Topic: Best 24 bit "bit bucket?"

[JasonSobel]

well, as long as this thread has some useful feature comparisons between the Tascam HD-P2 and the Marantz PMD-671, I thought I'd pop in and clear up a few things...

actually, I wouldn't say that the HD-P2 is bigger than the PMD-671
from this thread:
http://taperssection.com/index.php/topic,62271.0.html

Marantz PMD-671 = 10.4" x 7.3" x 2"
Tascam HD-P2 = 9.6" x 7.4" x 2.36"

so, they're very similar in size.  the PMD-671 is nearly an inch wider, while the HD-P2 is only slightly taller and only slightly thicker.  I guess it all depends on which dimension is most important to you

Because I'm like that... I did the math-
Marantz PMD-671 = 151.84   cubic inches
Tascam HD-P2     = 167.6544 cubic inches

nice 
it's that extra 0.36" of thickness that kills it for the HD-P2 

[meatling]

saying the 671 was faulty at launch is simply not true, it's had zero problems since release.

You are mistaken. The first 671s were defective by design: 24-bit samples were written with swapped bytes (3-1-2 instead of 3-2-1) resulting in unusable recordings with atrocious noise.

I wonder how such a flaw could get past quality control in the first place.


m

[sygdwm]

saying the 671 was faulty at launch is simply not true, it's had zero problems since release.

You are mistaken. The first 671s were defective by design: 24-bit samples were written with swapped bytes (3-1-2 instead of 3-2-1) resulting in unusable recordings with atrocious noise.

I wonder how such a flaw could get past quality control in the first place.


m

news to me. i have 2 (1 stock/1 oade mod). both bought as soon as they came available. zero problems with the firmware/hardware on either. ymmv.

[meatling]

The first 671s were defective by design:

news to me. i have 2 (1 stock/1 oade mod). both bought as soon as they came available. zero problems with the firmware/hardware on either.

That's bizarre. I had bought mine in April 2005, and the cause of the defect was crytal clear after examining the .WAV files and verifying the diagnosis by swapping the bytes back. I still can't imagine how this can be anything else but a firmware bug, which would have to affect every single recorder of the series. So, it's a mystery to me how you could receive yours intact.

Anyway, I'm glad that your experiences were more pleasant than mine. After having to deal with what Marantz chose to call "support" at the time, I'm not sure whether I will ever buy any of their products again.

m

[sygdwm]

incidentally, i fried a fuse in the stock unit one month after the warranty ran out by sending it reverse polarity from a rat shack power cord. marantz told me to get fuct. i was pissed for a minute, but i just run it on internal AA's now w/o so much of a hiccup. live and learn. i am considering getting a third fwiw.

[Digital Quality]

If I run a digi-mod UA5...what would be the best option to dump the data to in 24 bit? I know the iRiver and JB3 are 16 bit. What else that has optical or digital in is 24 bit besides the microtrack? and if so how much is it. Is there anything that would be around the price of an iRiver that can actually do 24 bit??

imo, your best option is a pda set up.  you can get one with all the needed components for under $500. 

buy a used "ipaq h2210" off ebay for ~$150 tops     http://tinyurl.com/3c4x3m
buy the pa audio card from core sound for $200       http://www.core-sound.com/pdaudio-cf/1.php
buy the software from forum member gordon aka "live24/96" for $50   http://www.gidluckmastering.com/live2496.html
buy two 4gb transcend 150x sd cards from newegg for $90 shipped.   http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?item=N82E16820163159

all you need is an optical cable to go from your ua5>pda and you're done.  seamless two gb splits and the ability to run 24/96 without worry.  you can switch cards at set break and you'll have enough space on a 4gb card for 24/96 every time as long as they play for less than two hours.  if you feel the band may play over two, run at 24/48, where you get four hours on a 4gb card.  the only drawback to the pda rig imo, is it's ONLY digi in, there's no built in adc for analog in.  however the other feature sets i outlined above far outweigh that one shortcoming.

I've been running something like this for a little while - it works nice once you get all the kinks out. I have a Dell Axim PDA instead of the HP though. The card also works on a coax signal which is handy. The Dell PDA uses a 5V charger too. I'm building a power cable to run the PDA and MR-1 off one battery.

The PDA always gets a lot of oohs and ahhs from the section hehe. My only gripe is that the capture card takes up the CF slot and leaves us the SD slot for storage. I wish it was the other way around but that would be a trickier design.

[JNT]

Overall I've been pretty happy running the PDAudio system as a bit bucket from my V3.   There is more of a learning curve with this set up when it comes to selecting the different components and type of media.  I have had a few glitches along the way but I have gotten them worked out.

My current set up is H555 dual expansion pack recording to either a Toshiba 5 gb PC card or the addonics external hard drive for festivals. I have been running 24 48 with good success.  I haven't tried 24 96 yet.

I'm planning to switch to a a different PDA with a built in CF and SD slot. i want to get rid of the bulky expansion pack and start recording to SD cards without the moving parts of the PC card drives. I think this will also help with battery life. The one downside to this is that afaik 4gb is the largest card I can use since the larger cards are SDHC which I don't think the PDA can use. This is only an issue for festivals.

I'm looking forward to trying the direct to FLAC recording so I can fit more on each card.

Joe

[Digital Quality]

The flac doesn't work so good. It's on too low of a compression setting so the files just wind up bigger than the wav version (for 24 bit anyway). I never got the auto-splitting working quite right either so I just let it record onto one file and split it in CDWAV. The new version handles up to 4GB files so it's pretty easy.

I run 88kHz most of the time. That will get a little over 2 hours on a card and it down samples to 44.1 nicely. The only hassle is you have to use the command line version of flac to encode 88kHz files.

The biggest gotcha is to always remember to format your flash media with at least 32kB clusters.

      format <vol> /a:32k

The default cluster size is really small so if you forget /a:32k the media will run too slow.

[JNT]

Yeah I'm ordering 1 or 2 4gb 150x transcend cards today. When its time for a festival I will either need to by a seperate box to dump the files onto or switch to the H555 with expansion pack and external HD.

Some of my problems involved the expansion pack and it just makes everything too bulky.

* sometimes the card wouldn't be found, reattaching the expansion pack would usually fix this
* one time I think I lost power in the expansion pack but the pda itself didn't

The flac doesn't work so good. It's on too low of a compression setting so the files just wind up bigger than the wav version (for 24 bit anyway). I never got the auto-splitting working quite right either so I just let it record onto one file and split it in CDWAV. The new version handles up to 4GB files so it's pretty easy.

Interesting  Can the compression be increased or does that increase the load on the processor too much?


Joe

[Digital Quality]

There isn't an option to change the encooder level except at compile time. It would be nice to have working just to take care of of some of the file header problems. Sometimes my headers are all messed up. I think it may happen when I try to shut down too fast. I can always get around it by reading/saving in other tools but it's a little annoying.

[Digital Quality]

Guess - I should upgrade, it's been a while.

BTW in case anyone is curious, my PDA is an Axim X50v. Dell quit making the Axim PDA a little while ago so all the accessories are super cheap right now. I think you can get an x50v for about $200 on ebay now. Meanwhile, the x51v is still pushing close to $500.

Edit: I upgraded and now I get 2Gb splits by default. Nice.

[jerryfreak]

hey guys, I am putting together a rig for this summer from mine and some friends' stuff.

I've been out of the game for awhile, and havent gotten much into the solid state recorders. I built a lot of the toshibas out there that the schoeps peeps are using with the vx pockets. if you've seen someone on a portege, chances are I built it

I was planning on running mk4>v2>ad2k>vx pocket at 24/48 this summer, but would like to get a robust 24/96 bit bucket, seems like the pdas have finally come of age.

I had mixed experiences with the pdaudio when I demo'd it back in 03. one recording I successfully made was here:

http://www.archive.org/details/sci2003-10-31.flac24

particularly, the windows driver support sucked, I literally had to learn linux (which I successfuly did for this sole purpose!) and run ecasound to have a pseudo-stable setup.

I'm looking for something that is 100% reliable, like the vx pocket? I've tested its bit-accuracy several times for 12-14 hours, (and 100's of times with double-DAT transfers inverted over each other to reveal digi decoding errors) to test various machines I've built around it, the most solid audio interface I've ever worked with, but unfortuantely limited to 24/48

My question for you: are the current pda solutions that rock solid? I'm willing to hack and tweak it if I can get solid performance that will work 100% of the time. has anybody done extended recording tests with sine-waves or other verifiable bitstreams to confirm absolute stability

and if so, what pda offers the most bang for the buck. I'd be looking for basic recording and playback only (Is digital playback is still a challenge?) looking for something that has decent output level, that can drive some etymotics (my rio karma is a good reference point of what I like for analog output).

Battery life and cost are huge factors. Ideally 3-5 hours per battery. Can you guys recommend me a system that is confirmed trouble free. What sort of battery life do you get?

[OOK]

I was planning on running mk4>v2>ad2k>

Add a tascam HDP2 and your done.......Its stable and reliable.....it would be the perfect addition to your rig.

I have no experience with a marantz 761 or Sound device 722 but they are the other go to decks. Agian stable and reliable.

I would stay away from the microtracker....some have worked with the qurks its has like no auto 2gig split...and other voodoo the machine seems to make....it seems semi stable but I just don't trust it....

[jerryfreak]

Hard to justify the tascam for $700+ if the pda works and is stable for half the price and a fraction of the size. Never considered the microtrack. lack of 2GB splits is a deal killer for me, and it doesnt appear to be 100%  bit-accurate and reliable form what I've read on here

Add a tascam HDP2 and your done.......Its stable and reliable.....it would be the perfect addition to your rig.

I have no experience with a marantz 761 or Sound device 722 but they are the other go to decks. Agian stable and reliable.

I would stay away from the microtracker....some have worked with the qurks its has like no auto 2gig split...and other voodoo the machine seems to make....it seems semi stable but I just don't trust it....

[OOK]

Hard to justify the tascam for $700+ if the pda works and is stable for half the price and a fraction of the size. Never considered the microtrack. lack of 2GB splits is a deal killer for me, and it doesnt appear to be 100%  bit-accurate and reliable form what I've read on here

Add a tascam HDP2 and your done.......Its stable and reliable.....it would be the perfect addition to your rig.

I have no experience with a marantz 761 or Sound device 722 but they are the other go to decks. Agian stable and reliable.

I would stay away from the microtracker....some have worked with the qurks its has like no auto 2gig split...and other voodoo the machine seems to make....it seems semi stable but I just don't trust it....

Again though PDA audio still suffers from a lack of support by this community.  It has struggled with and still struggles with from driver support, at least from the last I heard.  You said it yourself you had to go and learn a computer language just to get the thing semi stable..  The cost verses not having anything to worry about far outways the cost verses is the thing going to be stable and working when I need it too.  The tascam and Marantz models would be the way to go if you are looking for ease of use, reliability and being able to do 24/96.