New Zoom H1 line in / recording snaps and crackles

[supamonsta]

Hi mates,

I bought a brand new zoom H1 for live recordings,

so far the tool seemed good and ease of use, but our last recordings are full of clipping, it's un-listenable...

I'll run some tests this weekend and I'd like to have your ideas to what is causing these clippings,

let me explain:

Zoom h1 with brand new cable (little jack - dual RCA / jack adapters),
The main console (mackie 1402 vlz pro) routes the master to the Zoom line in.

Level set around -10 db in zoom
around 0db on the master fader mackie
around 0db on my motu ultralite output (our liveset from VOLT)
around -2db on ableton live master (I know), limited and compressed a bit

all in here is clipping the hell when I listen to the zoom's recording WAV 16/44 files, but in audacity I can see the recording is NOT clipping, and does NEVER goes above -11db... (same in live's meter if I drag the file and play it)

the sound is harsh clipping in some place, and regularly really clipping.


while we played it live, the sound was FINE in the P/A (sound system?), loud but hey, fine.

???

any ideas to what I should check??


Zoom : wav 16/44, EQ OFF, low cut OFF... 16GBram sd card

Oh, I forgot, same with a recording of our live set as for the other DJ sets we recorded through the same mackie central master console (feeding the sound system also)

thanks by advance

cheers

[Grijak]

You need to download and install the latest firmware for the H1 which is 2.0.

http://www.zoom.co.jp/

[simmerdown]

not a volume problem i will bet $1...

latency and buffer settings in prefs need tweeking..or asio4all

[supamonsta]

Thanks for the Firmware 2.00 tip, I didn't even imagine that there was firmwares and updates on these little recorders...

Released as following function update and bug fix version.

1. Added USB Audio Interface function.
2. The starting time is shortened.
3. Added the File Recovery function that restores broken data caused by power-off while recording.
4. Skip date/time setting menu after 10 seconds with no operation.
5. H1 freezes at the end of a recording in MP3 format in rare cases.
6. Some PC software can not recognize the mark created by H1.

But as you see, there is nothing about lin input clipping, sadly.
Anyway I'll download and install this update, it is still interesting



I made other researches on the web, and the conclusion is I need some LINE IN LEVEL ATTENUATOR... because the input level parameter in the H1 is only for digital clipping and doesn't avoid analog overload of the input...
so you can (same for the H2) have a low level recording still clipping...

anyone about these attenuators?


Another solution seems to use a headphones output to feed the H1 (but if it is a DJ console, there will not be any free headphones out...)

not a volume problem i will bet $1...

latency and buffer settings in prefs need tweeking..or asio4all

do you speak of live preferences???

You didn't read my first post, did you?

We got these clippings, whatever we're recording, our liveset, a dj set... this has nothing to do with ableton or my soundcard


thanks for trying to help


Cheers

[supamonsta]

http://www.parts-express.com/pe/showdet ... er=266-244

I don't know if -12db is a good choice...

but it seems the easier way to be sure to make clean recordings, isn't it?

cheers