Sony ICD-P28 Digital Voice Recorder

I just purchased this recorder before going to a lecture, hoping to record it to listen to again later. I must say, this little toy is slick. It's very small, and has a very nice interface. Unfortunately, when I played back the recording I made, it was almost inaudible. It was extremely muffled, with periodic extremely loud noises, whenever the recorder was gently touched or moved. I've also tried testing it, recording my own voice when holding it up in front of me. It was definitely audible, but not as clear as I had expected it should be.

Another thing to consider is that, despite the fact that this unit has a USB interface, you cannot access your recordings without installing Sony's custom software. The disc that comes with it only has software for Windows 98 through XP, and although it does support wav, it does not seem to support MP3, as advertised on the box. I doubt you can rely on Sony to support this recorder indefinitely, so its future obsolescence might also be a deciding factor in purchasing it or not.

I just purchased the ICD-P28 Digital Voice Recorder about 2 weeks ago. I recorded a 2 hour meeting with this recorder and the recording was very clear and understandable. I was in a meeting hall with a sound system. I came home and downloaded the recording to my computer's hard drive, and the recording sounds even better over the computer's speakers. Then, I copied the file to a CDR disk. The copy was successful. The only drawback is that I can only play the disk on my computer. I cannot play it on any other cd player. I tried converting the file to mp3 format through another software, it sounded horrible. So, now I'm trying to find a way that I can convert my files to a format that my cd-mp3 player will accept. I must admit that I found this very disappointing. However, the IDC-P28 does exactly what it says it will do. I recommend after buying this item, read the instructions and directions carefully. You will find that it clearly says that the recorder does not support mp3 format, and it never said that on the package either.

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I am a working journalist and I have really found this recorder to be a handy tool for me. It took a little while to get accustomed to using it, but it has proven its worth to me for several interviews, press conferences, court hearings, government meetings, even a funeral of a local dignitary that I needed to cover. I have been happy with the clarity of the recordings, even those of people speaking on a microphone, through an amplifier. I haven't had any other digital recorder, so I have nothing to compare this to, but overall it has done the job I needed it to do.

I have only one small complaint the small display screen isn't working so well, but it hasn't hampered my ability to use it, since what I normally do is record, then download onto my computer, where I actually listen to the recordings.

Downloading the files are very simple. I will note that the recordings come in an special format so you do need the special software to listen to it, but the files are convertible to other formats if need be. I don't find this a problem because I don't need it in other formats, but I can see how this may be a problem for others.

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I was looking for a personal digital recorder long time ago, and evaluated so many options from prices ranging from 80$ to 200$ and finally, I've chose this one. The recorder has many cool features and the recording quality is just great!. I placed the recorder on a table and walked away 5 meters from the table, and talked no louder than my normal voice volume, the recording was crystal clear. I recommend this one!. NOTE: I haven't tried it to record a lecture.

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I purchased this recorder to take to a writer's seminar in February 2005 in which I hoped to record the speaker instead of taking notes by hand. The recorder picked up every noise near me my legs crossing, feet shuffling, the lady next to me coughing it is so sensitive that it picked up so much next-to-me noise that the speaker's voice was inaudible (she was only 4 rows away in a small room).

I also tried using the recorder on my own dictation, and it was audible, but with a lot of background noise again. I'm not super picky about products, but really am disappointed with this one.