Side by Side Comparison of: Sony vs igadgitz vs Hermitshell

This recorder is great! Lightweight, easy to use, great sound quality. The process of downloading recordings to the computer is as easy as connecting it via USB. The software recognizes there is a new recording and with a click transfers it to the appropriate folder. Play back is easy and amazingly clear through computer speakers.

I have owned this for a little over 6 months and have arguably used only a few of it's basic functions. But, I am a sound engineer, and the quality of the recording is the most important point as long as the ease of making the recording is reasonable. The sound quality of the recording of this device is exceptional, and just making a simple voice recording is trivial! For around $50 dollars, it sound close to professional microphones for the twice the price. The battery life is also exceptional, because it seems for the 2 or 3 minutes I plug in the USB connector to transfer a few voice recordings, it charges. In fact, I don't even know how to charge it otherwise because it has never come up.

This is a great little recorder. It has mutable functions like voice activated recording, microphone recording, interview, lecture, meeting, and voce notes. You can put the recordings in different folders to keep everything organized. With out added micro SD card the preinstalled 4GB hard drive gives you 43h 55m of record time. If you need to you can add a Micro SD card for extra record time. But what puts this aside of the rest of the voice recorders is that you can connect this to your computer and transfer all the recorded files for later reference. This is a must for every student that is able to record there teachers lecture.

Works well so far. Conducted interview and sound was excellent. Wish I didn't need instructions, but it's not too complicated. Also can connect to computer with USB cable included and uses normal batteries.

I bought this for my daughter who's taking Organic Chemistry from a professor whose lectures ramble all over the place. She records his lectures then listens to it again where she can rewind, take detailed notes, and really sort it out. She LOVES it and so do her classmates who have asked that she send them the digital audio file as well. She can save it on her computer, burn it to a CD, listen to it in her car. Perfect for learning a tough subject! The device works great, picks up the audio wonderfully and is small enough to not be intrusive. I am VERY pleased with this purchase!

I had the ICD PX-312, which was damaged by battery leak, I have bought this one. High quality voice recorder, and easy to use.

This works easily and well, the only drawback is you have to reset the volume when you start or stop recording otherwise there is an audible "beep." As I use this for recording lectures I often get thrown off by the beep, but I have had it awhile now and am getting use to it and remembering to turn it off.

Bought this because I had to record several one hour sessions for work. I knew there would be a lot of talking and asking questions and answers provided, so I didn't want to miss anything when I had to translate. It is sensitive enough to pick-up everything but that also is a downfall when others are talking simultaneously, papers are being shuffled, pens tapping, etc. Instruction paper that came with it was just OK. Learning curve for using the buttons.One down side is that you can only have five (5) folders to separate your work. If you can add more, could not find where to make more folders. Had to remember to download that day's folder onto my computer before using it the next day.I prefaced the meeting with the description and that created the initial folder. When I pressed the record button again, it remained it the same folder but it created a second recording under the folder. So essentially, you have two recordings (one stating the meeting name and then you have to press another button (I think the fast forward button - sorry don't have it in front of me while writing this) to listen to the second recording (the actual meeting) under that initial folder).Depending on the quality of the recording you select, depends on the number of hours of recording it can hold. Audio is more than adequate when listening without headphone. Audio is also more than adequate when transferring to the PC and listening. I have nothing to compare this to but I would definitely recommend for recording.Reason for four **** stars is because of the limitations of folders to separate the files. Should be able to create more than five separate recordings

The menu is too complex and confusing. So if the default settings are not for you, you must study. I finally figured it out. I raised from 2 stars to 4 stars.It will consistently record for 72+ hours on the lowest setting on one set of two batteries. Sony (one battery) and the rechargeable Trustins get only about 16 hours. For spy work it is great. You can leave it for 3 days running on your porch or in Baskerville's study.

Worked better than I expected. I have not used it extensively; rather, not very often.Pros: I have used it when I need to voice record conversations and lectures I want to review, or hide it in my pocket for more clandestine purposes. Couldn't believe that it actually picked up voices through my suit jacket or pants pocket (though distant during playback).Cons: It is not as user friendly as I would have imagined. No instruction book included. I had to test multiple settings in order to find those that fit my needs.Annoying feature: When you want to delete a recording, the device begins playing the recording until you finalize the deletion.

--and by "all," I mean it records things. I didn't give it 5 stars because it doesn't have a built-in laser pointer (kidding). I drive 40 minutes to/from class every day, so I have ample time to listen to it while nothin' else is going on.Only downsides: If you put a sufficiently large memory piece into the unit, it takes forever to start up. I just left it out and use internal memory. In addition, when you try to delete something, it actually plays it while it's asking you if you really want to delete it. It's a bit distracting and annoying if you're in-class while you're attempting to delete something. If I wanted it to play, I'd have played it before deleting it. It's not that many more button-presses.I'm always in the front row and recording quality is fantastic. I don't have to "really listen" to make out what the instructor is saying. It's just on the recording.

I had one of these for over two years then I lost it while in the woods. All of the features matched my needs. The ability to store music, podcast, and make my own voice recordings made it a one-device does all for me. You can set date/time on recordings (music or voice recording) to play as an alarm so I wake up to a different song each day of the week. The sound quality is excellent and when you use Sony's Sound Organizer you can easily set-up podcast downloads, move music and recordings to/from your PC. Anyway, I lost one of these and I looked for it for a month or two and I just couldn't stand being without it so I bought this replacement. I didn't rate it at 5 stars because the display isn't back-lit. Everything is great on this device except you can't see the screen in low light without you flashlight or something. Some folks say the menus are complicated but I disagree. The right-left button scrolls through the top level menu and then there is a choice for "Details" to take you to a second level. A different list of menu items may appear if you are in playback or record mode. It wasn't long for me to get familiar with how it works. Oh and the batteries...I have left it running all night in the woods to "listen" for game sounds. I retrieve it and review the recording in Sound Organizer for peaks in the sound graph. I can do this three nights on one pair of batteries. It's very efficient with energy consumption. It can go 16-20 hours easy on a battery and records.Another cool thing about this device is it has an external speaker so you can chose to use ear phones or just playback through the speaker. It also has a mic-in jack so you can add one of those ear piece microphones and record meetings or conference calls for later use to take notes. All in all, I have been very pleased with this device and my 15 year-old son has bought one and is using it to keep all of his music on now...and he has iPhone and other devices but he likes this thing better.

Not great. Cheap plastic quality, menus are difficult to navigate - took me half an hour of fiddling with it to figure them out, and the documentation is second rate. The sound quality is ok, but not great. If you're a Mac person, I wouldn't recommend it. The software that comes with it is Windows only. You have to pop out the chip and insert it into your Mac and listen to the files. Not user friendly at all, but if you want just a cheap recorder, go for it. I'd have spent a bit more, though. It's difficult to use the additional memory as well. You can't use both the internal and external memory at the same time, and have to switch between the two. Pain in the ass.

The quality is down with this model. I had an earlier version and it had a more solid feel and the plastic was a better quality.This model is also missing stereo microphones so... now that I founds the older one (I had lost it and bought this one as a replacement),this new one sits in my drawer. It's an inferior product.

doesn't come with a cable to connect to the computer or a card or a USB port. Thank god I had an extra cable that fit just right.

Several years ago, a friend bought a recorder from Radio Shack that relayed voice to text when connected to his computer. (It was priced similarly to this recorder.) Was hoping this item did the same as it came with a USB cord. (IT DOESN'T!) Was also hoping it would be more efficient at picking up member comments at our association meetings, but it's no better than the old cassette recorder we used prior to this.

This is an okay item. Pros: Fairly inexpensive, easy to use/handle, and acceptable voice/recording quality. Cons: No screen back light which makes it difficult to view the screen in low light (evenings/nights). However I think this benefits the battery life.

I would give it 5 stars if it had a back lit screen. It is very hard to read the screen in all but very good lighting.

It did not work, couldn't get menu to work; returned

I have spent so much money on portable tape recorders only to be dissatisfied. It is a good quality recorder but playback take forever. It is not functional for what I need. I have had stalking problems and am trying to catch "a needle in a haystack". It records fine but then I have to playback 8 hours or more and relisten to what I have recorded. There isn't an easy way to transfer the audio and scrub through it. I am just a basic user. If someone needs a portable recorder, it works fine. For detective work for evidence building, it is not the right one for me.

Functionally it's good. My big complaint is that the characters on the screen are almost invisible in any light except direct sunlight or high intensity lamp shining directly on the screen. I could not even make out the icons, they were so small. There are no instructions to even explain what the icons mean let alone what function they preform. One either has to already be familiar with them or be proficient using another device that is similar. These faults override any positive feelings I have for this device. I am going to find a different manufacturer.

It is a great recorder. I use it for my classes and the recordings of the lectures are beautiful. Clear and concise, I honestly can sit in the back of the classroom and record a lecture and still be able to hear my teacher in the recording. HOWEVER, when I first used the recording I could record 25 1-2 hour lectures. The second time, I got rid of the recordings and refreshed the recorder and could only record ten. I just recently deleted those and now I can not record any lectures. And now i have to buy an additional SD card because the recorder now does NOT record at all. Very disappointed with that. I have nothing on the recorder and it still does not work. Thanks alot Sony.

Cheap microphone. The microphone frequency range is very narrow. It will not pick up the highs or lows. It is stuck in the middle with what sounds like muffled audio. It's hard to make out what is being said from 15 feet away. I can however plug in a good microphone and get excellent audio. If you plan to use your own mic, this is great. If you are using it in school or a class with the onboard mic, then you need to be in the front row to hear clearly when played back. This recorder as-is would be best used for dictation only or with an external mic.

This is defiantly a lower end quality audio recorder. i make short films and i was needing something to record sound on besides my actual camera microphones. I thought this would be a great option, Sony usually have decent products but this is one of those cases where you really get what yo u pay for and if you got it cheap thats because it was made cheep. When the package arrived the box (within the package) was beat up, it even had a note saying, box is beat up but the device works just fine. It also had battlers installed, this kind of told me right off the back that someone else didn't like what they got and returned it and now i have it. Now i use a Lav mic to make my recordings, i found that the Sony recorder didn't do that great of job, i felt like i heard a lot of white noise, way more than i should. now some might think its the lav mic attached, well that's not true, i hooked up the same lav mic to my phone and i had better sound quality than what the Sony gave out. I was also hoping to get some sort of sound levels but this is a very and i mean very basic sound recorder. I say if your going to use this,it might only serve as a decent recorder for a class room to take notes or to record a meeting. this is not something to use for professional projects.

This unit is impossible to program. The Quick Guide and the pdf Manual are of NO help. Instructions for setting the Record Mode are incomplete and do not work as written. I have not found any source for answers to a specific question.

I received items and it is missing the following: stereo headphones, stereo microphoneshirt-clip ,carrying pouch, application software, Dragon Naturally speaking DVD-ROM, and Application software.

I just threw this into my E-waste bin. After only 3 months of recording, this unit failed to transfer any files to my computer. After 6 months, it stopped working altogether. A complete waste of money. The Olympus recorder was much better and long-lasting.

Very inadequate instructions. This unit will not work with my cable connected phone system.

I had high hopes for this recorder.Pros: Cheap + acceptable construction.Cons:1) Menu system is horrible. No UI engineering seems to have been done at all. Buttons presses are completely unintuitive + when you press the wrong button, you have to go all the way back to top of menu hierarchy + start again.2) No way to change date, except to remove batteries + set entire date again.3) Date always lost when removing batteries. Most system keep a few minutes of residual charge, so batteries can be changed quickly with recorder retaining settings. It appear all settings (date + all other settings) are lost for each battery change.4) Recoding stops after 199 recordings, even if large amount of memory remains.5) Recording quality distorted, even when recording in quiet room.

The product was disappointing as the volume and clarity of recording drops even a few feet away. It is not worth the money.