East Midlands Oral History Archive: Solid state recorders

Solid state recording technology means recording onto some form of hard drive or memory card, usually with the intention of transferring the information onto a computer (your computer hard disc is a form of solid state recorder). There are a variety of solid state recorders on the market and on this page we try to give you an idea of what is available and how useful it is for recording oral history.

For good archival recordings it is best to record .wav files at a minimum of 44.1Khz 16 bit quality, and all the recorders mentioned below will do this. For the professional sound recordist the difference usually lies in the recorder's ability to work well with professional quality microphones, which the cheaper machines often don't do well, but most of these recorders have very acceptable built in microphones (not all do - be careful!) and your decision will probably come down to affordability and ease of use.

Marantz PMD661

For several years many projects used the Marantz PMD660. However, at the start of 2009 Marantz announced a successor to the PMD660, the PMD661. This recorder improves on the PMD660 in several ways but does so at added cost and in March 2011 the price seems to be around £400 - £450, although this can fluctuate and it is worth shopping around. At EMOHA we really like this. When used with good microphones the quality of the recordings is excellent. However, once you have bought a couple of microphones the cost of the full kit can be quite high.

Have a look at the Marantz PMD 661 portable field recorder with Doug Boyd, Director of the Louie B. Nunn Center for Oral History at the University of Kentucky Libraries on You Tube - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NtnpodTVG70

You may still be able to find the PMD660 in shops or second hand and it remains a good recorder. The main drawback we found was a hum on the recording from the mains supply when using 'unbalanced' microphones.

Portable recorders

Also on the market are increasingly affordable handheld recorders such as the Zoom H1, Zoom H2, the Zoom H4n, the Edirol R-09, the M-Audio Microtrack, the Sony PCM-D50, the Olympus LS-10 and others. Prices vary from the Zoom H1 at £80 to the Zoom H2 and Tascam DR-07 at around £150 to most of the others at upwards of £250. While none of these units is perfect, they are generally very good. Photos can be found on the websites below.

We at EMOHA have used the Zoom H1 (good although the casing is sensitive to noise and you'll need a tripod), Zoom H4 (avoid - too fiddly for oral history), Zoom H4n (very good, less fiddly than the H4, but with many additional features you won't need), Zoom H2 (simple to use, good for the price, a popular choice) and Edirol R-09 (good, simple to use).

Reviews

If you have used any of these recorders, or others which are similar, and would like to share your thoughts on them, please contact EMOHA at emoha@le.ac.uk

mp3 recorders

This is often a cheap option, and there are many different units available in the shops. For the best sound quality you should make sure they handle uncompressed .wav files, but other formats such as .mp2 or .mp3 provide acceptable results. These types of units provide an option similar to the digital dictation machines - you can transfer the information to a computer and copy onto CD should you want - but there may be issues with how well they handle large files and compatability with different sorts of microphones. These machines are not specifically designed for interviewing, so are probably not the best choice for high quality recording of lengthy interviews.

Where to buy solid state recorders

If you are thinking of buying a solid state recorder you may wish to visit the following companies. They should not be considered to be approved or recommended by the East Midlands Oral History Archive.