Hard Disk Recorder / Control Surface.
19 People rated this product : 8 out of 10
3 People wrote reviews









10 out of 10
Feature:
The internal effects processor was a key element in my studio,as the effects in my Peavey PV10 mixer are virtually useless.
Quality:
I love the tactile aspect of this recorder,as everything's solid & smooth to the touch.It has a nice sleek & nuetral quality in appearance.
Value:
I chose this product specifically for all of it's various features at a bargain of a price-worth every red cent.
Desirability:
More for practicality than anything else,as I am always on a budget.
Sound:
I use this recorder in conjunction with my Korg Triton Extreme & Alesis Ion & this recorder relays very clean recordings to cd's very well.
I have also had great results with my AKG Perception 100 microphone,as the vocal effects are impressive.
Ease of Use:
Since I am new to multi-trackers,I would have to give the Zoom recorder a top rating for ease of use,as I've only had the recorder a few months & I had most of all the functions figured out in a couple of weeks & at this point,I am very fluent with this product.
Support:
No support needed thus far.
Overall:
Will utilize it as long as it holds up.
Submitted: 4/20/2008
Style of Music: Ambient/techno,rock,pop,jazz......









9 out of 10
Feature:
In terms of features, this has everything it needs to do recording production at pro level. The only drawback is that these are mostly accessed through layered menus, and there is a bit of a learning curve associated with navigating these quickly, and with auditioning the settings to find the ones you like. Nevertheless, it is quite easy to just jump in and start recording with excellent results.
The housing of this recorder is nice solid metal construction, with high quality pots and faders, and a 5 position LED meter bridge, also, the CD drive is the type one sees on desktop PCs...heavy duty.
My only criticism is that I would prefer to see a dedicated set of external FX in/out, and I would also prefer that the main audio outputs were 1/4" /XLR combo like the inputs, rather than RCA outs.
Quality:
Very well-built recorder in terms of fit, finish and solid feel. I've been given to understand that these are quite intolerant of hard shut-down, so would recommend a UPS backup system. I would not take this on the road, but not for lack of quality. Seems as though it will last a very long time as long as care is taken not to allow it to have it's power source taken away.
Value:
I looked at a great many other recorders and laptops in this price range and none of them had the features or storage capacity of this one.
Desirability:
I don't really care about how it looks as long as it functions as it should and is an appropriate size for what it does. Of course, when I started recording music, one could have spent the better part of a million dollars to outfit a studio with the equivalent in functionality.
Sound:
The sound quality is wonderful...very quiet, very nice, warm sounding preamps. All processing is done at 24 bits, so the fact that it creates 16 bit .wav files doesn't affect the sound quality adversely. I haven't yet dug very deeply into the various FX, amp models, etc, but what I've heard so far leads me to conclude that outboard processing will be largely unnecessary. As good as my unprocessed, raw recordings sound, it doesn't compare to the way they sound when the on board mix-down algorithms are applied...STUNNING.
Ease of Use:
It is very easy to get started with this unit, however, to completely master all of the features and get everything out of it that it has to offer will mean a challenging learning curve. This is designed to be a completely self-contained production studio, and it mostly succeeds, but as already stated, I think it needs better connectivity to outboard processing. They included MIDI, S/PDIF and USB connections, which is great, but why not simple audio auxiliary I/O?
Support:
Never used support.
Overall:
The only upgrade I might consider at this time would be to get the 16 track version. I don't expect to wear this out...it's more likely that it will become obsolete before that happens, and I don't expect that to occur for a very long time.
I looked at a lot of other recorders, and I also considered just getting a PC or laptop with DAW software...all do-able in this price range. This recorder just covered the bases better than any other option I looked at, within about $300 of the price.
Submitted: 11/24/2007
Style of Music: acoustic, rock, prog, alt, jazz, fingerstyle guitar
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"Very helpful service, thanks for changing the shipping option for me!" - customer on July 17, 2008
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