Olympus DM-10/Marantz PMD670 Digital Audio Recorders
RSSBy Jeffrey Hastings -- School Library Journal, 04/01/2006
Olympus America Inc.,Two Corporate Center Drive, P. O. Box 9058, Melville, NY 11747-9058 (800) 622-6372 www.olympusamerica.com/education $179. Marantz Professional, 1100 Maplewood Drive, Itasca, IL 60143 www.d-mpro.com $899.99.
Once a proud and shiny squadron, my library's remaining ranks of cassette recorders are looking pretty shabby. When that last soldier buys the farm, most likely any day now, it will symbolize the end of the cassette, that scrappy underdog, the Lo-Fi format of the Hi-Fi world. So many wonderful spoken word projects were made possible by the simple and cheap cassette recorder. Now I'm hoping that the advent of podcasting might revive the great teaching practice of assigning audio projects, enhanced, this time around, by the Web-wide shareability of digital files.
While you won't find a 40-buck solution for making the analog to digital audio recorder transition at this point, here's a David and Goliath comparison that pits personal technology against professional to give you an idea of the range of digital recorder options out there.
The palm-sized digital recorder Olympus DM-10 is so small it feels almost covert, yet it makes excellent recordings. The built-in microphone sounded great when I used it to record a one-on-one interview at the medium sampling rate. But it impressed even more when attending a school assembly and employing the included stereo mike. I got a surprisingly natural sounding document of the live event by recording right off the arm of my auditorium seat. Powered by two AAA batteries and with a recording capacity of over 10 hours of voice in SP mode, this sleek little unit is undeniably cool—you can even plug in the earbuds and groove to your favorite MP3s, or use the 64MB of flash memory to transport your files. However, the DM-10 doesn't record in MP3 format and the software included for playing files recorded with the unit lacks the means to convert to the popular format. I used a freeware program called Switch to convert the DM-10's DSS files to MP3 and it worked fine, but your patrons may not appreciate the extra step required to make files playable in most common media players.
Marantz has always been a niche leader in professional audio recorders. I used an analog predecessor of this unit to record radio interviews way back in... well, a long time ago. Equipped to accept a pair of balanced XLR microphones, the chunky Marantz PMD670 is built to last. It is capable of recording in four formats and dozens of sampling and bit rates, and the best thing is the unit can record directly to MP3 on the supplied 64 MB compact flash card. That meant I was able to record a high-quality audio file, slip it into my PC's card reader and drag it right onto my computer for instant listening, sharing, and podcasting. Pro quality, no hassles—gotta love that.
These are both excellent digital audio recorders—one designed for personal use and dictation, and one geared toward high-end professionals. While neither are as uniquely suitable to the educational environment as the trusty cassette recorders of yore, you may have a place for one of them until the market adjusts and a new classroom classic is born.
| Author Information |
| Jeffrey Hastings is a school library media specialist at Highlander Way Middle School in Howell, MI. You can e-mail him at hastingj@howellschools.com. |
