TASCAM DV-RA1000 HD Reviews

4.6/5.0 based on 4 customer reviews

Sweetwater Advice

Brad Moline

If you're a studio or house of worship that wants to capture the most precise details of your mix, the Tascam DV-RA1000HD is the perfect recorder for you. I've used some different recorders in the past, but when I connected the DV-RA1000HD in my studio, I was ecstatic with what I heard! I didn't realize what I was missing until I used this device. The sound is crystal clear and the ability to record DSD is unbelievable at this price range! The integrated 60 GB hard drive allows for recording on the go and the USB connection allows you to hear your mix back on your computer before you transfer it to disc. The DV-RA1000HD is a must-have for anyone serious about their music.

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Customer Reviews

John C. Baker
from Princeton, NJ
April 7, 2012Music Background:
Recording engineer/producer, Recording Academy member

Tascam DV-RA1000 HD - The Perfect Back-Up

There are many reasons to own this unit, but one of them is that it guarantees you will not have a failure IF your main computer "goes to sleep" unexpectedly while you're recording a long session, which I do on a regular basis. Last weekend working for a very high-end conference at an equally high-end Ivy League university where each 1 1/2- to 2-hour session was to be recorded for their archives, I had two sessions where the computer running Sound Forge 10 went to sleep and losty about a 30-second segment of the session before I could wake it up again. Even changing the computer's settings did not seem to help, but the problems notwithstanding, the fact that I had the DV-RA100 HD running simultaneously saved the day. It records either to its own hard disc, a DVD or a CD. High def or regular, def, the choice is yours, but a must-have back-up unit with flawless operational capabilities.

Aaron M
from Ocean Springs, MS
December 14, 2011Music Background:
Recording/Mixing Engineer

Awesome piece of gear!

I have a mobile recording setup that I do location recording with. I mix in the box down to stem tracks, and afterwards send them stems out of the box through multiple outboard compressors, eq, and effects through a Dangerous 2 Bus. The sum of my 2 buss feeds into the Tascam which has superior converters and dithering. From there I can print CDs, store on the hard drive, or dump the mixed song back to my computer as a wav file. It does everything I need, is easy to use, looks/feels great, is solidly built, and has a clear uncolored sound. What else would you want?

Jerry C.
from Boston MA
June 16, 2012Music Background:
music lover

Great for stereo rack

I use this for recording from digital radio. Jazz at night mostly. I'm very happy with this unit and Sweetwater in general. I'm an audiophile on a budget, and this is a great recorder and also a great cd player. Good for burning cds too.

Jan Jarvlepp
from Ottawa, Canada
March 15, 2009Music Background:
cellist, composer, teacher, independent producer of recordings

Great audio quality/DSD conversion doesn't work on iMac

With the DSD option I can now produce the best quality recordings I have ever made in my life (and I have been recording for over 35 years). The naturalness and clarity is fantastic. However, using my OS X iMac I found that the supplied Bronzewelder 1000 software was unable to convert DSD recordings to 44.1 kH PCM for CD use. I e-mailed Minnetonka, the producer of this software, about this but they didn't have anything to say about correcting this situation. So I ended up dubbing my DSD classical concert recordings via analog cables to my old Alesis MasterLink recorder in order to burn CDs for customers. Thus all audible benefits of the DSD master were lost. For this important reason, I wish I had chosen the Korg DSD recorder as I suppose that their DSD to PCM conversion software works. Without this hitch, I would have been happy to give this unit a 5/5 rating because it sounds truly wonderful.

inSync Review

Ryan P. Ziolkowski
10-13-2010

Absolute ease of use through the navigational menu a well as dense clarity make the Tascam DV-RA1000 a fantastic choice as a mastering/mixdown recorder. The 44.1 kHz to 192 kHz in frequency is well within the range for any type of cd production from project studio to the full range super audio demands of the most extreme audiophile. I found that the integration of the 60 GB hard drive was an excellent compliment to my digital audio transfer from my laptop to disc as there is less room for error. I recently moved a pro-tools session to disc using the DV-RA1000 and finally got the quality that I had been looking for (for a long time) in a finished product. I would definitely consider the DV-RA1000 an excellent investment and the right mixdown burner for all engineers and clients.