Marantz PMD-660

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Manufactured by Marantz, the Marantz PMD-660 is a portable, solid-state, compact flash audio field recorder. It has 2 XLR (balanced) inputs, 2 line-in inputs, 2 internal microphones and can record in raw WAV or MP3 formats. It is powered with 4 (non-rechargable) AA-sized batteries which offers 3.5 to 4 hours of uninterrupted recording.

[edit] Uses

As a field recorder, the PMD-660 is designed to be used outside of a controlled studio environment. Uses are electronic news gathering (ENG), podcasting, faith and live music recording.

[edit] Problems

There have been numerous complaints about the pre-amp quality on the PMD-660 which causes high hiss levels. Marantz is aware of this problem and has no plans to improve the audio quality as they feel the level of hiss is acceptable for an entry-level machine.

Some vendors have created modified versions of the recorders that address the pre-amp problems.

Some users have reported that a -10 to -15dB pad between the microphone and XLR input will reduce hiss.