Soon to be the greatest portable digital music device! ?

[feralicious]

Well I stumbled on this FM Radio/Digital Music Player/Recorder yesterday and it looks fantastic!
http://www.neurosaudio.com/store/prod_neuros.asp

So many features.
-FM Radio tuner.
-Plays mp3, OGG Vorbis, wav.
-Records from FM radio, from a line in or from an internal mic.
-Broadcasts whatever you're playing to your stereo.
-Five preset buttons you can set for playlists, radio stations, recordings.
-128mb, 256mb, 20gb, 40gb, 60gb, and 80gb models which are expandable with their "backpack" system. You can start small if that's all you can afford then buy a backpack with a larger drive.
-It's sexy!


Only 2 drawbacks as far as I can see.

1. no flac support as of yet, BUT Josh Coalson, FLAC developer, is currently working on it. Neuros firmware is now open source. So it looks to be coming at some point in the not too distant future and will be able to be upgraded with a firmware download.
http://neuros-firmware.sourceforge.n...lessAudioCodec
http://www.neurosaudio.com/community...archTerms=flac

2. No gapless playing. Not a good thing and seems odd since the Rio Karma can do it. But then I don't know about those types of technical things. This feature has been requested and discussed so hopefully they'll get that sorted out soon as well.

(Oh, and no cuesheet support, but if you had the above would you need it? I'm not sure what role this plays in one of these contraptions since I don't have one... yet.)

But she's a beauty!

Can you convert a show to OGG as one whole file (without burning to audio, though I suppose you could use a cd-rw) so you could put your entire show into this thing and have gapless audio?

[ssamadhi97]

Originally Posted by feralicious

Can you convert a show to OGG as one whole file (without burning to audio, though I suppose you could use a cd-rw) so you could put your entire show into this thing and have gapless audio?

Using foobar2000:
* select all tracks of a show in your playlist
* open the context menu
* use Convert -> Run conversion, single file output

(that's a rough outline of the process. make sure that the diskwriter plugin is configured properly.)

[TheMamba]

^^^ What he said.

[Gizby]

Once I can save up the money, I hope to get the 20gig model for taping. $1 down, $249 to go.

[feralicious]

Originally Posted by ssamadhi97

Using foobar2000:
* select all tracks of a show in your playlist
* open the context menu
* use Convert -> Run conversion, single file output

(that's a rough outline of the process. make sure that the diskwriter plugin is configured properly.)

Hmmm... looks like I may be spending $400 very soon...

[jcrab66]

the neuros is a pretty nice taping device.... i know a bunch of folks that are already using it..

[feralicious]

Originally Posted by Gizby

Once I can save up the money, I hope to get the 20gig model for taping. $1 down, $249 to go.

Looks like you've only got $239 to go for a 30gb model here:
http://etronics.resultspage.com/electronics/Neuros

[feralicious]

Originally Posted by jcrab66

the neuros is a pretty nice taping device.... i know a bunch of folks that are already using it..

Hm, what kind of mic should one use? I'm so tempted to tape, but I'm too loud at shows. And I like to really enjoy them so I wouldn't want to hold back, and I also wouldn't want to have the quality of the taping on my mind instead of letting go and enjoying the show. Maybe I could just go see bands I don't like.

[dorrcoq]

You? Loud?

[fatoldpig]

i've been waiting for flac support and checking their site for about 8 months now.

[Gizby]

Originally Posted by feralicious

Looks like you've only got $239 to go for a 30gb model here:
http://etronics.resultspage.com/electronics/Neuros

Wow, a $10 upgrade from 20 gigs to 30 gigs. Thanks for the link!

[feralicious]

Originally Posted by dorrcoq

You? Loud?

Hard to believe isn't it?

[Kush]

Originally Posted by jcrab66

the neuros is a pretty nice taping device.... i know a bunch of folks that are already using it..

I would be interested in getting one of these and was wondering if I could get some answers to questions I have about using it for taping.

[irishcrazy2005]

So what I understand here is that the taping would go through the line-in jack, which is a mono 1/8 inch analog jack. Do most tapers have digital inputs into their recording device (such as a Dat recorder)? Also, it says that it records in .mp3. Can it also record .wav?

-Phil

[Gizby]

Originally Posted by irishcrazy2005

So what I understand here is that the taping would go through the line-in jack, which is a mono 1/8 inch analog jack. Do most tapers have digital inputs into their recording device (such as a Dat recorder)? Also, it says that it records in .mp3. Can it also record .wav?

-Phil

Originally Posted by The Sound Professional's page for the Neuros recorder

Some features we have tested that are not mentioned on the Neuros website:

* Audio playback in MP3 format (up to 320 kbps), MP3 VBR, OGG, WAV & WMA and recording in 64-160 kbps MP3 format, 8, 44.1 & 48KHz WAV
* There is a maximum file size of 4Gb (that's huge!), so you can record a 44.1khz .wav file up to 6.4 hours long or a 48khz .wav file up to 5.8 hours long! This is long enough to record a whole show without stopping!
* This unit (unlike the iRiver recorders) has recording level meters
* The battery life when recording MP3 files is 4-6 hours. However, when recording .wav files, the hard disc is spinning constantly, so the battery life using only the built-in battery is about 2.5 hours. We now have two add on rechargeable external battery packs shown below which will extend this run time to 10 hours!
* There is a small amount of amplification built into the unit. If you plug a powered mic into the line input, you can increase the gain up to 12dB. With a sensitive mic (many of our small condensers have good sensitivity), you can get reasonably good levels even in recording situations that are not all that loud (close range voice recordings, unamplified music at moderate levels). Of course, in loud situations (amplified sounds, rock concerts), you will have no problem getting a nice, strong level.
* To insure that you will get a high quality recording when recording a .wav file, you should defragment the hard disc in the Neuros just before making an important recording.

The only downside I see is the battery life, but 2.5 hours for recording isn't too bad. And I'm also curious if it can record in 24-bit, as I'd love to be able to switch up to that.