Thanks to the list for your opinions, I will keep your
recommendations in mind as I progress with the project.
1GDW, Gerald White
--- In Walter Knapp <>
wrote:
> Klas Strandberg wrote:
>
> > When I tried two omnis without a barrier I got some kind of
stereo of what
> > was happening far away and no stereo of ambience. I didn't like
it.
<SNIP>
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>From Tue Mar 8 18:23:29 2005
Message: 16
Date: Mon, 10 Mar 2003 18:51:53 -0800
From: "Martyn Stewart" <>
Subject: RE: Going digital.
There you go Walt, I just got in and read both e-mails, I looked at my
user manual and found what Matt said to be consistent, Thanks for the
sonogram info, I think it was just the recordings so what I will do is
record with the 2 machines and use the same microphone for your
information, I agree with all Matt said so he helped me with a bit of
homework, I will say this Walt, you are totally methodical in what you
do and a totally interesting Bloke to know, I wish there were a load of
people like you here to learn off, you old dog!!! I'll put the
recordings up soon mate, but let me have my dinner first, I'm starving
:-)
Martyn
-----Original Message-----
From: Walter Knapp
Sent: Monday, March 10, 2003 1:18 PM
To:
Subject: Re: [Nature Recordists] Going digital.
wrote:
> I don't think the Marantz has the 6 second prerecord. That's a
extremely
> valuable feature found on the Portadisc.
>
>
> The Marantz PMD650 does have pre-record, although it's only 2 seconds.
One
> of the other main distinguishing factor between ours and the Portadisc
is
> that we constantly update the TOC ( every 2 seconds ) so in the event
of
> anything bad happening, you should only lose two seconds of audio. We
also
> have a 20 second buffer to reduce the likelihood of shock damage etc.
The Portadisc seems to be keeping the TOC in non volatile memory. Even
pulling the battery during record won't hurt you. It will write the TOC
as soon as power is restored.
The Portadisc does appear to be buffering the record, though I've not
seen a spec on just how long. I assume it's using the same memory as it
does for the prerecord, probably a bit more.
Minidisc is so reliable, for either machine, I think it would be awfully
rare this becomes important.
> I'd wondered about the quality, because the MD and solid state marantz
> look so similar I was wondering if they were recycling internal
circuits.
>
> Not at all. There are no circuits an MD and Solid State recorder could
> share, as the board layouts are totally different.
It's more the external appearance that gives this impression.
> Signal to noise ratio:
> HHb Portadisc - 89dB
> PMD-650 - 90dB
> PMD-690 - 80dB
> Wonder what went funny with the PMD-690, that says it's a fair amount
> noisier.
>
> This is incorrect - I don't know where these figures have come from
but
> the signal to noise figures I have from our test labs, and which we
use in
> all our promotional material in Europe is 85dB for the PMD690.
They are from the pdf Owner's manual copy of the Marantz Pro US site.
Thanks for the correction. It did look odd.
> Power consumption on record:
> HHb Portadisc - 4.5w
> PMD-650 - 5.5w
> PMD-690 - 5.2w (and note when turned off it's still consuming power)
>
> These are also incorrect. Power consumption is 5w on the 690. The
reason
> it consumes power when it's turned off is to keep the realtime clock
chip
> charged and up to date ( when creating files the time and date is in
the
> file header so this is necessary ) . The current is so small that the
> power drain shouldn't be noticeable. Obviously if the battery is
v.flat
> this will rise, but in normal use it's negligible. Having the digital
> output circuit switched on also increases power drain, so if you don't
use
> it turn it off.
This also was from the same Owner's manual.
Yes, the power use when off is small. 10mw if I remember correctly. I
expected it was the clock.
The same is true on the Portadisc, as far as digital output. It should
be turned off when not needed.
> With regards to the statements floating around about battery life, the
> battery lifetime in both PMD650 and 690 is much longer using our own
NiCad
> or NiMH battery packs, rather than standard alkali.
The same owner's manual lists the alkalines as providing 1 1/2 to 2 1/2
hours, and the NiCad battery pac as providing 1 1/2 to 2 hours. It did
not list a NiMH pac. I assumed that it should be longer for NiMH, with
the only question if it runs ok on using regular AA NiMH or if you would
need a special pac. It's preferable if special pacs can be avoided.
If that owners manual has that many errors in it, it should probably be
revised. Unless the european machines and the US ones are different.
> We will be launching a 2nd gen solid state recorder at the AES in
> Amsterdam, the week after next. Can't say too much obviously but does
the
> idea of using media up to 10gb sound interesting ( 12hours of
uncompressed
> stereo, with days worth of broadcast quality compressed audio ... ) ?
Looking forward to hearing more.
> That's ok, I'm downloading the pictures of the Marantz for my files
> right now. The idiots! Some are jpeg, high quality, but some are tiff
>
> If you use the Marantz Pro Europe site (
> www.marantz.com/pro/europe/index.html ) , the images are all properly
> scaled jpeg ( and in fact there are a selection of sizes available ).
Full
> product sheets and the user manuals are also available as pdf. I don't
> administer the US site so I really can't comment on whether they are
> idiots or not !!
For those of us who use modems (that's my only economic choice where I
live), putting up that mixture amounts to idiots. It was the US site.
One tiff alone took me 25 minutes to download.
I see this problem a lot, the assumption that everyone has high speed
connections is wrong. I have seen this sort of thing more commonly from
US sites than other parts of the world.
> If anyone wants information about the Marantz range, I do subscribe to
> this list so please feel free to ask.. there seems to be an awful lot
of
> conjecture floating around in threads like this ..........
Keep watching, the subject comes up a lot. And it is hard to get some of
the info. Nature recording is not a big market so the things that
interest us sometimes don't get good coverage in promotional stuff.
Walt
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