Recording devices (off-topic?)

[David Boyce]

I thought maybe I was going off-topic from Kent's original thread, so have 
renamed this.

Although it's not strictly a piano topic, I guess we have all wanted at 
times to make recordings of interesting pianos and so on, so perhaps it's 
tangentially related.

Gary, what I have is the Philips 785 not 765. It has a three CD changer and 
a CD recorder, and the microphone socket on the front. I think they didn't 
sell it for long.  There are one or two little oddities I think maybe they 
ironed out in later models. Occasionally the thing freezes, like a PC crash. 
I searched hard online about this, and found out that you cure it by 
swithcing the machine off at the mains. I've been very pleased with it 
otherwise.  Though, as you say, machines like this require the more 
expensive "Audio CD" format disc. I think those come with a tiny piece of 
code on 'em that makes the thing work.  It's supposed to offset the costs of 
piracy I guess.

There are plenty of digital handheld voice recorders, but up till now, 
they've not been of a quality suitable for making long, nice-quality, stereo 
recordings of pianos and other live musical performances, via stereo mics.. 
It seems to be only now that devices suitable for that are beginning to 
appear: capacity has been an issue up till now.

I do think things are beginnning to get easier.  It's like in the early days 
of digital photos - you needed special software and a firewire etc to get 
pics out of the cameras.  All a bit too much faffing around.   Then USB 
connections came along, card readers and popular data card formats like SD 
cards, and the whole thing got easier.  My cheapo DVD player (also have an 
expensive DVD recorder) has a card reader on the front, and a visitor from 
Siberia I had staying with me recently, was able to take the card out of his 
little Canon camera, slot it into the DVD player and see his pics on TV, 
without needing the PC.  So that might be a route in future: stereo 
recording devices with data cards, say SD,  that you can simply play in the 
DVD player, which of course will also play your audio CDs.

>From time to time I have met individuals who have argued that vinyl is 
superior to CD.  Well, if you have a high-end $2000 turntable and matching 
RIAA preamp, etc etc, and stable mountings, and you look aftger your LPs 
most scrupulously, then _perhaps_ there might be some special quality about 
LPs that you like, though I still don;t think it's _better_.  But for the 
ordinary domestic listening situation, CD as got to beat vinyl LPs 
hands-down, in my opinion.

Getting back to recording formats, Sony Minidisc might have been an option, 
but I am afraid it's on the way out.  To have been commerically successful, 
it would need to have succeeeded as a music _playing_ format.  But people 
were too much into the CD format to want to change, and only a handful of 
commercial recordings ever appeared on Minidisc.  Making live stereo 
recordings of accoustical sources with microphones is, I suppose, a tiny 
minority market - a market of clever, musical, intelligent people, albeit, 
but not commercialy viable. If it was a larger market, I think the next 
generation of cellphones would be able to record in high-quality stereo onto 
an SD card. That would be very handy.

Best regards,

David.

David,

Thanks for your explanation.  I, too, have a Philips CDR 765, but without
the mic jack on the front panel.  I get around the hassle of having to go
way out of my way to buy the compatible, and expensive, "Consumer" CD-R's
that cost an additional $1.00 in "royalties".  I just record on the CDR765
with the RW discs and then make a 20-cent CD-R copy of that on my PC's disc
writer.  So, what I do is an example of what you said about there being many
ways to go about making a recording these days.  Oh yeah, then I have a tiny
handheld digital voice recorder.  I have to come out of the earphone jack
into the line input of my PC (not a great impedance match but it works) to
make a permanent file of anything recorded with that.  Oh well, it is all
still way better than the old Sony open reel tape decks we had as kids.  If
you haven't listened to a Sony 250 or 350 or the like for awhile, the sound
quality may amaze you.  It is atrocious in every way!

By the way, my CDR 765 is not the best player I've had as it sometimes is
unstable when it comes to tracking.  Recording with it, though, has been
entirely trouble free.  How has yours been?

It is good to know that there is one less audiophool than I thought there
was yesterday.  Thanks again.


Gary