Zoom’s H4essential Recorder gives wedding
filmmakers everything you need to record high quality
32 bit float audio at a wedding for a very affordable price spoiler
for how I feel about this audio recorder. Out of the way
because I respect your time today. I'm going to be reviewing this recorder
from the perspective of a wedding. Filmmaker So if you film weddings
or corporate videos or commercial videos or anything where you need a high quality
32 bit float audio recorder that will not break the bank,
keep watching. Also, for the sake of ethics,
I want you to know this video isn't paid or sponsored by Zoom, but they did send me
this recorder so I can make this review. And I want you to know
this video does have a sponsor. It's my friends at Media Zilla
If you're a wedding filmmaker that wants a beautiful way
to share your wedding films, that makes your couples feel like
they're watching something on Netflix. You have to check out Media Zilla. They offer you a massive step up
from sharing your wedding films on YouTube or Vimeo, and there's no ads,
no copyright claims to worry about. you can check out media zilla
at the link in the description below. And when you use that link, you'll get two months free or 20% off
the cost of any annual membership. Thanks to Media Zilla
for sponsoring this video. getting right into the review. I'd like to start
by showing you a piece of history. This is the first audio recorder
I ever purchased a zoom h for. And while it has plenty of scuffs
and scratches and the buttons are a little sticky,
this recorder still works just as well as it did
when I purchased it way back in 2009. now Zoom has made updates to this recorder
with the most notable being the H four in pro
that added locking input jack connectors and some other quality
of life improvements. But here we are with the H
for an essential which is easily the biggest upgrade
that this line of recorders has ever seen. It keeps all the old features but
streamline ends the entire set up in a way that will give you the features
that you need while also cutting costs. So let's talk
about these upgrades to start. If you've used Zoom's F three recorder,
the H four essential is going to feel very familiar to you because Zoom has gone
all in on 32 bit float recording with the four essential
just like it did with the F three. What I mean by that
is that when you turn this recorder on, it shows you waveform that indicate
the audio is recording and you can even press the mixer button here to adjust
the audio volume up and down. But here is the critical difference
between this recorder and Zoom's previous recorders,
like the older H-4 in with a previous Zoom recorder
as well as any non 32 bit float recorder. You wanted to monitor your audio meters
throughout the recording to make sure that the ideally hit
between -20 and -12 decibels, because your goal would always be
to get your audio loud enough, but not too loud
where it would peak and be ruined. This peaking was also accompanied
on some recorders by a bright red light that would flash if the game was too loud,
indicating that it was peaking With the H for essential. On the other hand, just like the F three,
you will see waveforms on the screen and you can access the mixer button,
like I said. But because the zoom h for essential
is recording in 32 bit float, any adjustments that you make to the gain
on the mixer screen are only going to affect the preview view of the audio
that you're hearing with your headphones. These adjustments
will not show up in the final audio file, so there's no worrying about your gain
being too loud or too quiet and there's no peaking light or warning
either. You can simply turn
on the recorder, confirm the waveforms are showing up and press
record to record high quality audio. Then if things are too loud or too quiet, you can fix them in your editing software. Just keep in mind that the only time
that you may not be able to fix things is if you're running your audio recording
through something like a DJ soundboard, and the audio is already
peaking from there. Soundboard. If you're recording audio
that was already peaked, you're not going to be able
to magically recover it like you would if you were recording directly
from the microphone receiver, which would be recoverable. Also say, I know I just said that there's
no peaking, but I do want you to know that the recorder will warn you
if the audio signal is too powerful. And that is kind of
like a peaking warning. And I know
people might call me out about that, so I'm just letting you know it has that. But for 99.9% of recordings, you're
not going to need to worry about it. Anyways, if you're wondering about
how the audio quality of this recorder is, I'm happy to tell you
that I'm using it to record this video. So if you think this sounds good,
you should be good to go. that said, I do want you to know that
after testing the H for essential side by side with audio recordings
from the Zoom F three, it sounds to my ears
like the preamps in the H for essential are a bit worse than the F three,
and I find myself needing to boost the gain of the H four essential
by about six decibels more to compensate for that gain
difference between these recorders. to be clear, once
I did that, the audio quality was great, especially for a quarter
at this price point. But I want you to be aware that the audio quality of this recorder
might not be to the level of the F three and you may need to work with it
more in post to make it sound as good. but I would also be aware
that the audio quality is going to be heavily influenced
by the quality of microphone that you use. So use a good mic if you want this
recording to sound its best. Also, I want you to know that to my ears
I did not hear any buzzing or humming or other distortions from this recorder going back to the four essential,
simplified and streamlined interface. Now, as I've already showed you, Zoom simplified setting your gain levels,
but they've also simplified a lot more. to start, let's talk buttons. Which all these buttons, by the way,
have a soft touch feel to them that keeps them quiet
so you won't hear any clicking button press sounds and pressing them. These buttons remind me of the start
and select buttons on my Super Nintendo from way back in the day. They feel great with these buttons. You can easily tell the recorder which audio input
you want to use by simply pressing the one or two or Myke button to use
the top microphones on the recorder. You also have a giant record button,
which, as the name implies, records. You have start, stop and forward back
buttons. On the left side,
you have a line in, line out and volume control for the headphones. And on the right you have a scroll wheel
and button to change settings, a usb-c port for charging that can also be used
as a Usb-C audio interface. The power in Hold switch and a slot
for using Zoom's Bluetooth adapter. The will enable you
to control the recorder remotely and use it with TimeCode, Which, incidentally, if you want to use this recorder
with TimeCode, I've created a step by step tutorial showing you how to use timecode
with any zoom or test cam audio recorder. I highly recommend watching it. I'll need to up in the corner
and down in the video description. As you can see, there
isn't a ton of buttons on this recorder. And what's funny is that
whenever I initially used it, I searched around for a menu
button of some sort. They would let me access more settings. But then I realized, wait a second, The menu is always present on the recorder
and accessible using the scroll wheel that very comfortably happens to be right
where your thumb is resting. So if you want to access
any of the settings of the recorder, all you have to do is scroll
and then press the inner button. With this menu. You can look at your previous files, you can change the settings
for the built in microphones as well as the excellent quarter
inch inputs, Change the sample rate
and other basic settings like the time and date and language. What's great is that if you're a wedding
filmmaker or someone that find yourself consistently recording the same things
over and over again, you should not need to dive
into these menus often at all. and setting up the recorder to record
is as simple as selecting your audio input and then pressing record. It's very quick and as I said earlier,
it's a streamlined process overall that I really like talking battery
life now. Zoom says that using the built in mics
this recorders capable of recording up to 9 hours
when using alkaline or rechargeable batteries and 19 hours
when using lithium. Keep in mind, though, that for a wedding
you most likely aren't going to be using these built
in mics and instead you'll be plugging into a soundboard or microphone via the
excellent or quarter inch inputs to test the battery life of the H for a central
and simulate using it at a wedding. I plugged a microphone that did not
require phantom power into the excellent Jack and put some fresh alkaline batteries
in and recorded audio with the recorder until they died. In total,
the batteries only lasted for two and a half hours
this way, which was not a very long time, but also not very surprising considering
that the recorder would require more power to record this way
than using the built in microphones. The main thing you need to keep in mind
is that if you're recording a long reception, I would either use
lithium batteries, which would probably get you close to 5 hours of recording time
or plug the H four essential into a power source, either a wall outlet
or a usb-c power brick. Any of those options should result in
you having plenty of power for a whole wedding,
and I always recommend plugging in for power if you can. Now there is one interesting quirk of the
H for Central that we need to talk about, and that is the axilla and quarter inch
and puts on the bottom of the device. Thankfully, as you can see,
these are both quarter inch and zl r inputs giving you a ton of versatility
if you're plugging into any soundboard. But like I said, there is a quirk
and that quirk is identifiable right here by this text at the bottom
of the recorder where it says Excel. Ah Mike Tierra line. What this means is that
if you are recording from a soundboard, that soundboard is usually going to be set
to mike level, which in essence means that it's not going to be pushing out
a super loud audio signal to your recorder because the audio has already
been processed through the soundboard. Alternatively, though, if you are plugging
into the back of a speaker, for example, that audio signal is usually going to be
line level, which is significantly louder because the soundboard knows
that it's needing to pump up the volume a lot out of the speaker because it's
going to want things to be loud. the issue that you can run into is that if you plug an audio recorder
into a line level output, the audio recorder won't be able to handle
that volume of audio and it will peak. Now, I know I just said earlier
this recorder records in 32 bit float, so peaking
is most likely not going to be an issue. But to prevent that from ever happening. What Zoom is essentially saying with this text
that says Excel are Mike and trace line. Zoom is recommending
that if you're plugging into a mike level input to use an Excel R cable
and if you're connecting to a line level input to use a quarter
inch also known as a trace cable, this isn't a big deal because I always
recommend having both these cables and you can even get adapter cables
that will work between both of them. But what makes this weird
is that most modern audio recorders that I've used have a simple setting
in the menu where you can choose whether you want the input to be at mike
level or line level. You do not need to use a different type
of cable to change the setting. So this takes me back to the premise
that I have for the H for essential, and that is that Zoom is going to give you
the features that you need while also cutting costs. I believe that this excellent interest
text at the bottom of the recorder summarizes that premise
well in that I'm betting that Zoom was probably able to save some money
by doing things this way instead of using a different component for both Exelon quarter inch,
the could handle mike and line level. Now this talk about cost
cutting leads me into one of the last things
that we need to talk about this recording because we need to talk about the overall
build quality of this device. Whenever you take it out of the box,
you're going to see that is essentially the same size
as the H four in an H four in pro enough. So that will actually fit into the case
that came with my h4n, which is where I'll most likely
be storing this recorder going forward because it does not come with a protective
case, as the essential name implies. I believe that with this naming system,
Zoom is saying that they're giving you everything that you need
to record high quality audio, but they're also trying
to make this recorder as affordable as possible, meaning that you're
not going to get things like a case. And if I had to describe the overall
build quality of the H for essential, this recorder feels a good bit lighter
than other audio recorders that I've used, including the older H4 in the test
cam X6 and even Zoom's own F three. Yes, the F three is significantly smaller
than the H four, but it's also more dense
and it feels more premium. So it's clear
that Zoom tried to save money with the manufacturer
of the H four essential, and that is especially apparent not only in the lightweight
plastic construction of this recorder, but also in the crooked 32
bit float sticker on the front of mind. It came like this from the factory
and it's not bothering me enough that I want to take a razor blade and remove it
and then reattach it where it's correctly lined up. But I did clearly consider it in addition,
it's almost a meme to me at this point. But whereas I thought that we'd gotten away from flimsy SD card
door covers with the Zoom F three, the H four essentials, SD card door
feels especially flimsy, and I'm sure that a lot of filmmakers will probably
have this break off relatively quickly. All that said,
while this recorder does feel cheaper, I would not expect that
to affect the audio quality in any way. And as long as you're not throwing it
or dropping it from a significant height, you should be fine. Or to put things another way with the test
cam X8, I felt like that was a more premium device
that felt heavier and better. Put together, but it also came with a massive glass
touch screen and if you dropped it, there was a good chance
that it could crack. So basically what I'm saying
is don't drop the H for essential or the test kit Max eight
and you should be fine. Just don't drop your audio
of course. Cool. Anyways, build quality out of the way. We've talked about all the features
and capabilities of this device, but I've saved the most interesting
for last because that is the price. For context. I bought my old trusty and reliable zoom h for n in 2009 for $300. It was literally my first purchase that I ever made from B an
H, And now here we are 15 years later. And at the time of recording this review
with the H for essential, considering all this time has passed and inflation
has run rampant and prices have gone up for everything, how much do you think
this new recorder costs? This is where things are
really mindblowing because Zoom is pricing the H for essential at $200
at the time of making this video. Yes. $100 cheaper
than what I paid for one in 2009. What, Are you serious? Yes, I'm serious. It's kind of freaking me out here. Okay, Zoom is making inflate and resistant
audio recorders that actually go down one third in price
over their previous version. Who could have guessed? So here's my point. In my opinion, after having tested
the H4 essential extensively, I think this is a great recorder
that lives up to the essential name that they have given it. Zoom is giving you a ton of power
and 32 bit for audio recording while cutting the costs
in a lightweight plastic housing. And as the name implies,
that's really all you need. So if you are a wedding filmmaker
that has been looking for a 32 bit foot audio recorder,
that is not going to break the bank. I think that the four essential
is a great choice and I will link to it down below
if you want to pick it up. Also now below, I'm going to link to
my free wedding videographer Gear guide. So if you are a wedding filmmaker
and you're wondering what gear to purchase,
not just audio, but any gear, you are going to love this guide
because it's going to show you everything that you need
as well as the links for where to get it. It's going to save you a ton of time,
and most importantly, it's free. You can download the gear guide at the link down in the video description
and also Zoom released two other recorders, an H one essential
and an H six essential. Do you want to see reviews
of those recorders? Which one do you want to see a review of? Let me know because I don't want to make
these reviews if you don't watch them. So yeah,
let me know in the comments down below. and also subscribe.
If you want to see those videos. Thanks so much for watching
and have a great day. talking battery life. Now, Zoom says that this recorder is capable of recording up to 9 hours
when using alkaline or rechargeable batteries and 19 hours
when using lithium batteries. in my testing with alkaline batteries. I found the reporting to be a bit under
and my battery lasted for about 10 hours. So if you are filming a wedding,
you should be good for even a very long ceremony and reception,
especially if you use lithium batteries. And as a plus, remember that
you can charge the recorder using usb-c. so if you have a nearby plug or external battery pack,
you can run it pretty much indefinitely or at least as long as it can record
with a one terabyte micro SD card, which is the max
size of SD card it supports.
