off-topic: seek best MP3 hardware forums

  Which are the best forums for discussing portable solid state
recorders?

For example, an MP3 recorder or perhaps an MP4 multimedia recorder.

 wrote:


Is there really enough to discuss that there would be a
forum dedicated?  Wouldn't it just be a matter of comparing
line-item advertised features?

I'd think your best bet is the portable device category in a
web forum at an audio enthusiast website.  When I google for
"portable MP3 forum" the first hit is a 'site I already had
in mind to suggest,

http://www.head-fi.org/forums/f15/

Go into their forum and post a topic detailing what you want
to know in the appropriate forum category which I probably
linked above, if user reviews of various player/recorders
don't give enough of the info you need.

One other site that has a lot of reviews and tear-downs of
various players is http://www.anythingbutipod.com/
(unless you want an ipod...)

 

Kony, thank you for your info. I want to get info which is not easily
found (sometimes it's not even in the manufacturer's own specs.)  And
anyway I certainly don't want to trawl thru each model one at a time!  
Unfortunately comparison charts are too high level.

I probably won't get my dream machine but I don't want something
completely unsuitable!

I'm recording SPEECH so I want to plug in mics or line inputs. A solid
state "field recorder" might be more suitable but they seem to be far
poorer value for money than consumer players.  Even if I could afford
them, many field recorders seem to have remarkably poor ergonomics.  
Other devices are criticised for playing too quietly. I need to speak
to users to know this type of thing.

So I figure a good forum would be a starting point.

---------

BTW these are the sorts of things I'm interested in:

* Can I record and monitor thru an earpiece at the same time? (Very
few MP3 recorders seem to offer this. Don't know if MP4 recorders have
this.)

* Can I disable the automatic gain control on the external mic socket?

* Can the recording quality for all mics and line inputs be user
selected?

* Does the display show a progress bar and/or display a timer when it
is playing.

* Does the display show recording levels and can levels be set
manually?

 wrote:



I don't know of any products that do all this, but it seems
you will need to get a purpose-specific recorder, it is
unlikely an MP3 player offers most, if any, of these
features.

 kony wrote:

Yup. For the OP, Google "solid state recorder".

Expensive professional kit though.

On the other hand, there is still MiniDisc.

Or a small portable computer of some sort. Application for a PDA or EEE
PC endowed with a decent microphone socket?

--
Adrian C