NAMM Summer Session Podcasting Gear Update

We made it to Indianapolis in time to get checked in and take a quick trip to nearby Zionsville, Indiana. We looked for Morpheus, but he was a no-show.

Zionsville is a semi-rural village that looks like not much has changed in a hundred years. One exception is the Eagle Creek Coffee Company (free wi-fi again!) Zionsville is stuffed full of great places to eat, but we'll spare the details in case you are worried this is going to become a gustatorial travelogue.

Friday we hit the NAMM Show hard, scouring over 500 vendor areas looking for gear that would be useful for podcasters. One of the early highlights is the Samson C01U Mic. This is an established mic design, except that Samson has removed the traditional audio connectors and replaced them with a USB connector. The mic should give excellent results for voice and be a good option for podcasters. It doesn't require drivers, so you can just plug it in and start podcasting. We asked Samson about their plans for additional mics, and they said that it will be easy for them to release more USB versions of their mics, but that they needed to see how this CO1U sold.

Alesis had a lot of gear that should make podcasters drool. They were showing the Alesis MultiMix USB mixers, and introducing FireWire versions. These mixers have the established functionality of traditional mixers, but also have integrated digital audio interfaces. The USB versions are appropriate for podcasters that need one or two channels of audio in to their computer. The FireWire versions can do eight channels and more.

Numark was showing the iDJ, a mixing console based around two iPods. It lets you use the two iPods for audio sources, mix between them, and input additional sources via a microphone or line-level connections. The iPods' front buttons are replicated as large knobs on the iDJ, creating a great hands-on tool for working with them.

We talked to the product manager for the iDJ, and he knew all about podcasting. He was even working on his own podcast. He said that Numark plans to have a tutorial available on using the iDJ for podcasting.

M-Audio had one of the hottest set of introductions for podcasters. They were demonstrating a new digital audio recorder, the iControl GarageBand control surface, and a 16-pad audio control surface which coul be used to trigger music, samples, etc.

Digital audio recorders were one of the most popular introductions at the show. There were several that looked perfect for podcasting, including ones from Edirol, Tascam and Sony.

At the Hammond Organ booth, we talked to jazz organist Tony Manoco. He invited us over to a gig he had at Indianapolis' Jazz Kitchen. It was a great time. The guy is a madman on the Hammond organ, and he's got a hot trio that plays hard-hitting jazz.

We'll have the details on the latest gear for podcasters in the coming days.