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In Reply to: Small system for taking oral histories posted by Cafe Jeff on March 19, 2002 at 11:18:19:
Hi Cafe Jeff,I'm not sure what about minidisc recorders bothers you. Have you listened to a recording made on one yet? I use a Sharp minidisc recorder both for personal portable sound (copied from CD's) and for live recording of musical performances and concerts. There is some loss of high frequency response above 16 KHz, but the fidelity is very good and the editing capabilities are great. I looked at all the available portable recording options 2 years ago when I bought my minidisc and it was the best alternative I could find then. Some things have changed (DAT has become less viable, MP3 solid state recordings more viable).
The realistic alternatives for compact, simple field recordings that I know of are:
Cassette
PRO's: Low cost, easy to find media. Simple technology, can find play back gear everywhere.
CON's: Good quality portable recorders are hard to find and expensive ($500 up), cheap recorders have very poor sound quality. Mid-Fi sound quality at best. Editing requires multiple decks. Serial acess to recordings (fast forward, rewind), limited search capabilities. Poor battery life. Relatively short recording time. 120 minute possible, but 90 minute tapes are more reliable. Little cool factor. No easy way to rip sounds at high speed into a PC, requires real time playback.
DAT
PRO's: Great sound quality. Medium sized (paperback book size). Some versions are able to directly accept XLR mic inputs. Good search capabilities (track markers). Digital PCM recording, no multi-generational signal degeneration. Professional image, major cool factor. Flexible recording formats permit optimisation for sound quality or recording length.
CON's: Reliability poor (high maintenance, requires expensive adjustments/cleanings). Very high cost, portable recorders are aimed at journalists ($1000 and up). Long term storage of DAT tapes is problematical, not appropriate for archival use. Media is expensive and usually only available via mailorder. Serial acess to recordings (have to fast forward, rewind). Editing in recorder comparable to Cassettes (tape based). Limited availability of playback equipment (except in studio).
MiniDisc
PRO's: Very good sound quality. Can be extremely compact. Relatively inexpensive ($200-300) portable recorders. Editing in recorder is very flexible (can cut, move, merge sections. Random access to recordings (it's like a PC disk, plus you can easily reorganise the recordings without a second machine). Great search capability. Low cost media ($1.25 mail order). Long battery life (up to 30 hours per charge). Very flexible recording time options, 74 minutes high quality stereo, 148 minutes high quality mono, and up to 320 minutes of lower quality mono (basically good for spoken voice). pretty decent cool factor (the recording NEO sold the guy at the beginning of the Matrix was on a Minidisc).
CON's: Media has limited availability (Best Buy, Circuit City or mail order). Lossy recording technology, multi-generational signal degeneration. Dwindling popularity in USA, but strongly supported in Europe and Japan (media will remain available, long term prospects for gear less certain in USA). Limits availability of playback equipment. Home and studio decks are available for purchase (and home decks are a steal right now price wise), but are usually only found in PRO sound systems (your church may use one, numerous music acts use them to play back prerecorded tracks during concerts). No easy way to rip sounds at high speed into a PC, requires real time playback.
MP3 Recorders
PRO's: So-so to good sound quality (tops out as Mid-Fi). Can be very reliable (no moving parts). Very long battery life (FLASH based). Great editing capabilities possible (haven't seen it demonstrated yet, most systems assume PC is editor). Hot trend, likely to improve dramatically in future. High speed upload/download to PC possible (potentially one of the best features).
CON's: Lossy recording technology, multi-generational signal degeneration (even worse than Minidisc). If flash based, then incredible high cost per minute. Hard drive recorders much more viable, but physically larger and more expensive ($400). Smaller recorders usually limited to 32 M-Byte or 64 M-Byte. Until hard drive recorders shrink, limited applicability to portable recording use.
If I was looking for a recorder for oral history with some musical recording capability I would strongly consider a Minidisc portable recorder. In the future I expect that MP3 recorders will supplant Minidisc, but for at least the next few years Minidisc is likely to remain your best option, especially if you don't have a large budget for this item. The small journalist's DAT recorders are cool, but if you don't have a service department to keep them going I don't expect you would get great service from them (they don't like dust).
Phil
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Follow Ups
- Re: Small system for taking oral histories - Haldor 18:21:24 03/19/02 (1)
- Re: Small system for taking oral histories - Cafe Jeff 11:30:06 03/21/02 (0)
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