[Bobo]

Hey,

Anyone have any experience with the R09 compared to R-1 for recording
live music? (Basically rehearsal tracks, not particularly loud music -
setup turn on and
turn off at end).

The R1 works well for this for me and I was considering an R09 as a
replacement/
augmentation of the fleet.

Is it known whether R09 is inferior fidelity? More noise? (comparing
16/44.1)

Does the R09 have a limiter? The R1 does and that saves the day on occasion
as I'm not riding the level at all.

Can you even still get R1's anywhere? I can't seem to find them.

Thanks
Dick Norton

[Mike Rivers]

On Dec 27, 2:30 am, Bobo wrote:

The R1 works well for this for me and I was considering an R09 as a
replacement/
augmentation of the fleet.

If you already have something that works well, what more do you want?
Why do you want to augment or replace it?

Is it known whether R09 is inferior fidelity? More noise? (comparing
16/44.1)

Everything newer is better. Probably the biggest improvement is with
the built-in mics (I assume you're using those) but it might not
matter for your purpose or in the space where you record. The other
big difference is that the R09 is a current model and had a firmware
upgrade this year while the R1 is dead in the market and won't change.

Does the R09 have a limiter? The R1 does and that saves the day on occasion
as I'm not riding the level at all.

In that case you're not making the best recordings you can. You don't
hvae to ride the gain, you just have to set it lower. Have you looked
at the Editrol web site? You should be able to find out there whether
the R09 has a limiter.

Can you even still get R1's anywhere? I can't seem to find them.

Probably not new, but I'm sure they show up on eBay now and then.

Have you looked at the Zoom H2?

[Bobo]

Mike Rivers wrote:
On Dec 27, 2:30 am, Bobo wrote:

The R1 works well for this for me and I was considering an R09 as a
replacement/
augmentation of the fleet.

If you already have something that works well, what more do you want?
Why do you want to augment or replace it?

If the new rig was better fidelity I'd then replace it. In any case I have
occasion to need it to be in two places at once, and hence having two
is the easy way to address that need.


Is it known whether R09 is inferior fidelity? More noise? (comparing
16/44.1)

Everything newer is better.
It may be different, but I'm not sure it will be better. The R09
has AGC which is absolutely not of any interest to me for
music, but it is unclear from looking at all the Edirol stuff whether
they have a limiter/compressor as did the R1. If they don't have a
decent compressor (and the R1 is pretty good on that front, at least
for what I'm doing) then it is something new that is worse, at least for
me.

When the R1 came out there was a great deal of hoop-la (is
word, no?) about the great components in the front end and
the fact that they tried to get very low noise signal paths. I don't
see any of that mentioned for the -09 and I am suspicious that
someone noticed there was a bigger market for small meeting
recorders and set the design center somewhat further from the
music recording folks such as myself.


Probably the biggest improvement is with
the built-in mics (I assume you're using those) but it might not
matter for your purpose or in the space where you record. The other
big difference is that the R09 is a current model and had a firmware
upgrade this year while the R1 is dead in the market and won't change.

Does the R09 have a limiter? The R1 does and that saves the day on occasion
as I'm not riding the level at all.

In that case you're not making the best recordings you can. You don't
hvae to ride the gain, you just have to set it lower.
Well aware of the process/issues here. Sadly "set it lower" is tantamount
to "be lucky". Take two is not an option.

Have you looked
at the Editrol web site? You should be able to find out there whether
the R09 has a limiter.
Yes, and no.

Can you even still get R1's anywhere? I can't seem to find them.

Probably not new, but I'm sure they show up on eBay now and then.

Have you looked at the Zoom H2?

I was so unimpressed with the earlier zoom (I had one - 32 K sample rate)
that I didn't consider them seriously. It has to be at least as good as
the
R1 I have now, as I'm not willing to inferiorize (is not word, yes?) the
final
product.

If some pro here can relate the H2 to the R1 in terms of fidelity and noise
floor I'd gladly look in that direction.


Regards,
b

[Mike Rivers]

On Dec 27, 7:43 am, Bobo wrote:

If the new rig was better fidelity I'd then replace it. In any case I have
occasion to need it to be in two places at once, and hence having two
is the easy way to address that need.

You have your decision made, then. Buy an R09 (or look at
alternatives) That way, you can make your own evaluation as to which
one will work best in each circumstance. No need to buy another R1. It
isn't going to be better than a new R09.

It may be different, but I'm not sure it will be better. The R09
has AGC which is absolutely not of any interest to me for
music, but it is unclear from looking at all the Edirol stuff whether
they have a limiter/compressor as did the R1.

I can find no mention of a limiter or compressor in the documentation
available on line (and I suppose neither can you). It's surprising
that there's no manual. It's possible that it doesn't have a limiter.
Around here, we tend to discourage limiting when recording,
particularly with a 24-bit system, preferring to just set the level
conservatively and make gain adjustments later if necessary. But there
are a number of people who hang around here who own an R09 and if you
wait a day or two for one to notice your post, he or she will look at
the menu or the manual and give you the answer you seek.

And in case you're the type who wants to ask "If you don't know, why
did you respond to my post?" well, it's because I have studied these
recorders to see if there was one that I wanted to buy (so far I
haven't bought one) and do know a good bit about them in general. I
just don't have this one specific answer because what's important to
you isn't important to me.

When the R1 came out there was a great deal of hoop-la (is
word, no?) about the great components in the front end and
the fact that they tried to get very low noise signal paths. I don't
see any of that mentioned for the -09 and I am suspicious that
someone noticed there was a bigger market for small meeting
recorders and set the design center somewhat further from the
music recording folks such as myself.

You could be right about this, particularly since they offer the R4
(two versions) for professional music recording. However every one of
these pocket sized recorders have many users who are very happy with
their application for casual music recording.


Well aware of the process/issues here. Sadly "set it lower" is tantamount
to "be lucky". Take two is not an option.

Not lucky, just using good judgment of the situation. It's a skill
that you learn. But if that's what makes you comfortable, it's a
feature need.

I was so unimpressed with the earlier zoom

Neither was I, but while I didn't compare the H2 with other recorders,
I thought they really did it right the second time around. And it's
dirt cheap.

Have you looked at the Korg MR-1? I reviewed that in Pro Audio Review
and the only reason why I didn't want to buy one on the spot is
because I want the optoin of using it with my own condenser mics,
which means at least an outboard phantom power supply and adapter
cables. But it's a superb sounding recorder and even the limiter works
pretty transparently. It doesn't have built-in mics but comes with a
miniature stereo mic (from Audio Technica) that sounds very good. It's
a couple hundred bucks more than the R09 and uses a hard drive rather
than a flash memory card (much greater recording capacity without
reloading) but it's a very high quality recorder.

I haven't had my hands on the new Sony PCM-D50 other than at a trade
show, but it looks like it's about 90% of the flagship PCM-D1 at 1/3
the price. It has a limiter, too.

[anahata]

Bobo wrote:
It may be different, but I'm not sure it will be better. The R09
has AGC which is absolutely not of any interest to me for
music, but it is unclear from looking at all the Edirol stuff whether
they have a limiter/compressor as did the R1. If they don't have a
decent compressor (and the R1 is pretty good on that front, at least
for what I'm doing) then it is something new that is worse, at least for
me.

I have an R-09 but not a R-1. I haven't tested the AGC. Other than that
it doesn't have a limiter/compressor, but you'd have to test the
behaviour of the so-called AGC to find out whether it was equivalent to
the R-1's comp/limiter.

When the R1 came out there was a great deal of hoop-la (is
word, no?) about the great components in the front end and
the fact that they tried to get very low noise signal paths. I don't
see any of that mentioned for the -09

Again I don't know about the R1, but I'd never trust the R-09 for low
noise on an external mic. It's not too bad on the internal mics, which
are electret and therefore high output, and if I wanted to use it with
good mics I'd be using a preamp and the R-09's line input and wouldn't
expect any trouble with noise.

someone noticed there was a bigger market for small meeting
recorders

The R-09 is overkill for that, You can get voice recorders for a tenth
of the price.

--
Anahata
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