Adding to his reviews of new digital audio recorders, our Tools Editor Jeff Towne now presents a comprehensive test of the Zoom H2, focusing on field recording for radio. As ever, it aint perfect, but it has some unusual capabilities, along with the customary weaknesses common among these little machines. Jeff says, The Zoom H2 is a very convenient small recorder, and can give remarkably good sound when using its internal microphones. Its especially good at picking up musical performances or collecting stereo ambiences of events that are at least moderately loud. Come by Transom to see the full review and listen to sample recordings.
"When recording with the built-in mics and volume set to maximum, a broad-spectrum hissy background sound is noticeable. After plugging in external mics, the preamp becomes much quieter. At a gain setting just lower than maximum, the recordings I made with a Sennheiser ME20/K6 mic were very clear and sounded natural.
Compared to my Oade-modified PMD660, the PMD620 was a bit noisier, but sounded very good as long as the preamp gain was held a little below maximum. Overall, I'd say the PMD620's preamp is better than the stock PMD660, and similar to the well-regarded Sony Hi-MD minidisc recorder....
With external mics, the PMD620 is capable of excellent performance."
I'm testing out a 620 right now, and will have a review up soon. I'm not sure any of these little guys are ever going to satisfy nature recordists, trying to capture delicate sounds in very quiet environments. That said, it is indeed true that the 620 sounds pretty darn good with external mics, even though it only has an 1/8 inch minijack input.
When using external mics, the noise level and overall sound quality is SIGNIFICANTLY better than any of the other small flash recorders I've tested.
BUT - there's always a but isn't there?
There are a couple of very strange quirks that I'm still trying to rank as minor annoyances, or serious deal-breakers. The most eggregious is that there's a latency in the headphone monitoring. That is to say, while recording live sound, there's a slight delay in the headphones. There does not seem to be any way to get the phones to monitor the inputs directly. It's maddening.
The other big thing is that the headphone jack is placed on the top end of the recorder, right between the built-in mics, so if one is using headphones to monitor, and using the built-in mics, the cable is protruding out from the machine, in a particularly distracting way if one is sticking the recorder in close to an interview subject. It also seems likely to flap around an make noise.
A couple other little things... I'll do a full run-down soon.
But in the meantime, the short version is that the Marantz 620 sounds very good with external mics of any kind, even dynamic omnis, much cleaner than a stock 660, or either of the Zooms. And the ergonomics of using the device are mostly very good: push the big record button once and you're rolling, input gain can be adjusted from up/down buttons on the side . But there are some issues that make it irritating to use.
Just to be clear: from initial impressions, the Marantz 620 seems to be quieter when using external mics than the other small recorders. The larger recorders, specifically the Sound Devices 722 and the Tascam HDP2, still sounded better than the 620, but those are much bulkier, and more expensive.
I disagree with the author about the line in clipping. I have now recorded a few live performances using preamps and a limiter and then out to the H2 with great success.
Here's the setup. Keep the gain setting at 100. Don't bother with the 0-127 at all. If possible keep the setting on the side at Medium. Read why at the zoom forum the author above didn't explain any of that stuff. Check out the thread called "how to get the most out of your zoom H2".
Make sure that the gain levels you're feeding into the H2 aren't peaking. If needed, turn down the output of the preamp a bit. I bring along a limiter for extra security and set the threshold just under -.5.
I think I know why the author had trouble with using line input
The line input is a bit hotter than other devices. You need to tame it down. My guess is that the author chose to tame it down in the digital domain by changing from the default of 100 to some lower number like 80 or whatever. As discussed on the zoom forum, that may appear to not clip in the H2 meters, but it is misleading. What is happening is it is clipping in the alalogue realm, then the volume is being lower. So you're gettting a clipped sound wave that appears to not be clipping in the digital domain. Leave the setting at 100. Ignore the option to change it, it only masks problems you may be having.
The workaround is to make sure your signal level isn't overloading as it enters the H2's line input. If it's too hot, lower it before it comes in! Once you do that, all's good! I've recorded a few concerts using the H2 with no problems, once I learned this.
Nope, that's not it... I did several tests trying to get a clean line-level signal in, and the example posted had the "rec level" set at 100. The input meters on the H2 were showing nothing near clipping, peaking at maybe -12.
No matter how I had the inputs set, I couldn't get clean line level audio into the H2 except by feeding it an extremely low signal level, with peaks well under -12dBfs.
I could avoid clipping at those levels, but then once boosted back up to a normal range in a digital editor, the noise floor would come up with it.
I read through the Zoom forums, and saw all of the tips and work-arounds, and tried them, but didn't find them to help me get an acceptable sound.
Several of the comments in the review seem very odd compared with my experience. I've done tests recording a barely audible ticking clock in a very quiet room, and the H2 manages that fine (using its internal mics on the mid sensitivity setting, level 100) with no significant noise. I've used that same level setting for professional choir and pipe organ with fine results too. Line in is distortion free up to the indicated clipping point - tested with graduated test tones and music. The problem reported with external mics is however very true - the mic input is bizarrely noisy in contrast to the internal mics and the line input.
First off, thanks to Jeff Towne for mentioning my plug-in. Second, if anybody tried it and thought "the darn thing doesn't work", you were probably right... I've been recoding my plug-ins in the last few weeks and I broke the Zoom2Five in the process. The new repaired and improved version is now available for download.
Is the internal speaker in the Marantz 620 usable or is it really bad? Is it about the same quality as my Mac G4 14" iBook? I want to use it as a songwriting sketchpad kind of recorder for when I'm away from my studio and retire my Sony hand held Cassette Recorder (YUK!). So many of these small dig recorders have only a headphone out and the speaker idea makes it more convenient for me. I'm not expecting great fidelity naturally but how bad is it?
I am looking forward to the review on the 620 and it appears it might be the way to go for audio interviews which is my primary application. But why in the world did they put the headphone jack on top of the mics ??? That makes no sense to me and would the headphone cable noise get picked up by the mics ???
A great review of the H2 Jeff. I just got one myself. Like any recorder, it has it's flaws, but I think I can work with them.
This would be a great recorder for someone starting out without much money (no need to buy a mic). It would be great for travel - light - simple - easy to find batteries. And great to have around as a back up in case something goes wrong with your big heavy recorder while you are in the field.
Handling and wind noises are problems though. The first time I took this out on the street the foam cover popped off and blew away. I could buy a fancy one - and some spring-loaded grip to reduce handling noise - but these seem like things I could make myself. I'd be interested in instructions and advice (or links) if anyone has done this sort of thing successfully.
I am wondering if the clipping from the external mic and preamp wasn't due to some fast transients that failed to 'move the meter' when levels were being set due to the slow response times of lcd's. Has anyone tried compression/limiting external to the H2?? My good ol' live to 2 track rig is a stereo mic, small mixer and compressor which has worked well feeding everything from Cassette, to MD, to DAT, to Ederol. I'll give it a shot with the H2 and see how it shapes up compared with the internal mic and compression/limiting. But I don't want to re-invent the wheel if someone else has already done this. All in all I love this unit...
The Cheeseman
does it work, stand alone, as a 2 trac mixer? In other words, can I record a piano trac and separately record an accompanying vocal trac later? If not what is the best comparable pocket recorder that will do this, do you think.
So which sound quality should I be recording on? I don't really want to waste a ton of space on my hard drive unnecessarily, but I'd hate to submit a story to the folks at This American Life, and get it kicked back because the quality wasn't high enough. Any thoughts? Can this recorder capture professional-level quality interviews?
If you want to eventually broadcast what you record, use the uncompressed .wav format. It takes up more space, yes, but using MP3 runs the risk of introducing weird digital artifacts along the broadcast chain. Start with the best you can get.
I'm having problems getting my Zoom H2 to be recognized on my MacBook Leapard system. Any suggestions? I'm hoping to use it for interviewing and editing with Audacity. Thanks!
Like the person above, I'm interested in capturing broadcast quality interviews. Setting the H2 on a table between the two speakers and using the internal front and back microphones seems pretty appealing, but I'm concerned that the sound quality of final product might not make the cut. If I follow all of the suggestions can the issue of low "levels" be overcome? Should I be using an H4 with condenser mics instead?
I'm a voice over talent and I travel a lot, I would like to know if this recorder will give me the SAME results as if I'm recording in my studio at home?
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