The Edirol R-4 is a portable, battery or DC powered 4-channel hard disk recorder with a 40 GB internal hard drive, a Compact Flash card slot for data backup and transfer direct from the hard drive, and a USB 2.0 port that permits high speed computer transfers for post production purposes.
The R-4 is a high resolution, self-contained location recorder, with 24-bit/96 kHz capability, 4 XLR and 1/4" combination analog connectors for input from microphone or line level sources, and switchable phantom power for the XLR microphone connectors, in support of professional condenser microphones. A SPDIF digital I/O, on coaxial connectors, is also provided.
Each input channel of the R-4 is equipped with a dedicated level control knob, and a global, switchable peak limiter is available for the analog inputs. Edirol has also included a set of 5 EQ's and Dynamics processors for greater "in-house" control of the recorded product. The onboard waveform editor features jog wheel scrubbing and a lean, but practical set of editing tools, displayed on a large, backlit LCD. WAV is the file format of choice; MAC OS X and Windows XP are both supported, in their more current versions, along with Windows 2000 and ME.
The technology gets cheaper and the features increase in the world of location digital recording, a nice ratio for the consumer. The R-4 is a genuine value for the working professional recordist, serving ENG or musical recording applications.