Thanks to the reviews posted here, I bought this microphone. It's awesome and I highly recommend it to other Amazon electronics consumers - especially at this price.
In addition to the sleek look-and-feel, feather-light design, on-off illuminated button (so you can keep it plugged in but not active or use as mute button while recording - see Customer Images), its best feature is the 8-foot long cord which allows amazing flexibility and range despite being anchored via the USB port to your computer. For me, that one simple design component speaks "volumes" about the overall design quality of this product.
This microphone is recommended for voice - not music - recording. But I found the music playback perfectly acceptable, especially as a background track.
The installation is as easy as plugging it into your USB port. Software is freely available via download.com and then by searching for EXPStudio Audio Editor Free 3.93, which features multiple track capabilities (background music with voice-over). Using your computer, the software and this microphone, you definitely can create your own in-house recording studio. Logitech USB Desktop Microphone
First, I had some doubts about reviews below for the performance of this mic.
I got this thing today, and my... let me apologize to reviewers below. This thing works beautifully!
I put this mic about a feet away from my mouth(bit more than a feet... right next to where I use mouse with my right hand), and spoked a few words in normal voice level(maybe a bit lower) while my air conditioner was making some noise. When I played the recording back, the voice was captured loud and clean. This mic is outstanding with reasonable price tag!
My daughter is an aspiring pop singer. Neither of us has alot of tech ability. We wanted something simple to use so we could record her singing on the computer. After viewing several options we decided to purchase the Logitech.
The mic arrived assembled in its package. All we had to do was figure out how to plug it in the computers USB port. Next we followed the booklets instructions to go to sound recorder in programs and click the record button. Easy enough since it clearly described where to find this in the instruction booklet. She sang a snippet and the book says if you press play and hear your voice it works (yes the book actually says this).
Well we clicked play and heard her voice - crystal clear. Very simple!
The microphone looks odd in the picture, but its actually very sleek. Its shaped like a noodle and about 9 inches tall. Its very slim. Because it pivots forwards and backwards on the base its easy to adjust. The base has a button to turn it on and off. My daughter is used to a traditional mic but she enjoyed this one.
Great little mic for the money!
I'm a bit perplexed at another review that stated the microphone does not work with Windows XP (Service Pack 2); in fact, it almost prevented me from purchasing. Nevertheless, I took a chance, and I'm glad I did. All I had to do was plug the jack in, and I was off and running.
Sound quality is best at about 6 inches away, although tone is muted a bit. I was very impressed, however, at the complete absence of background noise - despite the fact that my washer and dryer were both running, and my wife and kids were talking and watching television only a few feet away. For my weekly podcast, this is the perfect choice.
Interweb research shows the next best microphone to be in the $60-$80 price range so the $20 price makes the Logitech USB Desktop Microphone a no-brainer.
As for that Service Pack 2 issue, it's possible that the difficulty was the result of another problem (such as a conflict), or it's possible an update has rendered the problem obsolete. In any case, mine worked right out of the box. Highly recommended.
This microphone is being used with Dragon Naturally Speaking Medical Version. It has excellent voice recognition qualities. I needed to get the microphone off my head and get away from the wire. It has a pause button that lets Dragon continue working while you talk or think.
After plugging this usb microphone into my win2k system. I found the volume of
the voice recorded is very small, with much background noise. And I can not
record clearly unless I speak very close to the microphone. I was very
disappointed at first, thinking I'm buying the wrong thing.
Later I noticed there are two different microphone controls in the volume
setting dialog. One is the mic of my sound card, and another one is this USB
device. I tried to disable the onboard mic and set the volume of the USB one to
maximum, then I started recording... Much to my surprise, this time the voice
quality was superior!! I phoned a friend in China for ten minutes using skype,
and the conversation is very clear even I placed the mic far from my mouth!
Then I recorded a song of mine with cooledit 2.0. Again I get superior voice
recording quality! There is almost no background noise so I think I will not
use the noise reduction feature of cooledit any more! The USB cable is also
long enough to place the mic far from computer when singing. Be sure to DISABLE
onboard mic when using this USB microphone.
UPDATED:Nov. 19, 2005
I've been using this microphone for ten months. It has helped me save lots of oversea calling fees.
If you want to use this mic as your primary input device under Linux, simply put the following lines in your ~/.asoundrc
pcm.asymed {
type asym
playback.pcm "hw:0,0"
capture.pcm "hw:1,0"
}
Then you can recard some voice using arecord:
arecord voice.wav
Overall this is a great product well worth the price.'
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