I remain a little concerned about the DR-1's ability to stand up to
the indignities of life as a field recorder. The Tascam DR-1 costs
less, but it is not as well constructed as other small recorders. The
first DR-1 I worked with had a defective 3.5mm mic input jack. But
others I have seen did not have this problem.
The DR-1 costs about $225 from retailers in USA. There is an
additional cost to consider. The DR-1 uses a proprietary removable,
rechargable Li-Ion battery. The battery provides about 6 hours of WAV
recording. A spare battery costs about $48!
The DR-1's 7mm (1/4-inch) mic input is unique among small recorders.
This input jack should be more durable and less prone to noise than
the 3.5mm inputs.
Members of our forum have speculated that small recorders like the
DR-1 may benefit by recording at very high gain setting, and low mic
sensitivity. The DR-1 Firmware version 1.02 adds a third, even lower
mic sensitivity setting that could be useful if you want to record at
full gain.
Raimund, can you confirm that when the DR-1 records via MIC2 input, it
records in true mono, a single channel that uses half as much space on
the flash memory card than a stereo recording of the same duration
would? That would be a nice advantage.
Most small recorders have a mono mode, but they either record silence
on the other channel, or they record the mono signal to both channels.
The result is that mono mode takes as much memory space as stereo.
--oryoki
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