As a news reporter, this unit is a dream for getting great audio, dependably, and then quickly transferring it to your computer for editing. It's biggest drawback is it's very hungry appetite for batteries. I go through about two sets per week and I don't get the touted four hours per set. I've found it handy to use a card reader rather than the bulit-in USB port to download the audio as doing so through the recorder just uses more batteries. also, the warning that your batteries are about to die is too short-lived and can come at inconvenient times. Otherwise, it's perfect. It's rugged and reliable and is a huge step above cassette or minidisc recording. Well worth the money for professionals.

I am a DJ and engineer at a community radio station. We got a PMD-660 to replace an aging minidisc unit.

I have used this unit to record lectures and concerts, either from the board or with Church Audio external electret condenser mics & preamp.

Pros - Reliable performance, great sound quality (from line-in or outboard mics/mic pres anyhow). Input and output volume is adjustable by knobs, as on an older analogue tape deck, not via scrolling through menus or punching buttons for stepped level adjustment, which can be jarring (I'm old-school. Can you tell?). Lightweight, no bigger than the old-style low-fi mono cassette decks. Pro features like selectable modes like mono mode which preserves full fidelity while doubling memory capacity (great for lectures and conferences where stereo isn't a must).

Cons - A bit overpriced for what it is and definitely oversized. It could be half as big and work just as well. The VU meters (which aren't located in the illuminated LCD screen for some reason) are hard to read especially in sunlight. When recording in mono, it reads from one stereo channel but not from the other, so you must make certain that the inputs to both chanels are live. Switching recording modes (MP3 or WAV, mono or stereo, sampling rate, etc.) requires complex "finger dances" upon the unit's push-buttons which are tough to memorize. Having frequently-used controls on the top and sides of the unit rather than all in one location makes working with it crazy at times.

Since the popular-priced units below this one are really meant for casual use and tend to be rather toy-like (and tend to include features that the serious recordist has little use for), and since the next price-point after this one is upwards of US$600 or US$700, I would call this a good compromise in terms of price versus functionality.