Scott's thinking of the consumer minidisc limitation on digital file transfers - the confusion may be my fault as we discussed it in another thread where both minidisc and iRiver were mentioned. Still, your iRiver is recording in a lossy compressed format that needs conversion and reconversion several times. You'll get better overall quality by recording to 48kHz or even 96kHz uncompressed WAV files and keeping everything in the digital domain fromn start to finish as you can with a pro level recorder.

Steve I agree with you on that one, but sometimes money is the problem when purchasing equiptment (lack of).
I am looking into getting a new Digital Flash Card Recorder to use as a better way to record music at a reception or recital.
Do you have any experience with either of these units.

What do you think of these two to choose from:

Marantz PMD660 - Portable Compact Flash Digital Recorder with XLR Inputs ( I love teh fact that the PMD660 has XLR inputs as I greatly prefer these to 1/8 mini plugs.)
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/cont...ughType=search

or the

Edirol / Roland R-1 - Portable Wave/MP3 Compact Flash Recorder
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/cont...goryNavigation

I have hear both good and bad on these 2 units.

The bad on the Marantz PMD660 is that it has a terrible high-pitched whine when you record using the internal mcrophones. (although I would be using an external mic instead.

The bad on the Roland R-1 was the construction and lack of XLR inuts to name a coupe of things.

Thanks,
Michael

I too have heard good and bad about both - more bad about the Marantz than about the Edirol and I think I'd look closer at the Marantz 671 than the 660 if it were me but I don't have any hands-on with either one so take anything I say with a ton of salt. M-audio has a new pro grade recorder introduced this month, the MicroTrack 2496, not much bigger than an iRiver, that looks VERY promising and some online retailers are listing it at $400 US, very reasonable indeed.