Jeff DLB

The noise seems to be much more broad-band than a pure 60Hz tone. Attached is a noise sample (17sec, 2.8MB, WAV) with some talking and instrument sounds. I could not find a period of pure noise when nobody was making other sound, which is part of the problem when trying to filter the noise with Audacity. (I should try to get a pure-noise sample at home, though I'm not sure whether my AC has the same noise profile.) -Jeff DLB line_noise.wav

I have some recordings that have AC line noise. Is there a way to filter out the noise? I tried using Audacity, but got very poor results with the noise removal and equalization filters. In the future, I suppose I will use batteries (what a pain) or perhaps a battery box for the mics (would that help?). -Jeff DLB

Will, in fact I did do it myself. I found a pair of eyeglass retainers that are made of some sort of cloth tubes, somewhat like thick shoelaces. After some surgery I was able to slide the mics through. It works, and is very stealthy, but I need to add something to clasp the croakies & mics more tightly to the glasses so they keep their position. -Jeff DLB

The parabolic mic reminds me of the 1974 movie "The Conversation" by Francis Ford Coppola, starring Gene Hackman and featuring a very young Harrison Ford. Has anybody else ever seen that film? It's one of my favorites. -Jeff DLB

While searching unsuccessfully for Croakie-type eyeglass retainers at the local pharmacy, I found a very useful item. Amidst the sunglasses were a pair that had UV-shielded glass but were otherwise completely undarkened. These seem ideal for indoors stealth recording, where sunglasses would be out of place. I do not wear corrective lenses and previously had only found reading glasses with at least some amount of magnification. -Jeff DLB

Many thanks for that information! I had not realized Sound Professionals sold croakies and had instructions for inserting the mics. This is very helpful. -Jeff DLB

SoundPros builds them from scratch, I assume, so they can thread the wires through before attaching the capsules and jack. I am wondering whether I can take my already-assembled BMC3s and shove them through the croakies. So far I have not been able to find a local store that sells Croakies in order to inspect them myself.

Argh! I was posting from my Treo, and my submission kept coming back with an HTTP error message, so I thought I had posted zero threads. Sorry! Now, about my original question...

Is it possible to put SP-BMC2 mics into Croakies, or would I need to assemble separate capsules and wires in orde to make them fit? -Jeff DLB

Is there a simple remote that at minimum tells Rec/Pause status? I have the RH10 and the only problem is that you can't tell if you're actually recording when the unit is not visible. I recorded 5min of garbage this weekend when I thought I was paused; the opposite--not recording when desired--would have been worse.

I recorded our basement jam session the other day. Thanks to the advice on this forum, I was able to get a faithful rendition of what we played without overloading by the drums or bass. I used SP-BMC3 mics -> radio shack attenuator -> MZ-RH10 minidisc mic in. I set the levels conservatively, and as a result got rather low amplitudes throughout. The good news is that using Audacity (outrageously great free! software) I can quickly boost the levels, and there is no noise that I can discern. The bad news is that I must do that for each track individually, and for each channel because one mic was getting lower volume. My two questions are: (1) is there a shortcut way in Audacity to have Effect: Amplify normalize each channel independently? I am splitting the stereo tracks, boosting each one, and then recombining. (2) Is there a program that would take a bunch of tracks and normalize each one, without me having to individually edit each song? Thanks for any info, Jeff DLB

The other thread was interesting, but it did not answer ryst's question: "would the difference between 0.25 mV and 0.13 mV mean anything to the recording quality?" -Jeff DLB

I think your ecording levels are much too low (13-15, you said). Try 25 the next night, and then go up or down based on the results. Make sure you are not set to "loud noises" or "low sensitivity". I have the SP-BMC3 mics and find them extremely sensitive. -Jeff DLB

Agreed. However, thanks to those samples I just now discovered (I gotta get out more) that Robert Plant plays Morning Dew, one of my favorite tunes. Definitely a cover of Tim Rose's 1967 version, rather than the Grateful Dead (or Bonnie Dobson), but it's still nice that song is getting played. -Jeff DLB

To play my MD in the car, I bought a cassette adapter that plugs into the headphone jack. I am surprised that there is so much hiss. I had always thought that hiss was a feature of the magnetic tape. Is it intrinsic to the magnetic encoding technique itself? How can I reduce it? Lowering the treble with the MD's equalizer has no effect on hiss. Turning on Dolby NR on the cassette player reduces hiss and all the other high frequencies, not surprisingly. Is there an easy way to get decent sound (no worse than a regular cassette or FM radio) from MD in the car? Thanks, Jeff DLB

I have a pair of full-size mics (Nakamichi CM-300). Is it possible to use them with a minidisc recorder when the situation warrants it? They have better Max SPL (138dB vs 105dB) and dynamic range (114dB vs 76dB) than the very nice, very small SP-BMC3s I just bought. The Naks are powered by a battery in each mic and have an XLR plug on the end. If I had the appropriate adapter, could I use these with the MD (Sony MZ-NH10)? Would they go to Mic In or Line In? I'd like to experiment, but I don't want to fry my new toy. -Jeff DLB

Thank you for the info about swapping channels! -Jeff DLB

I just got my first minidisc recorder (Sony MZ-RH10, + SoundPro BMC-3 mics) and am loving it! I am amazed at the small size of the unit, especially by comparison with my portable cassette decks. The mics also are stunningly miniscule by comparison with my old Naks, and being able to use a tiny alligator clip instead of a big metal stand is much appreciated. The MD user interface is about what I was expecting from perusing this forum and the on-line manual before purchase. Everything is reasonably straightforward. The fact that you can't set manual level control as the default is indeed ludicrous (but is not enough hassle to warrant $100 extra for a Sharp unit). The illuminated display is very nice. The earbuds are mediocre. The unit works fine with a cassette adapter for playing in a car. I did several experiments recording acoustic piano to find the best setting. AGC is obviously not good. With manual levels the sensitivity needs to be set to low to avoid substantial distortion from the piano. After that a level of 15 seems to work just fine. The one strange thing about the SP BMC-3 mics is that the wires from each capsule are identical and give no indication I can see of right and left. I had to test by operating them and have marked one of them for future reference but was surprised SoundPros did not do it themselves. -Jeff DLB

I just found another difference (answering my own question): the BMC3s have a different (and better, for me) clip available. See photo at http://www.minidisco.com/sp-bmc3.html

Thank you! P.S. It appears we live in the same state (since 1995 in my case). -Jeff DLB

I'm about to become a Minidisc user [first post]. I just ordered the Sony RH90 and the SoundPro BMC3 mics. (This will replace an aging cassette-based sytem of considerably more weight and bulk: Marantz PMD-430 & Uher CR-240 decks, Nakamichi CM-300 mics, Beyer 12ft stand.) I just noticed on another vendor's site that there also exist SP BMC2 mics that seem to have identical specs as BMC3 at a lower price (only notable diff I can see is plastic vs brass case). Is there a notable difference between BMC2 and BMC3? My vendor told me he is temporarily out of stock of BMC3 until tomorrow (supposedly), so I'm wondering whether to change my order or wait for the 3s. Thanks, and greetings to all, Jeff DLB