Minidisc recorders: what are my options? (2 Viewers)

[lachlustre]

Hi,

How user-friendly is this Audacity malarkey.

This business with the copying to CD sounds very feasible and probably more useful. I am not very technically minded as you are no doubt aware and would appreciate a few pointers as to how I achieve the results you had previously suggested.

It's good to see that the MD issue is not a problem, but I still wonder what I should use in the field. I wonder what the professional sound recordists use?

Thanks again

Tony

Hi Tony,
I guess I'm a "professional sound recordist" in the sense that I'm a postdoc in a bioacoustics lab (Leiden University)... if that's what you mean!

First of all, I also recommend Audacity for basic sound editing. In our lab, we have tried a variety of software: CoolEdit, Goldwave, Avisoft, SIGNAL, SoundAnalysisPro, MatLab, just off the top of my head, and I am writing my own sound analysis, databasing program that I will launch to an unsuspecting world later this year. Audacity is about as easy to use as I could imagine, and, even better, it is a free software project, so is guaranteed to remain free. And it does seem very active with frequent updates. I would give it a look at least.

We also use a wide variety of recording hardware. We still have a stack of professional cassette recorders (Sony Professional Walkman) that are very sturdy in the field, and not to be written off entirely. We had one project in Uganda a couple of years ago that actually used a Creative Jukebox mp3 player for recordings! This is one of those 30GB laptop harddisks-in-a-box devices: no extra media required. But, it is annoying for recording because you can't alter recording level in the middle of a track. Also, it has the tendency to skip if you knock it during recording. But it served its purpose ok, I think. For the last couple of years, I have been using Marantz PMD-670 flash-disk recorders. I'm very happy with them. They are extremely sturdy, and survived field-bashing without a problem. The recording quality is excellent (particularly if you avoid using the recorder's own microphone preamp).

They use flash-disks, just like digital cameras, and the way that you transfer recordings to a computer is very analogous to the way you might use a digital camera too. You just connect the flash card to a computer, and copy the wav files (instead of jpg's) onto your hard disk. Then, rather than using Photoshop to tidy up your pictures, you can use Audacity to clear up the recordings.

You should note that this method is technically superior to the method that Ermine mentioned with the MiniDiscs. Every time you convert sounds from analog to digital, you lose some information. Using the Marantz recorders, this operation is performed once, in the recorder, then you transfer the digital recordings directly to your computer. With the MiniDisc method, you convert the analog sound to a digital format inside the minidisc, back to an analog signal to pipe into the computer's Line-in jack, and then back again to a digital signal using the computer's soundcard (which may be a weak link in the process if you have a laptop, or a cheap soundcard).


With a 1GB flash disk (now quite cheap, and fairly easy to replace all over the world), I found it impossible to run out of recording space in one field session. The 2s prerecord function is really handy for birds that call intermittently (in this mode, the machine constantly records into a buffer in its memory, and when you hit the record button, it transfers the buffer onto the flash disk: you magically record the 2s before you hit "record"!).

The main problem with them is the battery life: they take 8 AA batteries, which need to be changed every day in the field, more or less. That is why I would strongly recommend the smaller PMD-660: we just have 2 in the lab now, but I haven't used them in the field. They are half the size, half the price, they only use 4 AA batteries, and the battery life is much longer (8 hours, I think). They miss some of the functions of the larger PMD-670, but I don't think there's anything gone that a wildlife recorder would really miss.

We haven't used Minidiscs in the lab very much. The lossy-compression in the earlier minidiscs made them unsuitable for many analysis tasks, and the uncompressed modern versions seem to have been superceded by the flash disk recorders. We had a couple that were used for a while, but they don't seem to be used very much these days. But that doesn't mean they are a bad idea, and I know that some other research groups are now using them.

 

[ermine]

Audacity's not too bad. Best way is to d/l it and test it out. It's a clean piece of software, doesn't take over your machine etc. Try it out - take it for a spin and see how you get one. If you hate it, uninstall it

The biggest piece of pain you get with recording on a PC platform is realising that the audio card has two independent mixers. One is for what you hear. And the other is for what you record. So if you double click on the speaker icon in the taskbar you get a mixer panel up and in the top left it says play control. If you select options, then properties in the top left menu of the mixer it will say adjust volume for playback (checked) or recording. You want to tick recording, and tick the line in and microphone control. Or just tick all of them. The mixer will now say record control, and you want to select line in (or microphone, or whatever).

You should note that this method is technically superior to the method that Ermine mentioned with the MiniDiscs.

agreed. It's worth noting however, that HiMD allows direct digital transfer of a recording to the PC, so with that technology the copy is bit-perfect in the same way as a flash card recorder transfer is. But the OP does not have a HiMD, so he must use analogue transfer

If say, MP3's are better

No. Avoid like the plague. They are not better. Keep your digital data uncompressed. Signal quality once lost can never be regained.

 

[griffin]

If Battery life is an issue my MZ-710 will run all day (8-12 hours ) using the attachable cradle and battery accessory. It also fits in the palm of my hand. Ermine has already mentioned using the pause function to avoid the set-up polava. I thing the 660 has battery of 4 hours ? I am nor sure if mine has lossy compression but all the sonograms I have created look fine, and I record in MONO which is LPG4 ( I think ).

Sorry doing this between lessons !

Life in the humble ole' Mini Disc yet.

Linz

 

[lachlustre]

Griffin, Ermine,

Here's a question that I've been meaning to ask MiniDisk recorders: how well designed are they for use in the field? In my opinion, ergonomics and usability are almost as important for sound recorders as they are for cameras - perhaps more so as you have to keep looking up and down from recorder at your waist to bird in the tree. My most frustrating moments have been trying to hit the right button with blue fingers at dawn in the frost, or being unable to control the recording level properly because the screen was hard to see. Or the bird flying off in some unknown direction while doing all of the above.

I love the Marantz recorder I have because it is a continuation of their field journalist cassette-recorder equipment: everything just works very simply and easily, and everything is very solid. The minidisc recorders that I've seen don't seem to have the same design (although there's no reason why someone couldn't design a minidisc recorder with these characteristics, in principle).

Also: how well do minidiscs deal with being shaken around? Hardisk recorders have to be very expensive before they deal with this, and I could imagine anything with a spinning disk inside would have this problem.

A couple of other points: Ermine: point taken about the minidisc recording. I also agree that that isn;t a reason in itself to upgrade equipment just for field recording.
Second: I feel a bit bad about passing myself off as a "professional" sound-recordist. I mean, I am (its part of what I get paid for), but most biologists who study bird song are not the world's biggest experts in sound recording equipment. We're mostly interested in birds and animal behaviour like most people on this site! I've probably done a little more background research in acoustics, and equipment than most of my peers, but I still wouldn't class myself as an expert in equipment: its not like I could build one from scratch!

 

[ermine]

I can only speak for my Sony MZ-NH700which you can see here

The good points are -

small - you can always have it with you and not notice the weight, say when combined with a Sennheiser MK300D or something like the Soundman binaurals. MDs are smaller than any CF recorder I've so far seen

in the case of HiMD - Awesomely quiet mic preamps. Better than the Marantz you're using click here for a test result. That obviously isn't so much of a benefit with the above mics, but is for my MKH30/40

cheap media 1GB size. No economic imperative to d/l in the field

cheap - my second NH700 was £50 on ebay

great battery life - can record 24hours if on the HiMDLP mode for those trawling sessions.
​

Bad points are

Really ugly ergonomics to start manual recording - the process is

press rec-pause
press nav/menu for 1sec or more
scroll 6 steps to rec/set
scroll 2 steps to rec vol
set manual

and you're off. Nice rotatey wheel thing to actually set rec level and this works while in pause or in recrod mode (didn't always with previous Sony MDs apparently). Easy to use with gloves in the cold, but the buttons are hard. You want to do this before setting off. You can also use a LCD remote and use the pause button on that - the display flashes in pause and counts up in rec mode.​

rec level indicator is 2x 6 level bargraph and overload indication. Serviceable but not great. Don't push this into the top three bars on birdsong - I don't think that the attack time is great.

No 48v phantom power. Well, whaddya expect shame, as the preamps do cut it with genuine condenser mics, so you have to tote a phantom power unit and 12V of batteries as well if you are using them.
​

The main drag is the agonising 'start record' process. So the MD field recordist runs in rec/pause most of the time. And curses if he accidentally presses stop because that means that process has to be gone through again.

Seriously though, the quality of the uncompressed recording is excellent (there is another comparison by Rob Danielson of a HiMD with Rode NT1s and a Sound Devices 722 somewhere which showed the transparency of the HiMD was not totally outclassed audibly though the SD did have the edge - as it should)

For someone with a budget of less that £2000 I wouldn't hesitate to recommend they go HiMD for £50 on ebay and spend whatever they have left on their microphones. I considered switching to the Edirol R1 or the M-audio Microtrack but on discovering I was going to gain ergonomics and lose preamp signal quality (in the case of the microtrack, and the Marantz 660) and still not have 48V phantom power (in the case of the Edirol) I figured I'd need to go up to something like this Nagra. Since I do this for fun and not professionally I can't justify spending £1000+ for the ergonomic improvement. At least not at the moment

Griffin, where do you find is a good place for recording Crossbills - I'll to be up Inverness way in a month or so and I'd like to add this species?

 

[griffin]

Hi Lachlustre,

I think the fact you get paid to sound record birds in the field def. qualifies you as a professional !

MD's, as Ermine has pointed out, ARE a pain the ass to use, and just like most equip have some quirks and flaws, as well as pros. My biggest gripe is that it sometimes fails to write to disc, so much so that I TOC edit every five or six recordings then go through the setup as described by Ermine. I once lost a whole day of Scotbill calls , 19 tracks in total as the machine decided to fail. Had to go back next day to resample and didn't see nearly as many birds. Wouldn't have been as bad but a couple of colleagues ( who are sceptical of sonogram stuff ) were with me and I looked like a real dick. The linear PCM is supposed to be a boon for sonograms but as I have said the lower qualities produce perfectly acceptable graphs - may not be good for other stuff though ?

They seem pretty robust - my 710 has been dropped on concrete twice, cracked, superglued and the battery cradle is held on with gaffa tape ( NOT professional ! ). It also stopped working when it got soaked, but once it dried out it worked again. I now carry it in a sandwhich bag with a silca gel sachet so it keeps rain and mositure out. Now you can see why I am reluctant to use the new one.

I am actually seriously considering a 660, though have read on Forums that it can be a bit noisy ?? I like its compact size, though will need spare batteries as at this time of year I need standby for 8-9 hours continuous field recording. I even considered going for a tape one but they are such heavy bugg:ers.

Linz

 

[griffin]

Griffin, where do you find is a good place for recording Crossbills - I'll to be up Inverness way in a month or so and I'd like to add this species?

Abernethy/Glenmore area is your best bet for that area, plus some sites in Black Isle. There are lots about at Culbin Forest ( Common ) just now I believe. Actually, its hard to go anywhere up here just now without seeing them ! We have them all round Aberdeen at the moment.

If you get any down your way please send me a WAV. Would love to compare the "types" that are in England ( that irrupted June 2005 ) to the ones we have here, which are more sedentary plus the ones that came in to last Summer.

Linz

 

[lachlustre]

MD's, as Ermine has pointed out, ARE a pain the ass to use, and just like most equip have some quirks and flaws, as well as pros. My biggest gripe is that it sometimes fails to write to disc, so much so that I TOC edit every five or six recordings then go through the setup as described by Ermine. I once lost a whole day of Scotbill calls at Glen Derry, 19 tracks in total as the machine decided to fail. Had to go back next day to resample and didn't see nearly as many birds. Wouldn't have been as bad but a couple of colleagues ( who are sceptical of sonogram stuff ) were with me and I looked like a real dick. The linear PCM is supposed to be a boon for sonograms but as I have said the lower qualities produce perfectly acceptable graphs - may not be good for other stuff though ?

They seem pretty robust - my 710 has been dropped on concrete twice, cracked, superglued and the battery cradle is held on with gaffa tape ( NOT professional ! ). It also stopped working when it got soaked, but once it dried out it worked again. I now carry it in a sandwhich bag with a silca gel sachet so it keeps rain and mositure out. Now you can see why I am reluctant to use the new one.

I am actually seriously considering a 660, though have read on Forums that it can be a bit noisy ?? I like its compact size, though will need spare batteries as at this time of year I need standby for 8-9 hours continuous field recording. I even considered going for a tape one but they are such heavy bugg:ers.

Linz

The Sennheiser set-up I use (ME66/K6) is quite loud, which makes it a good choice for the Marantz 670... as I said, we have only just got the 660's: I'm not really sure if there is a marked difference in quality yet. With the PMD-670, we had to go out with 16 spare AA batteries for the two units, which was a bit ridiculous! At least there are only 4 needed for the 660, and I think the battery life is right at the edge of your requirements anyway...

It sounds like the Marantz is definitely a good choice with respect to ergonomics and reliability. But if I was paying for it out of my own pocket, well, the Marantz will run you more than $500 (if you can get it in the states), including CF card.

 

[griffin]

Abernethy/Glenmore area is your best bet for that area, plus some sites in Black Isle. There are lots about at Culbin Forest ( Common ) just now I believe. Actually, its hard to go anywhere up here just now without seeing them ! We have them all round Aberdeen at the moment.

If you get any down your way please send me a WAV. Would love to compare the "types" that are in England ( that irrupted June 2005 ) to the ones we have here, which are more sedentary plus the ones that came in to last Summer.

Linz

Sorry I can't give out grid refs or specific sites as all Loxia are Schedule 1 and Scottish and Parrot are sitting on eggs right now, but suffice to say they are pretty easy to find if you recognize their calls.

Linz
Linz

 

[griffin]

It sounds like the Marantz is definitely a good choice with respect to ergonomics and reliability. But if I was paying for it out of my own pocket, well, the Marantz will run you more than $500 (if you can get it in the states), including CF card.

Can get it here in UK £395 without card - I have loads for the camera anyway ! Probably cheaper to buy from Germany like the mics !

Linz

 

[ermine]

Sorry I can't give out grid refs or specific sites

sure, understood I dipped on them when they came to Lackford Lakes last year. I'll let you know if I get some down sarf.

Take a look at a HiMD as they're pretty good value on ebay what with the Ipod-mania combined with Sony's copyright follies. And the PCM recording is the business when using the 1G discs, particularly if you're into analysis/sonagrams.

I haven't had the sort of TOC hell you have had with the exception of once when I was using Sonictstage 3.1 and I had edited the himd in the field to gain some more recording time. I don't do that now, ever, and haven't had a problem.

I think the HiMD stores the audio in a buffer and then writes to disk at intervals, unlike the older units that write continuously. I haven't lost the recording even when I dropped the recorder while recording, which would have been instant recording death on the older units.

One thing people who haven't used MD should know where MD doesn't score is the process of writing to disc isn't totally silent and is an intermittent sound. You need to keep the MD in a pocket, in the dead zone of the mic or at least 2m away for nature recordings.

 

[griffin]

sure, understood I dipped on them when they came to Lackford Lakes last year. I'll let you know if I get some down sarf.

Take a look at a HiMD as they're pretty good value on ebay what with the Ipod-mania combined with Sony's copyright follies.

Yeah "my other one" (!) is a MZ-NH900 but have only recorded Sparrows and other finches in the garden. My mic is MONO so the PCM is not much use as it records in stereo - only records to left channel. Have tried adapters but they just add noise. Must make sure the new mike does stereo to use PCM, which is basically why I bought it ?

There have been some great pics of xbills down middle England way on Birdguides recently. The photographers look like they would have been close enough to get decent sound recordings even with something crappy. Anyone fancy getting me some calls ?

Linz

 

[ermine]

My mic is MONO so the PCM is not much use as it records in stereo - only records to left channel.
Linz

That's the beauty of the Sonicstage usb download. Stick the stereo wav into Audacity and nut out the right channel to keep just the left - you now get a 50% space saving as an added bonus with no loss of signal quality CDs need a stereo wav so there you just copy the left channel onto the right.

On my Sennheiser MKE 300 which is also mono I made an inline adaptor which copies the left channel to the right but with a 20dB attenuation, so the right channel is the same as the left by quieter. The advantage of that is is something flies out in front of me and gets overloaded, I can patch in that section from the right channel which often as not isn't overloaded.

 

[griffin]

That's the beauty of the Sonicstage usb download. Stick the stereo wav into Audacity and nut out the right channel to keep just the left - you now get a 50% space saving as an added bonus with no loss of signal quality CDs need a stereo wav so there you just copy the left channel onto the right.

On my Sennheiser MKE 300 which is also mono I made an inline adaptor which copies the left channel to the right but with a 20dB attenuation, so the right channel is the same as the left by quieter. The advantage of that is is something flies out in front of me and gets overloaded, I can patch in that section from the right channel which often as not isn't overloaded.

I didn't make what I said very clear, sorry. The PCM mode on the 900 only records in stereo, so with a mono mic it only records the left channel to disc, and this seems at a lower overall level than if in true stereo or in MONO mode (which I normally use ).

The inline adapter boost sounds good though, esp. for distant chippy xbill calls. I did consider a FEL pre amp / boost. Any experience of these ?


Cheers,

Linz

 

[ermine]

I didn't make what I said very clear, sorry. The PCM mode on the 900 only records in stereo, so with a mono mic it only records the left channel to disc, and this seems at a lower overall level than if in true stereo or in MONO mode (which I normally use ).

The inline adapter boost sounds good though, esp. for distant chippy xbill calls. I did consider a FEL pre amp / boost. Any experience of these ?

HiMD has no mono option at all. That's not a problem as if you d/l the recording to your computer you can either delete the right-hand channel to save hard disc space by making a mono wav or duplicate the left channel onto the right which will will be right for a CD and not give you a one-sided result in headphones. I agree with you it is a shame that there isn't a mono option which would double the running time, guess Sony didn't see a call for it.

A FEL mic preamp isn't needed for the HiMD as the Sony mic preamps are low noise to start with. You only need a FEL preamp if the input stages are noisy, which is probably the case on your old NetMD deck but not on the new. On manual gain you can normally boost the record level so high that normal ambient noise and mic background hiss move the lower meter bars. If that isn't the case you have either a faulty HiMD, an unusually low sensitivity microphone or perhaps you haven't set the Mic Sens to high in the mode -> rec set menu of the 900?

 

[HouseFinch]

No. Avoid like the plague. They are not better. Keep your digital data uncompressed. Signal quality once lost can never be regained.

I usually convert my WAV files to MP3 just before I burn them to a CD-R, as the WAV files by themselves are much too large to fit on the CD: am I doing the wrong thing? I never notice a difference between the MP3s and the WAVs, when I set CDex to "Very High Quality" in regards to converted files.

Is there another way I could shrink down my WAV files?

 

[griffin]

HiMD has no mono option at all.

Hi Ermine,

You are absolutely right, can only do MONO in MD mode on the 900, which is why I have just stuck to using the MZ-710.

I am sure when I originally tested it the signal appeared "weak" only going to one channel of the stereo spectrum due to the mono mic. Would this be the case ? Perhaps this is just an aural illusion and if I copy it like you say I may get a full strength signal ? Will have a play about today in the garden - the snow and especially high winds here today means that going out looking for and recording xbills is a tad pointless. There is always tommorrow !

Linz

 

[ermine]

WAV files by themselves are much too large to fit on the CD: am I doing the wrong thing?

Good on you. You should challenge sweeping generalisations like 'avoid mp3' It's a bit long-winded, but the difference is illustrated

on here

I was going for dramatic effect to counter the impression Tony had been given that MP3 was 'better'. For most listening by human ears MP3 is perfectly serviceable. You can hear the difference in my blackbird recording but you have to work at it. I don't think you have Turdus merula in America but you'd recognize one from the mp3 with no trouble. MP3 has its place - I have a copy of the 4 CD bird sounds of Britain and Europe on one mp3 CD in my car as it's that much more convenient, though if I know I want to recognise a particular call in the field I listen to one of the real CDs on my stereo first. One of the bird calls that is a lot easier to hear the distortion mp3 introduces is that of a European Starling but I wouldn't want to inflict that species on you

It's a lot of effort to get yourself and your equipment in the field, and I feel that having done all that work I don't want to close off my options in future. So when I get my recordings I first grade then into the ones I can toss - the ones hopelessly marred with aircraft noise, vehicles, dogs, you know the score. Of those that are left, I keep a copy of the raw field recording WAVs on DVDs as lossless compressed FLACs, because one day in future there may be a detail I am interested in and I do not want to throuw anything away. I then edit, often have to high-pass filter because England is a noisy place with too many vehicles and above all far too many aircraft, and then I can put this wav on a CD and store the edited wav and CD cue sheet on another DVD.

Your requirements may be different. I can't record for long periods before extraneous noise interrupts the session, so I never end up with recordings longer than a CD, other that my weekly trawl to sample the dawn chorus on Sundays, which I store as a stereo FLAC of three hours each. If data storage is a problem for you, however, since you record mono you can probably reduce your data to fit nearly four hours onto a CD wthout resorting to compression by -

using Audacity to throw out one channel, making your wav a mono wav, since you are recording with a mono microphone. That will get to to about two and a bit hours on a 700Mb CD. Using FLAC which is free from

here will let you pack your data in about 60% of the space previously needed. So you can probably cut your storage needs by two thirds without MP3.

What matters, ultimately, is that your recordings give you pleasure, and MP3 can do that fine. However, if you ever want to analyse your recordings, or think someone might, then you need to think about that decision a little bit more. And whatever people might try and have us believe, a MP3 file is never better than the original.

 

[ermine]

Hi Ermine,
You are absolutely right, can only do MONO in MD mode on the 900, which is why I have just stuck to using the MZ-710.
Linz

I didn't realize the 900 would do mono under any circumstances! Shame the MD mode is still subject to the Sony download restrictions otherwise that would have been more useful to me under some cases

If only one channel is playing the amount of sound you get on replay is 6dB down, but the one-sidedness does seem to make that difference seem a little more. The metering should show you in record if you are getting about the same amount of modulation onto the disc with the same mic and source using each deck. Give it a go and also consider tinkering with the mic sens on the hiMD - that should be set to High. I had a try today with my MKE300 mic and that seems fine after conversion to mono. I just couldn't go back to an original MD after being spoilt by the uncompressed recording and the usb download!

 

[griffin]

I didn't realize the 900 would do mono under any circumstances! .....
If only one channel is playing the amount of sound you get on replay is 6dB down, but the one-sidedness does seem to make that difference seem a little more.

Yeah, the 900 has two modes of op, MD and Hi-MD.

Does the machine RECORD the signal at -6dB, or does the full signal go on to one channel ? If it records at full strength I am happy to double it to stereo as you describe. If it records at -6dB that is not so good with the soft clippy calls I work with - they are sometimes faint as it is.

I always set mic sens HIGH and have the OEM ATR55 on TELE to maximise signal and directionality. Have produced some really good results but really do need to go to the "next level" now !

Cheers,

Linz