Topic: Zoom H1 XLR 32bit Handy Recorder announced on Aug. 8 2024

[Ozpeter]

Ozpeter, any news on yours shipping to you?

BHPhoto says H! XRL will be in stock  mid October.

As mentioned above, they told me it can't be shipped to Australia.  Then a couple of days ago they sent me another message saying that there is still a delay in despatch.  So... heaven, and Amazon, only knows. 

[rastasean]

Looks like the recorder is now shipping via amazon: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DBLF9PVF

[Ozpeter]

Today my bank told me that Amazon Japan have now charged my account $215AU for this device despite them saying the order was cancelled.  Their site says the order is being prepared and delivery date is not yet known.  Well, although I could probably cancel the order, I'll see what happens.  I can't complain at the price...

[Ozpeter]

And now DHL say my device should arrive on Friday!  Delivery cost was included in the price.  I will try to get some kind of review with samples up on YouTube as soon as I can - if anyone has any requests let me know - I will try to demonstrate real-world dynamic range / self noise as best I can, very likely using a Sennheiser MKH MS rig.  No, it doesn't support MS monitoring but there's nothing to stop MS recording of course.  I will also make a list of the interesting ancillary features from the manual and try to show them in use.  As far as I remember, the last device I bought with XLR inputs was a Tascam DR40 recorder, the original version before the mark 2 came out.  And I've never used it...

[rastasean]

Nice, I bet you're anxious to get this in your hands to try out during the weekend.

Maybe a some ideas of tests to run - how long does the battery last; external power - does internal battery get used first or external power; how does it work connecting to mobile device and computer; power on time; can you adjust levels during recording?

Thanks for any of these you're willing to do.

[Ozpeter]

Sure, Rastascan, I will do my best to cover those questions as soon as I can.  Sadly my personal life is kind of complicated at the moment and I'm living daily in two houses 50km apart, so I am going to have to review the device here are (later) on YouTube in a fragmentary fashion. 

Anyway - it's arrived, quite possibly being the first to get to Australia (it's not on sale here yet).

I haven't even had a chance to turn it on yet, but before I take that significant and necessary step, here are some initial reactions and observations.

Firstly - it's tiny.  If I put it down on my mobile phone, the phone is about 30% bigger (Pixel 7).  Of course it's fatter (deeper).  Generally it's kind of the size of my PC mouse.  Probably the size is dictated by the XLR connectors and the batteries.  It weighs hardly anything.  It's chunky angular shape actually goes well in the hand.  It seems hard to drop.  And actually it has a lanyard strap hole. Underneath it has chunky rubber feet, and on my wooden dining table it really, really doesn't want to slip and slide. XLR cables are unlikely to make it move around even though it is so light.

The kind of downside of the size is that the controls are miniscule and I can cover all the transport controls with one thumb. But having said that, when using an index finger on them they are spaced sufficiently that I would not expect misoperation to happen.  Likewise the display is tiny too   That can disappear under my flat index finger.  Perhaps this is why they have gone to so much trouble with voice assist for those with limited or no eyesight.  I might need that myself even with my strongest glasses on!  But bear in mind I haven't seen it illuminated yet. 

The press button controls only move a tiny bit.  The record button is slightly recessed, which is good as it is also the stop button.  There is a traditional "hold" switch.  The switches for things like input selection and suchlike feel a bit kind of flimsy but they are also very small. 

Overall I can't help in my mind comparing it with the reel to reel recorders of my youth, which I could hardly lift, and whose quality would probably be blown away by this tiny device.  I have seen a lot of technical progress in my 60+ years of sound reccording!

Next I will insert batteries, turn it on, and do the initial setup.  (That stuff has already been covered by Zoom official videos on YouTube so I won't describe it in detail).

Watch this space....

[Ozpeter]

MicroSD card slot seems fine, I mean the door.  No complaints there.  Battery door is eaay to open quickly but snaps shut with a positive feel.

And it's on.  The display couldn't be smaller and still be usable.  I have to use my strongest reading glasses.  But it's ok, bright and contrasty - just... small.  Menu item selection is quick and easy and fingers seem to fall naturally onto the right buttons.  Only comment so far is that there is a setting to turn off phantom power on both inputs, but it seems necessary then to turn it back on one input at a time.  A toggle would have been more intuitive.

Boot time is something like 6 seconds.

Next test, connecting a mic.  A stereo one.  Superlux S502, original version, not modified, not ever used since I bought it about 10 years ago.  It's all I could bring from the other house where all my gear is.  But tomorrow I plan to do some more serious tests using a Sennheiser MS pair, MKH30/40.  No, the recorder does not (yet?) support MS playback but that doesn't stop MS recording of course.  That test will be a case of using a $219 recorder to record a $5000 mic rig (AU dollars).  It will be interesting!  But the Superlux is perhaps a value-for-money mic being used with a value for money recorder.

[Ozpeter]

OK, first test recordings made in domestic situation.  But that's ok, I can tell a fair bit from that.  Overall I have no adverse comments to make at all.  I took it for a walk into the almost windless garden but of course with a decent mic, "almost" doesn't work.  The gentle air movement was enough to cause to distinct rumble - but it was pretty bassy rumble.  Next I walked up to the tumble drier and turned that on - which makes a dinging sound or two before it gets going - and then recorded its rumbly sound from about an inch away.  Then I left it running while walking to the far end of the house.  Playing back with the headphone level as loud as I cared to have it, I could hear no system noise, and no distortion.  But bear in mind that I'm 75 and my ability to hear high frequencies is compromised.  The headphones I was using were Sennheiser SD25-1 II cans and the available monitoring and playback level in those was fine even without normalising the volume, which can be done in the device. 

[This paragraph is totally wrong!  You DO get two separate mono files when reccording two mono inputs]  There were two unexpected things.  Firstly when the input it set to two mono inputs, you don't get two mono files - you get one, a mix of the two inputs into one mono file, via the mixer facility which specifies their relative balance.  I completely misunderstood that.  If you want stereo, you have to set it to... stereo.  Embarrasingly I gave someone on YouTube some really wrong advice about this which I will have to correct.

The other unexpected thing was a channel reversal situation, which I thought might be to do with the Zoom, but having checked further, the red connector from the Superlux is the left channel, not the right channel as I would normally expect.  Nothing to do with the Zoom.

I have also tested the built in normalise function.  This seems slow compared to that function on the Zoom M2 and M3 devices, but that's subjective.  I will look into that in more detail in due course.  This could reflect the processing power of the CPU of the device, which being very cheap might not have a lot of grunt.  Dunno...  Playing the normalised file at volume setting of 70 / 100, with these cans, was plenty loud enough.  Once again, I could hear no noise artifacts, nor distortion.

Overall feeling at this point, albeit probably premature, is that this miniscule device can record just as well as anything I used in my days as a classical music recording engineer, recording live events and CDs.  As memory serves me I started with a hired F1/SLF1 setup, then moved to Sony DAT machines, of which I think I had one of the first 50 in the UK.  Then I went to Sony portable DAT, and from there to HHB Portadat.  Then to Roland R-44 unless I'm forgetting something in between. . I don't think this Zoom would be significantly more noisy than any of those devices, and these days you can expect a flat frequency response from just about anything.  But if I now came out of retirement and turned up to a gig with this mouse sized device as the recorder, I could imagine the client would fall about laughing. And then walk out...  Unless they actually heard some rehearsal playback.

Please note that I am not saying it's the greatest, of course it isn't, but I'm just reflecting how the size and price point has got to a place I would never have dreamed of back in the day.

Tomorrow I have about four hours spare, at my house with all my other gear, and I hope to be able to upload something so that you can say, "Man, are you totally deaf?"  But hopefully not...

[Ozpeter]

And I am 95% certain that I can mount the Sennheiser MS pair direct to the H1 XLR device, no cables needed, to make a one-piece rig that could be put up in front of any acoustic ensemble to make a remarkably good fuss free recording...  I guess a USB power supply at the bottom of the mic stand would be prudent but still, it would be very simple.

[Ozpeter]

Other features I like -

The low cut cutoff frequency can be set to OFF, 80 Hz, 160 Hz or 240 Hz.

Output level to another device, eg camera, can be set as a fixed value which disables the volume control.  It can be set from −40 to +40.  It can be set using a built in tone generator.  The test tone is a 1kHz sine wave at -20 dBFS.

The recorder can output a sync tone at the start of each recording to assist in syncing to a video camera.   Poor man's timecode...

If you are recording your own performance you can set a delayed start.  The following times can be selected. Off, 3 sec, 5 sec, 10 sec   Just make sure it's set to "off" for live performance recording!

Alternatively the recorder can be set to start up to an hour after the record button is pressed, in one minute increments. This could be handy if you want to use the recorder at the foot of a mic stand unattended in a concert situation.  Set the timer before the audience comes in.

"Files are automatically saved at regular intervals during recording. If the power is interrupted or another problem occurs during recording, an affected file can be restored to normal by turning on the power again."

The device uses a trash folder for deleted files, in case you delete something you actually needed...

Normalising - If a recording continued for a long time and was split into multiple files, the volume will be adjusted based on the maximum level of all files in the series.  Handy.

You can feed a suitable USB device with a 32 bit stream to back up the recording in real time entirely in the digital domain.

[adrianb]

And I am 95% certain that I can mount the Sennheiser MS pair direct to the H1 XLR device, no cables needed, to make a one-piece rig that could be put up in front of any acoustic ensemble to make a remarkably good fuss free recording...  I guess a USB power supply at the bottom of the mic stand would be prudent but still, it would be very simple.

For some time I’ve been hoping for some 120 degree (or adjustable) XLR adapters to appear so I can do this with my MKH8040 mics.

Do you know what the PIP voltage of the H1 is?

[rastasean]

Thanks for your thoughts on the recorder. How do you like the menu system?

[Ozpeter]

Plug-in power2.5 V according to the manual.   I have yet to try that input.  Maybe tomorrow... meanwhile I have done the MKH30/40 direct connect test and indeed it works very well.  What a weird thing to be able to turn those mics into a one piece hand held recording rig!  I had to use two 90 degree adapters to separate the mics -both adapters on one mic - the other connected via a male to female adapter - without the right angle ones they were too close, touching.  With the adapters they were probably too far apart to satisfy purists but it sounded good to me.  The capsules were in line though.  I had to turn the raw MS into XY using the DAW but that was the work of a moment.  Then I normalised the result.  The test involved putting on loud music and holding the mics right up to the speakers.  Then walking out of the room into a different one, and from there turning off the speakers remotely to provide a silent contrast.  To check it, I had to find a really quiet spot in the house to play it on headphones turned up loud.  I heard no distortion (and using the DAW I zoomed right in to the waveform at its peak to verify), and I heard no noise apart from house noise.  The only caveat being my questionable hearing.  I will do my best to turn that experiment or another into a YouTube video in the morning and will link here. 

[Ozpeter]

Thanks for your thoughts on the recorder. How do you like the menu system?

It's fine, very intuitive in use.  Because the buttons are so close together there's no point in looking at them, so I can just focus on the screen.  I noticed one thing that was odd, just a couple of options reversed in one context compared to another one but that was of no consequence.  When making selections the buttons have very little travel but at the same time they have enough resistance to avoid misoperation.

Overall my only gripe with the device is lack of MS decode support, which I am sure would be no big deal for them to add, but unless they see a demand I don't suppose they will bother.

I've never used a 32 bit float device with mic inputs before, but just on the basis of my tests I don't see any need to want to change the levels.  Somehow it seems just fine.  I guess it helps that the headphone output is reasonably beefy, so you can change the level on replay easily that way, or while monitoring.  I might do some tests though to see what happens if you use the mixer screen to jack up the level to the max - will it overload?  Probably not.  I hope my neighbours will tolerate the loud music I will be playing tomorrow....

[Ozpeter]

Here's my video "review" which I had to do in a great hurry.  (This is on my non-monetized channel and I paid for the device with my own money).

https://youtu.be/u-uYC7cIbR4

I'd be interested in any opinions of course.  What I do need to re-test is the noise level when I'm not holding the sensitive mics in my hand.  I strongly suspect that the slight rumble comes from my blood and muscles but I do need to prove that.  I will report as soon as I can, but any further testing may be a day or two away, unfortunately.