Klarinet Archive - Posting 000090.txt from 2002/08

From: "Benjamin Maas" <benmaas@-----.com>
Subj: RE: [kl] please: your advise on recording equipment
Date: Tue, 6 Aug 2002 00:23:39 -0400

Boy, I go away for a few weeks on vacation and a big ol' thread on recording
pops up... Anyways, I apologize for coming in to this thread late and I hope
I've read most of the previous posts from the archives.

A search through the archives will tell many about my views on recording and
quality versus what is popular. First of all, there is a bit of a
misunderstanding on some technology below.

> -----Original Message-----
> From: schiffer@-----.edu
>
>
> On Sat, 3 Aug 2002, Jeroen T. Salm wrote:
>
> > I have searched on the internet. The Nomad Creative (III) is (indeed)
> > (almost 500 dollars/Euros) a hell of a machine. But: in the newsgroup
> > of Creative "they" mention that recording by microphone isn't working
> > alright (you don't have vu-meters for instance to adjust the recording
> > level), lots of difficulties with long recordings, and problems finding
> > the good combination microphone... what setup (mike) do you have, and
> > what is the result? As good as DAT? You can by a Nomad Creative
> > microphone, but that is just for speech (quality)...
>
> It is true that there are not vu-meters for the nomad - this is why you
> need to have everything amplified and mixed before it reaches the nomad. I
> don't actually own any recording equipment, at this time, so I just end up
> plugging the Nomad into other people's equipment; one setup was two shure
> mics hooked into a Mac laptop, and I just went line-out from the laptop
> (I don't know what software he was using to do the recording on the
> machine).

*****The quality is as good as DAT and better than MD (because MD is
> compressed). *******

First of all, if this is the Nomad recorder/player that I'm familiar with
(made by Creative Labs), it records MP3 which is really no better than
Minidisc. It is a different compression scheme, but it is by no means
lossless compression (like MLP which is used for DVD Audio). As for the VU
meter issue... just because you go in line level doesn't mean you won't
clip. To protect the recording from distorting, it most likely has a heavy
compressor to make sure things don't get too loud. Yes, that also means
that if you are recording yourself with this, your dynamics you worked so
hard on just disappeared.

> I've never done any recording longer than about two hours,
> but you may have trouble if you don't have ample RAM or disk space on your
> machine, as the .wav files are rather large, and require a lot of memory
> to manipulate.

(I'll touch on this a bit later...)

> I hope this helps,
>
> jeremy

There are several digital formats to which you can make a reasonably good
recording. The deciding factor is 90% price. All formats are available in
professional and consumer, portable and non-portable versions. The portable
ones will run on batteries whereas the non-portable ones require a plug to
operate. Most of the portable ones also have some sort of a direct
microphone input.

Anyways Formats and options:

DAT- Yes, tapes are expensive but it is still one of the best 16 bit
recording formats out there. I buy 24 bit multi-track tapes for about what
DATs cost (and I can reuse them) for my professional use. Sony still makes
a portable unit. It is called TCD-100 (or M1 is a similar unit). If you
want something better quality, go for the Tascam DA-P1 which has a couple of
microphone preamps in it for "real" microphones (as opposed to a stereo mic
with a 3.5mm jack). It is much more expensive, though. For table
top/rackmount non portable use, go for something pro like the Sony R500 DAT.
With these [pro] decks you have many options for audio I/O both digital and
analog.

MD- I consider MD a replacement for cassettes. Same quality, slightly
better functionality. Sound is usually really bad due to poor analog to
digital converters and often heavy compression to keep people from recording
too high of a level (especially the Sharp ones). Not to mention that even
if you go in digitally, the compression does a pretty decent job of screwing
up the sound as well.

MP3- I haven't seen a player that can take a microphone, but MP3 is still
compressed audio. With a cheap player/recorder, there is only so much
quality you can get. MPEG 1, Layer 3 is a old lossy audio compression
scheme. What does this mean? It means that what you record into it is not
what you get out when you play back. Lossless compression (like Meridian
Lossless Packaging-ie DVD Audio) will give you exactly what you put into it
even after compression.

CD- CD is of the same quality as DAT. 16 bit audio that is uncompressed.
Generally the converters in CD recorders are also a bit better quality than
similar MD or MP3 recorders. I would recommend the "pro" CD recorders by
Tascam, HHB/Fostex or other companies as they don't require "music" CDRs.
For those who don't know, music CDRs are identical to the data ones, but a
fee has been paid to the RIAA to make up for lost sales due to copying.
Consumer recorders usually won't accept discs to record on if they haven't
been encoded for music use. Pro recorders, though, are different. They can
record on anything. A couple months ago, Marantz Pro has finally came out
with a portable CD recorder(the CDR300). It is not very big and has 2
microphone preamps built into it for use with "real" microphones.

There are a lot of other high-end recorders out there, but they will start
at roughly $1500 and can go as high as $25000 for some... If anybody is
really interested in these, they won't need my recommendations off of the
internet :-P

That covers recorders... What are you going to use for a microphone though?
With the cheap consumer players with a 3.5mm mini plug, you can purchase a
Sony stereo microphone that runs on batteries for about $100. If you want a
bit better quality, get the Audio Technica AT822.

In some of the descriptions, I referred to "real" microphones. By that I
meant mics that you'd most likely find in a studio. With these, the sky is
really the limit as to what you can spend. You'd want to use condenser
microphones that have to plug into a preamp that can power the microphone
and bring the level up to what your recorder can use. The preamp can be
either an outboard preamp or part of a mixing board like a Mackie 1202. A
mixing board will give you the option for plugging in multiple mics and EQ
each input. Microphones I'd recommend for this start with the Shure SM-81
at the low end of price (roughly $250/each and you need 2) or perhaps even
the MarshallMXL 2001 (at under $200) to the Sennheiser MKH 800 at the higher
end (roughly $2500 each).

The reason why pro recordings of your favorite player sound good is because
of the level of expertise of the engineer and the quality of his/her
equipment. When I record a client, I'll use equipment that costs many
thousands of dollars, but that is what is required to get the sound I'm
looking for.a

Today, with computer technology being so good and cheap, hard disc recording
is getting quite popular. You are still limited to the same digital issues
as with the older (tape based) technology. If you have bad converters or a
bad microphone, your sound won't be good. Space requirements for hard disc
work: 16 bit 44.1 KHz recording (the bit and sample rate for a CD) is
roughly 10 megabytes per minute for stereo files. 24 bit raises it to
closer to 15 megs/minute. 24 bit 96 KHz recording (for DVD-Audio and a much
higher fidelity) is around 20MB/min for stereo.

Windows media also has an issue with files that are 2GB or more or more than
16 bits. If you need this, you'll need to use a professional recording
program that is specifically made to bypass these issues. Macintosh does
not have these file size limitations.

Hope this helps a bit...

--Ben

Benjamin Maas
Freelance Clarinetist and Recording Engineer
Los Angeles, CA
benmaas@-----.com
http://www.fifthcircle.com

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