Topic: new marantz PMD 661

[J.T.L]

Nevatons...and yes I cannot transfer files from 661 to Mac OS 10.5.6 but can under XP SP3. Under Mac I drag and drop with no transfer notice and am left with a 0kb file on my desktop.

[TomR]

Hi All - first post.

Raimund Specht has placed figures for the 661 preamp noise on his Avisoft web site

http://www.avisoft.com/recordertests.htm

Cheers - TomR

[flintstone]

Thanks, TomR!  The PMD661 test results are similar to the Marantz PMD671,
and quite a bit better than the PMD660.  Good news!

[Krispy D]

hmmm, why no mac drag and drop?  that is one of the best features of my 660!

[J.T.L]

hmmm, why no mac drag and drop?  that is one of the best features of my 660!

Ok, to update that...I dragged the file over again last night and 18 minutes later (yes 18) it started to copy. I sent this info to Marantz...

[su6oxone]

you've got ~4GB of recorded files, so that's about 4 hours of run time.

4 hours sounds pretty decent.  Enough for an opener and main act, although 5 hours would be perfect IMO. 

How does the unmodded 661 sound btw?

[Goldy]

New mod on the Oade site:

The Marantz PMD 661 Super MOD upgrade rebuilds the XLR inputs using very high speed, very low noise and super low distortion op amps that dramatically improve low level detail and clarity. Input capacitors are also upgraded. Components are selected by ear to optimize detail and low level resolution. Super low THD+N op amps allow for a very wide SFDR even with signal levels down 50dB. This preserves the signal quality of the highest grade microphones when recording soft signals, like voice, un amplified music, nature sounds and FX.

[su6oxone]

New mod on the Oade site:

The Marantz PMD 661 Super MOD upgrade rebuilds the XLR inputs using very high speed, very low noise and super low distortion op amps that dramatically improve low level detail and clarity. Input capacitors are also upgraded. Components are selected by ear to optimize detail and low level resolution. Super low THD+N op amps allow for a very wide SFDR even with signal levels down 50dB. This preserves the signal quality of the highest grade microphones when recording soft signals, like voice, un amplified music, nature sounds and FX.

Interesting that both the super and concert mods are $650 with ground shipping.  I'm not clear what the difference is though:

The Marantz PMD 661 Concert MOD upgrade rebuilds the XLR inputs using high speed, low noise and very low distortion op amps that dramatically improve fine detail and clarity. The result is a very detailed, open 3D soundstage. Input capacitors are also upgraded. Components are selected by ear to optimize detail and imaging for recording all types of music.

The Marantz PMD 661 Super MOD upgrade rebuilds the XLR inputs using very high speed, very low noise and super low distortion op amps that dramatically improve low level detail and clarity. Input capacitors are also upgraded. Components are selected by ear to optimize detail and low level resolution. Super low THD+N op amps allow for a very wide SFDR even with signal levels down 50dB. This preserves the signal quality of the highest grade microphones when recording soft signals, like voice, un amplified music, nature sounds and FX.

Nice price though... very tempting.

edit: oh is it the 'low' versus 'very low' in the concert versus the super mod?

[digifish_music]

Super low THD+N

Well that's something that should be measurable in comparison to the original, any charts/data?

digifish

[darktrain]

Yeh, I would like to see how these run stock, the mic in on the 620 is very good and if the 661 is at least that good, no mod needed IMO, especially for louder rock like shows, and i think i saw somewhere the pre amps are vastly superior to the 660 which is why those were so popularly modded

[audBall]

I might as well add myself to this thread.    

[Colin Liston]

New mod on the Oade site:

The Marantz PMD 661 Super MOD upgrade rebuilds the XLR inputs using very high speed, very low noise and super low distortion op amps that dramatically improve low level detail and clarity. Input capacitors are also upgraded. Components are selected by ear to optimize detail and low level resolution. Super low THD+N op amps allow for a very wide SFDR even with signal levels down 50dB. This preserves the signal quality of the highest grade microphones when recording soft signals, like voice, un amplified music, nature sounds and FX.

Interesting that both the super and concert mods are $650 with ground shipping.  I'm not clear what the difference is though:

The Marantz PMD 661 Concert MOD upgrade rebuilds the XLR inputs using high speed, low noise and very low distortion op amps that dramatically improve fine detail and clarity. The result is a very detailed, open 3D soundstage. Input capacitors are also upgraded. Components are selected by ear to optimize detail and imaging for recording all types of music.

The Marantz PMD 661 Super MOD upgrade rebuilds the XLR inputs using very high speed, very low noise and super low distortion op amps that dramatically improve low level detail and clarity. Input capacitors are also upgraded. Components are selected by ear to optimize detail and low level resolution. Super low THD+N op amps allow for a very wide SFDR even with signal levels down 50dB. This preserves the signal quality of the highest grade microphones when recording soft signals, like voice, un amplified music, nature sounds and FX.

Nice price though... very tempting.

edit: oh is it the 'low' versus 'very low' in the concert versus the super mod?

Don't all of his mods basically say the same thing?  "Very low noise and super low distortion op amps"...

[Mike R.]

I'm a very satisfied customer of Mr. Oade, but I would still love to hear (or hear about!) one of these things stock.

These folks (with a little different emphasis than this forum) seem to compare it well with the PMD671.  I'm not sure if these links have shown up here yet (maybe they have!). 

http://avisoft.com/tutorial_field_recording.htm
http://avisoft.com/recordertests.htm

[ok, I see the same link from Tom R. a day or two ago]

[datbrad]

New mod on the Oade site:

The Marantz PMD 661 Super MOD upgrade rebuilds the XLR inputs using very high speed, very low noise and super low distortion op amps that dramatically improve low level detail and clarity. Input capacitors are also upgraded. Components are selected by ear to optimize detail and low level resolution. Super low THD+N op amps allow for a very wide SFDR even with signal levels down 50dB. This preserves the signal quality of the highest grade microphones when recording soft signals, like voice, un amplified music, nature sounds and FX.

Interesting that both the super and concert mods are $650 with ground shipping.  I'm not clear what the difference is though:

The Marantz PMD 661 Concert MOD upgrade rebuilds the XLR inputs using high speed, low noise and very low distortion op amps that dramatically improve fine detail and clarity. The result is a very detailed, open 3D soundstage. Input capacitors are also upgraded. Components are selected by ear to optimize detail and imaging for recording all types of music.

The Marantz PMD 661 Super MOD upgrade rebuilds the XLR inputs using very high speed, very low noise and super low distortion op amps that dramatically improve low level detail and clarity. Input capacitors are also upgraded. Components are selected by ear to optimize detail and low level resolution. Super low THD+N op amps allow for a very wide SFDR even with signal levels down 50dB. This preserves the signal quality of the highest grade microphones when recording soft signals, like voice, un amplified music, nature sounds and FX.

Nice price though... very tempting.

edit: oh is it the 'low' versus 'very low' in the concert versus the super mod?

Don't all of his mods basically say the same thing?  "Very low noise and super low distortion op amps"...

My interpretation, also considering what Doug has done with other units, is the super mod is for recording very soft level sources like nature sounds needing high gain and low noise, and the concert mod obviously for loud sources requiring less gain. The op amps for each could be different, where in the super mod they are lower noise at high gain, but may not be as ideal for high input level, low gain applications, and the reverse with the concert mod. The lower THD improvement could be equal in both mods.

[newplanet7]

How's it sound?