iRig Pro

(Cost me – £129.99 from GAK)

Bought this little box to do some recording when out and about with my laptop and mobile phone.

Very impressed with both size/weight as well as quality of sound.

Comes complete with cables for laptop as well as thunderbolt for iPhone. There’s a battery compartment for phantom power (though it works fine without the battery if you don’t need phantom). Is has midi connectivity as well.

The main input is a hybrid XLR/1/4″ jack so you can hook up most mics and instruments to it.

I like using it to quickly record ideas to my phone (using the thunderbolt connector and a simple recorder app) and even taking a line out of a mixing desk to record rehearsals. The result is a surprisingly high quality MP3 that I can then import into Logic for editing and enhancing.

Love it.

The only con is it feels maybe a bit plastic-y when you first un-box it. A battery definitely makes it feel more substantial.