Audio Hardware/Software Repsonses

1. I thought building the microphones was fairly straight forward and easy. I thought soldering was going to be much harder than it turned out to be. The hardest part was stripping the rubber coating off the wire. The wind screen was also a tricky process. After the build, I thought my microphone performed very well. The sounds I was able to capture were very good. I was able to get ambient sound along with extreme close ups and just simple foreground sounds. Ideally I would like some nicer wind screens. I think that the microphones we made and used were good enough for what we were doing, and for the money they were defiantly worth it. If I had unlimited money I'm not sure what I would buy because what I had got the job done.

2. My experience with the MiniDisc was O.K. It did the job I needed it to do but wasn't the easiest to use. It was annoying how you would always have to re-enable the sensitivity after finishing a recording. Another thing that bothered me was trying to start a new recording. The MiniDisc created new groups every time instead of new tracks. It got very confusing. The only other recording equipment I have used was camcorders and I though this was nice that it had a sensitivity control. In an ideal world the settings would be saved throughout the time of use, along with making it easier to make new tracks and digital recording.

3. For this project I used Audacity. I have never used this program before and thought it was alright. I chose Audacity because it seemed to be the program that instructor was encouraging us to use. The program offered all the features that I needed and helped me create good sounds clips for my drift project. It could be a little more user friendly and have a better interface. I think I will use this software again just because I now know how it works and also because I don't know which other program I would use.