Tips for kitchen setup (Mic outside, recording birds etc)

[Ixus]

Hey!!

My father has a pretty cool setup in the kitchen where he has drilled a hole thru the base of the window just big enough for a mic to go through, one he had bought off some bird man for recording birds out in the wild. Anyways, that mic goes to a mini disk player and out to a copuple of old computer speakers. It's on all day, you can hear the birds, cars pass by, and if guests talk shit about you when they think they are out of ears reach on the porch !
This setup is old and and cables are a bit busted and so on. Upgrade time!

I was wondering about what I could put in there instead. The mic is fine (well it needs some cable soldering, my dad fixed it with fishing wire, not the best solution ) it has a 3.5mm tele jack. I was thinking about an Ipad, and having it go out to a pair of speakers.

Basically what i wonder about, is there;

-Nice recording apps for ipad, having it on standby streaming the sound from outside and record with a touch?
-other solutions, a zoom kinda recorder maybe?

Basically it will be turned on all day, and should be easy to record if something special happens.
Also gonna buy new speakers, something not too big and heavy as they are going to be mounted on either side of the window!

Cheers fellas


Edit: Also should be very easy to operate for the old man Few easy steps to turn it on and off!