EQ Magazine - September 2008 - (Page 54)

TASCAM DR-1 ($399, WWW.TASCAM.COM) While a little bulkier than, say, the MicroTrack II or H2, the front panel buttons make for good targets, and there’s plenty of room on the sides of the casing for connectors. I/O is one 1/8" stereo jack (with plug-in power) for external Mic 1, 1/4" jack for external Mic 2, 1/8" stereo line in, and 1/8" stereo line/headphones out. The battery is user-replaceable and you can buy several if you’re concerned about running out of juice; the battery recharges via USB or an optional AC adapter. The mics can rotate 90 degrees as a pair, which is useful if you want to change the mic direction depending on whether the unit is standing up or lying down. What it does best: For starters, the DR-1 comes with a 1GB SD cartridge, which saves you a few bucks but it also accepts up to 32GB SD HC cards—that’s a lot of memory. It’s very musician-oriented, with not just dynamics control while recording, but the ability to overdub onto an existing recording—this is a killer feature for songwriters who want to add, say, a harmony to a vocal or lead guitar part on top of a rhythm part. And because the original file is not overwritten, you can keep overdubbing; every time you overdub, it generates a new file with the mix of the original file and the overdub. Other musician-friendly features include time stretching (change speed while keeping pitch constant, or vice-versa), center-channel cancel to zap vocals, loop playback, effects you can apply while recording (seven reverbs, treble boost, chorus, autopan, lo-fi), tuner (chromatic and pitch), and metronome. Limitations: As with units having built-in mics, placement is crucial although like the other units, you can use external mics if needed. And while only one other recorder has a highimpedance input for guitar, given the overdubbing capabilities I was hoping the DR-1 would have an instrument input; it doesn’t. Finally, while the mics do rotate, they don’t have the same flexibility as some other offerings. Bottom line: TASCAM is synonymous with “musician-friendly,” and that philosophy permeates the DR-1. Besides, if you want to do overdubs, it’s your only choice; I’d consider this the top pick for songwriters. YAMAHA POCKETRAK 2G ($450, WWW.YAMAHA.COM) When you open up the box, you can’t help but wonder where the rest of the recorder is—the Pocketrak 2G is the smallest, slickest, and lightest of all the recorders covered here. If you’re going undercover and want to record something without anyone knowing it, this is the one to choose. But what do you give up in return? Well, not much. The 2GB of internal memory is nonremovable/replaceable, and the I/O is limited. But that’s pretty much it. It even has a retractable, full-size USB connector so that in a pinch, you can plug it directly into a computer and you don’t need to carry an extra cable. What it does best: Not only is it so portable there’s no excuse not to carry it on you at all times, the battery will probably be up to the task as well: The Pocketrak 2G comes with an AAA “eneloop” rechargeable battery that gives about 19 hours of stereo recording time (assuming the backlight is off). That’s phenomenal, but a standard AAA alkaline battery gives even longer recording time— about 25 hours. Yes, we definitely have a candidate here for the 54 EQ SEPTEMBER 2008 www.eqmag.com http://WWW.TASCAM.COM http://WWW.YAMAHA.COM http://www.cadmic.com http://www.eqmag.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of EQ Magazine - September 2008

EQ Magazine - September 2008 Contents Talk Box Sounding Board Punch In Freak Folk Todd Rundgren Guitar Trax Bass Management Key Issues Drum Heads Vocal Cords Mix Bus Cheat Sheet Sony Acid 6 Ableton Live 7 Portable Recorder Showdown Gadgets and Goodies Sounds Room with a Vu

EQ Magazine - September 2008

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