info needed on zoom r8

[ianjm]

Has anyone used or has any views on the Zoom R8.

Wifes going to treat me and it looks ok.  usually use a micro br

[Hook]

Looks pretty cool, the drum loops in addition to the rythm machine looks cool. i dig the zoom effects, or at least the ones I've used. The only thing I can't tell from the description is does it have virtual tracks?? 8 just wouldn't be enough for me, however if your using in conjunction with your computer I guess that doesn't matter as much. It seems to be about $150 dollars cheaper than the Boss br800 and that's cool, but it's about the same as a br80, the big difference there is you can't record 2 tracks simultaneously (I think). Regardless all toys are good,I think I might eventually splurge on the R24 so I will look forward to hearing more!
Rock On!

[64Guitars]

I haven't tried one but pretty much everything I've read about it sounds good. Lots of great features at a good price. The only thing I'm not too keen on is the short travel of the faders. But then the BR-800's aren't very long either. Longer faders make it easier to set your levels accurately and to do smooth fades. That's why mixing desks in professional recording studios and radio stations have faders with a long travel (100mm or more). For comparison, the faders in my BR-864 have a 45mm travel. Although I'm not certain, I suspect the BR-800's faders are shorter (they just look it in the photos) and the Zoom R8's look shorter still. But photos can be deceiving. For example, a larger knob on the fader can make it appear in photos to have a shorter travel. Maybe a BR-800 owner and a Zoom R8 owner could measure the travel of their faders and let us know? Typical lengths are 45mm, 30mm, and 20mm.

The only thing I can't tell from the description is does it have virtual tracks?? 8 just wouldn't be enough for me

From what I understand, the newer Zooms don't need virtual tracks because they record directly to wav files and you can specify which wav file to use for each track. So, for example, you might record track 5 to "LeadGtr.wav". But when you listen back to it you might decide that you want to do another take. So you set track 5's file name to "LdGtr-Tk2.wav" and record again. Now you have both files on the memory card so you can decide later which one to use for the final mix. So the number of tracks you can record on a Zoom is limited only by the amount of free space on the memory card. And if you run out of room, you can always move some tracks to your computer to free up some space.

I wish Roland would follow Zoom's example and write each track directly to a wav file. Then we wouldn't need the BR Wave Converter to import and export tracks. And the number of tracks per song would be virtually unlimited. Of course, sound quality is important. Since the BRs are 24-bit internally, it would be best to record 24-bit wav files. But 16-bit should be an option for compatibility. The user should be able to choose the wav file sample size and rate for each song. According to the manual, the Zoom R8 can record 16 or 24-bit samples at a rate of 44.1 kHz or 48 kHz.