There are no options to change recording format at the moment, and I have not heard mention that there may be in future Sansa firmwares. I agree it would be a nice feature, especially being able to record to mp3 to use up less storage space. However, the CPU in the device may be too slow to encode to mp3. It would also be nice to be able to record to SD card rather than internal flash. All of this applies to voice recording too.
Audio frequencies transmitted through FM never exceed 15kHz so the optimal sampling rate for FM recording would rather be 32kHz.
Besides, higher sampling rate => higher bit rate => more writing operations => decreased battery life.
Pelago:
Direct encoding in mp3 might be a plus for some people, but people using another lossy codec might be annoyed to have to transcode.
PCM allows people to choose which format they want to use without any prior degradation caused by lossy encoding.
However, I must admit talking about issues related to transcoding from lossy to lossy and preservation of audio quality is a bit awkward considering we are talking about FM audio.
First as a radio guy, I am not a fan of the radio recording (maybe thats why I only get 4 downloads a week of my podcast). However 32 kHz is the best. Anything in excess of this could cause overmodulatioin (sound Clipping) or audio distortion. When I record the show I record at 32kHz for the web. Going any higher is a waste. Sorry.
If you want a Quick answer Private Message Sansafix or another admin… The better thing to do is to go to the Product Feature Suggestions board. Post it in there… Im sure it will get some support.
I was quite excited to read the Fuze can record direct from the radio in .wav format but when I got my hands on the Fuze and made some test recordings I was hugely disappointed! The sound quality is noticable worse than the sound produced by the Fuze’s tuner when listening to a live broadcast.
I agree we need an option to increase the sample rate from 22Khz to 32Khz. 22Khz is fine for voice recording but for the radio it sounds terrible
Are there any hardware limitations on the Fuze that restricts the recording sample rate to 22Khz?
The FM record feature is ruined because of this issue… Which is a shame because the Fuze has a very good quality and highly sensitive tuner.
Message Edited by 2stepsteve on 06-22-2009 12:57 PM