Topic: Best hand held for Internal Mic Quality.

[FutureThought]

Hello guys & girls,

I'm simply looking to buy a solid state, hand held recorder for collecting sounds & events from my holidays & travels, mainly atmospheres & incidental sounds, spoken word etc, but I don't want to use external mics. I do however want to get the best possible quality from a self contained unit & would appreciate any recommendations.
In a slight contradiction i have noted the Tascam DR-100, which would give me external mic options if i wanted to take my recordings a little further & I like the fact that you can buy the mini wind jammers from Rycote for some of the Tascam recorders. Anyways....i'm waffling now. All info appreciated.

Cheers,

S.

[12milluz]

I have heard the Sony PCM-M10 has some fantastic internal mics.

[fmaderjr]

I have heard the Sony PCM-M10 has some fantastic internal mics.

It certainly does. Especially for ambient recording (very low noise and lots of gain). Also small size, great battery life and an easy to read display for checking levels.

For loud music I much prefer my R-09 Micsketeer, but it isn't what future thought wants it for.

[Ozpeter]

The M10 mics are indeed nice sounding and low noise, but unfortunately they are omnidirectional, and that messes up the stereo image, with higher frequencies tending to appear more wide than lower frequencies, leading to a muddy sound in the centre.  You can improve matters in post-production, but I wouldn't describe the M10 as the ideal inbuilt-mic recorder by any means.

I really must get around to doing a side-by-side ambient recording to add to http://taperssection.com/index.php?topic=135640.0 - not that I'd describe the other Sony recorder described there as the perfect ambient recorder either, but the difference would be instructive.

[FutureThought]

How does the Sony M10 compare with Tascam's DR100?