You had me excited for a few minutes but the catch is only inputs 7 & 8 have mic preamps, bummer, back to dreaming about the ZED R16.
The ZED works out actually cheaper per mic input at USD 125 compared to USD 200 for the Zoom R16 plus I get a pretty capable FOH mixer as well as the recording capability.

Bob.

Actually, Channels 1 through 8 are mic/line inputs although only 5 & 6 have 48v phantom power. Channels 7 & 8 can be switched to the internal mics on the R16's front panel. You can plug in 8 mics and record all 8 channels simultaneously.

Considering how absolutely impressed I am with my Zoom H4n, the R16 is likely very well thought out and is a steal for $399.

Thanks, took a bit of digging around to find the specs but yes, you are correct. The review linked to in the first post and the specs and the photo and the sample connection diagram did not make this clear at all and it's something I've nearly been caught out on before.

The full specs are here:

http://www.samsontech.com/products/productpage.cfm?prodID=2009

Bob.

Plus it records 8 channels at 24 bit resolution although at only 44.1k.

For the money it certainly is quite a bargain and I'm sorely tempted despite a bit of a lull on the income side at the moment. I did have a play around with it at Integrate last year on the Zoom stand and I'd completely forgotten about it as the guys on the stand were more interested in getting my feedback on their prototype pocket camera.

I've now read through a lot of the user reviews and I don't think anyone is complaining given the cost of the unit. Recording directly from it seems to be bit of a challenge but I wouldn't see that as much of a show stopper for people here. The mic pres are well, you get what you pay for. I'd say the same about my Edirol R4, sure not Sound Devices pres but I always use condensor mics so never an issue for me but a couple of people from elsewhere have emailed me saying they found it a major issue. Lesson from that experience, be careful recommending stuff on public fora.

My need as I think I've mentioned before is to replace the front of house mixer with something the FOH engineer will be happy to use and that I can record 16 discreet tracks from at the same time with the minimum of fuss. Both the A&H and the Mackie mixers look attractive and both are under USD 2,000 although getting one shipped down here adds a fair wack to that and our dollar is going south at the moment. The Mackie might be the go but user reports on the A&H unit are very positive.

Only downside I can see with the Zoom is it's very light, running it with 8 XLR leads going into it could be something needing gaffe tape. Only having phantom power on two channels is a tad limiting as well, probably done to save battery power and might be user fixable easily enough for anyone handy with a soldering iron.

I could see this unit being very usefull for people shooting conferences or round table discussions. Having one channel recorded per mic can save your bacon.

Bob.

Bob, it looks like the usual washing machine salespersons have managed to add their margin here in Oz - so far I've seen AU$669 and AU$799 - have you found better?
Peter

"so far I've seen AU$669 and AU$799 - have you found better?"

No Peter and I've pretty much given up buying locally.
Price from B&H inc cheapest shipping down here is USD 474.40.

At todays exchange rate that'sAUD 564.

I'm assuming an exchange rate of 0.84 as that's what I ACTUALLY got last Friday night. So you could save $130 buying from the USA. You could also try some local arm twisting but on low cost items it can be difficult.

The again the R16 can be found on eBay for AUD 474 inc shipping from the USA. You save quite a bit that way.

Bob.

I liked that it can be used both during shooting and during editing.

Mixing, recording parallel sound, and using it as a Mackie-compatible control surface later.

I gotta check out those micpres to see how good they are, I'm pretty picky and would hate to schlepp the separate micpres I'm using now.

As a control surface, I don't expect Penny+Giles pots, but then it doesn't cost like an MCU either.
Does it have motorized faders though? I'm too beat to look right now.

"Does it have motorized faders though?

For $399? You're kidding, right?

"Does it have motorized faders though? "

I asked that question of the Zoom guys and NO. For that kind of money they thought I was pulling their leg even asking.


Does anyone actually find a HUI useful, I've thought time and again about getting one, love the bling but is it really all that practical?

Bob.

Thanks Bob - that sounds a good idea.

- how do you go with power supply, buying from US ?

"how do you go with power supply, buying from US "

The unit comes with a 5V 1amp plug pack. It will run from 100 to 240V except you'd need to either bend the pins to get it to fit our outlets, buy a $2 physical adaptor or buy a local 5V 1amp plugpack. The later is what I'd be doing as the adaptor that comes with it looks pretty nasty to me as it would stick out of the socket a fair way..

Bob.

The recorder interests me, but what about the maximum 44.1 KHz ?

Isn't that a deal breaker in terms of synch issues?

John

Yes, but it can tune a 7-string guitar or a 5-string bass!

:O[

When used as an audio interface, you can use rates up to 24/96.

Sigh.

Could still be a decent interface for Boom Recorder Pro, but...


Wonder if they're performance limited somehow?

Or is it just a music focus?

Not sure Bjorn.

This seems to suggest that the recorder/mixer is really useful. Just not sure about the 44.1 KHz limitation in terms of practical audio synching with Vegas video footage. Maybe it's not that big a deal for what you get for the money.

John

Getting two digital devices to sync perfectly has always been a hit and miss proposition without some sort of hardware synchronization between the devices. Vegas doesn't care as long as long as the sample rate is close to the ideal 44,100 or 48,000 samples per second. Vegas will sync 44.1k audio just fine. It will just have to be resampled to 48k when you render and there will be a very slight audio quality hit.

Thanks John,

I may buy one of these. Not as portable as an H4n, but then again I won't need to bring my mixer along with the R16 so the space will end up around the same.

John

"The recorder interests me, but what about the maximum 44.1 KHz ?"

So long as it's exactly 44.1KHz no problem.
Drop the audio into a new Vegas project, Set audio sample rate to 44.1KHz, goto Audio tab and Set Resample Quality to Best and render to a new file at 48KHz. That should be the end of it assuming the device's clocks were running at 44.1KHz.

If you have multiple audio tracks then use Multichannel Mapping to render all the tracks to a single wave file. This makes keeping them all in sync way easier. When you bring the multichannel wave file back into Vegas you can then assign channels to tracks, a very neat Vegas feature.

Although Vegas will resample on the fly it does take a lot of CPU, best to do it once and get it over and done with, especially if you have multiple tracks of 44.1KHz being resampled to 48KHz

Bob.

Thank Bob,

Sounds pretty easy.

John

What would be the outcome if I included an audio render (as a part of a wmv or mp4 file) that wasn't 48KHz? I'm just wondering if I've inadvertently left the audio settings at 44.1 KHz or another setting? Would the audio be muddied, lower quality...?

Chances are that you wouldn't notice a thing. Audio for video has been standardized at 48k for years. It has always bugged me that Vegas defaults to 44.1k audio. I wonder how many people don't change that setting in the project properties?

Chances are that you wouldn't notice a thing. Audio for video has been standardized at 48k for years. It has always bugged me that Vegas defaults to 44.1k audio. I wonder how many people don't change that setting in the project properties?

You might be right about that. I change the project properties to 48KHz, but is possible I forgot to at times over the years.

But my concern was with an imported separate audio track that I had to synch to the one the camera recorded being off if the recording were long. I will probably resample so as not to chance it.

There also appears to be a Users Group for the Zoom R16.

John