Olympus Telephone Pickup TP-7 Microphone

Advantages: Great storage, wireless and portable, no tapes!
Disadvantages: Takes AAA batteries which expire fast, not well thought out.

...to download the voice and music files stored within. I found this particularly appealing: no wire is needed and when on the move, it is often necessary to use computers that are not your own. The last thing you want to be doing in a hurried situation is unravelling wires! As a storage device it is also possible to keep images and documents, just as you would on a normal USB memory stick. A word of warning though- the Olympus uses AAA batteries which essentially expire every six hours, meaning that if you are embarking on a heavy day of researching or lecturing (or whatever your purpose), it is wise to carry spare batteries. The batteries last longer if you do not use the "HQ" or "High Quality Stereo" setting but to gain clear audible data i found that the HQ setting is absolutely essential. On the subject of audibility, the microphones... Read review

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Advantages: Small, lightweight
Disadvantages: Can't remove clip

...This Sony microphone is capable of very high quality recording, at comes at an affordable price - it can be bought for a little over £50, which is good value. It's designed to work with Mini Disc recorders. It can be used with a battery (which needs to be bought separately for less than £5), or by plugging it in to an external device. The plug is gold plated, which ensures a high quality connection. Very usefully, the IM 719 has two modes - Voice and Music. These automatically adjust the pickup settings to provide the best quality of sound. As a musician, I’ve been very pleased with the quality of music recording from live concerts that I’ve performed in. The microphone is fitted with a clip to allow it to be attached to a lapel for voice recording, though this is obviously not so useful for music recording. As the clip can... Read review

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Advantages: Good quality, easy to use and very small
Disadvantages: Probably a bit dated now

...I work for a Psychology department within a University and as you may or may not know, Psychologists do a huge number of interviews. Up until about 2 years ago they were happy to use the old fashioned method of tape recorder and microphone. Someone then decided that they had had enough of this and wanted a better piece of equipment for recording interviews so I set about seeing what was about. What we needed: ************** Our needs were simple, all we really required was something that made a decent quality recording, was small enough to carry around easily, had a lot of storage and was user friendly. After searching the internet for days, reading reviews and looking at the specs and prices of loads of different recorders I came across the Olympus digital voice recorder range. Features: ******** The DM-1 caught my eye because... Read review

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