What equipment do I need for portable podcasting?

September 16, 2005 1:53 PM

I'm looking for an inexpensive set-up to allow me to do portable podcasting. Is there a good combination of MP3 player and microphone that can be had for less than, say, $350 that would still result in decent audio quality?

Also, will I need to get a mixer, or can I edit the audio on my laptop later?

posted by bjennings to technology (8 comments total)

What would you be mixing? Audacity might be sufficient.
posted by odinsdream at 2:22 PM on September 16, 2005

I got an Iriver ifp-795 as a result of this thread, and it's been great. It encodes directly to mp3, and can record for hours and hours and hours. I use it for recording interviews, and the sound quality and range of pickup have been great. I haven't tried to record music with it, but it'd probably do an okay job if you attached a better mic to the thing...
posted by flod at 2:29 PM on September 16, 2005

Oh, yeah, I picked mine up here.
posted by flod at 2:32 PM on September 16, 2005

The Edirol R-1 is reportedly very sweet indeed. Built in stereo microphones, and the quality is great (a podcast I listen to uses one for field recordings - encoded directly to MP3 on board).
posted by coach_mcguirk at 4:41 PM on September 16, 2005

I've been looking into something similar (for recording ambient sounds when travelling, rather than making podcasts) and have just about settled on one of Sony's newer Hi-MD (minidisc) machines. This is based purely on internet research for the moment, but they seem ideal to me - unlimited capacity on 1GB removable discs, record to wav as well as sony's own atrac, and some models (NH700) even run from regular AA batteries (a huge plus as I can't guarantee access to a regular power supply.) The only slight down-side is it seems that audio import/export must be done through Sony's own software.
posted by rjt at 4:56 PM on September 16, 2005

That Edirol looks like the ultimate bootlegging machine.
posted by craniac at 6:06 AM on September 17, 2005

You might want to take a look at this post. The mic and mixer he suggests have gotten good reviews.
posted by Taken Outtacontext at 8:52 AM on September 17, 2005

The sony MD's have a transfer-to-PC only ONCE crippleware built in. Get the Edirol.
posted by Joseph Gurl at 9:48 AM on September 17, 2005