471
>
> which quickly led to this:
>
> http://gnomad2.sourceforge.net/

Yes, I've known about that program for quite a while, but it
originally didn't support the NJB3, and it's still not clear what
subset it supports (what do they mean by "datafiles still need to be
done"?). Also, the firewire port is not supported, but I think the
NJB3 has USB2 so maybe that's enough.

Anyway, now that Gnomad has some NJB3 support, the NJB3 isn't totally
disqualified. I just think I like the roughly-comparable Neuros
machine better, from what I've seen so far.

Arny Krueger

March 18th 04, 04:02 PM

"Paul Rubin" > wrote in message

> "Arny Krueger" > writes:
>> I'm losing patience with all the hand-wringing. For example, the
>> NJB3 has been disqualified based on a perception (no hard facts)
>> that it won't interface with Linux.
>>
>> Yet, with one search with Google, I come up with this:
>>
>> http://www.nomadness.net/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=471
>>
>> which quickly led to this:
>>
>> http://gnomad2.sourceforge.net/
>
>
> Yes, I've known about that program for quite a while, but it
> originally didn't support the NJB3, and it's still not clear what
> subset it supports (what do they mean by "datafiles still need to be
> done"?).

They mean data files as opposed to music files.

> Also, the firewire port is not supported, but I think the
> NJB3 has USB2 so maybe that's enough.

NJB3 uses only USB-1.1, and truth be known, the Firewire isn't all that much
faster than the USB 1.1.

> Anyway, now that Gnomad has some NJB3 support, the NJB3 isn't totally
> disqualified. I just think I like the roughly-comparable Neuros
> machine better, from what I've seen so far.

So there's a posted online test of its record-mode frequency response and
SNR someplace?

I checked there forum and found lots of talk, but not much in the way of
hard facts about actual performance.

Paul Rubin

March 18th 04, 04:16 PM

"Arny Krueger" > writes:
> > Yes, I've known about that program for quite a while, but it
> > originally didn't support the NJB3, and it's still not clear what
> > subset it supports (what do they mean by "datafiles still need to be
> > done"?).
>
> They mean data files as opposed to music files.

You mean I can transfer audio tracks but can't use the NJB3 as a
general purpose hard drive. Ok, that's tolerable.

> NJB3 uses only USB-1.1, and truth be known, the Firewire isn't all
> that much faster than the USB 1.1.

Hmm, that's not so hot, I saw someone claiming 45 mbit/s transfer
through the USB2 port on the Zen.

> > Anyway, now that Gnomad has some NJB3 support, the NJB3 isn't totally
> > disqualified. I just think I like the roughly-comparable Neuros
> > machine better, from what I've seen so far.
>
> So there's a posted online test of its record-mode frequency response and
> SNR someplace?

Haven't seen one, just seen anecdotal reports that it sounds pretty good.

Arny Krueger

March 18th 04, 06:18 PM

"Paul Rubin" > wrote in message

> "Arny Krueger" > writes:
>>> Yes, I've known about that program for quite a while, but it
>>> originally didn't support the NJB3, and it's still not clear what
>>> subset it supports (what do they mean by "datafiles still need to be
>>> done"?).
>>
>> They mean data files as opposed to music files.
>
> You mean I can transfer audio tracks but can't use the NJB3 as a
> general purpose hard drive. Ok, that's tolerable.

>> NJB3 uses only USB-1.1, and truth be known, the Firewire isn't all
>> that much faster than the USB 1.1.

You can do both, but each mode of operation requires different software
running on the host PC.

> Hmm, that's not so hot, I saw someone claiming 45 mbit/s transfer
> through the USB2 port on the Zen.

I saw that report. Same guy claimed 55 megabits per second via firewire.
That's about 7 megabytes per second. I'd put the NJB3 around half that for
transferring music.Still much faster than real time.

The data file xfer software is very stripped back and fits on a diskette. I
think the basic idea is that you keep the full music interface on the NJB3
hard drive as files, and use the file interface to load it onto the host PC.
Of course you can do what you will with the rest of the NJB3's hard drive.

>>> Anyway, now that Gnomad has some NJB3 support, the NJB3 isn't
>>> totally disqualified. I just think I like the roughly-comparable
>>> Neuros machine better, from what I've seen so far.

>> So there's a posted online test of its record-mode frequency
>> response and SNR someplace?

> Haven't seen one, just seen anecdotal reports that it sounds pretty good.

BTW, just picked up a Behr MXB1002 to take out with my NJB3 on Saturday.
Just voice this first time. In preliminary testing this looks like a very
useful match-up. Obviously, I'm not bootlegging, though!

Kurt Albershardt

March 18th 04, 06:19 PM

Arny Krueger wrote:
>
> NJB3 uses only USB-1.1, and truth be known, the Firewire isn't all that much
> faster than the USB 1.1.

IME the 1394 port is quite a bit faster, at least using Red Chair Software's Notmad Explorer. I'm regularly seeing 30 mbyte/sec rates transferring large recordings off the unit. Hint: Notmad uses a temp file on the system drive no matter where you drag the files, and doesn't copy the temp file to the real destination until all of the files are transferred. If you run out of space on your system drive or the transfer has errors, you lose all the files. Not well architected. Drag them to the system drive and they go pretty quickly, since the move is just a rename.

Kurt Albershardt

March 18th 04, 06:23 PM

Paul Rubin wrote:
>
> These are indoor events (I'm just recording from the audience and
> can't always sit near an AC outlet) so solar power isn't feasible.
> Yes the PMD670 is acceptable in terms of power requirements, though I
> think a microdrive would increase its power consumption somewhat. I'd
> probably make a D cell pack for it.

If you can work with 7.2V, lithium camcorder batteries are an excellent value and have a high energy density (both weight and volume.) I haven't looked, but I'll bet there's a switcher that would do a 7.2V -> 5V downconversion with 80+% efficiency out there.

Arny Krueger

March 18th 04, 06:28 PM

"Kurt Albershardt" > wrote in message

> Paul Rubin wrote:
>>
>> These are indoor events (I'm just recording from the audience and
>> can't always sit near an AC outlet) so solar power isn't feasible.
>> Yes the PMD670 is acceptable in terms of power requirements, though I
>> think a microdrive would increase its power consumption somewhat.
>> I'd probably make a D cell pack for it.
>
> If you can work with 7.2V, lithium camcorder batteries are an
> excellent value and have a high energy density (both weight and
> volume.) I haven't looked, but I'll bet there's a switcher that
> would do a 7.2V -> 5V downconversion with 80+% efficiency out there.

The sleezy way to drop battery voltages a tad is to stack up ordinary
silicon recitfiers at about 0.6 volts drop per junction.

james

March 18th 04, 08:05 PM

In article >,
Kurt Albershardt > wrote:

>If you can work with 7.2V, lithium camcorder batteries are an excellent value and have a high energy density (both weight and volume.) I haven't
>looked, but I'll bet there's a switcher that would do a 7.2V -> 5V downconversion with 80+% efficiency out there.

Are you pulling more than 1 amp? Why not just use an LM317 circuit? No
more than 4 or 5 parts involved in that, you could make it without a
board (just a blob of epoxy); maybe need a small heat sink.

Mike Rivers

March 18th 04, 09:18 PM

In article > writes:

> No, nothing like that, just extended music events, like filk/sf
> conventions, the IAJE conference, jazz festivals, that kind of thing.

So you want to record sets of an hour or two in length over the course
of a weekend. This is no problem.

> In principle I only need maybe
> 10 hours since I can recharge at night while sleeping, but in practice
> I'm so wiped out by the time I go to bed that I forget to plug the
> thing in, so I'd prefer not to depend on it.

The first lesson you need to learn about location recording is that
you can't let your mind wander. I'd suggest that you look for a
recorder that uses alkaline batteries, and change them once or twice a
day. Keep the stash in your car or your hotel room.

And just what kind of listenable quality do you expect to get from a
seat using an unobtrusive microphone anyway? I susect that what you'll
end up with is an artifact, not a very useful recording.

> Last time I spent much time on this ng, various people were saying
> umpteen vendors were getting ready to come out with recorders like
> what I'm asking for. So I went away for a while and now I'm wondering
> where the recorders are.

There are plenty of recorders that touch on your requirements but none
that meet all of them (cost being one). Anyone who said umpteen
sources were about to appear didn't know all of your requirements, nor
did they really know what was about to appear on the market. If I
wanted to record an all day festival event and wanted to bring back a
good recording, I'd be looking at the Sound Devices recorder and get
myself a seat where I could put up a respectable microphone in a
position where it would get the sound on stage, not the sound in the
room. Oh, and it would probably be for money.

> Hmm, ok. How does this sound:

[chomp]
> - $500 street price ($649 retail, 40% dealer discount)

Great, but you would't get it for that price. Not a chance. Maybe
$1500, but not $500. Not this year, not next year.

> As you've surely figured out by now, I'm no audio whiz.

You're also no manufacturing engineering whiz.

--
I'm really Mike Rivers )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me here: double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

james

March 18th 04, 10:00 PM

In article <znr1079634305k@trad>, Mike Rivers > wrote:

>So you want to record sets of an hour or two in length over the course
>of a weekend. This is no problem.

You know, I always think of this as quite the solved problem.
I'm staring at a box of tapes of Grateful Dead shows, which were
pretty much all done with a Sony D-7, a pair of condensor mics at 90
degrees, and nothing else. I'd argue that if you can do better from
an audience perspective, you can't do enough better for it to be worth
any more effort or expense. To *really* do better, you need individual
timecoded tracks taken before the stage mix. Might as well put a few
cameras up too.

Kurt Albershardt

March 18th 04, 10:23 PM

james wrote:

> In article >,
> Kurt Albershardt > wrote:
>
>
>> If you can work with 7.2V, lithium camcorder batteries are an excellent value and have a high energy density (both weight and volume.) I haven't
>> looked, but I'll bet there's a switcher that would do a 7.2V -> 5V downconversion with 80+% efficiency out there.
>
>
> Are you pulling more than 1 amp? Why not just use an LM317 circuit? No
> more than 4 or 5 parts involved in that, you could make it without a
> board (just a blob of epoxy); maybe need a small heat sink.

Wastes more power as heat, not what I look for in a portable battery design. At 7.2V it could be close either way. At 11-14V the switcher really pays off.

Paul Rubin

March 18th 04, 11:26 PM

Kurt Albershardt > writes:
> > These are indoor events (I'm just recording from the audience and
> > can't always sit near an AC outlet) so solar power isn't feasible.
> > Yes the PMD670 is acceptable in terms of power requirements, though I
> > think a microdrive would increase its power consumption somewhat. I'd
> > probably make a D cell pack for it.
>
> If you can work with 7.2V, lithium camcorder batteries are an
> excellent value and have a high energy density (both weight and
> volume.) I haven't looked, but I'll bet there's a switcher that
> would do a 7.2V -> 5V downconversion with 80+% efficiency out there.

Yeah, for a professional machine, that's a very reasonable approach.
But those camcorder packs (I have several of them) are quite
expensive. A Sony NP-F960 (7.2V 5400 mAH) is over $100 even
discounted. The equivalent capacity in NiMH D cells would have just a
little bit more volume, maybe 2x the weight, and about a third of the
cost.

Kurt Albershardt

March 19th 04, 12:01 AM

Paul Rubin wrote:
>
>> If you can work with 7.2V, lithium camcorder batteries are an
>> excellent value and have a high energy density (both weight and
>> volume.) I haven't looked, but I'll bet there's a switcher that
>> would do a 7.2V -> 5V downconversion with 80+% efficiency out there.
>
>
> Yeah, for a professional machine, that's a very reasonable approach.
> But those camcorder packs (I have several of them) are quite
> expensive. A Sony NP-F960 (7.2V 5400 mAH) is over $100 even
> discounted. The equivalent capacity in NiMH D cells would have just a
> little bit more volume, maybe 2x the weight, and about a third of the
> cost.

Try an aftermarket battery pack. Lenmar and others show up on eBay regularly for $60 or less.

james

March 19th 04, 12:04 AM

In article >,
Kurt Albershardt > wrote:

>Wastes more power as heat

Agreed. 78xx and lm317 circuits will be, at best, 60% efficient at 1A
with 7-8v in and 5v out. Also 7.2 isn't really enough headroom to
assure the constant output V.

Gets a little more complicated once you move away from linear VR's, but
you knew that. Still pretty simple, most of the circuit is dedicated to
keeping the inherent hf oscillation out of your radio/preamp/whatever.
(e.g., 50kHz in a LM2575). Still DIY-able and could fit inside your
battery pack...

Paul Rubin

March 19th 04, 12:13 AM

(Mike Rivers) writes:
> > No, nothing like that, just extended music events, like filk/sf
> > conventions, the IAJE conference, jazz festivals, that kind of thing.
>
> So you want to record sets of an hour or two in length over the course
> of a weekend. This is no problem.

Hmm, not really "sets" most of the time; often more like jam sessions
where different people around the room (sometimes including me) take
turns performing. These often go on all night and it would be nice to
be able to record 6-8 hours nonstop, but that's not a big deal.

> The first lesson you need to learn about location recording is that
> you can't let your mind wander. I'd suggest that you look for a
> recorder that uses alkaline batteries, and change them once or twice a
> day. Keep the stash in your car or your hotel room.

Yeah, this is what I what I've been looking for all along, though I'd
probably use rechargeables if I could (bring a stash of charged ones
and recharge them when I get home) and resort to alkalines in a pinch.

Also, letting my mind wander is the whole point of going to these
things. I'm there as a listener and occasional performer; the
recording is just to have a personal record of the event, and the less
attention I have to give the equipment, the better. I'm not trying to
be like a pro photographer trying to do the best possible job at a
remote photo shoot. I'm more like a traveller looking for a
minimal-fuss snapshot camera. So I'd love to just press a button and
not have to mess with the thing any more. (That's why I was asking
about AGC the last time I was here).

> And just what kind of listenable quality do you expect to get from a
> seat using an unobtrusive microphone anyway? I susect that what you'll
> end up with is an artifact, not a very useful recording.

I've been doing this for many years with cassette recorders and more
recently with an 8mm camcorder, and have been satisfied with the
results. They're nowhere near professional quality but they're
certainly listenable.

> If I wanted to record an all day festival event and wanted to bring
> back a good recording, I'd be looking at the Sound Devices recorder
> and get myself a seat where I could put up a respectable microphone
> in a position where it would get the sound on stage, not the sound
> in the room. Oh, and it would probably be for money.

Yes, doing it commercially makes it a lot easier to justify buying pro
equipment and do elaborate setups without steaming off the organizers
and performers. Official policy at the events I'm describing is
generally that recording is allowed for personal use only, so I need
to keep things simple.

> > - $500 street price ($649 retail, 40% dealer discount)
>
> Great, but you would't get it for that price. Not a chance. Maybe
> $1500, but not $500. Not this year, not next year.
>
> > As you've surely figured out by now, I'm no audio whiz.
>
> You're also no manufacturing engineering whiz.

True (I'm a software guy who dabbles in hardware), but I've certainly
worked on products of about that complexity selling for about that
price in about that volume. Do you think the feature set I listed is
attractive, and different enough from what's already being made (like
the Sound Devices recorder) that there'd be demand for it? The
context I asked in was whether you'd buy it if I made it. I'm about
5% serious about that--I'm looking for products to build and have some
funding sources, but hadn't really thought in terms of an audio
product since I haven't had much contact with that field and wouldn't
want to do something dumb.

Paul Rubin

March 19th 04, 12:16 AM

(james) writes:
> >Wastes more power as heat
>
> Agreed. 78xx and lm317 circuits will be, at best, 60% efficient at 1A
> with 7-8v in and 5v out. Also 7.2 isn't really enough headroom to
> assure the constant output V.

The NJB3 apparently wants 3.6 volts in and can tolerate 5 volts. If I
was using lithium ion I guess I'd just try 3.6 volt cells direct-in
with no regulation.

Paul Rubin

March 19th 04, 01:08 AM

Kurt Albershardt > writes:
> > Yeah, for a professional machine, that's a very reasonable approach.
> > But those camcorder packs (I have several of them) are quite
> > expensive. A Sony NP-F960 (7.2V 5400 mAH) is over $100 even
> > discounted. The equivalent capacity in NiMH D cells would have just a
> > little bit more volume, maybe 2x the weight, and about a third of the
> > cost.
>
> Try an aftermarket battery pack. Lenmar and others show up on eBay
> regularly for $60 or less.

Thanks, that's REALLY interesting. I looked around for those when I got
my camcorder and they were almost as expensive as Sony packs, and I'd
heard some reports of compatibility problems with the InfoLithium chip.
But here's a 4800 mAH pack for $28:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=3804669200

I've had one other experience with a 3rd party battery (RCA brand,
mechanical dimensions were far enough off that it wouldn't quite fit
on my camera) but at this price it's worth another try. I have one
NP-F960 that I paid about $90 for and considered that a fantastic deal
at the time. I've had reasonable luck with 3rd party cell phone
batteries that cost a fraction of what the OEM batteries cost, so this
camcorder pack is very attractive without being completely unbelievable.

Paul Rubin

March 19th 04, 05:28 AM

"Arny Krueger" > writes:
> > Hmm, that's not so hot, I saw someone claiming 45 mbit/s transfer
> > through the USB2 port on the Zen.
>
> I saw that report. Same guy claimed 55 megabits per second via
> firewire. That's about 7 megabytes per second. I'd put the NJB3
> around half that for transferring music.Still much faster than real
> time.

3.5 MB/sec is impossible for USB 1.1, which runs at 12 mbit/sec max.
But yeah, it's much faster than real time, especially for mp3 recordings.

> BTW, just picked up a Behr MXB1002 to take out with my NJB3 on Saturday.
> Just voice this first time. In preliminary testing this looks like a very
> useful match-up. Obviously, I'm not bootlegging, though!

Oh cool, I'm not sure what a Behr MXB1002 is, but I hope it works out
well. (Btw, I'm not trying to bootleg either--I just want a small
machine that's out in the open, but doesn't get in other people's way
with cords and stuff).

Arny Krueger

March 19th 04, 11:54 AM

"Paul Rubin" > wrote in message

> "Arny Krueger" > writes:
>>> Hmm, that's not so hot, I saw someone claiming 45 mbit/s transfer
>>> through the USB2 port on the Zen.
>>
>> I saw that report. Same guy claimed 55 megabits per second via
>> firewire. That's about 7 megabytes per second. I'd put the NJB3
>> around half that for transferring music.Still much faster than real
>> time.
>
> 3.5 MB/sec is impossible for USB 1.1, which runs at 12 mbit/sec max.

Yes. I was talking about the NJB3 Firewire port.

> But yeah, it's much faster than real time, especially for mp3
> recordings.

>> BTW, just picked up a Behr MXB1002 to take out with my NJB3 on
>> Saturday. Just voice this first time. In preliminary testing this
>> looks like a very useful match-up. Obviously, I'm not bootlegging,
>> though!

> Oh cool, I'm not sure what a Behr MXB1002 is, but I hope it works out
> well. (Btw, I'm not trying to bootleg either--I just want a small
> machine that's out in the open, but doesn't get in other people's way
> with cords and stuff).

Take a look at the Behringer site.

http://www.behringer.com/mxb1002/index.cfm?lang=ENG

5 mic inputs and a good context for a stereo player and recorder, for just
under $100. Runs on 3 each 9v batteries or a cord wart, and provides phantom
power if needed.

Mike Rivers

March 19th 04, 12:28 PM

In article > writes:

> Hmm, not really "sets" most of the time; often more like jam sessions
> where different people around the room (sometimes including me) take
> turns performing. These often go on all night and it would be nice to
> be able to record 6-8 hours nonstop, but that's not a big deal.

I've had good-intentioned recordings of sessions like that. They're
universally horrible, both musically and sound-wise. I've never kept
any of them. They're not enjoyable to listen to. Maybe there's some
history there, but I'll leave that for the historians.

I've also never made a good recording of a jam session where I've been
playing. If you can't keep an eye on the record level and where your
mics are pointing, it will suck. Guaranteed. I guess you've either
been luckier than me or you're not nearly as discriminating. I'm not a
sound snob by any means, but I'm a bit of a music snob.

> Also, letting my mind wander is the whole point of going to these
> things. I'm there as a listener and occasional performer; the
> recording is just to have a personal record of the event

Trust me, the recording is never as good as being there. If you had to
use tape, you'll wonder why you ever wasted it.

> Do you think the feature set I listed is
> attractive, and different enough from what's already being made

Yes, but I don't think there's a very large market for it. There's
really not a continuum of price vs. buyers (which explains the huge
quantity of $100 microphones, and then the gaps up to $1000, with just
a couple at $400 and $600. You'll have a lot of people like you who
will buy one for "opportunity" recording and record a lot of trash
that they really get off on if they could buy it for $200 or less, but
at $500, you're going to get people who can't afford to be pros - sort
of like the yuppie lawyers who buy Les Paul guitars to play in a
weekend '70's band.

At least that's my view of the market.

--
I'm really Mike Rivers )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me here: double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

Paul Rubin

March 19th 04, 10:13 PM

(Mike Rivers) writes:
> I've had good-intentioned recordings of sessions like that. They're
> universally horrible, both musically and sound-wise. I've never kept
> any of them. They're not enjoyable to listen to. Maybe there's some
> history there, but I'll leave that for the historians.

I'd say mine are 90% crap but the other 10% makes it all worthwhile.
That's the usual Sturgeon's law that applies to everything. What can
I say--when I play them back, I use fast-forward a lot, but I do like
to listen to them.

> I've also never made a good recording of a jam session where I've been
> playing. If you can't keep an eye on the record level and where your
> mics are pointing, it will suck.

I do usually point the mic in the general direction of whoever is
playing, and the camcorder that I now use, and previously the Aiwa
Walkman that I did most of my tapes with, have AGC so no level
controls. I bought a TCD-5M in the 1980's for this very purpose, but
for non-technical reasons ended up not doing much live taping with it.

Also, with the camcorder, I find the direction of the mic actually
doesn't matter that much. It mattered more with the Walkman and the
Radio Shack stereo mic that I used to use.

The comparison with jam sessions was just re the informality. These
things aren't like jazz jams where players trade bars back and forth.
They're mostly solo performances; someone plays a song, then someone
else plays a different song, etc. I'm not trying to play and tape at
the same time.

> Guaranteed. I guess you've either been luckier than me or you're not
> nearly as discriminating. I'm not a sound snob by any means, but I'm
> a bit of a music snob.

I'm choosing to to be too fussy about the sound. Like if your
musician friend calls you and asks if you want to hear a really great
new song he's written, and you say "sure", so he plays it for you over
the phone, the audio is going be atrocious but you'll probably enjoy
it anyway. Mostly what I'm getting from these tapes is a chance to
re-listen to songs that I hadn't heard before and that I liked.

My dad is a former professional musician (jazz drummer) and sometimes
tapes jazz shows with a dictation microcassette recorder, and even
those are enjoyable in more or less the same way. Think also of the
lively trading of concert bootleg tapes among fans of those things. A
lot of those tapes are made with equipment that's hidden under
clothing (muffling the sound) in addition to being awful to begin
with, and yet their fans consider those tapes as precious as gold.

> Trust me, the recording is never as good as being there. If you had to
> use tape, you'll wonder why you ever wasted it.

Again, I've done enough of this taping and listened to enough of the
tapes afterwards to not have any doubts about whether I want to
continue. In fact part of my desire for digital recording and ease of
making backups is because a box of the cassettes I made in the 80's
got lost at my dad's house some years back, and it still saddens me
that I don't have them any more, since I'd like to re-listen to them.
Plus, as you say, there's history there. I taped Christine Lavin in
folk clubs before anyone heard of her, similarly David Massengill, and
so forth.

> > Do you think the feature set I listed is
> > attractive, and different enough from what's already being made
>
> Yes, but I don't think there's a very large market for it. There's
> really not a continuum of price vs. buyers (which explains the huge
> quantity of $100 microphones, and then the gaps up to $1000, with just
> a couple at $400 and $600. You'll have a lot of people like you who
> will buy one for "opportunity" recording and record a lot of trash
> that they really get off on if they could buy it for $200 or less, but
> at $500, you're going to get people who can't afford to be pros - sort
> of like the yuppie lawyers who buy Les Paul guitars to play in a
> weekend '70's band.

Interesting and good point, thanks. Maybe I can make it more
attractive to pros by just charging 3x more for it ;-).

Mike Rivers

March 20th 04, 01:42 AM

In article > writes:

> My dad is a former professional musician (jazz drummer) and sometimes
> tapes jazz shows with a dictation microcassette recorder, and even
> those are enjoyable in more or less the same way. Think also of the
> lively trading of concert bootleg tapes among fans of those things. A
> lot of those tapes are made with equipment that's hidden under
> clothing (muffling the sound) in addition to being awful to begin
> with, and yet their fans consider those tapes as precious as gold.

I'm not an avid music collector. To me, music is here and then it's
gone. I do have a pretty large collection of records and tapes, but it
spans 50 years or more. Some people buy more CDs in a month than I
own. (to say nothing of those who claim to have over 10,000 songs
downloaded on their computer). I listen to plenty of defective audio.
As I'm typing this, I'm listening to a radio broadcast over the
Internet - the phase keeps wandering between channels and every few
minutes there's a complete dropout. I can't tell you what I've just
heard, which means I don't have a strong compulsion to go back and
hear it again. It'll probalby come around some time.

I used to be the regular sound guy and tape archivist for the Folklore
Society of Greater Washington, recording every concert for about 20
years before I got tired of it. These were "board tapes" and all
sounded fine, but other than the first few years when we were bringing
in "folk" who didn't have recordings for sale and weren't seeking
gigs, everyone who performed had recorded (or would soon record) just
about everything they did in concert. The recordings all sounded
better yet people were always asking if they could get a copy of the
tape. The usual reason was "I like to hear what they said about the
songs." But how many times can you listen to that? I suspect that
those recordings probably got listened to just a few times, and that
most of the time when they wanted to hear that artist, they went for
the record or CD.

I realize that at the shows you're talking about, there's a lot of
hotel room singing by people who aren't 'on the bill' and who don't
have CDs for sale. But people you mention like Christine Lavin
eventually do. And far be it from me to criticize the content of the
recordings that you enjoy listening to. But if you want to do it
better than you've been doing it, you just have to spend more
money.

--
I'm really Mike Rivers )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me here: double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

Charles Tomaras

March 20th 04, 06:08 AM

"Arny Krueger" > wrote in message
...
>
> Take a look at the Behringer site.
>
> http://www.behringer.com/mxb1002/index.cfm?lang=ENG
>
> 5 mic inputs and a good context for a stereo player and recorder, for just
> under $100. Runs on 3 each 9v batteries or a cord wart, and provides
phantom
> power if needed.

Note that this mixer only provides 18 volt phantom power when running from
batteries which isn't enough for most studio quality condenser mics.

Kurt Albershardt

March 21st 04, 08:59 PM

james wrote:

> In article >,
> Kurt Albershardt > wrote:
>
>
>> Wastes more power as heat
>
>
> Agreed. 78xx and lm317 circuits will be, at best, 60% efficient at 1A
> with 7-8v in and 5v out. Also 7.2 isn't really enough headroom to
> assure the constant output V.
>
> Gets a little more complicated once you move away from linear VR's, but
> you knew that. Still pretty simple, most of the circuit is dedicated to
> keeping the inherent hf oscillation out of your radio/preamp/whatever.
> (e.g., 50kHz in a LM2575). Still DIY-able and could fit inside your
> battery pack...

Better to redesign the internal VR so it accepts a wider range of supplies.

See again: Sound Devices, whose products run on almost anything you can throw at them from a battery.

Brian Dipert

March 24th 04, 04:51 PM

After much waffling and gnashing of teeth, I sold my entire DAT set
(portable and full-size decks, SBM-1, etc) on Ebay last fall. Now I
run a Nomad Jukebox 3 or, when I want to capture high resolution
audio, a Digigram VxPocket V2 (24/48) on my laptop or a Core Sound
PDAudio system (24/96) on my iPaq 3835 (and soon my laptop, once the
drivers exit beta). I've never looked back, and have no regrets.

>I'm a student about to enter a conservatory next year for classical
>performance, and I'm looking at options for recording concerts, master
>classes and other important events. I have a minidisc already, but I always
>cringe at recording one-shot performances with it due to the compression,
>and the difficulty at outputting digitally to the computer. My dad has a
>Sony DAT walkman, which I absolutely love, so I'm considering buying a
>copy-protection free recorder such as the Sony PCM-M1. However, before
>shelling out a ton of money for this recorder, how long is DAT anticipated
>to be around? I plan to use it for myself, probably digitally outputting the
>DAT to computer and burning the files to CD-R or DVD as a backup, then
>editing and burning CDs for friends and family. I just want to make sure
>media is available before I go down this route. Finally, I need something
>portable, so lugging a computer to concerts etc is not feasible. Any insight
>would be very much appreciated.
>
>Erik
>

Brian Dipert
Technical Editor: Mass Storage, Memory, Multimedia, PC Core Logic and Peripherals, and Programmable Logic
EDN Magazine: http://www.edn.com
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