IRiver iFP-890
 

I just bought one of these off e-Bay. I found it when there was just a few minutes left to the auction and I figured "why not bid?". It says there is a line-in. I'm doing mostly weddings and I want this to record audio from the PA during ceremony/reception (line level). I also intend to get a Giant Squid mic to record during ceremony if a PA isn't being used. Can anyone tell me for sure that this device will do what I hope it will?

In addition to this I'm planning on getting a Senn wireless to record the officiant or groom during ceremonies.

Any info is appreciated. Thanks.

It can do all the things you want.

I have the IRiver 895 (512MB) and the custom Giant Squid Lav (Black 6ft cable with the custom connector).

If you connect it to the PA I would recommend changing the recoding volume to something between 35-38 or even lower depending on how hot the signal from the PA is.

For the GS I have the volume set at 38.

With the GS lav it records in mono but you can easily turn this into stereo in your sound app (do a stereo pan).

I've used it numerous times and the quality is outstanding.

You can record at 320 kbps.

There is a firmware upgrade available. Here is the deal with that.
As is stands the IRiver does not show up as a flash drive in my comp so you have to use the iriver software. No big deal since it comes with it and you can download it in case you are on a PC that does not have it.

If you upgrade the firmware it will work like a flash drive and you can drag and drop in window explorer. However, they made a change and the recording is capped at 96kbps (something near CD quality) not the 320kbps.

I don't have the new firmware on mine so I can stil do 320kbps.

I will run some tests between 320 and 96kbps to see what the difference is (since you can manually set the recording to different values up to 320kbps).

At 320kbps you can get 3.5 hrs from the 895 with 512MB.