Recording with an iFP: recommended settings?

[levinel]

Sometimes I need to record a music lesson or part of a live performance to study later. (In this case, ethnic percussion.) I've been using a cheap cassette recorder, but now I have an iFP-780 - which seems much better suited. However, digital recording is totally new to me.

Well, for the above specific purpose, it looks like I can get away with low sample and bit-rates. But I'm curious about what experienced people recommend for this and other recording tasks. Here are a few that come to mind ...

- teacher's examples (for practice only)
- FM broadcast
- line-in from a portable CD player
- line-in from a cassette tape player
- café performance by soloist or band

For all but the first, the temptation is to go for the "best" available settings, but I suspect that with other constraints, such as quality of the source, mic placement, and ambient noise, the best settings might result in large files that don't add much.

So here's a related question, based on a familiar example - the notorious 96 Kbps limit of the UMS firmware... For what iFP recording tasks is 96 Kbps adequate, and for what tasks is it better to switch back to the IMM firmware?

[ManchesterUnited4Life]

I have an iHP-120 which I use to record when I want the *best* results (via the optical in+.WAV). My H340 is used in most other circumstances, and seeing as there's not much difference between the '780 and the '340 in terms of recording options, I would hope my advice is pretty accurate;

Teacher's examples - 96-128KBpS
FM Broadcast (I assume you mean recording?) 128-320KBpS
Line in from Portable CDP - 192KBpS
Line in from Cassette tape - Highest bitrate (in this case 320KBpS)
Café performance - 160-192KBpS

For those I've left as variables, it's simply your decision as to which bitrate you feel comfortable working with. Personally, I record FM Broadcasts @ 320KBpS because it's what the player was already set up to do when I bought the unit - however, I've been meaning to scale it down to 128KBpS, solely because I now only use it to record songs for future reference (read; d/l later ) ...

HTH,

MU4L

[wulfrun]

Originally Posted by ManchesterUnited4Lif e

I have an iHP-120 which I use to record when I want the *best* results (via the optical in+.WAV). My H340 is used in most other circumstances, and seeing as there's not much difference between the '780 and the '340 in terms of recording options, I would hope my advice is pretty accurate;

Teacher's examples - 96-128KBpS
FM Broadcast (I assume you mean recording?) 128-320KBpS
Line in from Portable CDP - 192KBpS
Line in from Cassette tape - Highest bitrate (in this case 320KBpS)
Café performance - 160-192KBpS

For those I've left as variables, it's simply your decision as to which bitrate you feel comfortable working with. Personally, I record FM Broadcasts @ 320KBpS because it's what the player was already set up to do when I bought the unit - however, I've been meaning to scale it down to 128KBpS, solely because I now only use it to record songs for future reference (read; d/l later ) ...

HTH,

MU4L

As a general guide, consider that the sample rate determines the highest frequency that can be recorded, you have to sample at twice the highest frequency in the source. For speech, for example you don't need to sample more than 8kHz to keep 4Khz frequencies, which is enough. For music you need higher sample rates of 32 or 44.1kHz, these will keep 16 or 22.05kHz respectively (these are the *maximum* possible). Bit rate is another matter, try various settings and see what you're happy with.

Personally I use the following:

* For speech, 16kHz and 32k-bit
* For FM tuner, 32kHz or 44.1kHz and 128k-bit (actually, FM radio does not need more than 32kHz sampling since it doesn't contain >15kHz frequencies)
* For line-in, 44.1kHz and 128-256k-bit depending on the original's quality. For cassette originals, even 32kHz is probably overkill!