Tuesday, September 6, 2011

Android Dictation with TapeMachine

When I got my Android phone earlier this year I immediately started searching for dictation apps. I was disappointed in what was out there. It was obvious that most of the options were meant to capture "remember to pick up eggs, milk, and baby food"-ish voice notes rather than "this is a letter to John Smith regarding ...."-esque dictations. Many of the options had no pause button, which is essential, and many had no ability to scroll back and re-record, which is essential. Almost all of the free options had crippling 30-second to 1-minute time limitations. Finally, most of the apps, free or paid, recorded in formats which were not easily opened by my paralegal using any standard software.

TapeMachine Recorder solved every one of those problems. It allows you to pause, it allows you to scroll back and review or record over. It records in the standard .wav format but can convert to more compact, but equally standard, formats such as .mp3 or .ogg for emailing (which is all easily done from within the TapeMachine app). There is no real time-limit to the recordings (except what your memory space will allow). There is a free lite version as well. This version has a 1-minute recording limit and cannot covert files to .mp3. The Full version is just over $5.00 and is well worth it.

My Android phone now doubles as a fully functional digital dictation recorder that converts the recording and emails it to my assistant for typing. Go buy it.