Zoom F8 Limiters

When I first saw the Zoom F8 audio field recorder prototype at NAB 2015, I was a little skeptical. How could they make a pro level field recorder for only $1000? Most of the pro level devices are priced at least twice that, and those with 8 mic inputs are often 3 to 4 times that. But the specs looked really, really good on the most important things: the preamps and analogue to digital converter.

So I put in my preorder and took a chance. What I did not realize at the time, is that the input limiters that should prevent clipping when things get really loud are digital instead of analogue limiters. This is usually a serious disadvantage and render the digital limiters useless because the clipping and distortion damage are done before the audio gets into the digital part of the recorder.

However, there's a reasonably happy ending: because the Zoom F8’s pre-amplifier and analogue to digital converter produce a dynamic range of 120dB, I’ve found that things generally work ok until you get the most extreme screaming, as far as dialogue is concerned. In this episode we take a closer look with an audio sample you can hear to assess how well the F8 does in cases where dialogue suddenly turns to screaming.

Zoom F8 Initial Impressions [video]

When I first saw the Zoom F8 audio field recorder prototype at NAB 2015, I was a little skeptical. How can they make a pro level field recorder for only $1000. Most of the pro level devices are priced at least twice that, and those with 8 mic inputs are often 3 to 4 times that. But the specs looked really, really good on the most important things: the preamps and analogue to digital converter. So I put in my preorder and took a chance. I’ve now been shooting with it for almost four weeks and I’m quite impressed with most aspects of this recorder. It looks like it will meet my needs quite nicely - corporate videos with a one or two person crew.

One of the big features for me, though some will scratch their heads when they hear this, is the DC power hirose input. That means I can power the F8 for over 25 hours with my Anton Bauer Digital 90 battery. Yes, it and its accompanying charger are ridiculously expensive but I have no regrets. Shoots go so much more smoothly and end up coming out better when I'm not constantly changing batteries on everything. That's one of the big drawbacks of consumer and pro-sumer gear. Their batteries aren't made to last through an entire shoot in so many cases.

What really impresses me on the F8 is the clean, higher dynamic range of the recordings. You cannot appreciate that difference until you've worked with a proper preamp like the F8's (and Sound Devices and Zaxcom, etc.)

Zoom F8: Good Enough for Pros?

Zoom's new F8 eight input field recorder seems to be aimed at professional recordists, location sound engineers, and professional sound designers. This seems to be the message from Zoom's marketing group.

And indeed, the Zoom F8 has many of the features a professional sound engineer would expect in a modern digital field recorder. But not all of what they'd expect.

First, let's define "Pro" for the purposes of this piece. By pro, I mean a person who makes the majority of their personal income as a sound engineer or recordist, or designer.  By this definition, I am not a pro sound engineer. I'm a semi-pro.

Also, I'm only putting these thoughts down to help clarify things for myself and perhaps for other curious audio for film enthusiasts. I'm not setting myself up as the definitive word on this matter or any other. These are just my thoughts, from my semi-pro perspective.

From the perspective of this definition, most pros will probably not choose to use the Zoom F8 as their primary field recorder. This is not a criticism of Zoom and I am not saying that the F8 is a bad device that has no use for anybody. I'm just saying that most pros will find this device lacking in a few key areas that make it less than the optimal tool for their jobs. They are better served by Sound Devices or Zaxcom recorders and mixers.

Here is a list of features that the Zoom F8 has or does not have at present that may cause many pros to take pause:

• Cannot gang groups of inputs together aside from simple stereo or M/S pairs
• Headphone pre-amp produces colored sound that does not match what is recorded (fortunately the recording is much better than the headphone amp)
• No switch or menu option to toggle an input between line and mic level
• Pots only control gain trim, not fader. Cannot currently be set to control faders (though this could potentially be addressed with a firmware update)
• Pots are very small. Probably ok for setting up gain but not great for mixing
• Both the limiter and high pass filter are post fader and in the digital stage (this is possibly, though not absolutely, a problem depending on how much dynamic range is available in the pre-amps and analogue to digital converter)
• Not sure that Zoom has a service and repair department like Sound Devices and Zaxcom, two of the main designers in the pro field recorder/mixer market

These factors are things that are generally important to pros. Remember, these guys spend a lot of long days with their recorders and mixers. That they sometimes seem so picky makes a little more sense when you consider how much time they spend using these devices and the fact that their careers are on the line when they miss too many takes.

However, does that mean that pros won't buy Zoom F8s? I think that some of them would consider having one for backup purposes. Lots of pros already have one or another of the Zoom Handy recorders. They don't use the Handy recorders all that often but they can be useful sometimes.

And for those of us that are semi-pro, or one-man-production-crews, doing smaller budget projects like corporate videos, is this thing useful for us?

I think yes, absolutely!

The pre-amps on the Zoom F8 seem very good to me after the subjective tests I've done. The build quality is quite good. That I can use a proper pro-level battery like an Anton Bauer to power the F8 via its hirose input for well over 20 hours even when phantom powering multiple mikes is great. Timecode on the F8 is seemingly as good as a Sound Devices 744T.

So in short, just because this device isn't totally up to par for most pros as a primary field recorder, doesn't mean that it isn't useful for semi-pros and enthusiasts. I have no regrets spending $1000 for mine.

More to come...

Zoom F8: First Impressions

Just received my copy of the Zoom F8 field recorder yesterday evening and spent a little time working with it. We should have a final review sometime in September but wanted to give you my first impressions here.

Build quality: Zoom has been steadily climbing the build quality ladder and the F8 is a definite continuation of that trend. The body is a very solid aluminum and the strap brackets are as solid as can be. The selector knob that allows you to navigate the menus is a HUGE improvement over the silly little jog dial on all of the previous Zoom handy recorders. If we're being honest, that was the feature I did NOT like on any of the previous Zoom recorders. It felt flimsy and ergonomically, was not the quickest tool to get around in the menus. And when you're on a recording job, time is critical.

This new selector knob is as solid as you would expect on a Sound Devices recorder or mixer.

The power and menu buttons have a sort of clicky feel to them that I'm still not sure about. I think they'll be fine over time but only time will tell.

The battery and SD card doors are also very solid metal and the battery door closes with a finger screw. The XLR inputs are Neutrik connectors, an industry standard and always top quality. The external DC power hirose connector is a nice option for pro-level batteries. I connect the F8 to an Anton Bauer battery which should power the F8 for well over 20 hours based on the battery's "remaining time" readout which is usually pretty accurate.

Overall, the unit is smaller than I remember when I first saw the prototype at NAB in April. It is not as light as the more consumer grade recorders from Zoom or Tascam once you add batteries, and about the same as the Sound Devices 744T recorder I've used in the past.

The Screen: The screen is better than I expected and also includes an "outdoor" monochrome mode for use when out in the broad daylight. That is great because that was a major issue with the H6 recorder. The F8's screen also seems much higher grade than the H6's, easier to read and very bright. It also doesn't seem to suffer from the same issues when viewing off axis. Setting the brightness to 50% indoors in a brightly sunlit room, I had absolutely no problem seeing the screen. Haven't had a chance to work with it outdoors yet but will include that in the final review.

Controls and Menus: Usability is a big deal. If a device has a ton of features but you have to constantly dive into menus to access them, that can be a problem and makes working with the device less than practical. I sort of didn't love the H6, H5, or H4n for this reason. They all required a little too much menu diving and when that meant I had to use the jog-dial, it was not fast and not enjoyable.

The F8 seems to be better thought-out on this front. The biggest difference is the selector knob. The menus are similar but having the new metal selector knob makes menu diving a little less onerous. Also, I like that I can use the buttons to arm/select a channel, press the PFL button and quickly access settings for that input like phantom power, the limiter, and pre-fader mode. Nice improvement by Zoom here as well!

The potentiometers or gain trim knobs for each channel have a good feel and work well but they are small. I don't think I'd want to attempt to mix an 8 channel program with just these little pots/knobs. That's where the iOS app comes in.

The mobile (iOS) App: The app is surprisingly good! The only thing about it that made me scratch my head a little bit is that you have to install an additional little firmware thing to enable bluetooth on the F8. I can only guess that maybe Zoom didn't have final FCC approval when they went to manufacturing and perhaps that will be included in the next overall firmware update.

The app works great on iPad and reasonably well on my iPhone 6+. There are a lot of things to fit into the UI so it just works better on the bigger screen of the iPad. On the iPhone, it sort of switches between landscape and portrait orientations to make everything fit depending on what you're doing, mixing or changing settings. It works in a pinch but if I'm truly mixing, I'd rather do it on an iPad.

And that's a pleasure - a 9.7 inch screen dedicated to mixing works quite nicely.You can set the gain for each channel with a skeuomorphic gain pot at the top of each channel, mix with the sliding faders for each channel. You have nice large peak meters for each channel. You can punch the PFL button for each channel to toggle the phantom power or limiter. You can do just about everything aside from set up the recording formats and timecode from the app. I really like it so far.

Preamps and Limiters: This is where I need more time before I can really evaluate things. In terms of specs, the F8 looks top notch. Only more testing will tell for sure. In the recording I've done so far, the preamps appear to deliver in terms of sound quality and noise performance. They seem very, very promising. The limiter, unfortunately, is in the digital domain of the signal chain. In practical terms, this means it isn't all that useful. If a sound comes in too loud, it will pass unprocessed through the analogue preamp, through the analogue to digital converter and the damage is already done before it gets to the digital limiter. That makes the limiter pretty close to useless for preventing distortion from clipping. That's not a total show stopper for enthusiasts that are very price sensitive and have the luxury of doing retakes, but probably not acceptable for pros that make their living doing location sound.

Headphone Amp: for better or worse, this is part of the device that has gotten a lot of attention based on Jose Frias's review.  At first I thought that the headphone signal was noisy. I don't think that's actually the issue after more time with it. But it doesn't sound as nice as what is actually recorded by the F8. The question is whether this is a show-stopper issue. So far, I don't think it is for me. Again, I don't feed, house, and clothe my family with location sound jobs. I'm a corporate video one-man band. And for that scenario, I think it works fine.

Other Features: You can use the F8 as an audio interface connected to your computer via the mini USB port on the left side of the unit. There are ASIO drivers for Windows and it works with core audio out of the box on the Mac side. It isn't the most intuitive device for using as an audio interface if you're going to feed monitors from it, but not bad for recording and listening with headphones.

Timecode! Woot! I haven't had a chance to play with it yet but looking forward to syncing it with my Shogun recorder to see how well that works. Zoom claims to keep time within half a frame in 24 hours which is pretty good. Gotham Sound, a professional sound gear rental house, did a test where they jam synced a Sound Devices 788T and Zoom F8 from a third timecode generator, then stuck both of them in a freezer overnight for approximately 10 hours. When they came back, the two devices were within .8 frames of one another. This seems to suggest that the timecode generator in the F8 is good enough for most professional applications.

The recorder has a 3.5mm stereo out for cameras and two mini XLR outs (L and R) along with adapters so you can send a stereo output to full-sized XLR cables or inputs. Need to test these as well.

Keep yourself subscribed to the updates over the next few weeks and let me know if there are specific questions you would like answered.

Reviews Coming Up: Zoom F8, K-Tek Boompole, Rycote Zeppelin

In the previous video, you'll hear that I just received the Rycote Modular Windshield Kit 4 more commonly known as a zeppelin cover for shotgun mics. These are the huge covers that pro location sound people use out in the field to keep wind noise out of the recording

Also testing out my first proper boom pole from K-tek. The KEG 150 CCR is a carbon fiber 12.5 foot, 5 section pole with an internal, coiled cable so you don't have to fuss with a cable wrapped around the outside. I'm interested to see how quietly it operates. I've heard some people say that sometimes the internal coiled cables that make some noise and mess with your recordings. It also has a very nice XLR connector on the side of the pole so you can rest the end of the pole on the ground without messing with your cable. Nice touch

And I can hardly wait for the UPS guy tomorrow because he's bringing the new ZOOM F8 field recorder! Woot! Been waiting since April at NAB to get my hands on one of these and see how they sound and how well they work both on a cart and in a bag.

Power Your Tascam or Zoom Recorder All Day

Tascam and Zoom recorders are really impressive for their price, but given that they are made for cost conscious film makers like myself, the engineers had to sacrifice some things. On the Tascams in particular (DR-60D, 70D), battery life seems to be one of the things that isn’t perfect for longer shoots. The 4 AA batteries power the DR-60D for about 2.5 to 3 hours when phantom powering two mics.

So what can you do for those days when you have a 6 hour shoot?

You could carry around a lot of AA batteries and change them out several times, hopefully without sacrificing any of the takes. And if you’re recording a live event, you cannot afford to stop the recording while you change batteries.

The USB batteries on the market can be a good solution. In this episode we look at two on the market: Coocheer (cost conscious option that offers nearly 8 hours of power for the DR-60D with two phantom powered mics) and LifeCHARGE (pricier option that offers over 20 hours for the same recorder/mic combo).

Zoom H6: My Impressions After 4 Weeks

I've been a fan of both Zoom and Tascam and their various recorders for several years. My first handheld audio recorder was the Zoom H4, not the H4n, but the original funky looking, very plasticky, very noisy preamps H4. By today's standards, it wasn't awesome, but it was a pioneering type of recorder with XLR inputs and built-in stereo condenser mics. It was definitely designed mainly for musicians. And by the time the H4n came out and DSLR video revolution hit, the H4n became the first audio device that most low and no budget filmmakers turned to first.

Then in 2013, Zoom announced the Zoom H6 with better build quality, interchangeable microphones, and 4 XLR inputs, among a host of additional features. The H6 still seems to me to be aimed at various markets. Musicians are still one of the intended audiences and filmmakers are also clearly another intended audience based on the fact that Zoom offers a shotgun mic module option. I didn't jump on the H6 right at release because I was pretty satisfied with my Tascam recorder at the time (DR-100mkII).

Thanks to my friends at B&H Photo, I had an evaluation copy of the H6 for the last four weeks so I've finally had a chance to put it through its paces. Now I feel qualified to answer all the questions I've received along the lines of, "Tascam DR-60DmkII or Zoom H6?"

First thing I noticed is that the H6 comes in a pretty decent plastic case along with all of its pieces and accessories. It isn't Pelican case grade, but it is nice to have something to keep everything in one place for storage and travel. By "pieces and accessories" I mean the foam wind cover, the stereo mic module, mid-side mic module, a set of batteries, USB cable, memory card, and a license for Cubase LE. The warranty is a standard one year.

For me, when recording audio with devices at this price point (currently $399 USD), the most important thing is audio quality. I already know that the build quality and many other pro features are likely missing. But if it has great audio quality and isn't missing so many other features that it is too difficult to use, then it has achieved its purpose.

And I am happy to report that the Zoom H6 produces great audio quality.

My focus was the XLR inputs and not the X-Y stereo or Mid Side mic modules. Those might be useful in a pinch, but I recorded with a series of lavalier and cardioid and shotgun mics simply because that's the type of recording I typically do as a filmmaker. The interchangeable mic system is one of the features that Zoom evidently used to make the H6 more flexible for different types of recording, i.e., musicians and filmmakers. I've never been all that interested in using the mics designed for this purpose. The shotgun mic in particular, sort of makes me chuckle and cringe. Here is another case of a manufacturer covertly suggesting that this is a high quality mic--which undoubtedly it is--which will get you great dialogue audio when you mount it on top of your camera. Positioning a shotgun or any other sort of mic this way will always capture a lot of room and ambience which is not usually the sound that a new recordist is after. They usually want isolated dialogue with as little room and ambience as possible which is only possible when you position the mic 40 - 60cm from the talent. And booming the entire H6 up above your talent is possible, but probably not the best position since you'll have a bit of work on your hands to start and stop the recordings. So, I'm just not all that interested in the in-built mic or interchangeable mic modules. I'm not saying they're useless. To the contrary, I think they're very useful for a lot of people. They just don't fit the way I personally work or the way that most film sound people work and I don't want to spend a lot of money on something I won't use.

All that aside, I was really impressed with the sound quality. Zoom has come a long way since the days of the H4 and H4n in terms of clean gain. I measured a practical noise floor of -60dB. By practical noise floor, I mean that after recording dialogue, I loudness normalized the stereo clip to -16LUFS and then measured the average RMS amplitude of a section of "silence". -60dB is great. This is on par with the Tascam DR-60DmkII and my good old Focusrite Saffire Pro 24DSP audio interface and even the Sound Devices USBPre 2 audio interface. If you're interested in hearing the H6 compared to the Tascam and Sound Devices, we compared them last week here.

The build quality is unquestionably a step up from the original H4 and even a step up from the H4n. The body feels like it is covered in a high grade rubberized material. The heft of the device feels very solid. No creaking cheap plastic here. The mic modules feel like solid metal. On the previous Zooms, they didn't feel nearly this substantial and durable. It genuinely feels to me like if I dropped the H6, it would bounce and absorb the shock without sustaining any damage. Since this was a review unit, I didn't actually confirm that, but the build quality felt quite refined and durable.

The color screen looks impressive. But alas, this seems like a weak point to me. It looks very pretty but it is hard to see unless you have it at just the right angle and it is very difficult to see outdoors in direct sunlight. This is not a deal-breaker unless you shoot a lot outdoors in direct sunlight. I don't, but some do so I though this was worth mentioning. Indoors, the screen is great. Just about the right size and easy to see if you're looking straight-on. Not so easy from a wider angle.

The fader knobs are nice, I think nicer than on the Tascam DR-60D and 70D units, more solid feeling and very smooth. The buttons allow you to quickly arm which of the 6 tracks you want to record and with the newest firmware, also allow you to solo monitor a track which is super helpful to solve any problems when recording several mics at the same time. Neither the Tascam DR-60 or 70D allow you to do that. This is one area where Zoom is pretty strong. They have a much better track record than Tascam at adding new features to their recorders via firmware updates. Tascam almost never does that.

The Zoom H6 can also act as a bonafide audio interface. This means that you can connect it to your computer via USB cable, hook a mic up to the H6, and record computer screencasts, for example. The Tascam recorders cannot do that. So there's another bonus! You can also monitor with headphones while you're doing that.

One thing I don't love about the Zoom H6 is that lack of buttons or controls for other settings. And that jog-dial that you use to navigate through the menu? Ugh. While it is beefier than it was on the original H4 and even the H4n, still don't love it. It feels flimsy and it is not conducive to running quickly through the menus, at least compared to the dials on the Tascam recorders. It isn't a deal breaker, in part because you don't need to go into the menus a lot on the H6, but it is never a pleasurable experience to menu dive with it. Need phantom power. Ugh, Menu dive. I'm being picky here and this is not a deal breaker. But I think that Zoom can do better next  round and it is time to ditch that job-dial.

Battery life is where the H6 shines relative to the Tascam recorders. I get more like 6 hours when phantom powering mics. The DR-60DmkII is still around 3 hours.

There is also a 3.5mm input so you can use those lavalier mics with 3.5mm (mini stereo jack) plugs. There's also a 3.5mm line out so that you can send the captured audio into your DSLR or mirrorless camera and avoid syncing sound during editing.

So overall, those are my impressions. Would I buy one? Yes, it is worth every penny of its price. Would I go with this over a Tascam DR-70D? That's a tougher question. If I needed an audio interface, too, I would go with the Zoom H6 because the DR-70D can't do that. That's where the Zoom shines and one example of how incredibly versatile it is. On the flip side, it always feels to me that the Tascam DR-60 and 70D recorders are a little more purpose built for film makers and a little more ergonomic and quicker to operate. Need phantom power? There's a switch for that, no need to menu dive. And even when you do need to access the menu, the dial is very quick. As always, there are tradeoffs and both are great options and neither is 100% perfect for everyone. For now, I'll stick with my Tascam. If I were buying today, I'd still probably stick with the Tascam DR-70D because I already have a great audio interface for my computer.

I hope that was helpful and please sound off in the comments with any questions or insights from your experience!

Zoom F8 Officially Announced and Available for Pre-order

Zoom has been kicking butt in the indie audio gear front more and more as time rolls on.

One of the more interesting audio devices I saw at NAB earlier this year was a prototype 8 channel pro-level field recorder that Zoom had at their booth - The Zoom F8. It is available for pre-order at B&H Photo as of today.

This is an interesting move from Zoom. They've been a strong contender among indie film and video makers as far back as 2007-ish with the Zoom H4. That device was breakthrough in that it was a small, handheld stereo recorder with pro-level XLR inputs that ran on consumer AA batteries and was reasonably priced (around $400 or $500 as I recall). I had one for a short time. It was amazing. But it had some serious issues: The preamps didn't have a lot of gain (so using dynamic handheld mics wasn't very realistic), the preamps were noisy, battery life wasn't great especially when phantom powering mics, and the plastic build quality wasn't amazing. Also, that jog-dial thing you use to navitage through menus was not great. But still, it was a worthy start.

Then the H4n came a few years later with better build quality, slightly better preamps (though still noisy), and better battery life. Some of the issues remained. The premps were still pretty noisy. The jog-dial thingy was pretty much the same. Another good step forward from Zoom. They sold a lot of these and there are still tons in use today.

Then the H6 came in 2013. Even better build quality, much better preamps, good battery life and some nice features that Zoom has added with firmware updates (e.g., the ability to solo monitor channels while recording so that you can dial in levels). I recently had an H6 on loan from B&H for several weeks and was really impressed! There were a couple of things I didn't love about it, but they weren't total show-stoppers: I still don't love the jog-dial and while the new color screen is pretty, it is slow and very difficult to see outdoors and nearly impossible to see in direct sunlight. I'll have a review here on the blog in the next week or so.

The Zoom F8 looks like Zoom is aiming at taking some of the lower end pro market from the likes of Sound Devices though their field recorders are quite a bit more expensive (arguably for good reason). Here are the specs for the F8:

• 8-channel/10-track field audio recorder/mixer

• 8 discrete inputs with locking Neutrik XLR/TRS combo connectors

• Compact and lightweight aluminum chassis, weighing just 2 pounds (without batteries)

• High quality mic preamps with up to 75 dB gain, less than -127 dBu EIN, and +4 dB line inputs

• Support for up to 24-bit/192 kHz recording as well as 96 kHz, 88.2 kHz, 48k, and 44.1 kHz, plus 47.952 kHz / 48.048 kHz for HD video compatibility; 16-/24-bit resolution

• Accurate Time Code (0.2 ppm) I/O on standard BNC connectors; dropframe/non-drop formats with Jam Sync

• Three different power supply options: 8x AA batteries, external DC battery pack with Hirose connector, or 12V AC adapter (AA’s and DC battery pack not included)

• Automatic switching of power source from DC to batteries at user-defined voltage levels

• Dedicated gain control knob, 6-segment LED level meter, and PFL/Solo switch for each channel

• Phantom power (+48V/+24V) on every preamp

• Advanced onboard limiters for input and output

• High pass filter, phase invert, and Mid-Side decoder

• Input delay of up to 30 msec per channel / output delay of up to 10 frames per output

• Compatible with Zoom microphone capsules; optional extender cable enables remote positioning

• Dual mini-XLR (TA3) balanced Main Outs plus ⅛" stereo mini-jack Sub Out

• Dedicated headphone output (100 mW) with front panel volume control

• 2.4" full-color backlit LCD with monochrome mode

• Dedicated PFL display with viewable trim settings

• Dual SD/SDHC/SDXC card slots, up to 512 GB each

• Records in BWF-compliant WAV or MP3 file formats

• Support for extensive metadata (BWF and iXML); input time, date, project, scene number, etc.

• Built-in slate mic/slate tone with front panel switch

• Built-in tripod mount; camera mount adapter also included

• Use as an 8-in/4-out USB audio interface (@ 96 kHz)

• Free Zoom F8 Control App for iOS allows wireless remote control, file renaming, and metadata entry

Wow! The things that impress me most is that these new pre-amps come with +75dB of gain. There are three power options (8 AA batteries, Hirose connector for pro-level batteries like Anton Bauer, and an AC adapter). Zoom claims that the analog to digital converters have 120dB of dynamic range (SoundDevices clain 117 for most of their recorders and mixers). This is the first time that Zoom has reported the A/D dynamic range spec so it seems like they're serious about playing with the big boys. Timecode generator that can also be jam synced. Aluminum build. iOS mixer app that does channel metering, faders for each channel, and the ability to enter metadata! Limiter with adjustable settings for threshold, attack and release.

So yes, being the audio nerd that I am, I have one on pre-order and will have a review after it ships in August. :-)

I do have some concerns:

• The hardware pots (potentiometers) for each channel look really small and I'm not sure how robust they'll be. Mixing may be pretty tough relative to the SoundDevices and Zaxcom pro-level field mixers which have big knobs.

• Output only includes 2 mini XLR outputs for the stereo mix bus and 3.5mm for DSLR shooters. No camera return. Though to be fair, this is probably not a big deal for most indie filmmakers and is part of the reason that this device is so much less expensive than the SoundDevices and Zaxcom field recorder/mixers. To me, this is why it looks like Zoom is still very much aiming for indie film-makers, not higher end pros (who would need this option. On the set of serious productions, you'll typically need a feed for the director and the camera.

• That screen is still quite small and I'm interested to see how easy it is to see outdoors in the sun. Also, audio meters should never be underestimated. Only those which are large enough and have enough steps are truly useful when mixing and recording. That's a very small screen to fit 8 meters. But if the app is good, this can be overcome.

Those seem like reasonable trade-offs given the $999 price. It seems like they packed it with all the audio quality you'd get in the higher end recorders and mixers, but without some of the more sophisticated features that are only needed for higher budget productions (more routing and output options).

Can't wait to put it through its paces!