Hiya all, I've been lurking here for about a month trying to pick up what knowledge I can, and you guys have been a great help in giving me ideas for future taping experiments.
I've seen that few (if any) people have tried the
Belkin TuneTalk microphone adapter for the iPod, and since I got one pretty much on a whim (I had a gift certificate for the Apple store online) I've been fiddling around with it to see what sort of settings work the best... I've got a pair of Giant Squid Omnis w/ battery box and bass roll-off feeding into the TuneTalk - it's only got one switch for setting it to either mic in or line in, and with no way of checking levels on the iPod it's been a matter of guesstimating which way the switch should be... it says that the recording light on the TuneTalk blinks to let you know if it's clipping, but I've covered mine with electrical tape to be even less of a giveaway. So far I've only done a handful of recordings to see how it works in different situations, but nothing that I think is decent enough to share (yet!). I do have some observations with this setup, though:
1st recording: Driving around with some friends, using the built-in microphone set to mic in... good levels for normal conversational volume, battery lasted about 90 minutes on high-quality recording for about a half-charge on the iPod.
2nd recording: "Zappa Plays Zappa" concert, Warner Theater, Washington DC
This show I recorded from mid-balcony with just the built-in microphone on the TuneTalk set to mic in... odd static (due to clipping, i suppose), kinda hard to hear at parts, but better than I expected for the built-in microphones for my location in the theater. Battery died after about 2 1/2 hours with a close to (if not) full charge.
3rd recording: Piano bar (Howl at the Moon), Baltimore, MD
There's two pianos set up on stage next to each other, with speakers set to the left, center, and right above the stage, and me sitting front and center. Used the Giant Squid omnis clipped to the collar of my jacket draped on the chair behind me, with the TuneTalk set to mic in... static due to clipping, battery died again after about 2 1/2 hours.
4th recording: Piano bar (same location)
Sat off to the left of the stage, same setup except the mics were clipped to the bottom of my jacket and on a higher bar-stool type chair... more audience noise than #3 due to not being so close to the speakers. First recording set to line in, and that seems to have taken care of the clipping... did a normalize on the audio and turned out fine for the most part. Stopped recording before battery died, recorded about 90 minutes on full charge.
5th recording: Steve Wozniak presentation / book signing, Washington, DC
Small bookstore, sitting in center about 5 or 6 rows back... the bookstore had a microphone set up at the podium with the audio piped through the store's in-ceiling speakers, and my mics were clipped to the sides of my jacket on my chair and faced forwards and up. Recorded as line in and lasted just under 2 hours on full charge, stopping before battery died. Had forgotten to turn the battery box on, so all I got was about 2 hours of silence.
Really sad too since I would have liked to listen to his presentation again as he's a very entertaining speaker.
After all that I got to thinking about the battery box and realized I didn't know too much about it other than the fact that it's got a battery in there and an on/off switch. What kind of usage can I expect to get out of this thing before the battery needs replacing? Would it be ok to leave the battery box on all the time (does it continue to supply power to the mics even when they're not plugged into a line in jack), or would it just drain the battery? Any suggestions for remembering to turn the battery box off/on as needed? I keep forgetting to turn it off and remember it an hour or so later.
The actual recordings last ~1 gig = 90 minutes, or around 1.2-1.5 gigs for 2 1/2 hours, so being able to record direct to the iPod's hard drive is very nice... the only problem is with the hard drive constantly writing it's using up all of the iPod's battery. However, I do have an idea for the iPod's battery lasting only about 2 1/2 hours or so at a full charge (the Belkin's manual says that you'd get just under 3 hours under perfect circumstances)...the
Minty Boost USB battery box would be perfect, giving about another 3 hours of use... (you wouldn't be able to use something like the
TuneJuice from Griffin since the TuneTalk is already connected via the dock connector... BUT the TuneTalk DOES have a mini USB port and comes with a USB -> mini USB cable so you can still have it connect to your computer and get power while connected, so all that would be needed would be a Minty Boost power charger and connect that to the TuneTalk/iPod via the USB/mini USB cable!)
Hopefully I'll be able to get some more recordings with this experimented out and can post some examples for review! Though I'm going to see The Who this weekend, I'd be too nervous about sneaking my gear in to do a stealth recording when they're already releasing CDs/DVDs of all of their tour performances and I've already asked for one for Christmas.
Let me know if you've got any questions and I'll see what I can do to answer them!
Topic: Experimentations with the Belkin TuneTalk, and Battery Box Blues (Read 5510 times)