Comparison Olympus WS-852 vs Olympus VN-741PC

A slot for a memory card allows you to expand the recorder's own memory with interchangeable cards (and in some models , recording is only made on such cards, they do not have their own memory). This feature also makes it easier to share data with other devices equipped with a card slot: for example, by inserting a card from a voice recorder into a laptop card reader, you can immediately listen to the material recorded on it or transfer it to a hard drive without fiddling with cables. Cards of the same type usually differ in volume and, accordingly, in cost, which allows you to choose the best option in terms of the ratio of these parameters.

— SD. One of the formats used in audio, video, computer technology, etc.; Almost every modern laptop has an SD card reader. However, the dimensions of such cards (32x24 mm) are relatively large for portable equipment, and therefore they are used relatively rarely in voice recorders. And they are often represented by more modern SDHC or SDXC cards with increased memory capacity and support for the high-speed UHS bus. Accordingly, SDXC support guarantees comfortable work with SDHC and SD, and SDHC support will not fail when connecting SD cards.

— miniSD. A slightly reduced (up to 22x20 mm) variation of the SD standard, otherwise completely identical to it (up to compatibility with SD-card readers when using simple adapters). It is rare due to the widespread use of even smaller microSDs.

— microSD. The most compact version of SD memory cards to date, have a size of 15x11 mm and a capacity of up to 4 GB. Due to their small size, they are widely used in portable electronics: in fact, they are the standard for mobile phones, and are also widely used in voice recorders. Like miniSD, they can be read by original SD card readers using an adapter.

— microSD HC. The second generation of the microSD standard; characterized by increased capacity, reaching 32 GB. In a voice recorder (and in general any card reader), ordinary microSD cards can also be used for microSD HC cards, but it is impossible to do the opposite — the card will not be read.

...— CompactFlash (hereinafter referred to as CF). One of the first memory card standards, it is still used due to its decent data transfer speed and impressive volumes (up to 128 GB). However, the dimensions of these cards are no less impressive — 42x36 mm. As a result, they are poorly suited for pocket format equipment and are rarely used in voice recorders — mainly in advanced models, where the priority is functionality and recording quality, rather than compactness. If the recorder is designed for CF Type II cards, it can work with all types of CF, and devices under Type I are only compatible with this type.

— memorystick. A proprietary standard developed by Sony and used primarily in its devices. It has a number of variations that differ in dimensions, volume and compatibility, and therefore, when buying a card for such a voice recorder, it is worth clarifying the specific MemoryStick specification used. The standard is rather poorly spread: firstly, because of its closeness (that's why, by the way, full compliance with it is guaranteed only in original Sony cards), and secondly, because of the high price of the cards themselves.

xD-Picture. Cards originally made by Olympus and Fujifilm for their digital cameras. The advantages of such cards are high reliability and compactness (20x25 mm), the disadvantages are high cost and relatively small volumes (up to 2 GB). As a result, dictaphones for xD-Picture are very rare.

The built-in microphone type determines the mode (number of channels) in which the voice recorder records sound.

— Mono. The simplest option: one microphone that records sound in mono format, i.e. without separation into left and right channels. It is impossible to provide a "surround" sound with such a recording, however, in the case of voice recorders, this is not decisive, because. usually in such a recording it is not the volume of the sound that is important, but the intelligibility of speech — and it is fully provided by a monophonic microphone.

— Stereo. In this case, a pair of microphones is usually used, spaced apart on the sides of the case; the sound is recorded in stereo, and the volume of the sound is achieved due to the difference in the sound reaching the left and right microphones. Considered somewhat more advanced than mono, although it does not provide better speech intelligibility by itself.

Separate input for connecting an external microphone. See "Connecting an External Microphone" for details.

The higher the amount of data per unit of time that is used to transmit the audio stream, the higher the quality of the MP3 recording is provided. So, the base bitrate of 32 Kbps means encoding one second of sound using 32 thousand bits of information - it is used only for speech transmission. Much more common in portable audio recording devices is the recording quality of 128 Kbps, 192 Kbps and 256 Kbps. The maximum possible bits rate for the MP3 format is 320 Kbps. The pursuit of the highest quality of sound recording makes sense for advanced models of recorders; for a conditional voice recorder for recording lectures, the basic bitrate parameters will be quite enough. Also keep in mind that the quality of sound recording affects the size of the resulting files and the duration of the voice recorder.

The maximum continuous recording time for the voice recorder. It depends primarily on the amount of memory (see "Built-in memory", "Memory card slot"), it is also directly related to the recording quality: the higher the quality, the more space the material occupies and the shorter the maximum recording time. In this regard, manufacturers usually indicate in the specifications the maximum possible recording time, that is, the recording time with minimum quality; with higher quality and time will be less.