DAT FOSTEX PD4

Fostex PD4, successor of the PD2, remains a reference for DAT portable time recorders. Released by Sony as an amateur format, the DAT suffers from problems due to its design: small width tape and low rolling speed. Faced with its popularity with sound mixers, the manufacturers have decided to try to turn it into a professional format. Fostex was thus the first one, with the D20 studio recorder, to develop a time code standard, afterwards taken up by other manufacturers. Even if the PD4 can be criticized on many grounds (mechanical frailty and high sensitivity to dust, humidity and thermal shock), this machine has many assets compared to its competitors: good mike preamps with dedicated power supply and efficient low-cut filter, convenient liquid crystals readouts, headphone monitoring of MS microphone recordings or just one channel, post-recording monitoring, full timecode recording including JAM sync and the on-board three-channel mixer instead of the two generally available, which can be very convenient with documentary shooting. Even if DAT is little by little being replaced by other digital formats, the PD4 remains the spare recorder for many sound mixers, in the same way as the Nagra IV-S was the spare recorder when DAT first appeared. Provided with a PortaBrace bag.