Are there simple line-powered MP3 recorders?

[Rich Grise]

Sure. But totally unknown in America.

Huh?
http://www.alliedelec.com/Audio-Video-Connectors/DIN-Audio-Connectors-/?N=4294965081

Cheers!
Rich

 

[Joerg]

Huh?
http://www.alliedelec.com/Audio-Video-Connectors/DIN-Audio-Connectors-/?N=4294965081

Well yeah, boutique stuff at boutique prices.

 

[Joerg]

On closer look, it doesn't look so good. Miserable non-obvious
limitations.

1) Power supply is an external 12V wall wart

2) External SD card is 512M max. You probably won't be able
to buy them that small for much longer.

3) Recording directly to SD is limited to non-MP3 format.

http://www.rolls.com/pdf/M_HR73.pdf

Badly in need of an update to SDHC and/or USB host.

Ouch. Triple ouch. I'll have to tell the guys at church. When I
mentioned it to our member who is the IT guru he really liked it.

 

[Spehro Pefhany]

Aha! Thanks. Rackmount is even better. I just wonder what they mean by
power supply, a wall wart or something a notch better. I'll show this to
the guys at church, if they want it I'll find out whether this recorder
can ignore the internal flash and go straight to removeable memory, and
what kind the supply is.

On closer look, it doesn't look so good. Miserable non-obvious
limitations.

1) Power supply is an external 12V wall wart

2) External SD card is 512M max. You probably won't be able
to buy them that small for much longer.

3) Recording directly to SD is limited to non-MP3 format.

http://www.rolls.com/pdf/M_HR73.pdf

Badly in need of an update to SDHC and/or USB host.


Best regards,
Spehro Pefhany

 

[Joerg]

Boutique? I have used them since 1970, and have never had a bad
connector from them. If you want quality, you pay for it. once.
Switchcraft makes mil spec, commercial and broadcast quality parts, not
consumer junk. I have had idiots drive over some of their XLR style
connectors, and some all metal 1/4" Phone plus & jacks that were laying
on concrete, without damaging them.

Sure. XLR is great, much better contacts than DIN usually. DIN never
made it over here and even for a cheap plastic version they often want

$3 a pop. I haven't seen them used anywhere other than on import

devices. I think they are even going lalaland in Europe now, haven't
seen a stereo from there with DIN in a long time and that's where they
were built in all the time (the 3- and 5-pin versions).

 

[[email protected]]

For our church we are looking for mains-powered (no batteries) MP3
recorders that can record up to 1.5hrs, preferably onto a USB stick. As
simple as possible, like on/off, record, stop.

I have looked around the web and only found gear from Roland which had
mixing functions and stuff that makes it too complicated, or Intempo
which is more geared towards recording from radio channels and would
probably need some hack to connect to our mixer. If this costs a few
hundred Dollars that's ok but it cannot be complicated with teeny LCD
screens and menus. In essence I'd have to be able to call someone and
say "Turns this dark gray gizmo in the left corner on and hit the red
record button", not explain a lengthy menu tree where they need a
magnifier just to see it.

IOW what we need is a cassette recorder sans cassettes, that records
onto USB. Any ideas?

I have a Zoom H2. Walwart powered, though it last a long time on just
batteries.

Here is the quick dope on the product. It has a line input, mic input,
and built in microphones. The mic input is a mini and very noisy. The
line input is excellent, but there is a caveat in that the line input
goes directly into the ADC. The digital leve control is just a post
recording scaler. The analog playback is noisy.

So here is what actually works well. Four channel recording with built
in microphones, two channel recording with built in microphones, and
line recording. It records to SDHC cards in PCM or MP3.

The unit is relatively cheap if you look around. About $150.

And for your entertainment, I did this recording:
www.lazygranch.com/sound/moo.ogg

 

[Joerg]

I have a Zoom H2. Walwart powered, though it last a long time on just
batteries.

Here is the quick dope on the product. It has a line input, mic input,
and built in microphones. The mic input is a mini and very noisy. The
line input is excellent, but there is a caveat in that the line input
goes directly into the ADC. The digital leve control is just a post
recording scaler. The analog playback is noisy.

So here is what actually works well. Four channel recording with built
in microphones, two channel recording with built in microphones, and
line recording. It records to SDHC cards in PCM or MP3.

The unit is relatively cheap if you look around. About $150.

And for your entertainment, I did this recording:
www.lazygranch.com/sound/moo.ogg

Thanks, and also thanks to all the other posters. After a hint from a
German audio engineer we have decided to purchase a Marantz PMD-580, a
bit steep at just under $1000 but it is a great allrounder. Besides
fulfilling all our requirements it has a major plus and that is being
able to schedule recordings via a LAN connection and also downloading
its recordings from remote. That's huge. This is the machine:

http://www.d-mpro.com/users/folder.asp?FolderID=4347&Tab=Data+Sheet

Otehr than that, XLR input, very large dynamic range, the works.

 

[Charlie E.]

Thanks, and also thanks to all the other posters. After a hint from a
German audio engineer we have decided to purchase a Marantz PMD-580, a
bit steep at just under $1000 but it is a great allrounder. Besides
fulfilling all our requirements it has a major plus and that is being
able to schedule recordings via a LAN connection and also downloading
its recordings from remote. That's huge. This is the machine:

http://www.d-mpro.com/users/folder.asp?FolderID=4347&Tab=Data+Sheet

Otehr than that, XLR input, very large dynamic range, the works.

Looks like a good unit! good thing I didn't see it two months ago, or
I would have used it instead of the SSCDR-1. Of course, then I would
have needed to run an ethernet cable out to the dias where the clerks
station is, and my conduit is already overfilled...

Charlie

 

[Charlie E.]

On Wed, 29 Oct 2008 09:25:28 -0700, Joerg
[snip]

http://www.d-mpro.com/users/folder.asp?FolderID=4347&Tab=Data+Sheet

Otehr than that, XLR input, very large dynamic range, the works.

Looks like a good unit! good thing I didn't see it two months ago, or
I would have used it instead of the SSCDR-1. Of course, then I would
have needed to run an ethernet cable out to the dias where the clerks
station is, and my conduit is already overfilled...

Charlie

"dias" ?

Vaya Con Dias -Chuck Berry

...Jim Thompson

So I am a dyslexic typer/speller...

Charlie

 

[[email protected]]

Thanks, and also thanks to all the other posters. After a hint from a
German audio engineer we have decided to purchase a Marantz PMD-580, a
bit steep at just under $1000 but it is a great allrounder. Besides
fulfilling all our requirements it has a major plus and that is being
able to schedule recordings via a LAN connection and also downloading
its recordings from remote. That's huge. This is the machine:

http://www.d-mpro.com/users/folder.asp?FolderID=4347&Tab=Data+Sheet

Otehr than that, XLR input, very large dynamic range, the works.

I've used the PMD660. Very nice. I'm sure the line powered unit will
be super. However, it would make recording cattle quite difficult. ;-)

For some reason, I thought you wanted the controls at hand, i.e. you
wanted a cassette replacement.

Seems to me you need to split the microphone signal, or maybe tap the
signal from the recorder in order to get it into the PA.

 

[Joerg]

I've used the PMD660. Very nice. I'm sure the line powered unit will
be super. However, it would make recording cattle quite difficult. ;-)

For some reason, I thought you wanted the controls at hand, i.e. you
wanted a cassette replacement.

You can do that with these units. The front panel is simple, has a REC
button. It looks like it just needs to be programmed correctly, once.

Seems to me you need to split the microphone signal, or maybe tap the
signal from the recorder in order to get it into the PA.

It's a mixer line-out that goes to the cassette recorder,
hearing-impaired transmitter and cry-room amp. Want to keep the
cassettes for various reasons, as backup until MP3 proves reliable and
also for people to take to shut-ins. So it'll be just one more tap ... ;-)

 

[JosephKK]

Do you remember the Tascam model? Flash isn't ideal but a lot better
than CD or having to plug the whole device into a PC. That is because a
church member does the spooling onto the web from home and would then
have to drive back to church to return the unit.

This is becoming the obvious embedded RTLinux PC project. Select your
PC104 form factor stuff, stir in the right Linux stuff and boom, it
just works.

 

[Joerg]

This is becoming the obvious embedded RTLinux PC project. Select your
PC104 form factor stuff, stir in the right Linux stuff and boom, it
just works.

Well, we just ordered a top-of-the-line Marantz recorder. Even easier:
Plug it in, turn it on, press "REC" -> works.

 

[Joerg]

When can we expect to hear the results of the new recorder on the web site?

A few weeks maybe. Some wiring will have to be re-done and I as well as
our IT pro must to do that after work. Also, the old rack needs to be
re-built and so on. Not exactly a piece of cake.

 

[Joerg]

Yes, but where is the challenge?

Right now I don't need any more challenges

Besides a few client projects I am trying to migrate to gEDA. Got it
running but the symbol editing turns out to be a real bear. Plus
learning all the Linux-speak.

 

[Charlie E.]

This is becoming the obvious embedded RTLinux PC project. Select your
PC104 form factor stuff, stir in the right Linux stuff and boom, it
just works.

No, too complicated. Instead, it is a USB enabled PIC project, with
an MP3 encoder/decoder chip to do the heavy lifting, and a decent
front end with mike/line inputs and line outputs (balanced and
unbalanced...)

Charlie

 

[Rich Grise]

A few weeks maybe. Some wiring will have to be re-done and I as well as
our IT pro must to do that after work. Also, the old rack needs to be
re-built and so on. Not exactly a piece of cake.

Maybe not, but think of the satisfaction you'll get from a job well done.



Cheers!
Rich

 

[Joerg]

Wow I admire you.
In spite of all the related posting here about geda, and I even downloaded
a complete CD some years ago with a distro + geda, I never got it to work...

Well, it does work. But a CAD program lives or dies with symbol editing
and that's where it gets a bit hokey. That is what I am working on now.
I have to migrate away from Eagle because they decided to not include a
hierarchical sheet structure in V5. So I am not going to upgrade. If
OrCad still had the robustness of SDT I'd go back there. But IME it
doesn't anymore.

I just hope this is going to be my last CAD system switch before I kick
the bucket. Because you start from zero every time, all new symbols to
edit, none of the old schematics are compatible, etc.

Many years ago, say 15 or so, kernel 0.9X, I had a command prompt,
and the only help was a book I bought about Unix in the eighties.

Then the file structure... X11, but it was so much better then DOS
with win3.1 on top, and it had a free compiler, great.
And no memory limits like DOS, and great networking.

I found the DOS file system to be much better and easier. And I ran my
last DOS in 5MB, with a multi-tasker roached onto it, mostly having
OrCad SDT, MS-Word, MS-Works, sometimes SPICE and some other stuff open
at the same time. Pretty much the same productivity as today sans the
Internet. Well, that was added later in the form of the Mosaic browser.

Today, for a similar productivity, I need >500MB.

 

[Joerg]

Maybe not, but think of the satisfaction you'll get from a job well done.

This is at church so we aren't after worldly recognition or self-pride

 

[Joerg]

Say Joerg,

Did you take a look a Kicad? If so, what did you think?

No, I haven't. One reason I tried gEDA is because it seems to have a
larger group of followers. I am not totally convinced yet because it
leans heavily on quite intricate command line action. But I want to give
it a shot. Ran into a few serious limitations already, like with
multi-section parts (U1A, U1B, etc). It does not seem to handle those
very well. So who knows ...

Have you tried it?