Hi,

I am a musician / composer, currently using an 828mkII for recording with a Mac (desktop). This has been a great introduction to the world of digital recording. I plan to keep this equipment, and use DP for mixing in the future as I feel it has been a good investment.

However I would like to add a very portable, reliable solution for recording and would like to move to a dedicated machine, instead of buying a laptop, for recording in the field, at musician's houses etc.

Its obvious that I will need high quality mic preamps and microphones, and I plan to purchase those, but that would be a separate discussion.

I am looking for a recording solution under $2000 perhaps (although I am not stuck to that number) that will simply get my high quality signal into digital form, at least 16-24 tracks. Additionally I would like the machine to work well in conjunction with my Mac, at least from the point of transferring files.

I have narrowed the field down somewhat to these options:

Hard Disc Recorder: Alesis HD24 or HD24XR, Mackie SDR2496 or similar machines

Workstation: Yamaha AW 2816, Tascam 2488 24-track, Roland VS2000-CD

I will mainly be recording acoustic instruments (guitar, flute, horns, some strings, vocals) as well as software synths and DI electric guitar / bass. I would like to produce master quality recordings eventually and it would be great to be able to capture great sounding tracks that could interface with other equipment.

From what I have read, many musicians (not necessarily engineers) think highly of the Alesis HD24 solution, and are satisfied with the A/D conversion. That being said, for recording, would there be any advantage to getting a workstation as opposed to a HD type solution? It seems that with a HD I would need to buy a mixer, or could I eventually just use software mixer / controller for this?

Do the mixers, preamps and effects in the Yamaha AW 2816 or Tascam 2488, for example really add significant value to the production process?

Are the converters in the workstations on par with the dedicated HD solutions?

I suppose I am really interested in the sound quality of the various machines. I would think that the workstations have to sacrifice in the A/D conversion department, since they are giving you preamps , a mixer, CD burner, etc, for $1300-$2000 dollars. Since I will be using outboard gear for all of these things (although an on-board mixer would be nice), I would think the HD units would be somewhat superior, just for capturing the sound.

Any thoughts? (greatly appreciated!)

-jason