Follow Up: Sennheiser E614, Zoom H4n Pro vs. Tascam DR100 Mk 3, Pre-Amp Noise OH MY

A follow up video after I learnt that mono recording works on the Zoom H4n Pro recorder adds extra noise to recordings. This might help anyone using a single XLR / Line input on the Zoom.
Shout out to this post: transom.org/20... that made me realise!

[@Matthew_Raymond]

The Zoom H4N (and presumably the Pro as well) has a mixer you can access from the menu that lets you set the volume and panning on all the channels. Using the Mixer, you can set Channel 1 panning to "middle" so you can hear it on both sides of the headphones. Also, if you're in Multitrack Recording mode (MTR), you should be able to turn the two XLR channels on and off independently, so you won't have to turn down the volume on the second channel. You'd just turn it off instead.

[@punkrachmaninoff]

zooms aren't confusing at all... 😂 thanks sooo much for this video. keep the dependable audio tutorial content coming, there is DEFINITELY not enough on KZbin at the moment!!

[@martinrandez7021]

You saved my life! All the misinformation going around about these quirks, you cleared it all for me. Thanks! And I'm now upset I have purchased the Zoom H4N pro. Damn

[@peoplelikeus3684]

Hello Martin, just saw Lachlan's video above and wondering how you're finding your H4n Pro . I'm trying to decide between H4n Pro, H6 or Tascam DR1000iii. If you have any thoughts or recommendations I'd be happy to hear them. Thank you.

[@martinrandez7021]

@@peoplelikeus3684 Hi, shortly after getting the H4N pro, my career took a sharp turn due to covid. I'm no longer in that field but my dissatisfaction was such that I intended to sell it and upgrade to Mix pre-3 ii by SoundDevice. I had made the classic mistake of skimming on the sound portion. Don't. Realistically, it's the price of 1 good lens, and should last a very long time. Curtin Judd has an excellent review on it and how it can serve one man crew filmmakers.

[@peoplelikeus3684]

@@martinrandez7021 That's great feedback. I'll check out the mixpre.

[@bobsamurai]

1 xlr mic center channel without noise on H4N Pro: 1. Menu>mode>MTR 2. Menu>recording>always new. 3. Main screen>Press track 1> Press Input 1 4. Record x2 The downside of this is that you cant see your level values through MTR. I ended up returning my H4N Pro. It's just not for single mic use as much as it is for dual-mic podcasts or musicians.

[@TexpatOTG]

I really like my Tascam Dr-100 mIII. It gets daily use, easy to use, and performs flawlessly. Good Vid .. Thanks.

[@peoplelikeus3684]

Is the Tascam likely to sound better than the H4n Pro or H6? thoughts?

[@TexpatOTG]

@@peoplelikeus3684 Probably for dialog recording there would be no significant difference. Both of the Zoom recorders are quite good. I really like the H6 personally. I think it really comes down to form factor, features and ease of use more than audio quality of the units.

[@peoplelikeus3684]

@@TexpatOTG Thanks for the prompt response :) I love the look of the H6 Black but difficult to justify currently. I want to upgrade my video audio from my Rode Videomic NTG to something akin to the fullness of the H6 without the cost. Here in Australia its around $600.

[@TexpatOTG]

@@peoplelikeus3684Try working on your audio editing skills on Audacity or like program. You might find that the audio you are looking for isn't a gear related issue. I often use Tascam DR10x with lav, shotgun or dynamic mics and find them quite good, but a little processing brings out the separation and crispness I like in my audio. I'm no expert for sure, but I do think you can over-estimate the value of high-cost gear when trying to achieve good dialog recording for your videos.

[@peoplelikeus3684]

@@TexpatOTG Good points. My voice while clear lacks bassiness I might investigate audacity.

[@resakabrava6325]

so now I understand some exagerate noisefloors comming up in recordings with the Zoom H4n (previous to H4nPro). Thank you for this technical detailed explanation! :-)

[@Jedlmind]

I know the fix. Stereo mode uses the same gain setting for both XLR/TRS inputs. In MTR (Multitrack) mode, you can set the gains setting for EACH input independently. also you should record in mono and send to both left and right outputs... You are welcome. :)

[@codytyler8510]

How do you send to left and right outputs (from the recorder) or are you talking about in post?

[@Rob-bc4yu]

I was wondering the same, why wouldn’t he just switch to multitrack mode?

[@JerryGartnerPersonal]

When you record in stereo mode or 4 ch mode on the H4n Pro, with one mic plugged into an xlr input, you can monitor in mono mix, but the device will output a stereo file. You can then go into your favorite audio editing software and delete the empty channel eliminating that added noise. I have also found that adding preamps like the Triton Audio Fethead Phantom, mitigates the poor S/N ratio of the H4n Pro quite well by adding 18dB of clean gain to the signal. At $99 per piece though, my $250 piece of kit suddenly becomes a $450 bit. Granted, the H4n Pro has a larger feature set than the DR 100 MkIII, but if you just use 1 or 2 modes, the Tascam is a better value with a better S/N ratio.

[@manolillo123]

Thanks,tascam have a AKM AK4558 arquitecture VELMET SOUND, you can recording with two mics at the same time in one mix channel mono and 0 noise floor.

[@aaronfriedman8201]

The problem with the E614 is that it has a high self noise of 24DB

[@KeshaUlyetov]

Very useful, thanks. Didn't know that issue with summing channels in mono mix.

[@ConatusModulari]

'Recordah' +1 Thanks, very insightful video 🙏

[@nodaysback1]

Just wanted to say, the H4nPro and the Tascam DR100iii are not the same type of recorder. The Zoom is a 4 track recorder and the Tascam is a stereo recorder. I own a DR100iii. It's great for stereo capture. But that's all it does. These two recorders are not an 'apples to apples' comparison. So, you could not replace an H4nPro with a DR100iii if you require multi-track functionality. Also, the H4n should allow you to monitor a single channel source thru both speakers of the headphones and the other channel that is not in use should be able to be set to "0" or Muted and should not be introducing self noise to the active channel. That would be a major design flaw. One last tip.. Try not to push those kinds of built-in preamps up to 100% gain. The last 10% of that range is going to be mostly noise. Reposition the mic closer to the source or use a microphone that requires less gain. hth..

[@diderichlangmannen]

With a full input gain the noise of the Zoom H4N Pro is not bad at all. The Tascam is the better recorder but it would had been much cheaper and maybe even more effective if you would have bought a Triton FetHead that is amplifying the signal of the Sennheiser with 27dB! The price is about €60,00 and the effect is that the sound of the E614 is much louder and even better. And the level of the preamp from the recorder can be reduced around 80%! So - much louder and better sound with nearly zero noise floor for just 60bucks . Life can be so easy!

[@ngocehgayabebas2118]

E614 need phantom power.

[@metal571]

I saw your comment on the original video - my bad, when I think Senn shotgun mics I think dynamic. You should now be reducing the noise enormously by reducing that second input on the Zoom to 0 because in my experience mic inputs that aren't plugged into mics generate significantly more noise than when one is plugged into them. It definitely looks like the gain on the H4n is not quite enough but regardless of overall level it's the EIN of the Zoom preamps that are going to determine the final noise added by the recorder to the self noise from the mic here, to my knowledge. Unfortunately though as you demonstrated, apparently you can't monitor in mono and use only one mic in the H4n at the same time...

[@lachlanlikesathing]

The H4n’s limitation here actually boggles the mind. You are right, the unconnected input definitely seems noisier. I am assuming you use an interface yourself?

[@metal571]

@@lachlanlikesathing I've got a UMC404HD, and actually record everything using OBS which is fed the webcam feed and the interface sound. Interfacing (pun not intended) with your camera shouldn't be a big deal if you were to move to something like that. Actually not totally sure why you want to use a mobile recorder here rather than a desktop interface.

[@gsboss]

mono mix came turned off for me. but now i at least know what that setting is used for

[@nathanksimpson]

the e614 has fairly high self noise, just on the level of being too high for dialogue? Perhaps?

[@ameeromedia5883]

As soon as you switched to the Mark Mkiii it was like heaven 😇

[@ngocehgayabebas2118]

How about sennheiser e614 self noise? Did you do noise editing for this video?

[@ChocolateMediaFilm]

nice that you are learning...

[@joshuaroth4127]

hey thank you for your video. this helped me a lot. are you going to do a comparison any time soon? would be awesome :)

[@Raoh1st]

Very insteresting. Do you plug your preamp in your camera or do you sync your camera and preamp recorder files in post ?

[@stucknote]

Thank you for the video. 2 questions here : 1. Can the Tascam DR100 Mk 3 do multi track ? For example, recording the left track first, then playing back left track (for cue) and record on right track. 2. Do you have any time synchronization issue with the camera footage (recording the Audio from Tascam, then sync and mix with the Camera video).. over time, will the audio drift ?

[@jouniko]

I understood that the audio was mono, coming from those recorders in this video. So... Were you you using a low bitrate audio encoder for your videos, or what was causing the stereo artifacts? Shouldn't identical left and right channels produce identical artifacts on both channel, even when using a low bitrate audio encoder? Or was there a third source of (stereo) noise in the mix, and that lossy low bitrate encoder generated audible artifacts from the small differences in the noise between channels? Perhaps the camera audio was not muted? 🤔 Does the compression have anything to do with this, shouldn't that too be identical across channels, or does it have some kind of random "dithering" effect? Like totally not sure if that's a thing, just a hunch. Or is it just a strange thing some modern encoder does, like some kind of randomization, so each channels ends up different? Why would it do that 🤔 I'm just curious, because I keep hearing this effect, sometimes it's so bad that I turn it to mono for tolerable listening. In your videos it's pretty subtle, just sounds like there is stereo room echo, that's why I started to wonder if the audio is actually coming from the recorders or not. Substract right from left channel to hear the artifacts I'm talking about in this comment.

[@patrickbohyer8033]

Great video. Would either of these options be good for recording Attar and microphone?

[@matismateuszmatt]

Still tons of self noise on that Sennheiser.

[@hellohogo]

Mateusz Broughton yep, he’s way too hot on the preamps. If he’s not getting enough gain on the recorder, it’s better to get something like a cloudlifter.

[@aaronfriedman8201]

The E614 mic has 24DB of self-noise!

[@МастерскаяЗвука]

Can I record the signal from the CD player or amplifier to the Tascam DR100 Mk 3 device? I want to demonstrate to my viewers the difference in sound before the upgrade and after the upgrade of the devices, for example, by changing the power supply cable. Can you advise a more suitable device for these purposes?

[@IsraelSuperguide]

i was recording today out side and i took it tascam but when i set the source EXT MIC and plug the small mic nothig was recorded. Then i changed source to omni and the small mic in ext in. it catched too much noise as i was walking. any sugestion, what am i doing wrong? i just want to use the small mic and cancel the other mics. thank you

[@peteriacochran]

very helpful.

[@guitarshred863]

Hello . I'm into music recording as a hobby.. I have cassette recording , DAT recording and MiniDisk . Is this thing can Add to my Music recording or I Have to look something else .... thanks

[@IsraelSuperguide]

Question, what setting shall i use when using an external mic plug in and iliminate or cancel the other external mic, so that it will only pick my voice. thanks!

[@IAmKAZMO]

I stick with Tascam dr100 mkiii and my Marantz Professional pmd661 mkii

[@jat5am]

can someone approve that this problem exists on h6? it has 4 XLR inputs after all. or is it only the drawback of the junior model?

[@TimandLauren]

Hey lachlan, after recording with this and my microphone, if i play it back really loud, i notice a background/hiss noise is this normal man? is there any way to minimize this hiss noise? Thanks, Tim

[@MegaBananenmus]

which one would be better to record a piano with only internal mics?

[@MuhammadKharismawan]

Even with the Zoom it ain't really THAT noticeable, Tyll had way worse hiss that goes for a long~ time.

[@dirface]

Never put a recorder on 100% gain. That's not how they are designed to be used. Get a better external mic with phantom power and this is a non-issue.

[@lamasteve6905]

Changing of mics took away the noise ? Record lower on each recorder and boost it in post. It’s all about the mix then, try the DBX plugin waves.

[@YuriLix]

all of these recorders have mics right?

[@MoElf]

What do you think about dr 40x

[@phrankus2009]

I believe you missed a step when you failed to link the LEFT and RIGHT input signals BEFORE enabling the MONO MIX function … yes ? >> REVIEW WALKTHROUGH HERE (CLICK) >>> kzbin.info/www/bejne/l3-ZqIhrbMeSmbM

[@simonshurville612]

Nice 🦞 🦀 🦞 !!!

[@robsteer8176]

Confused. Com, break it down in simple terms

[@nucsary3555]

First

[@xray111xxx]

I just repurchased my DR-100mk.3. I have a DR-40 too and found the DR-40 just lacked that last bit I so missed from the DR-100. Interestingly I have recorded mono on my DR-40 quite nicely and a low noise floor. I use a Shure SM7B with a Cloudlifter CL-1. A Dbx 286s is where it goes then to my Recorder. It worked out well. Maybe you need a Preamplifier with more gain then record to your Recorder. There really isn't allot of gain on most portable recorders themselves. I can't wait to get the DR-100 mk.3 back again. Awesome Recorder.

[@nucsary3555]

First