Griffin iTalk vs. Belkin Voice Recorder...

So now I have both the Griffin iTalk and the Belkin Voice Recorder. I will be keeping the Griffin iTalk and giving the Belkin Voice Recorder away to a friend, however, both are exceptionally cool and useful products. The only down side to the Belkin Voice Recorder was the inability to plug headphones or an external mic directly into it. Really, the headphones is the main issue for me, as the Belkin mic is really good. In fact, I think the internal mic on the BVR is a little better quality than the one on the iTalk. However, the iTalk does have a plug for an external mic, which also doubles as a headphone jack. Unfortunately, you cannot listen on the headphone set while recording with the internal mic on the iTalk, which was something I was really excited to try out. However, I can leave the iTalk on my iPod at all times, ready to go and record whenever I need to, which is better than the BVR, which I had to pop on. Also, the speaker on the iTalk is much louder and clearer than the one on the BVR.

I recorded three different short clips for you to listen to for comparison purposes. This one was recorded with the iTalk and an AKG microphone plugged into it via a Shure line matching transformer. As you can tell it is much cleaner sounding, but much more quiet (and difficult to hear) as well. This could be because I actually was holding the AKG about 1/4" away from my mouth, but in any case, it would be nice if there was some sort of gain control. Here's the recording with the iTalk. It is much louder, with more ambient noise and some popping. It was recorded while holding the iPod about 6-8" from my mouth. Here's another recording with the Belkin Voice Recorder. Not as much popping, but still some. Not as loud. Not as much ambient noise. All three files are in AAC format. None of them are in any sort of *amazing* sound quality because Apple put a cap on the throughput on this functionality on the iPod. Anybody want to hack it?

x-posted on 3650...