Sony MZN810 consumer with mic input and analog out
- - - - - $250

marantz PMD650 pro minidisk. Balanced and unbalanced in and out, preamps, limiters and digtal output - - - - - $930

marantz PMD670 flash memory recorder, Same specs as mini disk except faster download, exchange through flash memory reader and full digital recording with no compression - - - - - - $700

with 1 gig card - - - - - $900


Now if the cheap and dirty 810 can deliver with a reasonable output then that's a whole lot of difference in cost.

Can the sony record using a balanced mic with just a mini to xlr cable.

Will the input sensitivety of the cheapo handle all or most mics?

Will the resulting analog transfer sound acceptable? If it does the for $650, I can wait for a real time analog transfer.

People have infered that the Sony Consumer will deliver. If I have to hook a preamp to the consumer model then I might as well just bite the bullet and buy a Marantz 670 .

Has anyone used both? What mics have you been able to use with the Sony consumer model?

Thanks for all of your input

I have a consumer SOny MZR-55 a few years old.It has mic input plus mic sensitvity switch low-high. I usually keep it on high and set record level manually this with an AT 825 stereo mic plugged directly into it. Here recently ive been using a sign video xlr box and a ME66 plugged into the MD.It works great for me but I've been eyeing up the Marantz 670. The AD/DA vonversion doesnt bother me too much.Most average listeners would not be able to tell that there was a conversion that took place or what type of media it was recorded on as long as its recorded well. I out put the line out on the MD into a Tascam CD-R recorders analog in and burn in real time to CD. I can then just pop the cd into my mac to access the audio files at the same time creating a backup of the MD itself. The MD is so small kind of un-ergonomic with a mic and headphones etc hooked up to it.It will definitely improve the audio over the VX2k.

I´ve worked with consumer MD before (sharp and Sony can´t remember the models) .. and I do not reccomend it most of the times because of this:

RELIABILTY (did I spell this right?)...

You don´t want to loose some part of the best acting you´ll ever get from Actor X or of an important interview.. etc..

I don´t exactly know what happened since I was not sound man.. but in two of the three times we used a consumer MD recorder we got sound problems.. like "skips" or not recording the whole track (or the track at all) and stuff like that... not many but sure enough to quit using it.

Maybe it was a mishandling of the equipment... but we decided not to try it again...

There has to be a reason more than standard time code or whatever, for Professional MD recorders to be 4 o 5 times more expensive than consumer... and I´m quite sure that RELIABILITY is one of them.

If you are working on professional level I would go for pro stuff.. I don´t think there are many workarounds on sound as there could be on ligthing...

If you are making amateur short movies (reading amateur as no profits yet.. not as in not seriously taken) go for the camera sound when possilbe (external mic ouf course).. it works wonders.. if you can´t use the camera and can´t afford a professional recorder then RENT...
Just my opinion..

I use the Sony for a backup but have never had a failure with it. The sound mixes very well with the camera-recorded sound.

If it were the primary recorder on a one-time-only shoot then I'd pick something more reliable. Probably my Marantz cassette recorder or another video camera.

Yup, the $700 recorders are nice. But they are also nice and big. That's the killer as far as I'm concerned.

If I really wanted to record sound with sort of portable rig and size were not a problem, I'd look deeply into the multi-track hard disk recorders that can accept the input from 4-32 microphones (depending on your budget). They are even larger but often include a mini-mixer and very good sound recording.