Price: $279.99
(as of Sep 30, 2024 15:44:41 UTC – Details)
8-Track Digital Pocketstudio
Built-in High-quality Stereo Condenser Microphone
Two tracks simultaneous recording/ eight tracks simultaneous playback
Dedicated stereo master track available
Independent LEVEL/PAN(BALANCE) knobs for each track
4.5
Reviewer: BW
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title: The best $200 I have ever spent
Review: The DP-008EX is easily the best $200 I have ever spent.My background:-Intermediate acoustic guitar player + vocalist-Experienced in DAWs-Emphasis on writing songs, not “production value”I’ve only had this device for a few days and I can already say it is worth every penny. Here’s why:-The amount of functionality and quality you get out of a device this small and affordable is simply unheard of.-The built-in mics really are as good as other reviewers say. One could almost say the $200 is worth the mics alone. Audiophile snobs will surely disagree, but 90% of people using this device I think will find the mics to be more than sufficient.-I was able to lay down a 5-track recording, mixdown, and master in about 30 minutes from opening the box. Exporting and copying the song to my iMac using the USB interface was very easy and straightforward. The final product sounds better than anything I’ve done in a DAW, although I am not an audio engineer by any means.-While you will have to drill down in menus on occasion, there are enough dedicated buttons to make most of the useful functions only one button press away (sort of: I’ll get back to this).-You can monitor during playback and recording with absolutely no latency that I can tell.-The unit powers on in seconds. Once you’re at the home screen (and assuming you had a song previously loaded) you can immediately start recording. All your work will be saved when you power off the unit.-The simplicity of this device and the dedicated knobs makes the recording process a lot simpler and more fun than using a DAW in my opinion. I set this thing on my ottoman and crank out tunes from the couch. I record percussion tracks by punching the ottoman for a “kick” sound and tapping the guitar for a “snare” sound. It sounds amazing.I would like to take a moment to debunk some of the complaints I’ve read in other reviews:-Many say the battery life is weak. This doesn’t surprise me based on all the functions this unit provides. A little tip I picked up from reading the manual: you can set an auto shut-off time for the backlight. This might help the battery life a little bit. Just get the power supply if you’re worried about it, and pack a bunch of batteries with you if you’re going to go record in the woods. Get rechargeable so you can juice them up again when you’re at home.-One reviewer complained that the phantom power takes two button presses to enable even though there is a dedicated button for it. I assure you Tascam did this on purpose, so that you do not inadvertently turn on phantom power and kill your battery life (or a connected mic that doesn’t support it).-The most common complaint seems to be that it’s hard to use. I assure you that anyone with even a tiny bit of multi-track recording experience (in a DAW or elsewhere) should find this unit very intuitive and easy to use. If you are new to multi-track recording, take your time and read the manual. It is one of the best-written manuals I’ve seen in a long time. They left nothing out, and the quick start guide should get you up and running right away. I don’t know how they could have made anything any simpler on this device without sacrificing functionality or introducing problems/confusion. If you think this is too complicated, multi-track recording just isn’t for you.-Some complain about the real-time mixdown and mastering. If you are using the DP-008EX for its intended purpose, your songs should not be longer than 5 minutes or so. That’s 10 minutes of total wait time to export your master. Big deal. If you are trying to record 3-hour long band practices, look elsewhere. The DP-008EX is designed for recording individual songs. Don’t leave a negative review because you used the product for something it wasn’t intended for.-A couple people said the metronome is so quiet it is not usable. I agree that the metronome could be louder, but there is a very simple solution to this: turn down your master volume, increase your headphone/monitor volume. The metronome volume does not change with the master volume (it has its own dedicated volume setting). This should not have been hard to figure out.-Some complain about the 2-second count-in for auto punch in/out. I actually agree with this one. Tascam should just release a software update that increases this time (or make it configurable by the user). Not a deal breaker though.To summarize, this is the best piece of studio gear I have ever purchased. I can produce songs with this thing that sound as good as my $2k studio setup, and I can do it literally anywhere I want. Whether you are a professional or a beginner, this unit has something for everyone at a price for everyone.
Reviewer: Baron
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title: Easy to use with high quality sound!
Review: The Tascam DP-008EX is a great portable recorder. It has all the basic functions you need: pan, EQ, reverb, bounce, and more. The ability to bounce tracks endlessly means you can record 3 stereo tracks, then bounce them to 1 stereo track, then record 3 more stereo tracks, bounce again, etc., giving you the ability to record dozens and dozens of tracks if needed. I use the Tascam DP-008EX primarily to record multi-track music using synthesizers (Access Virus, Novation Nova, etc.), my own vocals, and a few other things here and there. The sound quality is top notch. There is no noise I can here, even after bouncing tracks several times, there’s no noise present at all. The sound is crystal clear.In the past I used my desktop computer to record multi-track music using Sonar, and other similar Windows desktop PC apps. While these PC apps are very powerful, I found that sitting in front of a computer tends to be counterproductive musically. No matter how many features a PC app might have, it’s simply a pain to use a PC when creating music. It takes forever to boot up a PC, the apps have no real knobs to adjust, they are all mouse driven, the apps tend to have tons of menus, options, etc. Plugging in all your equipment into the computer is awkward. A PC is just not the right tool for the job. The Tascam boots up in seconds. It’s easy to use. It’s quick and easy to plug in all your equipment. Everything you need is at your finger tips with real knobs and buttons. It simply does the job perfectly and it takes very little space. Sure, the DP-008EX lacks the vast number of features a PC app might have, but it’s so simple to use, and feels so natural in a musical setup, that I now never use my computer to record music on. After using the Tascam DP-008EX, I’m now thinking of upgrading to using a 32-track recorder, like the Tascam DP-32 in the future. The only reason I would ever want to use my PC for music now is for processing files after recording them. It’s just too awkward to use a PC for recording music, even for a software engineer like myself. It’s just not the right tool for the job.PROS* Boots up in seconds.* Absolutely NO NOISE. It has crystal clear sound even after bouncing tracks many times.* No latency, drops, or audio hiccups. Unlike a PC, this NEVER happens on this unit.* Reverb sounds good. It’s not cheap sounding reverb. It’s not the best either, but its good enough.* EQ settings work great. You can adjust EQ on a per-track basis.* Knobs are high quality with smooth fading and panning.CONS* The LCD screen can be hard to read at some angles (even with the proper LCD settings). I wish it had a better display.* It eats batteries like crazy. If you use it a lot, like I do, you’ll need to buy a power supply for it.* Power supply NOT included.* Proprietary native storage format. It stores your work on MTR partitions on an SD card which can’t be read by anything other than Tascam devices. This is a pretty big negative.* Making backups to a PC and transferring music to a PC require that you export your music to wav files on a special FAT partition on the SD card. Only after exporting to wav can you then read the audio you recorded. Exporting is a slow process. This is a big negative. Why did Tascam choose not to use FAT 32 and normal wav files to store all your recordings on in the first place? Why have this export feature? It’s a pain to deal with it. Fortunately you only need to do this when you’re done recording your music. But still, Tascam should not have done it this way. This is a really bad idea. I hope they stop doing this in the future. They should use 100% standard SD file partitions and standard file formats for all your audio work. That’s the proper way to do it.WISH LISTI love the DP-008EX because it’s so small and easy to use. I only wish it had more tracks to record on and a better LCD display. But it is an 8 track recorder, and I knew that when making the purchase. However, I find, being a synthesizer guy, that I really like having 16 tracks. I tend to use the bounce feature often to get more tracks out of this unit. I would prefer if this unit had the ability to record 16 tracks. That would be perfect. But the size would double if it had twice as many knobs, and it would be too big. It would be great if it had 16 tracks, but only 8 sets of knobs, and the ability to select which tracks the knobs were for (i.e., the first 8 or the second 8 of 16 tracks). Or possibly add a mode where you have 8 stereo tracks (16 mono tracks) instead of 8 mono tracks, were pan is a stereo balance control instead of a pan control. That way the unit would still be small and portable but support more tracks.CONCLUSIONThe only major negative is the proprietary storage format used by Tascam. This is a big drawback. Other than that, the unit is great. It’s easy to use. It boots up quickly. It has fantastic sound quality. The knob controls are smooth. I use it all the time and I love it. I highly recommend the Tascam DP-008EX!UPDATE: I bought this way back in 2013. It’s now nearing the end of summer 2021. 8 years have passed and it still works great! Absolutely no issues in 8 years. It’s really a quality piece of equipment. Money well spent!
Reviewer: buzzToronto
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title:
Review: Just great. Amazing sound and features. No latency. No fussing with drivers and extra equipment and cluttered DAW UIs. Great presets for compression and mastering. Iâve had so much better results on this than with Logic. Letâs you focus on what matters – capturing your musical expression. I use an NT1A with its phantom powered input and the results have been great for vocals and percussion. Itâs built in micâs may be ok but Iâve always used my NT1A. If I donât have the NT1A handy then Iâm glad the built in micâs are there! Line inputs for synth and guitars work great too.Only thing that I see as missing is the option to convert time code and in/out points to bars/measures (if recording with the metronome) instead of minutes and seconds. But this hasnât really prevented me from working at all. Was just surprised.Works very professionally. This really is a portable studio. It gets deep, but you can learn all of its functionality in about one evening. It’s worth investing the time to learn this machine’s capabilities.The build quality is good. Knobs donât wobble. Feels great. Bought a zippered amazon gadget case to protect it from dust and scratches.
Reviewer: Barron C.
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title:
Review: 8 track recorder that is easy to use. There are plenty of YouTube videos and the recorder comes with FULL printed user manual. This is becoming less the rule these days. You can download the manual if you wish.The quick start up guide takes you through the main features of recording, downloading to two tracks and mastering to .wav format.The quality of the internal microphones are very good but a good external mic will improve quality. You can also plug in electronic instruments directly. You can monitor as you go through wired headphones.The DP-008EX T provides a lot of options for inputs and outputs.All in all a good piece of equipment for anybody wanting to record more than one track with the advantage of being portable.
Reviewer: Monsieur Boingus
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title:
Review: I bought this machine as a step up from my wonderful BOSS MicroBR 4 track, which has amply served my needs for a number of years. The 8 tracks on the TASCAM give me a lot more flexibility and the controls are generally more intuitive than on the BOSS. The manual is clear and well written, and I succeeded in recording a professional quality demo’ in a few hours. The mixing and mastering process is a little bit trickier than I’m used to, but I’m sure I’ll grasp it better in time. As with all machines of this type, there’s a lot packed into a small package and I don’t think the unit would be any the worse if some of its more arcane functions – mastering tools, three different types of reverb, menu-driven individual track EQ – were quietly dropped from future versions in the interests of simplicity of operation. All in all though, a great machine and I hope it will serve me for many years to come.
Reviewer: Robert atcheson
Rating: 4.0 out of 5 stars
Title:
Review: Used for amateur recording of live music. The Inbuilt microphones are extremely adequate. I can see its use for speech recording in the future or recording interviews and conversations. Obviously, the unit is directed at garage band recording of original music, but there are more possibilities.
Reviewer: Shane C
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title:
Review: Fantastic piece of kit!! Having been used to the Tascam Porta 05 of the eighties that used “real cassettes”, this was a great replacement. It has a lot of features but you can literally use it out of the box to lay down tracks. But read the instructions for mixing and mastering. It’s logical but if you’re like me and hate reading instructions then you’ll get frustrated! Can’t fault it and my daughter and I have put some professional sounding tracks together. Outputs as a WAV file so use a good well known free software app to convert to high quality mp3!
