Richard Hess wrote:
> At 08:54 AM 2009-04-10, Curt Olson wrote:
>> Richard Hess wrote:
>>
>>> Has anyone determined where the preamp clips in the Zoom H2?
>>>
>>
>> This may not be exactly what you're looking for, but I've found
>> that my H2's line input seems to be happiest with a -10 db
>> unbalance source. I feed mine from the "Tape Out" jack of a Sound
>> Devices MixPre. Using the MixPre's 1khz reference tone, which shows
>> "0 VU" on its LED meter bank, I set the H2's input control to 60.
>> This shows a signal level of -18dbfs on the H2. Works great.
>> Bumping up H2 input to 81 or 82 brings it to -12dbfs -- also
>> usable, but with reduced headroom.
>
> Hi, Curt,
>
> Interesting. With the gain set to 50, the preamp seems to clip at
> about -12 dBFS (rough estimate from memory)
>
> I found this the hard way as the Mackie CR1604VLZ mixer in our
> church has RCA jacks that are hotter than I thought.
>
> From what I have seen so far, I think you might have preamp clipping
> in the H2 before you get to 0 dBFS with it set for 60 =3D -18
> dBFS...based on my having 12 dB or so of clipping at 50 input
> setting. You may remember this from the Sony D8.
>
> What I guess we need to know is the lowest setting on the line input
> which allows us to reach 0 dBFS in the file without preamp clipping.
>
> I solved the immediate problem with an approx 20 dB pad in a little
> Hammond diecast box. Set input to 100 and levels looked good.
So I guess the moral of the story is to watch your levels and allow
plenty of headroom. By doing that, I've had pretty good results so far.
> More later when I get a chance to test. These are the subtleties
> that are solved better in the Sound Devices recorders and now with
> cost-effective 32 GB CF cards, the 702 is becoming more attractive
> compared with the 722 which I have. BUT, the H2 is an amazingly good
> device for <10% of the cost pf the 722 and the built-in mics sound
> as good as the Audio Technica AT822 stereo mic which may have a more
> ragged high end but might have a better low end.
>
> Cheers,
>
> Richard
I use my H2 only as a cheap "bit bucket" to capture the output of the
MixPre. It seems to be reasonably good for that purpose.
Once, out of idle curiosity, I did a listening comparison between the
H2 and Sony Hi-MD, using a pair of WL-183s as the source. To my ear,
the H2 seemed to be considerably noisier.
Curt Olson
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