In June 2005 I upgraded from a Sony MZR70. The MZB100 is much more "blind-friendly" than most minidisk recorders on the market. I purchased it from: IRTI a company specializing in products for the blind.
Later I began using an Olympus DS50 digital voice recorder. It comes with a low-quality stereo microphone, but it's good enough for recordings to be used to identify new sounds. I have also used this recorder with my Sennheiser shotgun microphone, and it works well enough to meet my needs. A big drawback to the DS50 and the Sony minidisk recorders is that I cannot disable the automatic record volume circuit. That would probably be unacceptable to a professional recordist, but it does not present a big problem for my kind of recording. I like the DS50, because it speaks its menu options so that I can change most settings without sighted assistance. While the audio quality is not as high as that from a Minidisk recorder, I can get 18 hours of stereo recording before the recorder is full. It has a USB port, and I can easily transfer digitally recorded files directly from the unit into my computer. I then convert them from WMA to MP3 format for use on my website.
I also use various sets of binaural mics that either clamp on to a hat band or fit in the ears.
I spend a lot of time sitting at my computer, and I enjoy hearing nature sounds while I work. Based on suggestions from some avid nature recordists, I have installed an audio setup with which I am well pleased. My goal was to bring reasonably good quality stereo sound from outdoors into my home office. The following is a description of my setup:
Microphones: I purchased two Shure EZB/O Omni-directional boundary microphones for approximately $100.00 each. They are mounted on opposite sides of a shed in my back yard. It is important that they be mounted where they will be protected from direct rain. I was told that they should be mounted on a fairly large flat surface and not too near a corner or perpendicular wall. These microphones are very sensitive and will pick up even very light sounds. Wind is not a problem at all, unless a gust blows directly into one of the mics.
The EZB/O mics include preamplifiers and require phantom power. I used 100-foot XLr microphone cables , with no noticeable hum or interference. Initially I had some static from moisture getting into the XLR fittings, but I used silicone sealant and have had no more trouble.
Mixer: I purchased a Behringer UB1202 audio mixer for just under $100.--. It provides the phantom power needed by the microphones, and it offers a number of useful features that made it well worth the investment.
Speakers: I cabled the “Tape Out” output from the mixer into the Line-in input on my computer sound card. This serves two purposes; I can hear the sounds through my computer speakers, and I can also record via the computer. (See below) I cabled the mixer’s main output channels to inputs on my stereo system for even better sound.
Recording: I use an audio editing program called GoldWave, available from http://www.goldwave.com/ I set GoldWave to accept input from the Line-in, and I set the record mode to “bounded and looped”. I set the initial file size to 2 minutes, although I could have used a much longer time period. Once I begin recording in this mode, GoldWave continually captures the most recent two minutes of sound. If I hear a sound I want to save, I simply stop the recording within two minutes of hearing the sound. I then save the current file, which contains the past two minutes of audio. With GoldWave, it is easy to edit and convert audio files. I prefer the MP3 format, because MP3 files are only about a tenth the size of comparable WAV files.
Although this equipment cost a little more than I had initially planned to spend, I am happy with the outcome.