software 4 MD -> PC analogue transfer

[Chantelle]

I had intended to use a Net MD (MZN1) for research purposes. I need to record live interviews (so far no problems) and then had planned to upload these mono analogue recordings to the PC via USB (which is what the retailer told me that it would do ). I have not been able to do this and now see from other forum postings that Net MD models cannot perform this function, unlike the Hi-MD models. I understand that I would be able upload to the PC in real time using analogue cables. Question: What would be the appropriate software for uploading interview/conversation recordings to PC? For transcribing purposes, I also need to be able to repeatedly listen back to small segments of the recordings on computer, so software that would facilitate this would be helpful. Any insights?

[dex Otaku]

Depending on your budget, there are several packages I would recommend to do what you're talking about.

First is Audacity, which is open-source, hence free for non-profit use. For basic editing it has all the features you would need, as well as many you wouldn't [like multitracking].

Second would be Sound Forge, a mono or 2-track editor that I've been using since before 1.0 came out [around 91 or 92] and can highly recommend.

Third would be Cool Edit, which I've never liked the interface of though it does an excellent job with transcribing, editing, etc.

There are also some utilities that apparently allow your NetMD to transfer track markers by USB while doing an analogue dump. I'm not in the know on this, but hopefully someone else here spots this and gives you that info.

Cheers,

D.

[bhangraman]

If you don't need to do anything but voice recordings, I would suggest that you seriously consider getting rid of your MD and going for a memory or hard-disk based recording machine. MD offers one of the highest quality recording out there in a small format, but if it's for voice only, you don't need the recording sonic capabilities of MD and you're wasting huge amounts of time getting recordings into the PC this way.

If budget is not a particular problem, the iPod and the Griffin iTalk (which is what I use in the main for voice recordings) works a treat. It's simple to use and the recordings are automatically synchronised with the PC when you connect at lightning-fast speeds when compared to the MD/Hi-MD. If budget (or battery life beyond a couple of hours worth of recording in everyday use) is an issue, iRiver offer a huge variety of recording Flash and Hard-disk based players which not only play back music as well as MD's but record to a standard WAV file that can be simply dragged off the machine when connected to a PC. Neither (especially the iTalk, which is definitely Voice Quality) offer as good a recording quality as the MD's, but as long as you're not recording music, it'll be much better suited to your needs.

If you're looking at something a litle more voice-specific, the digital audio business dictation machines from the likes of Sony, Olympus, etc offer much more versatile cue/review functions, as well as bundled voice recognition of files.