recording from a cellphone
 

Folks

I have a genuine & legal need to sometimes record conversations made on my cellphone. The parties concerned all agree to the procedure. Any advice as to the best way to do this?

I have a device bought eons ago from Tandy which is a gizmo which you attach to a phone neat the ear area with a rubber sucker and which then plugs into the mini-tape recorder via 3.5mm jack. It fails miserably to record any conversation on any of my cellphones. There IS some conversation there but you cannot hear it because of a strong high pitch buzzing (bit like the noise when someone tries to send you a FAX down the normal phone line).

Perhaps someone can advice if there is some fundamental reason why this old Tandy device will not work with a cellphone.

There is a device in the Maplin catalogue [ZQ78K] but that looks sort of similar to the device I already have. Maplin are not far away so I will go and try it out in their shop if possible.

Thanks

Re: recording from a cellphone
 

What on earth is a cellphone???? :D You're in the UK remember :)

Actually Maplins have (or had) a device which will be what you're looking for - they had one when i was there in August...

Re: recording from a cellphone
 

Get a cellphone that can record? Like the T610. You can then download the audio file it creates by bluetooth onto your PC.

Simple easy and digital.

Re: recording from a cellphone
 

Thanks Russ, I will give Maplin a phone call to check they have the device part no ZQ78K and if so I will go on Thursday and if possible check it out in the shop. At the moment their website indicated none in stock.

...... and what is wrong with the expression "cellphone"? I have always referred to my "moble phone" as a cellphone because much of my working like I was dealing with folks from Latin America - where the expression cellphone is a better approximation to their word 'celular'. Never had the term cellphone queried before.

Re: recording from a cellphone
 

This is the UK - I find the use of americanisms a bit tiring, that's all :D

I'm sure it's a subject worthy of its own thread.....:pp

Re: recording from a cellphone
 

OK but £ÃÆ ’‚£Ãà¢Ã¢â€šÂ¬Ã…¡Ãƒâ€šÃ‚£ and not justified for a short term job. I have a Motorola Timeport which will do some recording - but just a few minutes which will not be enough. Bluetooth - well OK but that is then the £ÃÆ ’‚£ bit. My wife does have a cellphone (mobile phone for Russ) which would accept a bluetooth connector but it is a nasty little Philips thing with buttons I cannot see and which are too small for my fingers.

Re: recording from a cellphone
 

The dongle they sell in Maplins plugs in to your mobile ( :D ) phone like a hands-free kit - AKAIK it then plugs in to a tape recorder or whatever.

Re: recording from a cellphone
 

Russ one of our original pair of mobile networks was called Cellnet, indicating that the phones operated through a serices of cells or base stations as we call them these days.

Agreed we in the UK do normally call them "mobiles", like the thing that sits above a babys bed, but IMHO cellphone is equally interchangable.

Re: recording from a cellphone
 

No, cellphone is more of an americanism. I think our version is a better description as the word 'mobile' indicates 'on the move', which is the basis for such phones.

Snod, let us know how you get on with Maplins, I might get one of those devices myself, depending on the price...

Re: recording from a cellphone
 

and cellphone is more of a description of how the technology works.

"Two nations divided by a common language"

Re: recording from a cellphone
 

Russ, will do. Price is £12.99 for a one off.

Re: recording from a cellphone
 

You could get a cheapy hands free kit and chop it into a 3.5mm jack as well as the original headphone, thus splitting the voice to both tape and headphone?!