mdlbear | Toy shopping (Reply)

After my walk (which I needed, having missed yesterday) I went to Guitar Showcase, as I often do. It's not quite on the way home, but it's close, and, um, the car was already pointed in that direction. Yeah, that's it.

Upstairs in the pro audio section I found the display box for the Edirol UA25, which was at the top of my list for a portable recording gear based on my work's Mac laptop. So I chatted with the friendly salespeople, made sure that it had drivers for the new Intel Macs (it does), gave the thing a heft to see how it compares with the Tascam US122 (which was also on the list). And thought for a while.

I could have gone home, thought about it for a couple more weeks, and ordered it online for the same price (and saved myself tax and shipping). But, y'know, I already had the thing in my hands, and I already knew it was what I wanted. So I bought it.

In my opinion the main advantage over the US122 is the fact that it has a built-in (switchable) limiter, which will be especially useful for field recording, where I don't have much control over levels. It also has all the controls and the inputs in front, so I can stack things on it or put it in my rolly -- the US122 has the knobs on top, which is awkward.

And unlike the US122, the Linux drivers Just Plain Work, rather than having to load a firmware blob. So on the whole it was well worth the extra $80. Unlike my M-Audio Quattro (which I'll either put in the living room with the stereo and MIDI keyboard or sell off), the UA25 is USB-powered and has a (switchable) high-impedance input for electric guitar.

For the difference between the UA25 and one of the little handheld flash recorders (which start at $300), I can buy a couple of cheap but good-enough-for-field-recording microphones. AMS has a Behringer C2 matched pair on sale for $50 including a case and all the necessary accessories including a stereo bar (which would cost me $10 on sale at Guitar Center). I think I'll go with those. I don't think I'd use them in the studio, but for recording a concert from the audience they're probably just fine.

The other piece of gear that I'm considering is a new gig bag for Plink, my Vagabond travel guitar. They've apparently redesigned it since I bought mine -- it's described as "Heavy duty black nylon shell, plush red interior, heavy padding, zippered pocket with Vagabond logo, shoulder strap." Black... red plush... strap... (\me wipes drool off keyboard) We're talking serious gadget lust here, folks. Wish I could find a picture, but... Guitar Showcase also had a lightweight polyfoam combination gig bag/hardshell case that would work for my Ovation, but with Plink I can carry it on and have one less thing to worry about. It'll wait.

Update: (7:48pm) microphones and case on order.