Summer 2021 update on my DR70D that I bought in June off ebay for $179
Very pleased. I've put it through it's paces and it has exceeded it's price point. Best suited for people wanting to experiment with 4 channel mic / sbd+aud without having to delve into serious $$.
It came with the latest firmware installed (1.15) and an old class 4 32gig Sandisk SD card. I did about 4 aud + sbd mixes at 24/48 and another 3 shows of 2 channel at853Rx hypers > at8533x > XLR 24/96 with no errors. Long sets recording multiple bands and it went well.
I got a bigger card off the Tascam media list: SanDisk 64GB Extreme PRO SDXC UHS-I off amazon.
I 've done 4 living room recordings 4 channels at 24/96, about 7 hours long, with no errors. Just did a weekend of local shows and some onstage jazz groups and they went well.
Observations:
-Very small.
-It didn't take me too long to figure out the menu/settings but it was a bit redundant and had some poorly named settings. Expect to spend a little time checking the actual manual. After a couple living room tests and 10 minutes actually studying the manual I felt comfortable.
-Preamps sounds good, no more no less.
-USB power is great. Doesn't draw too much power (expect 4 channels w phantom to draw more). I recommend a right angle micro USB charging cable on both ends.
-Right angle XLR stubby cables are good too.
-Being able to only see all 4 levels at once (and not monitor the stereo feeds independently) worked fine for me. YMMV.
-The XLR/TRS combo jacks are great.
-I'm now a fan of hypers indoors. at853Rx hypers > XLR DR70D is a small, versatile, budget friendly rig that made some shithole clubs a little more tolerable recording wise. Throw in the ability to grab a quick board patch if it's available,
Cons:
-Menu setup/settings not the best (see above) but not the worst IMO.
-Having XLR inputs 3 and 4 physically split on different sides of the recorder is wonky af. I had to spend an hour carving out a little custom foam pad/stilt so the stubby XLR's I already had wouldn't be strained when sitting in a Lowepro.
-Can't MONITOR channels 1+2 and 3+4 independently through headphone jack. You have to listen to the mix of everything when monitoring from the actual deck itself.
-Only being able to assign the 1/8 stereo input to channels 1+2. Means you have to use the wonky 3+4 if you use the mini plug input for a sbd patch or external pre.
It sounds like there's plenty of cases of recording errors when this unit was first released. Sounds like Tascam did a crappy job with both the release and handling of errors. While I can't say for certain if they're completely fixed, there appears to be a step in the right direction. Update to the latest firmware and stick to the Tascam media list.
Tips:
-Put together a little baggy of adapters for SBD patches. I've literally already encountered 4 different scenarios: XLR, 1/4, 1/8 headphone, and rca. This unit has a 1/8 stereo input but it runs hotter than the XLR/TRS inputs IMO and resulted in 1 sbd patch with some unavoidable clipping. (2x) Right angle 1/4 > female RCA has been my favorite since I have a super long rca cable I usually keep in my trunk.
-A little mastering on the sbd feed helps a lot IMO. VERY subtle reverb keeps it from being so dry. Expect a lot of vocal heavy mixes from your sbd patch and a little compression can help even that out a little. If the sbd feed is vocal heavy, don't mix it in too much. Just enough to sharpen up the vocals, you don't want the vocals louder than the other instruments.