Topic: Choosing a portable recorder

[gatorglenn]

Hi,

First a little background info. I  record middle and high school concert bands and once in a while a chorus or orchestra too. I have been doing this as a hobby for many years. I used to record with DAT and/or minidisc and a AT822 stereo mic. I got acceptable recordings from those. Then a couple of years ago I started using a Roland CD2 to record with a pair of Rode NT5 microphones. Lately I decided to use my laptop with a Mobile Pre USB interface. This also works pretty good but I am not totally happy with the Mobile Pre USB preamps and I long for the simple days of not carrying a laptop to record but something smaller. I use a windows laptop and edit with Sony Sound Forge.

So I have been looking at portable digital recorders. I have got my choices down to three units. Fostex FR2LE, Marantz PMD-661, and the Sony PCM-M10. I am leaning towards the Marantz. The Sony seems nice but I would need an additional mic preamp for my Rode mics and that would add a couple of hundred dollars. I have not read much about the Fostex unit but I have read a lot about the Marantz one. Unfortunately it is next to impossible to actually see and handle any of these in stores locally so I will most likely be buying via the internet.

I'm asking for advice from people who have used these three recorders to help me choose one. I did not mention that I also have a Zoom H2 for fun and have used it for recording outside but I don't think it has good enough quality to do what I want for inside concerts.

Thanks,
Glenn

[su6oxone]

I own a stock 661 and love it, although I've never tried the other two.  As an all-in-one recorder, the  661 is fantastic.  It has decent battery life with AAs, is super easy to operate in the field, is relatively small and light for field recording, has a low noise floor, and has yielded me some nice recordings when I've taped with my mics directly into it.  You can check out some of them on LMA:

http://www.archive.org/details/tlg2010-01-30.ccm4.flac16

http://www.archive.org/details/elmwood2010-01-30.ccm4.flac16

http://www.archive.org/details/bd2009-11-16.ccm4.flac16

http://www.archive.org/details/gpn2009-11-16.ccm4.flac16

[Wiggler]

I'd also go with the Marantz and I'd get one modified by Doug Oade.
http://www.oade.com/

[travelinbeat]

I have got my choices down to three units. Fostex FR2LE, Marantz PMD-661, and the Sony PCM-M10.

I'd also advise you to take a look at the Edirol R-09HR.  This has been a hugely popular device on these forums (I use one myself), and at a price $200-$300 below the Marantz (the device that was my number one contender against the Edirol), you should have plenty of extra coin to accommodate the XLR > 1/8" turn around you'll need.  Sorry I can't help in the comparisons of those devices as I've never held one, but another thing you may want to do is check out each device's respective thread here in the Recording Gear section.  Start back at the first thread and read each post and see what people are saying.  Let's face it, if you're going to be dropping a few hundred on a new device, you'll want to be sure to do your research and get something that you know you're going to like.

[tekdroid]

I have got my choices down to three units. Fostex FR2LE, Marantz PMD-661, and the Sony PCM-M10. I am leaning towards the Marantz. The Sony seems nice but I would need an additional mic preamp for my Rode mics and that would add a couple of hundred dollars.

Keep in mind the Sony has a street price of $274-$299 while the others are $530-599. If it's a question of money, the Sony might come out to basically the same cost or quite a bit less, depending on what you buy. If you buy Sony's own XLR-1 XLR adaptor, only then it would be more, but there are cheaper choices to get your mics working on the unit, of course.

[spcyrfc]

having an all in one box (661, fr2le) makes things very simple.  i used to run a stock fr2le and loved it.  battery life was spectacular.  both the 661 and the fr2le are small, not in comparison with the sony or edirol, but still, very small and i know the stock fr2le sounds great, even for loud music. 

i would go with one of those two.  i have heard a mod (oade or busman) might be necessary on the 661, but have no experience with the box.

best of luck.

[Belexes]

I love my FR2LE as an all-in-one. Was great as stock, but better after the Busman mod.

If you end up choosing the Sony, I'd go with this as well:
http://www.naiant.com/studiostore/microphoneamplifiers.html

[su6oxone]

i have heard a mod (oade or busman) might be necessary on the 661, but have no experience with the box.

Not true, the 661 is good to go without any tampering by the Oade Brothers.  The 660 is the one that required some modifications for concert applications.

[fmaderjr]

If you end up choosing the Sony, I'd go with this as well:
http://www.naiant.com/studiostore/microphoneamplifiers.html

This would be a very versatile choice because you could use the M10 alone or with a small battery box and have a very small form factor if you ever wanted to use mini-mics. The Littlebox-M10  combo sounds great with phantom powered mics and still is smaller than a FR2-LE. I like this combo in a small gear bag much better than the FR2-LE.

[gatorglenn]

Thanks for all of your replies. I have a tough choice ahead. I'm not in a big hurry. Do you think it might be worth it to see in the next couple of months if any new recorders come out?

I have heard of the oade mods but I had not heard of busman mods, just one more thing to research. I am also considering some new microphones some day but that will be another post.

Thanks,
Glenn

[DigiGal]

i have heard a mod (oade or busman) might be necessary on the 661, but have no experience with the box.

Not true, the 661 is good to go without any tampering by the Oade Brothers.  The 660 is the one that required some modifications for concert applications.

I'll second that, the stock 661 sounds just fine.  I've used my stock PMD 661 to record chamber orchestras and loud PA concerts.

[rastasean]

As you can tell, all the listed recorders are popular by people here so pick one which you think is prettier. Do you like the dot matrix display the fr2le comes with or would you prefer the pmd 661 oLED display? 

i would hop on youtube and see what other people say about them as well.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cMwZfcXZFas
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mt4EcncKGlQ

I have the fr2LE because I didn't know about the pmd661. I like the 661 because of the spdif in but otherwise, it does the same as the 2le. I do know that the 2le has kind of a noisy headphone amp so if you want to monitor quiet audio through the 2le, that may not work terribly well. A nice thing about the 2le is that you can you 7.2 volt batteries with the unit providing long record times even when using phantom power.

I would suggest not spending the money on mods but rather on microphones, cables, light stands, adapters, batteries, etc. but if you have an unlimited budget, buy all three and get the 2le and the pmd 661 modded.

[Shadow_7]

The 661 wasn't out when I got my MR-1000.  I was bouncing back and forth between the FR2LE and MR-1000.  Ultimately I got a good deal on a used MR-1000, and I figured that the 8x AA's would give better battery life than 4x AA's.  Plus the FR2LE doesn't come with a flash card, where the Korg comes with a 40GB HDD.  Not to mention probably the best converters I've ever heard.

The MR-1000 is not flawless though, it's a field recorder only.  No USB soundcard option.  No multitracking.  Six hour session limit.  The onboard preamps are good, but could be better.  The limiter kicks in late.  Some mics require attenuation to use with the onboard preamps and other things.  It's a nice unit though.  At times I wish there was a battery powered 4 channel unit (but the MR-2000 is rack mounted).  And it would be nice if I could run audiogate in Linux (which I can't (yet)).