I will take a shot at joining in here – I have only a basic understanding of synching, stretching, clocks and such. A friend and fellow member here has explained some of this to me, but I don’t have any real world experience other than what I will detail below as I feel pertains to the subject at hand.
I am nowhere near as knowledgeable as you all as I have only been recording since last December. The threads here (which I avidly read) have helped me greatly, not only with gear choices (and wish lists) but also in understanding terminology and such. The practical value of this membership is a wonderful resource that I am very grateful to be able to draw from. Most of my efforts have been in smaller clubs/ bars (although I did a couple of local outdoor festivals this summer also.)
I own two DR-2d recorders which I have employed in a variety of configurations. I have often recorded an audience capture with one recorder and a soundboard patch on the other at times when it wasn’t possible to run cables all to one spot.
My most involved setup thus far has been to capture three stereo sources; my audience mics, usually with a ‘dual’ setting of -6dB for a safety track on one recorder, and the other recorder is set up with stage mics (mic in) and board feed (line in.)
I use NCH programs mostly - WavePad for editing, MixPad for mixing, and Switch for converting. The longest tracks I have mixed were @ 2 hours. My experiences in post have been very satisfactory to my ears – after meticulously lining up the two (or three) sources and experimenting with the volume of each and mixing down to a wav.
I guess I have used a lot of words trying to say that with my limited experience and knowledge, I have not found that any discernible difference in how files from these two recorders match up.