Hi, Does any of you use any kind of digital device for recording and transcribing interviews? Is it worth it to invest hundreds of dollars for these equipments? Or is it better to hire people to do the transcribing? Please share your experience!

When doing my final Masters' project I had 6 interviews to transribe and translate into English. I recorded them using a usual recording machine, and did the rest myself. It was quite boring and took lots of my time. Me advice would be - if you have just several inteviews, you can do it without any special equipment or even people, but if you have more that 5-6, use someone who knows how to do it. As for digital devices, I never used ones, so can't say anything.

I chose the digital option for recording (Olympus DM1). Advantages: small and easy to carry around, unobtrusive in interviews, don't have to worry about buying or changing cassettes, can download recordings straight to PC for storage, doubles as an MP3 player. Disadvantages: none that I've come across yet (but I've never tried recording with conventional cassettes). There is a discussion on digital recording at http://davidson.cba.hawaii.edu/digitalrecording.html which looks at some of the issues.

On the transcribing question, hiring someone to do it could work out pretty expensive, unless you have a VERY generous department who will pay for it. I was told that yes, transcription is tedious, but as a PhD student you are expected to do your own (sort of rite of passage I guess). On the positive side, I do find I get to know my data very well by the time I have transcribed the interviews, so half the analysis gets done in the transcription process.

Thanks for the advices!