M-Audio Microtrack II

[RPSharman]

Anyone have any experience with this recorder?

It seems without built-in mics, that it might concentrate more on the pre-amp and the recorder aspect of the unit.

This is probably going to be used to gather "usable reference audio" for a shirtless moped rider talking with a passenger, being chased by the camera operator on rollerblades.  I may or may not be able to stay in range for wireless reception, and there's plenty of room for the recorder under the seat and I might be able to hide a CUB on the handlebars.

Robert

[Bash]

Would this not be a classic case of a job for the Zaxcom recording wireless transmitters.

If they stay in range then all well and good. If, however, you lose them, then no problem, you can rebuild it all from the Tx files.

Kindest regards,

Simon B

Anyone have any experience with this recorder?

It seems without built-in mics, that it might concentrate more on the pre-amp and the recorder aspect of the unit.

This is probably going to be used to gather "usable reference audio" for a shirtless moped rider talking with a passenger, being chased by the camera operator on rollerblades.  I may or may not be able to stay in range for wireless reception, and there's plenty of room for the recorder under the seat and I might be able to hide a CUB on the handlebars.

Robert

[Eric Leonard]

Hey Robert,

It might be fine for your limited purpose.

As you'd expect, the preamps on these are somewhat noisy with limited gain and they sound thin. I got the best results direct-wiring some Trams for the minijack that carries 3 volt "plug-n-power" and avoiding the 1/4-inch TRS jacks. It's enough DC to power the mics and to kind of overpower the micpres. Not sure about trying the same with the CUB, though the MicroTrack II  claims to produce true 48v phantom on the TRS connectors (that would obviously power the CUB).

The limiter isn't great, and the push-button manual level controls are tough to "set and forget" accurately.

But the deal killer for me -- it has an internal battery that can't be replaced - so you have to be careful about keeping it fully charged. The interface is also kind of clumsy and unrefined.

For what it's worth, the mic-in audio performance of the old Sony MD and HiMD recorders is somewhat superior. On two 'extreme sports' shoots I used the Trams wired to the 1/8" mic inputs of the MD recorders and stashed them on offroad cyclists. They worked great, though I wasn't trying to capture dialogue so much as grunts, bike noises, crashes, etc.

For marathons and cycle races I've seen 416s rigged in full wind protection at the end of short fishpoles, somehow clamped to the back of another bike. That rider would pace the subject as quietly as possible. The results I heard were impressive - though all the low end had been tossed out.

Good luck -- seems like a tough one.

-- Eric