By Teja Gerken
Digital recording has grown by leaps and bounds in the past few years, making a multitude of home recording options available to musicians on a budget. Many of us were introduced to digital recording via DAT machines in the late '80s. Embraced by the professional audio industry as a low-cost mix-down and mastering tool, DATs also found a home with solo guitarists looking to produce high-quality recordings in their living rooms (see "The Digital Revolution," March/April '91).
After the DAT came the ADAT, practically revolutionizing the way we think about recording. Introduced by Alesis in 1991, ADAT was the first affordable digital multitrack, and it quickly became the industry standard. More than 100,000 ADAT machines have been sold, and thousands upon thousands of successful albums have been recorded in this format. The system's eight-track S-VHS videocassette format is thus compatible with the majority of today's professional recording facilities.
Another videocassette-based system is Sony's DA series multitrack machine, which records on High-8 tapes and has been embraced by the film industry due in part to its ability to fit a lot of music on each tape (up to one hour and 45 minutes, as opposed to the ADAT's 62 minutes). Both systems are available only in modular configurations, which has benefits and drawbacks. On the plus side, you can create a system with up to 128 available tracks by chaining several machines (of the same format) together. The modular configuration also allows you to tailor the studio setup to your individual needs: to add more channels, inserts, or auxiliary sends, for example, or patch in the mixer you bought last year. Recently introduced mixer/recorder packages by Alesis and Tascam have brought the prices of such proven systems down to almost the same level as self-contained hard-disk studios like the Roland VS-880EX. However, for all their professional appeal, these tape-based systems lack virtual tracks and random location access, they often necessitate further purchases and complicated hookups, and they're much less portable. If you would like to combine the benefits of hard-disk recording with those of modular setups, you may want to investigate stand-alone hard-disk recorders such as Akai's DR8 or DR16, Fostex's D-108 or D-160, E-mu's Darwin, and Yamaha's D24.
So how do you decide which recording rig is right for you? Ease of use is an important factor for most musicians, and while many of the new digital studios seem to offer the same features, a closer look reveals some important differences in formats and capabilities. I am going to concentrate here on the various all-in-one packages that may be viewed as alternatives to Roland's VS-880EX described in this month's cover story.
Found at the heart of every modern personal computer, hard disks are now also used as the recording media of choice in many digital multitrack recorders. For the sake of simplicity, I am also going to include Zip- and Jaz diskbased systems in this category, because hardware platforms treat them essentially like hard disks since they have similar capacity, speed, and SCSI interfaces. Any of these systems will make the problems of tape hiss, wow and flutter (fluctuations in pitch), and endless rewinding and searching things of the past. They all feature CD-quality recording capabilities, random access to any location, MIDI compatibility, and easy editing functions, such as jog-shuttle wheels (similar to those found on many VCRs). Many of these units also feature virtual tracks, which allow you to experiment with lots of different takes and choose your favorites during final playback.
Designing these machines to be portable and affordable necessitated a number of compromises. The biggest limitation for acoustic musicians is that many of these units lack XLR inputs, which essentially means that if you intend to use high-quality condenser mics, you'll need to add external mic preamps or a small mixer. Those who don't want to be limited to the on-board effects these units contain may also be disappointed in the lack of auxiliary sends and channel inserts in many of the machines, although strangely enough, some of the less expensive recorders shine in these respects. Given that many users might eventually want to use these home-recorded tracks in a professional environment, it would also be nice if more of them featured an easy way to digitally copy multiple tracks to another format.
The Akai DPS12 offers 12 tracks rather than the more common four or eight. Considering its 250 virtual tracks, these "extra" tracks may be unnecessary for many solo guitar or small ensemble situations, but those who are trying to achieve stereo imaging while recording larger bands will appreciate the flexibility that they offer. Users may work with an internal hard disk or a removable Jaz drive, as well as various external storage devices. The Akai is one of the few machines (along with Roland's VS-1680) that offers a display with actual wave forms-similar to those found in a computer's digital audio software. This feature can make editing more visual and potentially more accurate. Those who would like to venture into automated mixing can do so by hooking the unit up to an external MIDI sequencer. The DPS12 is also the only machine in this roundup that supports standard SCSI CD burners.
This cool little unit has brought digital multitrack recording into a previously unheard-of price range. While it only features four tracks (along with two virtual tracks) and lacks many of the features of its more expensive competitors, its logical layout and simple operation make it the perfect partner for singer-songwriters seeking to produce high-quality demos. The FD-4 ships from the factory without a hard drive (although one can be internally mounted) and instead relies on external storage media accessed through the unit's SCSI-II port. This allows you to utilize a drive that best suits your needs and will probably help you save money given that hard disks are coming down in price practically every month. Fostex recommends removable media drives such as Iomega's popular Zip or Jaz drives, but most any SCSI-II drive will do the trick. The FD-4's straightforward analog mixer doesn't feature sexy functions such as automation or scene memory, but it puts three bands of EQ onto each channel, and those familiar with a traditional mixing board should find it easy to use. Other nice features include two XLR inputs (without phantom power), as well as channel inserts, auxiliary sends, and digital ins and outs.
Although Fostex could have simply doubled the tracks of its popular FD-4 and called it an eight-track, the designers chose to make some other improvements to the FD-8 as well, adding 16 virtual tracks, extended editing capabilities, two recording modes (an uncompressed mastering mode and the space-saving ADAC-compressed normal mode), and a very hip optical ADAT interface. Despite this bundle of cool new features, the price of this easy-to-use powerhouse is surprisingly low. Like the FD-4, it features a straightforward mixer and is compatible with external SCSI drives, and its ability to transfer data to ADAT would come in handy for musicians who do their recording at home and then go to a professional studio for final mixing and/or additional tracking.
Measuring a mere 15.2 (width) by 9.8 (depth) by 3.3 (height) inches, the Korg D8 is perhaps the world's smallest hard-disk recorder, easy to take on the road or into the rehearsal hall. It also features on-board multi-effects based on Korg's Pandora line of signal processors and even a built-in drum machine, making it a complete studio in a box. If you're worried that size matters when it comes to recording quality, you'll be surprised to learn that the D8 records completely uncompressed audio and features a digital mixer with memory for up to 20 scenes. Unfortunately, there are no virtual tracks and there is only one pair of quarter-inch inputs (in addition to its digital input), which may make it difficult to record multi-mic setups or bands. But the Korg is bound to please many home recordists, especially those working by themselves.
The VS-1680, Roland's flagship digital studio, offers much more than twice the available tracks as the VS-880EX. Aside from its 16 tracks of playback, 256 virtual tracks, and eight simultaneously recordable tracks, it features some user-friendly characteristics that are missing from its smaller sibling. The unit's huge LCD display offers the same basic information found on the VS-880EX, along with more detailed readouts that make it a lot easier to use the many menu-driven commands. But even those who were not confused by any of the VS-880EX's features will be envious of the VS-1680's ultimate weapon: the display of digital wave forms, an important tool for accurate editing. (If you want to use your PC to edit the audio recorded on either the VS-1680 or the VS-880EX, you'll appreciate the special version of Emagic's Logic Audio software that Roland includes with each of these machines.) The VS-1680 is also equipped with two phantom-powered XLR inputs and eight individual (but analog) channel outputs. Its only weakness compared to the VS-880EX is that it lacks on-board effects out of the box, but it has room for two of Roland's 24-bit expansion boards.
If the VS-1680 expanded the VS line into the upper end, then the removable Zip diskbased VS-840EX brings it into more affordable realms. It still offers eight tracks of playback, 64 virtual tracks, built-in effects, and many other features that are comparable to the unit's more expensive siblings. Its limitations include a much shorter recording time and the inability to connect directly to a CD burner via SCSI. The lowest quality recording mode (LV2) offers up to 257 minutes of recording on one track, but if all eight tracks are used in the highest quality mode (MT1, which is one of the compression schemes found in the VS-880EX), the 250-MB Zip format will be used up in about 11.5 minutes. In reality, a track will often have breaks without recorded information, raising the amount of available time, but if you're into heavy multitrack recording this could easily become an issue. Even the optional SCSI port doesn't solve the problem because it is only usable for backup purposes and doesn't support direct recording to an external drive. Other perhaps less important drawbacks include a less sophisticated effects processor, fewer automated mixer functions, and the lack of high-end features such as time compression and expansion. On the positive side, the VS-840EX benefits from being a second-generation machine. Although it is still very menu driven, it sports a much more intuitive interface and an icon-based display and is more user-friendly overall than the VS-880EX. The VS-840EX might be all that many home recordists need.
If you're intrigued by the idea of making low-budget digital recordings at home, you might want to look at multitracks that employ minidisc technology. Although the format uses ATRAC data compression, which at least in theory doesn't sound as good as the less-drastic compression employed by various hard-disk systems, in the real world the difference between minidisc and CD often shrinks to inaudible proportions. Minidisc multitracks, most of them four-tracks, are as user-friendly as cassette four-tracks. They feature random data access, basic editing capabilities, and the ability to ping-pong and copy tracks without signal degradation.
A couple of these units offer mixers with functions that leave some hard-disk recorders in the dust. For example, Yamaha's MD8-currently the only eight-track in this field-features two phantom-powered XLR jacks among its 12 (!) inputs, two channel inserts, and two auxiliary sends with stereo returns. It also has a variety of output options and MIDI interfacing capabilities. Yamaha's second-generation four-track minidisc recorder, the MD4S, boasts many of the same features. Another pioneer in minidisc technology is Tascam, the inventors of the original cassette-based Portastudio. The 564 unit offers four tracks of recording, a 12-channel mixer, and (unlike any other machine in this category) digital outputs. Similarly, Sony's MDMX4MK2 offers four-track convenience with digital specs.
For many users, the decision of hard disk vs. minidisc-finances aside-may come down to the kind of equipment they feel comfortable with. If you're uncomfortable with the idea of multiple menu-driven functions housed in a single button, the more traditional architecture of minidisc recorders may make you feel more at home and ultimately result in better performances.