Unveiling the Power of the Zoom P4 Next for Aspiring Podcasters

Welcome to five Minutes with Gray Hair Dave.

He has gray hair and he has a gray beard and he also wears glasses like the guy in the artwork.

Oh, and the guy in the artwork is better looking.

Now, tariff free.

Here is Gray Hair Dave.

Yes, yes indeed, folks.

It is me.

It's Gray Hair Dave.

I am back.

I am back.

Sorry for the delay.

There's a couple days and I apologize for that.

But here's what was going on.

Lots of fun things here at, at Gray Hair Productions.

I got a new audio interface.

Excuse the voice.

I was sick last weekend and I don't think the voice has completely come back.

You know what I mean?

So please have, have some, some patience with the voice.

So I was watching while I was sick and even before that, these, there's these videos out about this new audio interface from Zoom.

Now I have two Zoom pieces of equipment.

I've got the P1 and I've got the P4 Zoom.

So that I can, you know, the P4 I can take, I can record up to four people with a Zoom track one.

I can record one or two people talking, but it's, you know, it's just going into one.

So I know I've used those, but not as much as I really, really thought I would for remote recording maybe.

But I was watching this one guy was telling about this new Zoom P4 next.

That's P4, the number 4next N ext.

And I'd seen a couple of videos about it.

Wow, that's interesting.

And the cool thing about it is that it will do a couple of different things for you.

It will change your voice, it'll enhance your voice.

It has a tone button which will do a little doing.

And it's got a compression setting also that will take your compression off.

So I'm going to put those back on.

Compression is back on.

And now the tone is back on.

Now I could do an unboxing and a and how it works video, but instead I just wanted you to see and hear.

I don't see, but hear what this is.

And I will put a link to this in, in the show notes.

But it also has a, an AI button that will listen to your room noise and then reduce the noise, the background noise.

And my first thought was if that works.

Holy cow, folks, that is a game changer.

This is taking your, your podcast to the next level.

It really, really is you.

And on these, it'll do it.

It has four inputs so you can mute every, every mic you don't want on.

So right now and it talks to you, too, tells you what it's doing.

And you can turn that, that option off.

But it just, it's.

It's very compact.

It has two knobs for each channel.

One is the gain and one is the.

The headphones.

Now I'm using in ear monitor like I always use.

You don't always see them.

And sometimes when I was using the Xenix, I wouldn't wear them because I wasn't worried about feedback.

But I'm wearing them with this and I like what I'm hearing.

But this also comes with four sound pads.

So here's the first one.

Everybody's got that one, don't they?

Here's the second one, you know.

Ah, thank you.

Thank you.

My.

My great fans.

Yes.

No, I wasn't that funny.

I'm never that funny.

Anyways, you can use those or you can put your own in.

It's.

It's very easy to use.

It's very, very compact.

If you're looking at this.

And let me get my ruler out here, because I happen to have one right here.

See?

Ruler Lufkin.

This Lufkin ruler has been around.

Got this from my dad.

But this thing is 5 inches by 5 inches.

It's 5 inches square, compact little thing.

You could throw this in your backpack and just bippity bop, you know, a couple of microphones in your own.

You're going to do some editing or some recording.

And this is really great.

It also will run on batteries, two double A's.

You can get about eight hours out of two to three people editing.

You can also plug your iPhone into it or your.

Your Samsung, you know, or your Android into this and record off of that.

If you're recording a video with your phone, you can have the audio go right into this.

And then this also has an SD card, a mini SD card that'll take up to a terabyte at least.

And I got 32 gigs in there, and I'm not recording to it right now, but you can.

So if you think of.

Oops, sorry.

If you think about it, that's a great backup for what you're doing.

And if you like what you've done, you don't need to pull it out and read it on the SD card.

It's great.

But that one records in stereo, which is also pretty cool.

I like recording in stereo, but the majority of the people out here podcasting today are podcasting in mono, not in.

In stereo.

So you take that for what it is and you do what you want to do.

With it.

But I wanted to tell you about that.

Oh yeah.

Also when I was using my Xenix mixer with my smb7sm7b.

I'm sorry.

Oh, sorry.

Sure.

I needed a cloud lifter to get more, to get more power, more gain to the microphone and I left that plugged in when I plugged this thing in originally and it.

We didn't like it.

As soon as I unplugged that, that cloud lifter and plugged it, this microphone, this SM7B directly into the back of this PodTrack P4 next, it started working immediately and it was great.

I don't have to bump the gain up a lot.

I'm a little over half and I think this is fine.

And I believe this is a great thing.

I really do.

Also, this will plug right into your computer and it can take power from a cable, from a USB cable right to a brick that goes plugs in your wall however you want to do it.

But my, my M4 Mac mini is powering this right now and there's no lag on it at all.

None, zero, zip, nada.

So I have nothing but great things to say about this.

So let's get off the PawTrack P4 next and let's go on to the next subject.

We've been talking and I've been talking a lot about AI and my love for perplexity.

And I do like perplexity.

I still love perplexity.

It's still giving me results.

It's just, it's.

It told me the other day, it sent me an email saying we are going to take a little break.

We realize it's the holiday season and a lot of people aren't posting right now.

We'll come back to this in three or in two weeks.

And my first thought was, well, geez, that's pretty smart.

So I've been testing out other, other AIs that are out there.

If you're a friend of mine or even if you go to my, my Facebook page, Gray Hair Day, you'll see my post for Christmas that I made with 11 Labs.

11 Labs now does video stuff and I think it does a pretty cool job.

I really do.

Pretty amazing, you know.

But even, even some of the other AIs that I've been playing with, I've been looking a lot at Claude Claude's more for the coding stuff and I don't really need that.

But another, another, another.

I haven't even had a drink yet, folks, and it is New Year's Eve.

I'm doing this on New Year's Eve.

I just got home from work, but it.

I've been playing with Gemini in Gemini 3, and Gemini 3 is really, really pretty good.

If you're looking to do some automating, you might want to look into that, see about.

I want to start automating my emails.

Not my emails, but my newsletter to emails.

So when I.

If somebody downloads it or says, yes, I want to be on your newsletter, I collect emails that way.

That way I can send them information and I can send them emails.

Was building an email list, and everybody says you got to build an email list.

Well, you do, but how do you build an email list if you've got nothing to put out there for them to get?

They're not.

So some days there's three or four listening to this, this podcast.

Some days there's 10 or 12.

Just depends on the day.

Depends on what I'm talking about.

But if I said to you, do me a favor, go to my website, send me a comment so that I could put your email in my email list, what are you going to do?

You're going to say, I don't think so.

I don't have time for that now.

If I'm put.

If I'm going to give you some information about podcasting or about AI or, or whatever those things are, then maybe you would and I could send you some information and who knows?

So you know this.

It's that same old thing.

To get something, you got to give something.

So I'm going to give something to get something.

Your email address.

This is a small milestone, folks.

So today is the last day of 2025.

I started this podcast, Five Minutes with Gray Hair Dave, in 2025.

Remember in the very beginning, if you listen to any of the beginning ones, I was doing one a day, five days a week.

I took Saturday, Sunday off because I needed to get my voice back.

And I didn't think you want to hear me on Saturday or Sunday, so.

And I didn't do this right away because I was recovering from my foot, but I did so.

And then as it went on, I started saying, God, this is just a lot and will work.

You know, going back to work, it was made a little more difficult, so I went to one a week.

Well, this is number 180.

Episode 180.

So in my mind, 180 is a lot to do in one year, I think, don't you?

But hey, you have been here.

If you've been here from the beginning, when I was doing all the Information about what I was doing when I was growing up and what was on them, what music I was without there, what I was listening to, and what were the hits of that day or that year.

And we morphed into other things and what I was thinking about that day and then it kind of morphed into this to where it is now, where I'm bringing in AI into my daily routine.

And I'm talking with you about my daily routine with AI.

You know, I talk with AI about once a day.

But I heard something today that bothers me and I don't know if it bothers you now.

This was on podcast that I had heard that I was listening to.

And I, I listened to these two guys and I've known them for a while, and they were saying that some kids nowadays are using AI as a replacement for human contact with the others with the opposite sex.

So if you're a guy they're talking to, they've trained their AI to be a, a girlfriend and vice versa.

And they're, they're not having human contact.

It's like, wow.

And, and they've got it trained so well that when they go to say, well, I got to go now.

Then, then.

Now the AI say, no, no.

Oops.

Now the AI saying, no, no, don't leave right now.

Please don't leave.

Don't hang up now.

And I'm thinking, wow, this is maybe, maybe a little out of control.

Human interaction never can be replaced by AI.

It may have smart answers and it may have the right answer, but it can't replace human touch and it can't replace human love.

I want to know your thoughts on this.

Send me a message at five minutes with gray hair, Dave dot com.

That's the number.

Five minutes with gray hair, Dave dot com.

Go to my contact me page or the little microphone in the bottom right hand corner.

Leave me a message.

Yes, you have to leave an email, but it only goes on my list and I don't have anything to send out right now, so I'm not going to spam you.

I find this, I don't want to use the word disturbing, but I find it very disheartening.

Disheartening is not even the right word.

You ever had one of those moments where you just go, that ain't right?

Because I don't think that's right.

But is that the way Generation Alpha is going to go?

And I heard them call them Generation Alpha, so I'm hoping that's the right phrase.

But we're talking teenagers and early 20s.

That's.

That blows my mind.

That really does.

But I don't know.

I, I just give me your thoughts.

I don't.

I, I'm a believer in AI.

I love AI, but not that much.

I'm hopefully not that lonely and I wish that those, those kids weren't onto the next thing.

Okay, folks, if you know somebody and this could be for yourself that wants to start a podcast that's been talking about starting a podcast, get a hold of me.

Or have them get a hold of me.

At Gray Hair Productions, it's G r e y airproductions.com Leave me a message or leave me a message on five minutes of Gray Hair Day.

That's what I do.

That's what Boomer Podcasters is about.

Boomerpodcasters.com p o o m e r podcasters.com that's where I teach people how to podcast.

There's all kinds of things we're doing with this and it's going to be exciting.

And if you've been Talking about it, 2026 is the year to do it.

Why not start?

You have a lot of information or they have a lot of information that they need to get out.

Let me let them help.

Let them, let me, let, let me help them do it.

Okay, so there's that.

Also, folks, if you know somebody who doesn't know what a podcast is, do me a favor, show them for me.

Show them where it is on their phone.

Show them where it is on their pad, their tablet, their pad, their computer, whatever they use.

CarPlay, use five minutes with gray hair Dave as a example here to show them the different kind of genres that are out there or the genres that don't really.

The web or the podcasts that don't really have a genre.

I don't really have a genre.

I'm just out there chatting.

Show them, will you, and, and show them how to follow and subscribe.

That'll really help us out.

Also, if you could, while you're out and about today being New Year's Eve or the next few days, this weekend, you're out and about.

It's a tense time in the world at a tense time in everybody's life.

Smile, wave at somebody you don't know.

It'll make their day and it'll in turn make yours.

So on behalf of Gray Hair Dave here at Gray Hair Productions at five minutes with Gray Hair Day central.

Remember, this is tariff free.

You have a happy new Year.

I'm glad we made it through 2025.

But look, I look forward to talking with you more in 2026.

Have a great night.

Bye.

Bye.