Happy to facilitate as I already use Zencaster. Happy to join and answer questions (as best I can)
I left Zoom because I wanted to up the ‘quality of the audio game’ by minimizing the garbled audio that one gets from Zoom. All of these offerings (Riverside/ Squadcast/ Zencaster etc.) upload the files as you go, as the bandwidth is available. I can’t explain the tech exactly but it helps take the ‘wobbly’, ‘garbly’ audio out of the end product.
Fortunately, I have not had problems that others have shared. I did have to reschedule my latest guest as we kept dropping the call. Not sure what the issue was but we just rescheduled and got on with it.
I still also record my intro/ extro in Zencaster to help match the ‘room tone’ and post production mix of the interviews just like I did in Zoom.
There are some post production mix options that may be attractive especially if you are a minimal editor. I am still a finicky and detailed editor so those options don’t really help me get a close-to-finished product right out of the gate, but I find the sound overall much better that Zoom can offer. It sounds richer to me.
I was going to switch to Riverside but I can’t remember why I didn’t in the end. Probably inertia. And, I was switching from Simplecast to Captivate at the same time so I didn’t want to add to the complexity of learning too many new things at once.
I’ve been a guest on Riverside and Squadcast and they feel pretty similar. Guests tend to be impressed by the experience as it takes them out of the Zoom room for a bit.
Crappy audio on the guest end is helped a bit by these offerings but it can’t do miracles. Hope this helps.
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I’m ready to jump ship from Zencastr 
Several paper cuts I could look past. But the deal breaker is exemplified by this chat.
This is not my guest’s fault. Tech issues happen and recording via Chrome’s features is the same tools that malicious actors use to violate our systems — so Chrome and our computers are nervous and touchy about permissions, local storage, and uploads started by Chrome itself.
That’s all a given. And it will happen with Riverside too. So my question for you Riverside users is the following…
After reading this chat, have you encountered a guest with this sort of problem in Riverside, AND were you able to do anything to help the guest resolve the problem?
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thanks yes it does. i need 20 characters to send so here goes
@craigconstantine, Man, I got panicked just reading that. Good to keep your cool Craig. It seems that most problems that arise with Riverside come from some “underpinnings” of chrome, giving permissions, access, etc. I had a long interview this morning with Riverside and when the guest joined I received the notice he was using the unsupported Edge browser. Quit and then came back with Chrome. I don’t have as many shows and bookings as you so I am now in the ritual of doing Tech Calls at least one week out from the interview. I need to for my sanity. I’m hoping that one day Apple updates Safari so there will be another option. I have been testing the IOS Riverside app lately and it is really smooth. Simple, simple for the guest and nice quality.
And when all gets a bit too stressful I find that a hot cup of Throat Coat tea in my favourite cup @Rob calms everything down… 
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My observation is that the fundamental factor we need to monitor is how the BROWSER behaves with whatever app we use to record interviews. Oftentimes the failure is between the app and the browser. I recall a month or so back that Sqaudcast (usually rock solid app) failed if recording on anything else but Google Chrome. The issue was eventually fixed but lots of folks lost their recordings.
Solution? Invest in a hardware recording back-up. Like the Zoom Podtrack P4. Otherwise recording is always going to be a gamble.
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Does this record both sides of interview? I’m guessing no. How does this compare to zoom H6 ? Scared to try riverside but eith backup…
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Hi @clevpt it’s great to hear from you.
Yes, the P4 will record both sides of an interview. The quality depends on your internet connection.
I would not recommend the Zoom H6 to back up your internet calls. It can be done but it’s not built to do this natively so you need to use a workaround - it’s a pain.
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I may need your help with explaining that pain. I’m about to invest in a Zoom H6… 
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The “magic” is what’s called “mix minus.” The H6 can do that too… but I think it’s buried in the menus. …but I don’t do what Jey’s been describing, so I’m deferring to his(*) “P4 is better” assessment. 
* always a good idea 
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is it crazy to own an H6 for it’s obvious benefits and a P4 as a backup option to have a sound backup which I find super valuable? Up till now i have the guest use their phone
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Congratulations @thearena it’s a sweet, sweet unit. I cherish mine.
The problem to overcome is that when you connect an audio interface to a phone the person on the other end of the line hears their voice coming back to them as an echo and that can also get captured in the recording too.
As @craigconstantine says, engaging the mix-minus button fixes that. Except the H6 does not have a mix-minus function. So we use a hack that produces the same result as mix-minus. In short, we make a stereo recording where your voice is panned onto one channel (maybe the Left) and your guest is panned on the other (the Right or vice versa).
This is the video that taught me how to do it. Pay extra care to ensure you use mono cables/adapters where he says so. Mono jacks or cables have one black ring. They can be a pain to source so if you have a local instrument store nearby it might be worth a visit.
The biggest danger is that all those cables make electrical interference a real danger. If you hear a hum then move the wires and H6 well away from your computer. And keep the wires as apart from each other as possible. This happened for me from time to time so set everything up well in advance of your interview to make sure you have time to fix this if it happens. Make sure everyone with access to your desk knows they will die if they mess with your set-up.
But it is effective and records good sound because the big, big, big upside is that you can adjust the levels in real-time, for each track, live while recording. So in practice, because I still use Zoom.us, the Zoom.us recording is my backup and my mix-minus Zoom H6 recording from the SD card is my primary recording.
The whole mix-minus setup should have no effect on the recording from whatever vid-conference service you are using.
Just one other thing - despite what the thumbnail on the vid says you can only record one remote guest this way. Any other tracks will be in the same room as you via the XLR connections.
Have fun!!!
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Still a simple, sensible and robust solution @clevpt. Nothing wrong with doing this at all!
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Riverside.fm has a lot of coupon codes available. I signed up for the first three months at 50% off.
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Oh that’s a nice price @jensen! Say, after a month or two would you share your thoughts on the pro’s and con’s of Riverside? I’d love to hear your real world experience (and what browser you use). Especially how easy your guests found the experience of using the service. 
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I don’t have another to compare to (like Zencaster) but I really love it. The recording quality is great. My cohost has found it relatively easy to handle. It has a lot of features that make it easy to edit into different formats for clipping/social platforms.
The editing feature makes clipping episodes a breeze and it has built in noise reduction and equalizing audio between participants. The video is very crisp, better than I found with zoom on their high level function. It also allows you to add logo watermarks and some other features.
I’m a big fan of it so far. Since we record a long recording and clip it into different episodes, the editing within the interface has been a huge time saver.
I took a minimum viable product approach to this podcast and using it has really added to the professionalism while decreasing the time to create episodes drastically. We usually record 1-2 hours and clip/edit into 6-10 shorter topical episodes. This whole process now only takes about 45 minutes for editing, clipping, exporting and loading into Lisbyn.
I would say the only real con so far is the transcript, it’s awful. I use it to mark through points to clip the episodes and the translations are among the worst I’ve seen. On a positive side, the bad translations have provided some great laughs. It has some integrations with other platforms that have this service so perhaps it’s not a big deal for most.
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Thank you @jensen this is such a generous post. Great insights about exactly the sort of stuff I wanted to hear about. I didn’t know it had an editing feature! Thank you again.
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@Jey if you end up trialing or purchasing a subscription, I would really enjoy hearing what you think about it, especially compared to other stuff you’ve tried. I don’t know what I don’t know so if I can glean some expertise from your experience that would be greatly appreciated.
This might be useful too, I think Riverside.fm has a direct integration with Descript. Haven’t used Descript yet but that’s next on my list of platforms to trial.
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I love the idea of comparing notes @jensen. And I definitely will share with you as I’m planning to experiment with Riverside and a few other double-ender apps.
Say, one thing you might experiment with on the transcription side is a new app called Eddy.
At the moment it’s in beta development and is completely free while it’s in Beta. The transcription can be exported as a Word doc. I think they plan to take on Descript. It’s pretty basic but free is free.
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