Topic: Recorder choice (another one???)

[carpa]

Hello to everybody, and excuse for my english, very far from being perfect.
This forum is a really nice place and many of you show a big knowledge in recording issues.
Portable recorders; answers are often related to technical considerations which I understand but cannot "translate" in actual sonic performance terms; then I am writing from Italy, where a lot of products you often talk about (particularly mic pres and others) are not available, and prices are much higher than in USA. . That's why I go with a new post, posing some specific questions.
Being a classical music pianist I want to record my concerts  for personal archive pourpose, to put some on my webpage etc. The three aims to mach in a recording rig are portability, lightness and quality. I play solo recitals, chamber music (piano and violin, trio piano violin and percussions) and piano and orchestra in very different acoustic situation and possibility to place the equipment.

My rig was (I sold the dat deck and the mic is broken):
Sony pcm-m1 dat deck(before of this Sony tcd-d3)--Sony ecm 979 m-s stereo mic connected to the deck's mic input using two Shure a95uf line matching transormers in order to unbalance the mic. To save weight I adapted a stand for sheet music as a mic stand (too  low but very portable)
In some cases I plugged the mic(always with the shure's a95 uf) into a very simple pre (no gain control, no phantom, only amplify 10 times the signal and 1/4 jacks ins and out) built by a friend 15 years ago or so, and then into deck's line in.

Here are some samples taken from my webpage (www.akademus.it/artisti/carlo.palese) in the section "repertorio", just to check the average quality of the recordings:

http://www.akademus.it/artisti/carlo.palese/audio/repertorio_file-154.mp3   Borgato handmade concert grand piano, Sony ecm979--shure a95uf- homebuilt pre-- line in Sony pcmm1 dat deck deck.  Mic  50 cm close to the piano

www.akademus.it/artisti/carlo.palese/audio/repertorio_file-55.mp3   concert grand-- Sony 979--shure a95uf--mic in SOny tcdd3 dat deck    mic 3 meters away from the piano

www.akademus.it/artisti/carlo.palese/audio/repertorio_file-268.mp3 steinway concert grand---Sony ecm979--shure a95uf - mic in Sony pcmm1 deck   open space concert with orchestra, mic far from players (5 mt.at least)

www.akademus.it/artisti/carlo.palese/audio/repertorio_file-149.mp3  concert grand piano (yamaha?)-- Sony ecm979--shure a95uf - mic in Sony pcmm1 deck  Mic 50 cm. close  the piano as in first sample

http://www.akademus.it/artisti/carlo.palese/audio/repertorio_file-103.mp3  steinway grand (6 ft) Sony 979--shure a95uf--mic in SOny tcdd3 dat deck   mic 50 cm. close to the piano

Situations vary a lot, but the average quality can be enough for me. In buying new things it would be nice to get better, in any case I don't want to go below this quality.

I am oriented to buy Edirol R09h; probably  in recording  with internal mics quality will be  worst than the samples I posted, but enough for rehearsals, working with my students etc.

The questions are in order to upgrade the rig starting from the recorder, which I wouldn't like being less good than sony dat deck.

1)I would like to buy a stereo mic to replace the sony 979 to plug in the recorder mic-in. Options are the multipowered Rodent4 or the new Audio-technica at 8022. How would they compare with the Sony ecm 979 and how the would suit the Edirol in terms of sensitivity, noise etc? Are there other product I didn't think about? If I buy a battery phantom p supply (art in example) I could use more mics, like the other new A-T bp 4025. Would it be a  better option to suggest me?

2)How would be -in my very different  recording conditions- actually audible the mic in noise of Edirol (or the general preamp quality) compared to Sony d-50 in use with one othe the mics listed above ? In other terms, do I need to buy the Sony (250 Euros more than R09hr) if I don't want to have worst results with an ext. mike than the samples I posted (that means: sony pcm-m1 dat mic in  vs. edirol mic in) ?

3) The two mono mics option coud be taken into account only if  easy in terms of placement (i.e. two mics in a single bar) and buying a phantom p supply. In this case which mics would do a good job for my needs (in the same price range of the stereo mentioned above) ? The stereo mikes are all cardioids, being one-point; if I buy tho monos will the omnis be better?

I know that  a good mic pre would be better, but I can't afford something like SD mixpre and I don't know if a good mic pre with Phantom48 battery powered exists at a much lower price. I can always use my minimal homemade pre in the meanwhile.

Excuse me for posing so many questions and for being so long.   
 
Thank you in advice for your patience









 

[carpa]

No answers.....
I know that inquiries about recorder choice are maybe too many, and probably in some other post I could find my answers, but I havent found anything referring to the mic preamp sound quality of  dat decks like Sony pcm-m1 o Tcd-d100 (they were quite the same machine).
This could help me to understand if R09HR mic input can be considered at the same quality (audible low noise/frequency response) or not.
Thank you again

carpa

[flintstone]

Take a look at Stephanie Wingfield's web site
http://www.wingfieldaudio.com/index.html

Stephanie is a professional musician (cello) who has lots of information about,
and sample recordings made with, pocket-size digital recorders and their built-in mics.

Stephanie ranks the recorders like this:
5 stars:     Sony PCM-D1
4.5 stars:  Sony PCM-D50, Marantz PMD620
4 stars:     Olympus LS-10, Edirol R-09HR, Tascam DR-1, Zoom H2

I would move the PMD620 to a lower category because it has pretty high
self-noise that would be more likely to be audible in quiet passages.

Any of these recorders will sound better if you use a high quality external
preamp and good external mics.  But that defeats the goal of having an
easy-to-carry, easy-to-set-up, inexpensive pocket-size recorder.

Flintstone

[carpa]

Thank you Flintstone,
I visited wingfield audio some days ago.  I am leaning towards R09HR, which seems to be the best compromise between all the devices.
They say the Tascam sounds good, but I find it more noisy than Edirol.
I know Sony is better on that side, but in order to improve my rig in the future the 250 euros (!) between Sony and Edirol could be better spent for one channel ( ;)of a decent pre.
thanks
c