Olympus VN-2100PC Digital Voice Recorder with microphone
£30.99
- USB connection to PC
- 4 recording qualities (XHQ/HQ/SP/LP)
- 4 folders for files management (A/B/C/D)
- Voice activiation (VCVA)
- Slow/fast playback
poor controls and total breakdown - Appears fine at first, but the controls have a very annoying fault - fast forwarding or rewinding is done with the same buttons that jump to another file either forward or backward, and it s very easy to accidentally jump to the end of a recording - very irritating when you re 20 minutes in to a 90 minute interview. I agree with the other comments re: Digital Wave Player - it s a pain, and life would be far simpler if the recorder could be plugged into any PC and seen as an external hard drive from which to drag and drop audio files. Worse still, my VN-2100PC has now packed up altogether. It won t transfer files via DWP without an error message popping up halfway through the process, and it dies without warning even on fresh batteries. Useless.
Perfect and cheap - As soon as I got this I started playing with it. To my amazement this was one of the easiest to work with devices I ever had. Who needs a manual :)I like the voice activation feature, it s really nice. Get one now if you haven t got one already, for this price you can t get any better. It s an absolute bargain.
Good recorder, but a bit flakey - Apart from the exceptional storage capacity, I was driven to buy this item by its small size. The software will only work with Windows and is awkward. If you are going to use this for covert recordings, you need to insulate it from body heat otherwise it will constantly crash. Sadly, this appears to be the case even if you wear it all day in your shirt pocket too. The power button seems more suggestive, so the only way to actually power-off the device is to remove the batteries, forcing you to reset the clock.The battery life seems impressive at first, but you will find that you cannot trust the battery level indicator. However, if you re looking for a cheap device to tape under a table, then this could prove useful. I ve had one of these devices in-place for two days before removing it, and achieved clear recordings of all voices in the room of 7m X 7m without any gaps (while the VCVA kicks in). A useful feature would have been to timestamp the start/stop of the VCVA recordings as cue-points in the resultant audio file.In summary, the recording ability is excellent, but this is let down by the instability of the supporting features.
Cumbersome - This is not compatible with Explorer or Windows Media. It has to be used on machines that have downloaded the Digital Wave Software (disc included) therefore it would be extremely cumbersome to use this on any but your own personal PC as that would require downloading software wherever you go. I doubt whether the saved files could be e-mailed. Apart from that, the quality of playback is extremely poor. It is very hard to hear what is being said on the recorder. It is very light and plasticky in feel. Not recommended.
Easy-peazy - I have just received this item and within 10 minutes I had it up and running including the programme. Hardly had to look at the manual it was so easy and I am no computer whiz.I thoroughly recommend this product. It pics up voice extremely well and plays back as clear as a bell on the device as well as the PC. Does exactly what I want it to without being too high tech with unnecessary features. The set up feature from disc is neat and simple. If you just want to record voice, then this is the one!