How does Telephone Recording work?

The telephone recorder has to be attached to the telephone, radio or audio lines to be recorded. Most telephone recorders will cover multiple lines. The telephone recorder keeps track of each line and records it Finally, in a newer telephone recorder, call recordingsoftware can be used to search, access and playback recordings. In some telephone recorders, call monitoring can be done live while the recording is being made.

The 3 types of telephone recorders in use today

Tape:

A telephone recorder in the old days was a huge machine that used reel to reel tape. It was expensive, difficult to learn how to use and expensive to maintain. Cassette tapes made it became feasible for small companies to also record their calls but finding recordings was a nightmare and the user was required to remember to start and stop their own recordings as well as change tapes. With Cassette tapes, live call monitoring is also impossible. Tape units are now largely obsolete.

Proprietary hardware:

Developed to replace the tape based telephone recorder, it consists of proprietary electronics and proprietary call recordingsoftware. The advantage of this is that everything usually works well together. The disadvantage is that the only way to repair, upgrade and maintain the proprietary unit is through the company that sold it, or their licensed technicians. This is usually quite expensive and it may be difficult or impossible to find that company's technicians in some countries or regions. Because the hardware and software was all built into a single unit, upgrades are often impossible. This meant that companies often had to throw away their old proprietary telephone recorder when they wanted to record more lines, or started using a newer type line such as digital or VOIP. Proprietary hardware telephone recorders come in all shapes and sizes from one channel boxes that sit on a desk to huge rack mounted servers that recorded hundreds of channels and have very powerful call recordingsoftware to analyze voice patterns and integrate them with a databases.

PC integrated:

The newest type of voice recorder integrates the power of a multichannel telephone recorder into an inexpensive and easy to upgrade PC. The call recordingsoftware is then installed to enable live call monitoring, search functions, archiving, playback and in some cases custom reports and grading. If the telephone recorder is attached to a network or the Internet, some call recordingsoftware will allowmultiple users on different computers to access recordings or do live call monitoring. Costs are lower because PCs are relatively inexpensive and upgrades can be as easy as installing new PCI cards or call recordingsoftware. Maintenance and service are also much less expensive because parts can be purchased from a variety of vendors and a specialized technician is not needed. Compare Versadial's phone recorders.

Unique benefits of a Versadial telephone recorder:

A Versadial telephone recorder is integrated into a PC. This telephone recorder consists of 3 parts: 1) A Windows based PC, 2) Voice recording PCI cards, 3) The VS Logger call recording software. Versadial was the first company to offer a Kit version of its telephone recorder. A Kit version consists of the Voice recording card and the call recording software and allows the user to install these into their existing Windows based PC. This option brought the power of a full-featured telephone recorder into a price range that even a small businesses could afford. A unique benefit of a Versadial telephone recorder is that the software used to monitor and manage the telephone recordings can be installed on multiple computers at no additional charge. This is a huge cost savings to larger businesses that wish to have multiple supervisors and managers access and use the telephone recordings. Most other call recording companies charge a seat license fee for each computer the software is installed on. Another unique feature is that the Versadial call recordings oftware can be accessed via a wireless network on a PDA. Versadial telephone recorders are known for their quality and reliability. After ten years of business product returns remain at nearly 0%.