Tascam DR-1

Tascam has been a specialist in audio recorders for a long time. It's no surprise then to find the DR-1, a digital field recorder, in its range.

Design and build: a heavy but effective build

The DR-1 does a great deal more than a dictaphone! A long way from the compactness of the Olympus LS-10 or the Zoom H2, the DR-1 is a larger more robust device.

The positioning of the controls is pretty logical overall: on/off and lock on the left hand side, control of in and out (headphones) levels, balance and access to the settings menu. On the front you have the usual buttons, with the record button well distanced from the others and a very practical browsing scroll.

It records onto an SD or SDHC card (no mention of SDXC). It comes with a small 1GB card. This is a bit lite. Among the optional accessories, we like the fact that there's a long life battery and a kit with stand, adaptor and wind break. It's a shame that they're difficult to get hold of.

Software: very clear

The DR-1's software is very well set-up. Everything is well organised and you don't get lost. It's very easy to start a recording and you don't have to spend hours reading documentation to work it out. The documentation is nevertheless very well set out, thorough and detailed.

It does however take quite a while to turn on. Not very practical for when you want to record something on the fly. We also feel the screen could be improved. The dark characters on a backlit amber background are less legible than the highly contrasted Ares ML display. Still in comparison with the Ares ML, we would have liked to be able to save several recording configurations so as to be able to gain access rapidly. Even so, access to these crucial settings isn't too much of a challenge here.

One of the best things about the internal software is no doubt the navigation scroll. With its very rapid scrolling, you don't lose precious time moving through folders and menus. The usual metronomes and tuners are also included, as is a tempo reduction tool, which allows you to play a file back more slowly without losing your top end.

Audio: numerous effects

Tascam's great idea is to offer a wide variety of choices in terms of how you use the recorder. You can record straight into the internal stereo mic, via a stereo mic on a mini-jack - you'll find many of these still in existence from the time of minidiscs or designed for dictaphones with very decent quality - or via a more standard mono ¼ inch jack. This isn't all however as there are 11 directly integrated effects. Varying reverb, chorus, lo-fi, auto-pan pitch, it's all there and, above all, you have enough to give you recordings you can use straight away without necessarily going through any further production.

To come back to the microphones, the built-in microphone does perfectly well and is fine for test recording, practicing and so on. The mono will work for interviews under any conditions - don't forget to activate the low-pass filter - or for recording a single instrument or voice with very acceptable results, as long as you don't go for too much gain. When you do, you should go for a more punchy mic. Lastly, we come to the mini-jack. Only for use as a fallback solution, it suffers from a very pronounced background noise, probably due to poor insulation of the electronics.

The DR-1 is to be appreciated as a robust all-rounder. You'll be able to carry it around with you without too much worry and it offers a ready-to-go sound. An excellent travelling companion it will be excellent for recording audio for the internet (YouTube, MySpace and so on). We nevertheless prefer the H4n or the MicroTrack when using external microphones, or the Ares ML for maximum quality.