TASCAM DR-07 Handheld Digital Recorder

Yesterday’s Stupid Deal of the Day was the Tascam DR-07 handheld digital recorder. I talked with a few people via Twitter and Facebook about this unit and I thought I would go further into it today.

This hand held recorder can be used for various applications, but I want to talk about how it can be used for the musician. Since I play guitar (usually at pretty loud levels) and I’m in a band, I wanted a easy way to record riffs, practices and show sets. I’m sure some of you have gone through the recording hassles…. using 4 track, multi track, multiple mics, checking levels, using a mixer, etc. If done right, these sound great and can be awesome recordings of live performances, etc. But dammit, I want something simple and something that sounds decent without a lot of set up or worry. Especially for shows. Nothing worse getting preoccupied with your recording set up right before it’s rock time.

This is where the DR-07 comes in. It’s small enough to keep in your guitar case, etc. You can just throw it up on the sound guy’s mixer console pointing to the stage and hit record. Since it’s easy to carry with you, you can always have it for practices, etc. The ‘mix’ will be as good as your normal room mix, so if you have a loud bass player.. you’ll have lots of bass on the recording, so it’s important to remember that.

The DR-07 uses stereo mics on the unit which point away (like your ears), and I do feel that it has a little darker sound. I haven’t experimented with the external mic input, but I would love to try a little splitter box with l/r mics at some point. The DR-07 also has level control, and it can handle the loudest room, and I’ve close mic’d my cabinet with this, so it can definitely handle the sound pressure level.

The unit generates wav files and writes to a SD card. You can use a mini-USB cable to interface directly to a computer (like a external harddrive) to retrieve files. Super easy. I do have a con though. It likes to eat batteries. There is a external power jack on it (I guess I should quit whining and buy an adapter for it). I also think it runs on the batteries if it’s plugged into the computer. Other than that, it’s a great thing to have and I highly recommend it.

Earlier on, the original reviews on this site (Way Huge Swollen Pickle and Creation Audio Labs Holy Fire) were recorded with this recorder. We switched to a laptop/interface set up to record with different mics to different speakers.

I found this video describing some of the functionality by PSSL01

You can pick up the Tascam DR-07 Portable Digital Recorder for $137.99 at Musician’s Friend (but keep an eye out for Stupid Deal of the Day specials.. sometimes this sells for $99).