Congrats!
I just sold my DR-70D as well but I'm not sure which one of the F4/F8/MixPre 3 to get.
When I got the Tascam a while back I was worried that four tracks might not be enough for the future but the F8 was a bit high in price.
The need for more channels never occurred but the handling and SQ of the Tascam left me with a wish for better sound and less fiddly handling.
I mostly do foley, nature recordings, on videocamera and occational some harmonica and audition/rehearsals.
But as the F8 have dropped massively in price the F4, F8 and mixpre 3 are pretty much in the same price segment give or take some.
I really love the size and handling of the mixpre and the SQ appears to be everything I've asked for.
But the Zooms - especially the F8 - offer some additional inputs and features like TC etc.
Did you ever consider the F8 or even the F4 before you got the mixpre?
I'm the proud new owner of a MixPre 6!
Most recently, I had a Tascam DR-70D (currently FS) and I feel like it's a big upgrade.
I've always admired Sound Devices quality and sound and I'm very excited to use it in the field in about a month.
Thanks for all the info in the last +/- 75 pages of these threads. It took awhile, but I managed to pull quite a lot of useful tips and feel very comfortable with it already.
If anyone here runs Jim Williams 460s, please chime in!
I owned a F8 (nought long before the Mixpre-3/6 were available) and a F4 and now I have a Mixpre-6. I like my Mixpre-6 but the F4/F8 are also excellent. Having had both, these are the things I like/disliked:
The Mixpre-x series:
I like the size and design of the recorders
I like that you can use XLRs all time and just switch between line in and microphone
The preamps are great, the analog limiters are excellent
You can use the audio interface (to lets says stream) at the same time as recording
Sound Devices is a great company, with a long history of professional equipment and great support
On the negative side, There have been a lot of firmware issues and I find the design choices really odd in many cases (they are marketed as recorders but, to me, they are really closer to their mixer series and the mixpre-6 usb powering is a shakey solution in my opinion). There are also apparently issues recording at 192.
The F4/F8:
The menu-ing systems on these are well thought out in my opinion
Dual SD recording
Easy powering options
Good preamps, maybe not as good as the SD (it's hard to tell really)
On the negative side. some early F8s had white sceen issue where an internal ribbon came loose and their support took quite a while to acknowledge it. having to use 1/4 for line in and XLRs for microphones was veyr annoying to me. The gain knobs on the F8 are awfully small. The headset amp sucks. This is a prosumer device and company and the support you get is not necessarily up to the level of SD support