I've had an H2 for 3 days now and have run all of the features through the paces... done some field recording, ambient bar noise,VO, etc. And so far, I have to say it's everything I was looking for.
I'm not an audio engineer but I've worked with some over the years... edited video/audio for broadcast... shot film and recorded dialogue to DAT... done a little recording and editing of audio for local radio spots, etc. So, I'm not completely foreign to the audio realm. I'm just not an engineer or bit cruncher.
Yes, I'm sure there are units costing 4 times more that can give a more faithful reproduction, etc. But, I only wanted something light and small to put in my camera bag that didn't require ectra mics, cables, etc. That was capable of getting decent recordings in a variety of situations without much fuss. I'm a photographer and wanted to play with doing some ambient work as soundtrack for my images (
http://www.skiphuntphotography.com). So, the H2 is perfect for me.
However, since I've now gone through every feature.. I've notices a few problems. First, I DID get some dropout (I think). I can hear a series of click sounds in random fashion. But, ONLY if I first record in 4channels 48k 24bit OR 44.1 24bit and then use the unit to 3D Pan the mix and encode the two pairs down to one stereo pair. The resulting stereo pair will have this "clicking" sound consistently. Yes, I'm aware it's better to do your post in the computer. But I wanted to test everything. If I do a 4channel recording in 16bit and re-encode to a single stereo pair.. it's fine, no clicking. And, even if I record in 4channel 24bit.. the source pairs are fine without clicking. ONLY when re-encoded to a single pair via the H2's onboard processing.
Second problem is that when I select a stereo file to "nomalize" within the menu, the H2 takes an awfully long time working on it. Says "searching peaks".. then after an hour it says.... "Now Processing". This goes on for hours or until the battery dies. AND once you start the process, it won't let you cancel. It just keeps either "searching" or "processing". I couldn't even get it to force quit by turning off the power. The only thing that worked was pulling the batteries. I tried again with another file and the exact same thing.
Like I said, it's not that big a deal since I'll do all my post later and NOT with the H2, but there are definitely a bug or two under the hood... at least with mine. Likely a firmware fix. Can anyone test theirs and tell me if it does the same thing? Maybe I got a flawed one.
Everything else is great. I love this little thing and will get much use out of it. But, I really wish they had put a metal tripod mount on this thing. I've carefully mounted the H2 on several devices over the last three days, and the threads are already looking pretty worn.