WM Software Spotlight: VITO Audio Notes

Audio Notes Record ScreenVITO Technology is known for many high quality Windows Mobile and Symbian applications ranging from VITO Remote for your entertainment devices to VITO Navigator for GPS navigation Now they’re trying their hand at high end voice recording for use in meetings, classrooms and other settings They’ve just released VITO Audio Notes 1.0

This first release is a solid one and contains useful features that will make recording classroom lectures and meeting minutes a very easy process.
Testing, 1, 2, 3

VITO Audio Notes is lightweight and snappy The user interface follows simple guidelines for friendliness and ease of use The opening screen has a list of files you’ve recorded along with Soft Keys to start a new recording and to access the main menu.

The menu has a few straight-forward options that allow the user to tailor recordings to best suit his or her needs VITO Audio Notes has a setting that will turn off the screen of your PDA to preserve battery life during long recordings It lets you choose to place your recordings in main memory or any storage card you have inserted The recorded files are collected for you in a folder called My Audio Notes The recorded files themselves can be mp3 or wav format and each type has three different quality settings to allow you to balance space constraints and still be able to understand what is being said And last but not least, VITO Audio Notes knows how to present its interface in English and Russian.

Audio Notes presents its user interface in black and grey colors regardless of the color scheme your handheld is using But for you folks that have to match, no worries Audio Notes is skinnable and several different color skins are available for free at www.vitotechnology.com.

Recording

Tap the record button and the recording screen comes up This displays the name of the file being created, how much time has elapsed, the bit rate of the recording and lights that flash in a scale based on the volume level of the sounds picked up by the microphone.

Audio Notes Main Screen Near the bottom is a place to adjust the gain of the microphone A very useful tool in varying settings The High Auto Gain setting is extremely sensitive and works well in quiet environments It’s so sensitive I could even hear the hum of the office’s air conditioner during test recordings There are also, Medium, Low, and Off settings for the Auto Gain Control A status bar at the bottom of the record screen also shows the size of the file that is being created, so you know how much space you have left as you’re recording The Soft Keys on this screen allow the user to Pause and Resume a recording or to Stop the recording altogether.

After you’ve recorded your meeting, lecture or other important audio, Audio Notes allows you to tap and hold on the file name and perform some other actions with it First of all you can play the file back You can also rename, delete or move the recorded file.

Conclusion

1.0 product releases can be some of my favorites They perform their tasks quickly and easily And they don’t have some of the advanced bells and whistles that just get in the way such as what you might find in later releases Such is the case with VITO Technology’s Audio Notes 1.0 This simple software does what it says it does in a clean and useful way And in my tests with the Auto Gain Control it clearly captured the audio sources I needed in high quality recordings This product will work well in the office, on campus or anywhere else a reliable recording is needed.

Pros: Clean interface, good sound quality, auto-adjusting gain control

Cons: None

Grade: A

Available from www.vitotechnology.com Audio Notes runs on Windows Mobile 2003 and Windows Mobile 5 Pocket PCs and SmartPhones.

Written by Nate