Portable stereo recorders (recommend)

The Zoom H2 would be good... it has 4 mics and can do a kind of sudo surround. Should be great for ambience sounds and it's cheap.. only about $200. And because it's a solid state (flash memory) recorder it makes no sound of it's own.

Following on the heels of another thread on this topic, I bought a Zoom H2 a few weeks ago, after comparing price/features with the other available products. I bought it for the same reason you're looking.

I'm happy with my choice. I wanted something that would make good recordings but not be so expensive to me that I'd be scared to pop it into a backpack when I go hiking.

The H2 works well for outdoor ambient sounds. Right out of the box I tried it out on my front porch to capture the bird and squirrel party. Playing the file back over my monitors, the sound was very pleasingly real. The recording doesn't "zoom in" on the wildlife sounds the way a nice shotgun mike could, instead the H2 records essentially what you yourself hear at the position you record from.

Pros:

It comes with a windshield (essential for recording outdoors); most other devices don't.
The built-in mikes and pres sound fine; you shouldn't need to rely on external mikes.
You can record at either 90 degree or 120 degree field widths, or even combine the two for the pseudo-surround.
It also comes with a mike stand attachment you can use to hold the device while recording outside.
Very easy to use.
Easy to set levels -- three main choices are done with a side-switch, refining the level is a simple menu operation.
Although various reviewers described it as fragile, it appears to be solidly and competently built to me. It is extremely light weight.

Cons:

Like probably every portable recorder, the H2 is VERY sensitive to handling noise. Ideally you want to mount it on its little (included) stand and not touch it at all during recording.

I've found though that using the mike stand attachment as a handle and holding very firmly (so your hand isn't moving at all on the handle), essentially eliminates most handling noise. On my to-do list is trying what happens if I wrap the handle with foam. Still, for recording any ambience at length and without any unwanted noise, the stand is the way to go. The H2's stand screw fits a standard camera tripod (at least, the mini sort I carry with my digital camera).

Pressing the start and stop record buttons makes a noticeable thump at either end of your audio files. This is, of course, easy to cut out.

From web searches you can also see some do-it-yourself shock mounts people have made for the H2.

Files have to be deleted one-by-one unless you manage those by moving the SD card over to your PC; there's no "delete all" feature.

I notice (only on PC headphones here) that the H2 is a little duller and less detailed then others...


Still, H2 looks like a front runner for me for the price but I'm wondering are the recordings good enough to use in your projects?

Such as ambient music etc

Not sure how much one can judge from files taken from a website; how much to attribute to the skill of the person making the recordings, any editing of the soundfiles, etc.

The website for O'Reilly Digital Media has a bunch of reviews, including sound files.

This site is interesting, too:

http://www.transom.org/tools/recording_interviewing/200703_recorder_reviews/

I use the H2 to record various types of found sounds. I have a fairly Zen approach to this. I use sounds I can find a use for, and don't use sounds I can't. The H2 was a nicely priced, complete package (even the included memory card is actually big enough to hold a reasonably amount of sound).

BTW, over the past few days of experimenting with it, I've found that a solid grip on its included mike-stand adapter (which doubles as a handle) is all it takes to avoid handling noise.

As noted in a previous thread, beware of Sony, since it appears they still use an unusual type of copy-protected memory.