As part of a research class I’m co-teaching at the University of La Verne we are conducting some telephone interviews and need to record them. We need to generate quality digital audio and cannot spend very much because most if not all the students will be conducting the interviews.
So far, I have several options, one for telephones (either cellular or landline) and several for Skype.
Olympus TP-7
Option 1: For Telephones — Olympus TP-7 Telephone Recording Device plus a digital recorder. Here’s a description from the Olympus website: “The TP-7, telephone pickup, makes phone recording two sides of the conversation. Just plug the TP-7 jack into the “MIC” jack of your recorder, and put the earphone side into your ear. When speaking on the telephone, the TP-7 will capture both sides of the conversation for recording by your voice recorder.” Here’s the best price I found: Amazon $13.99, Note that this solution also requires a recorder, (around $50, I think) that has a mic input (3.5mm or 2.5mm, assuming the TP7 comes with the adapter as indicated on the Olympus website).
Option 2: For Skype — I make Skype to telephone calls regularly using my unlimited annual skype plan; but a monthly plan costs $3/month I think, or you could pay as you go for a couple of cents per minute (or less). But, Skype won’t record, so you’ll have to add an application that takes the Skype audio and saves it. I have used Pamela Recorder and have been moderately satisfied. It’s been a couple of months since I used it and I think it interrupted the call a couple of times, though I’m not sure Pamela caused it. Pamela Recorder costs around $21. Other call recorders for Skype are PrettyMay ($25) and CallBurner, listed on the Skype website. I’ve not used either, but CallBurner has an attractive 30 day free trial.
Any suggestions?
Does the Olympus technology specify the kind of recorder? I have old school tape recorders and I might have access to digital (if my husband will share). Is this the one Dr. Bearley uses?
I am assuming the Pamela recording option records to my computer somewhere vs. a seperate device? Although I am not intrigued by the possibility of interruptions.
All that being expressed, I will go with the team. Thank you for the research Dr. Williams.
Hi Bendta,
The Olympus doesn’t specify the type of recorder needed, but as long as it is a digital audio recorder and it has one of the standard jacks for a mic (2.5 or 3.5mm) then it should work. Dr. Bearley uses something called USB Blast, but the only one I could find costs over $150. I figure many of you guys already have a digital recorder available or could easily find one, so the Olympus makes a lot of sense to me. The Pamela recording application records to your computer’s hard drive. You can specify the folder you want it to drop the audio file in. That is pretty handy, and it would probably work just fine, but I was a bit annoyed when my skype call dropped in the middle of an interview…… twice. BTW, I just updated the information with a couple of links and prices. –peter