Olympus DS-4000

Terrible – Do not buy it. It is badly designed and there is no support. You will lose large amounts of dictation. Nothing good about this product. Default settings are to switch off automatically if idle for a few minutes and to record in overwrite mode. So if you put the recorder down (to take a call or whatever) and then pick it up and press record, it will record over whatever you have done. The manual says this can be changed, but not how to change it. Olympus provides no support. Neither do its dealers. The buttons are badly placed and easily pressed accidently with similar loss of work resulting. Changing folder causes the same problem. When you go back to continue your first dictation, it overwrites the file. I lost days worth of recording more than once before I threw the machine away. PS the software doesn't work either.

Excellent – I will never even consider looking back to casettes or any other brand of recorder. The best kit ever made. Purchased for $999 for recorder and transcriber of the web. Best recorder ever made!!!

Good – I was very happy with the unit. The software was great when used with the Olympus AS4000. Had some trouble setting up the network side of things but the guys at www.officetechnology.com.au (who I got it from) helped immensely. Will be going back for more upon the cassette machines breaking in the office. Expandable memory - slide control - strong case - can run on normal batteries as well as the rechargeable ones flimsy battery case