A client asked me today if I could recommend a good digital recorder for her to use to capture interviews whilst out and about as she intends to make more audio products to sell from her website. My initial reaction was that they are pricy options and the less pricy minidisc player does a great job.

However, after having done a good bit of web-sniffing, I think I might be coming round to the idea of the digital recorder. I don’t own a digital recorder, I use a minidisc recorder, I used one back in the BBC days and I still get great quality audio from it. Much of that is down to using a decent microphone and I think that’s what has put me off looking at the digital recorders - they tend to have built in mics.

But what’s to stop us using the digital recorder with an external, good quality mic? Nada. So, after having scoured the forums and the web-o-sphere, here are a couple of digital recorders it could well be worth going for.

The one above is a Marantz PDM620 - it’s not cheap - the one in the link costs £279 and you’d probably have to update the 512mb card that comes with it, which adds to the cost. Then there’s the external mic… Now, these things are made with an inbuilt mic for a reason - because they function perfectly well in that way. I would say that for podcasting, where quality is less important, then go ahead and use the built in mics. But if you intend to sell what you’re producing, I feel it’s more important to go for quality and therefore a good external mic would be better for carrying out interviews (the inbuilt one will pick up all the sounds around too).

Another option, which is slightly less expensive, is the sexy red Edirol R09, which does come with a bigger card at 1GB (you can stuff more on it). Again, I’d go for the external mic option if you want to get higher quality recordings but it totally depends on your preference and your own circumstances.

On a slightly different note - headphones. I’ll write a seperate post about headphones soon but meanwhile, just be careful when taking them off - you wouldn’t want to hit yourself in the face with them ten times in one day now, would you? (Yes, I’m having one of those days). I’ve also just realised I’m still wearing mine, even though there’s nothing coming out of them…eh hem, time for a cup o tea I think (eases the headphones off, gingerly).

By the way, if you’re confused and befuddled by the options available to your when it comes to making audio resources for your website, feel free to email me with any questions you might have or check out my website to see how I can help you.