"Lindsay Cargill" wrote:
>I have narrowed down flash recorders to :
>
> TASCAM HD-P2
> MARANTZ PMD671
> FOSTEX FR-2
>
Battery life is short when recording with these three. 2 to 3 hours
is all you can reasonably expect from a set of rechargeable AAs. If
you run the batteries to exhaustion, you can damage them so they don't
hold as much charge. It's a pain to have to keep track of battery
level. Some sort of external battery is the best solution if you plan
to be on the go all day.
One web forum that has a lot of information about the Tascam and
Marantz is the Recording Gear forum at www.taperssection.com There
are over 600 posts about the PMD671, close to 80 asking which is
better, and fewer about the HD-P2 alone. The participants are concert
tapers, so the information is not always germane to nature recording,
but I've found lots of useful information there.
The taperssection.com forum on battery power is a great source for
information and links to good deals.
I've used a PMD670, the original Marantz digital recorder, and the
PMD671 has considerably better preamps. The Taperssection
contributors are happy with the PMD671, and they are ecstatic about
the PMD671 with modifications from Doug Oade. The Tascam preamps are
on a par with the stock PMD671. The Fostex FR-2 is maybe a bit better
(in my opinion), but it's a lot more expensive.
I'm really interested in the new Fostex FR-2 LE model, which is a
smaller and cheaper version of the FR-2 that should appear in stores
by August or September. I'm guessing that it will have the same
preamp section as the FR-2, but will be priced several hundred dollars
less than the FR-2.
Let us know which recorder you choose.
--oryoki
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