Great music recording device for capturing guqin sounds

I've tried condenser microphones, and the built-in microphones on handycams to capture the sounds from my guqin, but the results were not good. They could not capture the mellowness of guqin silk strings. Instead, condensers microphones and the built-in microphone on handycams tend to make the silk strings sound more metallic and trebly. Further, those microphones could only capture in mono (or L and R channels sounding exactly the same), which is disappointing.

So, the first time I tried out my ICD-SX713 Sony voice recorder (with a built-in option to record music in Linear PCM), I was blown away. It sounded very open and spatial, like "surround sounds". It even comes with a tripod adapter so I can mount it on a tripod and stick the dual stereo microphones *into* the smaller sound hole of my guqin so that it could capture the sounds of the wood and the natural reverberating echoes inside the sound box of the guqin.

Click here to hear a short sample recording, with the thickest gauge silk strings mounted on my guqin. You can only hear the extremely low bass "thumps" if you wear ear phones. There is a very low note in the video recording shown at the link above; it sounded like a very low bass bell. You can only hear that if you use earphones or headphones. Most speakers on most computers (yes, Windows PCs and Macs included) cannot produce low bass sounds often heard by the actual guqin player.

How about you? What recording device are you using with your guqin? Please post your comments! Thank you!

Here's a newer Sony ICD-SX813 model, available at your favorite Sony store near you.

(No, I am not getting any commission from anyone for recommending this. hahaha. LOL)