Olympus VN-3100

The Olympus VN-3100 is known as a Dictation Machine, but I like to simply call it a portable voice recorder. In size it is not very big, thus being portable. It measures in at a length of 10 cm, a width of 3.5 cm and an overall depth of 1.7 cm. The top end of the the device has a depth of 1.3 cm and the bottom end which contains the batteries has a depth of 1.7 cm.

The device is made in China, like many things are nowadays. The Olympus ...
...to reveal the batteries. The OLYMPUS VN-3100 takes standard AAA batteries.

In the box you get:
- USB Cable
- Microphone
- Software CD
- Manual
- 2 AAA batteries

The provided Microphone is supposed to reduce background noise levels when recording. I have used the microphone and have to say I cannot tell the difference between a normal recording and a recording with the use of the microphone.
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The Olympus VN-3100 is known as a Dictation Machine, but I like to simply call it a portable voice recorder. In size it is not very big, thus being portable. It measures in at a length of 10 cm, a width of 3.5 cm and an overall depth of 1.7 cm. The top end of the the device has a depth of 1.3 cm and the bottom end which contains the batteries has a depth of 1.7 cm.

The device is made in China, like many things are nowadays. The Olympus VN-3100 does not have a simple on/off button, but instead has a HOLD button on the top left hand side. To turn on the device you simply hold the HOLD button and pull it in a downwards direction. This in turn will turn on the device ready to be used. To turn it off push the HOLD button in an upwards direction.

On the left-hand side there is also an area into which a USB cable is inserted in order to connect to a PC or laptop. The part into which a cable is inserted is protected with a rubber cover. The rubber does not cover the whole space as it would be very difficult to reveal the connection area. There is a small space above the rubber covering allowing you to stick your fingernail into it and thus get access to the area of input.

On the face of the device there are many buttons, which include:
- STOP
- REC
- FOLDER/INDEX
- ERASE
- DISP/MENU
- PLAY
- VOLUME ADJUSTMENT
- FORWARD/REWIND

The STOP button has two uses, one is to obviously stop recording. And the other use is to access the date and time when the device is switched off. The button is located on the top left hand side of the device and has STOP written directly above it.

The REC button is the button used to start recording. The device has a fairly large memory allowing you to record up to 2150 minutes (about 36 hours) of sound. I do not know the memory capacity in MB, but it will be fairly large regarding how many minutes of sound you can record.

The FOLDER/INDEX button is used to access the four existing folders on the device. The 4 folders are named A,B,C & D and are accessed by repeatedly pressing the FOLDER/INDEX button. For e.g. if you want to access folder D you press the FOLDER/INDEX button 4 times, 3 times to access C etc. The button is located on the bottom left of the device and is of a black colour, with FOLDER/INDEX written directly underneath it.

The ERASE button as the name suggests gets rid of unwanted sound recordings. To get rid of a sound file you simply select it by moving either left or right with the left or right navigation buttons, located in the middle of the device. The left and right buttons used to navigate left or right are also used in other cases to forward and rewind. Once the sound file has been selected, listen to it to make sure its the right one. And if it the one you want to get rid of, simply press the ERASE button and delete accordingly. The ERASE button is located on the bottom end of the device and is very distinctive. The button will be of a black colour consisting of a red dot in the middle and ERASE written directly above it.

The DISP/MENU button when pressed provides you with information such as how many minutes of recording time you have remaining, the date of the most recent recording, the time of the most recent recording and the length of the most recent recording. The DISP/MENU button is located on the bottom right hand side of the device and has the name DISP/MENU written directly below it.

The PLAY button as you can guess is used to play a sound file. It is a circular button located in the middle of a larger outer circle consisting of FORWARD/REWIND and VOLUME adjustments controls.

The VOLUME ADJUSTMENT buttons are located directly above and below the PLAY button. And are obviously used to ADJUST the volume. To increase the volume of a sound recording you simply press the ( + ) button on the north side of the PLAY button, and to decrease sound levels you press the ( - ) button the south side of the PLAY button. The sound levels can be increased from 1 - 30, with 1 being the lowest and 30 being the highest.

The FORWARD/REWIND buttons are located in the outer circle, encircling the PLAY button and are to the left and right of the PLAY button. The button on the right is to FORWARD and the button on the left is to REWIND. To forward and rewind you simply hold the relevant button until it starts to forward or rewind the sound recording. Alternatively the FORWARD/REWIND buttons can be used to select files by a simple quick press of the buttons rather than holding them pressed to FORWARD/REWIND an individual file.

The device's display is in black & white and on-screen provides information such as remaining battery life, recording format, recording time remaining and which folder you are using.

The device itself is made from plastic, but is very durable. The face of the device which consists of the many buttons is covered with a see-through and scratch proof plastic covering. The covering does not cover the buttons, what it covers is the support text and prevents damage to the device's screen.

The top side of the device consists of a standard ear phone jack as well as a jack for a microphone. The ear phone jack can be used with any type of 1.5 mm ear phone and also the microphone jack can be used with any type of 1.5 mm microphone.

The back side of the device on the upper side has a built-in speaker used for sound output. And the bottom side consists of the area containing the batteries the device takes. To open the battery compartment you simply push the cover downwards to reveal the batteries. The OLYMPUS VN-3100 takes standard AAA batteries.

In the box you get:
- USB Cable
- Microphone
- Software CD
- Manual
- 2 AAA batteries

The provided Microphone is supposed to reduce background noise levels when recording. I have used the microphone and have to say I cannot tell the difference between a normal recording and a recording with the use of the microphone.

The OLYMPUS VN-3100 is compatible with Windows 2000/XP/VISTA. To use the device it is recommended to install the required software with the provided CD. Install the CD by following the simple instructions, it will take you about 5-10 minutes to install the software depending on the speed of your computers processor. The devices software will not be installed on your desktop, but instead in your list of programs under the name OLYMPUS DIGITAL WAVE PLAYER.

Once the software has been installed, connect the device to your PC or laptop via the provided USB cable. Your computer may come up with a message stating that you need to install driver software, do not ignore the message and accept driver software installation.

After the driver software has been installed you will be able to transfer your sound recordings onto your PC or laptop. The transfer will be time consuming depending on the size of your files. The longer recordings, say about 10-20 minutes will be about 8-15 MB in size and the transfer speed of the device is a very small 100 kbps. So, with the fairly small transfer speed the exchange of files will be fairly slow.

Overall the OLYMPUS VN-3100 is a great dictation device, the sound output is very good and the sound levels are excellent. You can compare sound levels to the a 1.1 sound system, which is considerably high taking into account the size of the device. I recommend the OLYMPUS VN-3100 to consumers who love recording sound, whether it be for personal or even professional use. I bought the device for about £15 new from a friend, which is fairly cheap for a device with a good range of features and good memory capacity. If you are looking to buy the device look on Ebay, Amazon marketplace or go to a price comparison to compare prices and you may find a great deal.

Thank you for reading my review on the OLYMPUS VN-3100. 

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