Zoom h6

Advantages: 1. A unique device of its kind - (a small box with autonomous power, recording without a computer, 6 inputs, 2 outputs), other manufacturers do not have this.
2. Quality preamps.
3. Combos XLR + TSR balanced - it is possible to connect microphones with long cables without the risk of interference and interference.
4. Phantom power (any: 12, 24 or 48 volts), you can turn on any input or all at once.
5. Power for electret microphones, eyelets, for example.
6. Availability of hardware compressors, cut filter. The settings for each channel are individual.
7. Convenient color display.
8. Long battery life, up to 20 hours. In my opinion, batteries are better than the built-in non-removable battery. Having a spare kit, you always feel confident, and you can buy them on every corner. You can use NI-Mh batteries.
9. Microphones are of good quality. Two types of microphones included.
10. The ability to connect instead of the standard stereo microphone or microphone or stereo line source.
11. Ability to use the device as a 6 + 2 sound card with the ASIO driver.
12. Exceptionally convenient buttons for selecting the active channel for recording and playback.
13. Nice appearance

Disadvantages: 1. Regular microphones with good sound quality are not without flaws. The main thing is a very bad vibrator with the case. Any touch to the body during recording leads to interference on the recording, and, sometimes, to clipping. Especially this suffers XY microphone. The manufacturer made a microphone in a heavy case weighing as much as 130 grams, but this did not help absolutely. Strange, but cheap, lightweight stereo microphone from the m-audio recorder is completely devoid of this disadvantage.
2. Microphones have a rather low sensitivity. At the recording level to a maximum, the voice of a calmly speaking person at a distance of 2 meters, we will get -12 dB level on the indicator. Although, of course, it does not really matter when writing to 24 bits, the dynamic range margin is huge.
3. There is no circular microphone in the kit. This is more than strange !!! How to record, for example, a round table? MS-microphone does not fit, he has a "deaf" zone behind him. I would love to change the complete MS microphone to mono omnidirectional.
4. The ASIO driver has a rather noticeable exit delay.
5. The ASIO panel has a minimum of adjustments: buffer and frequency. This makes using the device as a sound card is not very convenient. There are obviously not enough regulators: headphone level, output level, direct monitoring level.It would be nice to be able to control input effects and phantom power from the ASIO panel. All this is a function of the firmware and absolutely no hardware modifications are required.
6. Headphone amplifier of very mediocre quality. Power for high impedance headphones is insufficient.
7. The navigation bar on the menu is just awful.
8. When connected to a computer or power supply, the device does not turn on automatically, although this would be very logical. For example, so. I connected the power supply - the device turned on in voice recorder mode. Connected to the computer - turned on the sound card mode. USB media mode is not needed, it is much more convenient to work with a card via USB-3 card reader.

Comment: In general, a fairly good device, and the price is adequate for such opportunities.

Advantages: Excellent sound quality, flexibility of settings, excellent microphones, work from power bank, 2 monitoring outputs, convenient and reliable case, work in the mode of external sound card

Disadvantages: In the case the device is rather heavy, it is dangerous to wear it without a case. knobs or microphones may be damaged. With drivers for Win7 I had to tinker a bit.

Comment: Used this device throughout the year, in two modes:
1. As a multi-track recorder for recording band rehearsals. Here everything is above all praise. All instruments were connected directly to the recorder, and the drums were written on XY microphones. The resulting multitrack after the minimum processing was obtained in quality much better than is necessary for the analysis of rehearsals. Each instrument is audible clearly. Separately, I was pleased to be able to connect the device to the power bank and not waste batteries.

2. Also used the device as an external memory card. We connected via USB to the tablet and wrote directly to Cubase. With a laptop on Win7, there were problems with the drivers, an unsigned driver error. The device worked fine only if, when starting Windows, to select the mode with disabled driver checking. On Win10, everything worked without any problems.

In general, I am very satisfied with the device, he met all the expectations, he perfectly fulfills all the declared functions, and most importantly he completely solves my tasks in writing.

Advantages: The sound quality for my purposes is super, super, super!
Modularity - three microphones for different situations
Ability to work as an audio interface - you can’t think of a better Skype interview
The younger version of WaveLab in the kit - installed, upgraded to Elements and happy as an elephant
The possibility of external power from any source via USB - powerbank taxis
Long battery life (unlike H4)

Disadvantages: Screen - it would be better to make a normal monochrome, and not this pampering
Body shape and viewing angles are not the most comfortable.
The rocker move through the menu .. strange, it would be better to put JogDial
For this money, it was possible to bundle a normal suitcase, add a hard carrying case with one microphone (for example, XY, like the younger models), so as not to carry a large case, well, put a normal windscreen on all microphones.
Serious appearance scares some people to interview

Comment: Immediately make a reservation, I am not a musician and I use the device mostly for interviews, collecting ambient sounds during travels and less often for recording concerts with standard microphones (I bought the SGH-6 gun). I first bought a Zoom H4, I quickly realized that with good sound quality, the ergonomics of him was lame, and changed to 6-ku. Modular caps - thing! Understandably, they do not compare in sensitivity and noise with professional microphones for serious money, but they perform a number of tasks superbly. For example, with a HU microphone, I walked half of Jerusalem, recording the sounds of the city, and after minimal processing I received excellent “soundscapes” that incredibly liven up the memories, if you turn them on in parallel with viewing photos.Of course, it is impossible to record them while holding the device in their hands, but the cheap light tripod head with a convenient handle removes the question.
The MS microphone perfectly showed itself when recording performances by choirs and vocal ensembles, as well as recording interviews involving several people - a detailed stereo panorama makes it easy to digitize the conversation many times, and if necessary, the interlocutors can be turned off or mute easily.
I thought for a long time whether to buy an ordinary SGH-6 or SHH-6 cannon with an MS-module - I ended up taking the usual one, since a good MS is already included, and the SHH-6 is needed, rather, by H5 owners as a universal all-in-one solution .
And finally, Hochma - because of this recorder, my wife and I spent an extra hour on the Jordanian border, where we were long and politely “tortured” to see if we were Russian spies)) Fortunately, everything ended well))

Advantages: Good preamps (could be a bit less noisy). Case Included is windscreen. Enough good sound from standard microphones. 4 channels with phantom power + the ability to add 2 more channels. Color screen. The ability to quickly enable and disable recording channels, as well as the possibility of separate listening to any channel in the recording process. Pleasant execution, "soft-touch" plastic. Ergonomics of adjustments and buttons convenient. Quickly turns on and ready to go. In principle, it can work as a port studio with the ability to make Mixdown, shorten the file and so on. Works as an audio interface when connected to a computer.

Disadvantages: Volume controls have a low resistance when adjusting - there is a chance to accidentally move the position. Lack of digital display peak signal level on the screen. IMHO, the second Mid-Side microphone in the kit - an extra one - could have been saved. Not very convenient movement on the menu - the navigation rocker sometimes causes inconvenience when pressed. The not very informative start button is not quite pressing, although the other buttons have a distinct click. The principle of preservation is not very pleasant - each record is placed in a separate folder and the file itself does not have a date in the title.

Comment: A good model, I compare it with the Tascam DR-70d, which has 4 dB quieter preamps than the h6, which makes it possible to get a bit cleaner recording with external microphones. The price seemed too high (Tascam costs $ 150 cheaper with better recording quality), most likely due to the bundling of modular microphones. I would be happy to have the opportunity to choose a kit (like with cameras, when you can buy only the Body) In general, despite the shortcomings, a good option for a portable recorder and for recording sound for amateur films and reportages, as well as for field recording and sound design. .

Advantages: This is the only decent mobile device on the market.

Disadvantages: Not found

Comment: I use mostly on the road. Record sound for video.
Includes 2 microphones, a very interesting sound picture from an MS microphone.
Here is an example of recording from an MS microphone: https://youtu.be/_QgZJsHUAzE
A nice little thing: the device can make backup recordings at -3 dB, which helps prevent overloading in an unexpected situation.
If you plan to mount on a hot shoe DSLR camera, it is better not to plan: (because the sound from the lens with autofocus or the noise of the stabilizer is strongly reflected in the recording.
It is connected as a 6-channel sound card to a computer.
Batteries really last for a long time, I did not notice, maybe 15-20 hours ...
Highly recommend.

Disadvantages: USB 2.0
Cell phone interference
Slightly inconvenient menu (but you quickly get used to it)

Comment: I started off and bought a device when everyone bought refrigerators and televisions.
I use to record rehearsals. Once recorded a concert. Removed from the console and "from the air" MS microphone.It turned out great, such a record is well listened to, because there is a quality and a certain "sense of presence." People talk, listen to this record in the player, it turned out not worse than the studio one.
This is a great device for organizing a home studio: it is perfect for my experiments with ethnic instruments. Both microphones perfectly convey the nuances of the sound of acoustic instruments, and if you sift sounds and mix them, it will be just a candy sound.
Perfect for any musicians, cameramen, etc. according to the description)))

Now for the cons.
The minus is USB 2.0. In fact, it is not very clear why the outdated interface is used in the ultramodern device. Because of him the transfer of records to the computer is delayed.
Interference from the cell. Register. You can fight this only by disabling data transfer, or rather by switching your phone to flight mode. I have not experimented yet, but it seems that there is interference only when the phone is located on the side of the screen. Perhaps this is due to some formats or a specific model (of my phone), but there was no interference from other phones in the hall. I do not think that it is worth paying attention to this when buying, I read through the forums, it is still worse with similar recorders, and this one is attributed to those with no interference recorded.
I will not talk about the menu. Already used to it. I must say thank you, that in general there is a screen with such a huge functionality XD

Minus is of course a weak ruble. The real price of the device --- half of the current: (well, at least 2/3 ...