I wanted to replace 2 old portastudios, an 8 track tape recorder and a 16 track digital that was malfunctioning, with one new and more versatile and powerful unit. For the price and features, the Tascam 2488 Neo seemed like the ONLY choice! The manual is mostly well written and easy to follow (the manual for my old 16 track Fostex was almost indecipherable). The unit has 12 mono and 6 stereo channels but records only 8 tracks at a time. The windows style LCD is easier to use than the Fostex LCD. It offers both 16 and 24 bit recording,and mastering for the CD burner is surprisingly easy. The sound quality is fantastic. The editing site for cutting or moving material is also very easy to use. The few problems I had at 1st came from forgetting some procedural steps, nothing from the Neo itself. I haven't had it a month and and I have made 3 CD's. HOW COULD IT BE BETTER? Why not put ALL the INPUTS in the FRONT,not rear (my old Tascam 8 track had them on top where they were quicker and easier to access). Make it a true 24 track with all pannable mono tracks. Use fewer instrument FX more vocal,i.e. doubling and harmonies. On a 1 to 10 scale, I give it 9 for features and ease of use and it's the best apparatus I have owned in 35 years of personal home recording.Read full review
The Tascam 2488neo is the best value in a digital audio workstation recorder that I could find. I've had it for a couple of months now and have cut about 9 complete songs using it. It's a 24 track (with hundreds of 'virtual tracks' available). The neo has 8 tracks of simultaneous recording available, onboard mastering effects, onboard vocal and guitar effects, and a built in CD burner. It also has a 160gb hard drive, although the advertisements only say they have an 80 gig hard drive. There is a note in the box that explains that Tascam upgraded the units to the larger hard drive. The neo is fairly easy to use, and the manual is well-written. However, I HIGHLY recommend that you also buy the DVD tutorial off of eBay. It will literally save you hours and hours of time learning how the 2488neo operates and some of the tricks you can do with it that the written manual doesn't explain. The price you will pay for this recorder, a set of studio monitors, headphones and a decent mic is still less than I paid for a professional studio to record my three song demo last winter using their ProTools system. And what I've recorded on the neo sounds 1000 times better because I was able to not worry about studio time costs, and no embarassment about having to do re-takes while the studio engineer rolls his eyes because I didn't get it right the first time. Bottom line is this: you can record, produce and master...AND burn to CD professional quality recordings using the Tascam 2488neo. And you can do it yourself, saving thousands of dollars in recording studio fees.Read full review
The Tascam 2488 MK2 is a 9th symphony for at-home recording. The controls are very user friendly and the effects are sweet as a 5 pound bag of sugar. Midi controls are more to my liking, especially the sync mode. This machine is the OOH whee!!! I mean I laid a 3 minute track, dropped a couple of verses, played it back then realized the track was too short to add a complete 4 bar chorus at the end so I re-recorded the music track again over the original track by way of sync and let it play longer (5 minutes). my recorded verses played easily on time along with the re-recording of the music track without a glitch or loss of rhythm. I didn't even have to re-record my vocals. I've owned this unit less than a week and I feel like a pro at it already. I can't speak on virtual track usage. I haven't used it yet. Although 250 virtual tracks are over kill - I will probably never get around to ever using those extra tracks. Crap! I barely use the available 24. The 2488 MK2 meets all my expectations and then some. There are so many tricks and tactics I've already discovered I can do with this unit that I could never have performed on Tascams' 488 (8track cassette recorder). The 2488 MK2 is very cost effective and extremely powerful as a self contained unit. It is without question a sound investment. For the serious mined The 2488MK2 is a serious piece of hardware.Read full review
The Tascam 2488 was the missing link. over the years we have tried everything from two old cassette decks, to daisy chained 4 tracks, to so called digital recorders. the computer was supposed to be the answer with the fancy sound cards and interface cables. All of that is in the past. the Tascam 2488 came right out of the box, and with a few minutes orientation the band (4 piece) was recording. the sound is amazing. we had to pay over $100 an hour to get that kind of sound in the recording studio. Now we have it available to us anytime, any where. Did I mention it was light enough, and small enough to actually take to the gig. Now we have our first "Live CD" (in the works). I am a fan. Tascam you hit the nail on the head. The only thing I would change would be to have had it 30 years ago!!!!! Thank you from Casey w/Flashpoint and Friends.Read full review
I bought a 2488 for home recording use with out having seen one in a store. The buttons used for FWD, REV, play, stop and record were worn. They could be made to work by repeatedly pressing them but it made using the recorder and editor extremely cumbersome. The unit is apparently made with just in time manufacturing; the parts that would be necessary for repair were back ordered to China. The Tascam repair men said that it would cost $60.00 to diagnose the problem but the factory parts people, who were also trained in diagnosis and repair, said that they were familiar with the problem and the parts were on back order, with a one month wait time. I have bought other electronic equipment with the neoprene press button new and used; the rubber in the buttons dry out and the electronic switches that they press wear out.Read full review
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