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Zoom F6 (a 32bit recorder!)


IronFilm

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7 hours ago, pillepalle said:

Hopefully they deliver it with a pair of tweezers to be able to operate the unit :)

 

yeah, knobs look awkward and the idea to cycle through menus with those tiny buttons is not very appealing.

 

however....  the dual preamp + 32bit float looks very convincing! just imagine you have to do a car bag drop and simply don't have to worry about levels.

 

I can well imagine that once post catches up, this will be the standard in all recorders in 10years time.

would be interesting if Sonosax plans to do implement this with a firmware upgrade (if at all possible)

chris

 

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While the thought of 32 bit and full dynamic range is cool and all, I still think that the target audience (single person video shooter, run and gun) is going to be disappointed. While the audio in that video is fine, thing is the mic is connected directly to the unit. Many video shooters have wireless systems that are inferior to the preamps of this unit, and the dynamic range of the recorder won't help then. Sure, for car rigs or other cramped rigs, it would be awesome. But still I imagine those video shooters buying this thinking all their audio will sound great and have no distortion and be "raw". And then they put their Rode wireless system on their talent with the wrong gain staging. 

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8 hours ago, INARI said:

The file format itself is 32bit float, but I think the actual dynamic range is around 140dB.

 

which matches the maximum dynamic range of most microphones (and most sounds that don't make my ears bleed )

sounds good enough for me.

 

 

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13 hours ago, chrismedr said:

 

however....  the dual preamp + 32bit float looks very convincing! just imagine you have to do a car bag drop and simply don't have to worry about levels.

 

I can well imagine that once post catches up, this will be the standard in all recorders in 10years time.

would be interesting if Sonosax plans to do implement this with a firmware upgrade (if at all possible)

chris

 

 

The SXR4+ already uses dual A/D's and CAN record at either 24 or 32Bit. That is why there is a US version, because of the "Zaxcom dual A/D patent issue"..  See here: https://www.sonosax.ch/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/AUDIO_PATENTS.pdf

I suppose the next question is, what will Zaxcoms response be to this Zoom dual A/D recorder?  

 

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18 minutes ago, engaudio said:

 

The SXR4+ already uses dual A/D's and CAN record at either 24 or 32Bit. That is why there is a US version, because of the "Zaxcom dual A/D patent issue"..  See here: https://www.sonosax.ch/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/AUDIO_PATENTS.pdf 

I suppose the next question is, what will Zaxcoms response be to this Zoom dual A/D recorder?  

 


Probably there will be no response forever.

if it works with the scheme different from NeverClip.

 

There have been some models with dual ADCs that for increase dynamic range in the past.
https://www.merging.com/products/interfaces/merging+anubis

https://www.sony.jp/ic-recorder/products/PCM-D100/

 

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1 hour ago, engaudio said:

The SXR4+ already uses dual A/D's and CAN record at either 24 or 32Bit.

 

I don't know the machine, so I might be missing something, but the manual only lists 24bit and there's no hint of 32bit (nor could I find any mention through google), let alone float (which are two different things, although they are usually used together)

https://www.sonosax.ch/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/SXR4_um-hardware_eng.pdf

 

 

 

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6 hours ago, engaudio said:

 

The SXR4+ already uses dual A/D's and CAN record at either 24 or 32Bit. That is why there is a US version, because of the "Zaxcom dual A/D patent issue"..  See here: https://www.sonosax.ch/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/AUDIO_PATENTS.pdf

I suppose the next question is, what will Zaxcoms response be to this Zoom dual A/D recorder?  

 


I'm guessing  you own the European version of the SX-R4+ rather than the US version?

 

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7 hours ago, chrismedr said:

 

I don't know the machine, so I might be missing something, but the manual only lists 24bit and there's no hint of 32bit (nor could I find any mention through google), let alone float (which are two different things, although they are usually used together)

https://www.sonosax.ch/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/SXR4_um-hardware_eng.pdf

 

 

 

Yep, the manual doesn't really hint at it but it can do 32bit float. Odd because the early release notes mentioned it.. Anyway, here's a screenshot confirming from a test recording I just made on my non US model SXR4+.

sonosax sxr4+_32bit.jpg

Edited by engaudio
grammer
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9 hours ago, chrismedr said:

 

I don't know the machine, so I might be missing something, but the manual only lists 24bit and there's no hint of 32bit (nor could I find any mention through google), let alone float (which are two different things, although they are usually used together)

https://www.sonosax.ch/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/SXR4_um-hardware_eng.pdf

 

 

 

 

Anyway it's better to make a distinction between the file format and the actual amount of information it contains. 

 

The actual amount of information stored by the recorder is determined by the properties of the A/D converters and the analog circuitry (and the microphone obviously) and it is much smaller than the total dynamic range that can be represented in 32 bit floating point. As @INARI pointed out, around 140 dB would be a very good value.

 

So why 32 bit FP? It's a common sample format, you don't need to create a custom, say, 26 bit fixed point format. And floating point eliminates the need to adjust values in order to fit the more limited precision of fixed point. It's also much easier to handle when doing calculations (gain adjustments, etc).

 

Of course it also offers a marketing benefit. Some readers will assume that being 32 bit FP it will have an almost infinite dynamic range.

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thank you.
"We will not be too strict to preamp gain at field recording" It only works for that degree.

 

And all of condenser microphones cannot escape brown noise in the air,

and resistor that equipped in your machine has Johnson noise.

So, our ears and equipments can not be used up even with 24 bit int.

 

But I think it is a very good product considering the price.

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For those of you who are curious, brown noise for mics is Brownian noise due to the motion of air molecules (Brownian motion). Sennheiser, years ago, showed that the noise floor of their RF condenser mics dropped when the mics were placed in a vacuum in a bell jar. Pretty damned impressive demonstration. Oddly enough, the young human ear is limited by Brownian motion. However, that has not been demonstrated in an evacuated bell jar. The only way to lower the Brownian motion noise, is to use larger diaphragms that increase the desired signal by the increased area and only increase the noise level by the square root of the increase of area. That's a reason why little tiny lavalieres don't have the low noise performance of large diaphragm mics.

 

Johnson noise is the thermal noise in any resistor, even "perfect" ones, and at a given temperature, is inescapable. Good quality metal film resistors have noise levels very close to the theoretical limit for thermal noise. The only way to lower this noise level is to cool the resistor or device, sometimes being as extreme as using liquid helium.

Best Regards,

Larry Fisher

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5 hours ago, INARI said:

So, our ears and equipments can not be used up even with 24 bit int.

 

I think nobody here thinks that 32bit gives us better quality audio, I totally agree that with gain levels set properly a 24bit recording will be indistinguishable..

 

The benefit is not better quality, but that with proper dual amplifiers and float encoding it's simply impossible to mess up a recording due to improper gain settings.

Now if that is any benefit or just useless tech depends a lot on the intended use. Most sound production mixers probably know how to set levels properly (and take pride of it), but I can still think of occasions where simply never having to touch the trim knob could be useful (lavs, car drop, stunt scenes, unsupervised nature recordings, concerts that I want to enjoy rather then worrying about levels etc).

 

 

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4 hours ago, chrismedr said:

 

I think nobody here thinks that 32bit gives us better quality audio, I totally agree that with gain levels set properly a 24bit recording will be indistinguishable..

 

The benefit is not better quality, but that with proper dual amplifiers and float encoding it's simply impossible to mess up a recording due to improper gain settings.

Now if that is any benefit or just useless tech depends a lot on the intended use. Most sound production mixers probably know how to set levels properly (and take pride of it), but I can still think of occasions where simply never having to touch the trim knob could be useful (lavs, car drop, stunt scenes, unsupervised nature recordings, concerts that I want to enjoy rather then worrying about levels etc).

 

 

Is it fair to say a 6 I/P recorder this small needs to have 32bit FP because those pots are so impractical? And if a large part of the intended market is OMBers then a system that doesn't need constant adjustment (or even monitoring) of levels is also advantageous? I think aside from debatable improvements over noise floor, this recorder will bring 2 big things for the intended market: size and ease of use.

 

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11 hours ago, LarryF said:

For those of you who are curious, brown noise for mics is Brownian noise due to the motion of air molecules (Brownian motion). Sennheiser, years ago, showed that the noise floor of their RF condenser mics dropped when the mics were placed in a vacuum in a bell jar. Pretty damned impressive demonstration. Oddly enough, the young human ear is limited by Brownian motion. However, that has not been demonstrated in an evacuated bell jar. The only way to lower the Brownian motion noise, is to use larger diaphragms that increase the desired signal by the increased area and only increase the noise level by the square root of the increase of area. That's a reason why little tiny lavalieres don't have the low noise performance of large diaphragm mics.

 


Fascinating! That is the coolest fact I learned today

9 hours ago, chrismedr said:

but I can still think of occasions where simply never having to touch the trim knob could be useful (lavs, car drop, stunt scenes, unsupervised nature recordings, concerts that I want to enjoy rather then worrying about levels etc).


Reality TV / docos / etc

1 hour ago, Boomboom said:

… at 13:14 about the TC menu in Bluetooth mode… a hint: Timecode Systems. Ditch the box !  😉

Nifty! 
Zoom has already paired with TCS before for their Ambisonics mic/recorder. 

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9 hours ago, INARI said:

Thanks.

I mistakenly wrote  "Brown motion" as "Brown noise" 😅
[snip]

Hi Inari,

"Brown noise" is perfectly correct, similar to white noise or pink noise and is caused by Brownian motion. The scientist that Brownian motion was named after was Robert Brown, a botanist (!) (thanks Google).

Brown noise is heavily weighted towards low frequencies. Starting with white noise, you can make pink noise with a complicated but gentle 3 dB per octave low pass filter. If you apply a steeper but simple 6 dB per octave low pass filter to white noise, you get brown noise. It's described as the rumbling noise of a large waterfall.

Best Regards,

Larry Fisher

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7 hours ago, Boomboom said:

… at 13:14 about the TC menu in Bluetooth mode… a hint: Timecode Systems. Ditch the box !  😉

Rumor has it, the Tentacle BT system/access points are about to be made public in form of an SDK (software development kit) so third parties can sync to/from it (or develop for it) over... BT.

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On 5/29/2019 at 11:58 AM, LarryF said:

For those of you who are curious, brown noise for mics is Brownian noise due to the motion of air molecules (Brownian motion). Sennheiser, years ago, showed that the noise floor of their RF condenser mics dropped when the mics were placed in a vacuum in a bell jar. Pretty damned impressive demonstration. Oddly enough, the young human ear is limited by Brownian motion. However, that has not been demonstrated in an evacuated bell jar. The only way to lower the Brownian motion noise, is to use larger diaphragms that increase the desired signal by the increased area and only increase the noise level by the square root of the increase of area. That's a reason why little tiny lavalieres don't have the low noise performance of large diaphragm mics.

 

Johnson noise is the thermal noise in any resistor, even "perfect" ones, and at a given temperature, is inescapable. Good quality metal film resistors have noise levels very close to the theoretical limit for thermal noise. The only way to lower this noise level is to cool the resistor or device, sometimes being as extreme as using liquid helium.

Best Regards,

Larry Fisher

Large condenser mikes used for music are usually close to a loud sound source.

 

Electret personal mikes are usually close to to a person's mouth.

 

The noise problem is usually not equipment based but location caused!

 

With respect

 

mike

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