Which Digital Voice Recorder Should I Buy?

With a huge range of digital voice recorders to choose from you will likely spend many an hour researching the pros and cons of each one, compare their features, check compatibility and find features you may or may not need. But the type of digital voice recorder, notetaker or dictaphone is often overlooked.

In one of our first blog posts on our new USA centric digital voice blog we do a run down of the various Olympus digital voice recorders, what they are good for and of key importance the difference between a digital dictaphone and a digital notetaker.

Transcription Software: Compare Express Scribe vs Olympus Transcription Module

For many years Express Scribe from NCH Software has been a favourite of many small work from home micro-businesses worldwide. Starting out as free transcription software which could play just about any audio file format Express Scribe soon became the go to software for the Virtual Assistant industry.

Things changed when NSH up'd roots and moved to Denver, Colorado to grow their huge US business following. Express Scribe split in two in an attempt to monetize this software gem, a free version supporting a handful of common audio formats and a paid Pro version supporting everything. The plan was a good one until claimed support of the new .ds2 audio format left many a typist frustrated at poor .ds2 audio playback.

Olympus meanwhile kept on their focussed path of providing a stable version of their transcription module software. Starting out life called DSS Player Pro in version 4 then 5 and more recently at version 6 where it took on a name change to ODMS or Olympus Dictation Management System.

With the growth of the .ds2 (DSS or Digital Speech Standard Pro format) used predominantly by Olympus, Philips and Grundig the Olympus transcription module is becoming popular with outsource transcription providers looking for stable transcription software as well as the traditional base of medical and legal practices.

In our Dictate UK blog we delve a little further into the Express Scribe history and offer some reasoning behind NCH's struggle to play .ds2 audio files.

Windows 8 Compatible Transcription Software - Olympus ODMS

Olympus Audio have gone through some changes over the last year to eighteen months. Regular updates to their range of digital voice recorders and professional digital dictaphones are a given. Olympus are all over industry advancements in microphones and with cheaper memory revamps to the recorders are commonplace. Rarer though are changes to major versions of their software, minor versions are typical with updates and bug fixes.

DSS Player Pro (R5) -> ODMS (R6)

In early 2012 Olympus changed the name of their professional dictation and transcription module software from DSS Player Pro to Olympus Dictation Management System or ODMS. On the outside to the user not alot changed, other than a colourful green dictation module or vibrant orange transcription module splash screen. Under the hood Olympus kept innovating and moving with the times. Some of the key software tweaks seen in R6 were:

• Support for 256bit encryption audio files
• Improved interoperability with Dragon NaturallySpeaking 12 Premium & Pro
• Background voice-to-text using Dragon - this is a key feature improvement
• Windows 8 support in R6.1
• Office 2012 64bit support in R6.1

Olympus Transcription Software for Windows

Olympus continue to lead the way in the digital dictation and transcription world and with ODMS surge ahead even further, especially with their encryption and workflow solutions for secure dictation and transcription, key for all legal and medical firms. ODMS is at home in a small practicewith one or two typists or in a large enterprise covering multiple locations across towns, states or even countries. 

Out of the box you receive a single install licence for Windows and a single install licence for Mac. Managing many licence keys is fine for small business for for larger firms Olympus have the option to convert the transcription module and the dictation module software to a site or multi-user licence (MUL). The MUL will convert your single install licences to one licences for concurrent use.

Olympus ODMS leading the way in professional digital dictation and transcription software.

Digital Transcription Software for Mac OS X

Mac saturation in business as well as at home is becoming more and more prevalent. In the digital dictation and transcription world Olympus have long led the way in providing Mac compatible solutions.

For some time their range of digital voice recorders, dictaphones and transcription kits have been both Mac and Windows compatible.

DSS Player Plus for Mac is the Olympus software that allows the playback of digital audio files on a Mac. Different to Windows, dictation and transcription software is encompassed all in one software package known as DSS Player Plus version 7.

When used with an Olympus USB transcription foot control pedal DSS Player Plus allows the controlled playback of audio from within a word processor like Microsoft Word for Mac or Apples own Pages.

DSS Player Plus is only available as a single install licence, one licence is required for each install on individual Macs. The software is supplied with the range of Olympus digital dictaphones (DS-2500, DS-3500 and DS-7000) and includes in the AS-2400 and AS-7000 transcription kits.

More information on DSS Player Plus for Mac can be found in our main blog - click the title link on this post.

Olympus LS-100 Wins Best Field Recorder at 2013 MIPA Awards

The flagship Olympus LS-100 digital PCM music recorder has just taken out the award for best field recorder at the 2013 Musikmesse International Press Awards in Germany.

Beating out the Zoom H2N and Roland R-26 to take top accolade is a testimony to the efforts made by Olympus in recent years to break into the music industry. Zoom and Roland are familiar names in music, Olympus can now feel right at home in the recording studio too.

MIPA celebrates it's 14th year as the leading accolade giver in the musical instrument, sheet music and music production world. Awards are given based on votes from over 100 of the worlds leading music magazines.

Field recording, or phonography as it is also known, is the term used for recording outside of the recording studio. But this impressive unit is just as comfy in the recording studio too.

New iPhone App - Hugo Dictation - Works With Olympus Transcription Module

You know those times when you say, "Ah yes !! Why didn't I think of that?" well this is one of those times. A new voice recording app is making waves in the dictation world all because of an obvious yet perfect answer to a solution.

Background: For some time now, I and others have tried to find an easy way to get recorded dictation from an Olympus digital voice recorder and send it via a smart phone, ideal for people who dictate away from their office. I have tried WiFi enabled memory cards, cables into iPads but all no use. The easiest way was to take computer with you, USB connect the recorder and using a wifi hotspot email your dictation. Not the perfect solution.

Solution: Obvious, make a voice recording app and apply the specific smarts needed by the Olympus Transcription Module software (both version R5 DSS Player Pro and R6 ODMS) which is essentially creating an XML file to accompany the audio with specific data related to the audio, like Author Id, Work Types and Priority.

Out of the UK comes the Hugo Dictation app for iPhone which is fully compatible with the Olympus transcription module software. Simply record your dictation on the go and email them through to your typist/typing pool. The audio will auto load into the transcription module and will appear like any dictation recorded on an Olympus pro dictaphone, like the DS-7000 or DS-3500.

Within Hugo you can configure your Author Id so that audio can be identified as yours by your typist/typing pool. Work Type can be assigned to indicate any templates to be used and even a High priority marker can be set for those urgent dictations.

Hugo Dictation is available as a free Lite version or a paid version with recording time limits removed.

UK App Store Link
US App Store Link
AU App Store Link

Flying Saucer Spotted In Offices Turns Out To Be New Olympus ME-33 Microphone

Reports are surfacing of a strange, beautiful object appearing in board and meeting rooms world wide. The object is flat, round and shiny and has the inscription Olympus ME-33 Boundary Microphone on it.

This is a first, Olympus have taken inspiration from Philips (usually it is the other way around) with their new boundary mic the ME-33. Looking strikingly similar to the Philips LFH9172, the ME-33 sits unobtrusively on the desk and upto six can be chained together to cover a large area and therefore picking up audio from some very large meetings.

The ME-33 can be plugged into any Olympus digital voice recorder or dictaphone, for best results we recommend use with the DM-3 or the DS-3500. The ME-33 retails in AU for RRP AU$159.