VEC TRX-20 3.5mm Direct-Connect Telephone Recording Device

LifeIsGood: Was surprised at how small this is (1.5" x 1" x 1") but it does the job. Setting this up is a 20-second job and it's good to go. The 3.5mm jack will plug into a digital recorder or computer with no problem. The cord could use another few inches, in my opinion, but that also helps keep you from running around with the phone when you need it to sit still. Comes with double-sided tape to help keep things in place as well. Ran through a couple tests and it works great, recording dial tone, key presses, and voice. Basically, if you hear it through the receiver, this gets it. As others have noted, you MUST have a corded handset to use this as it connects in between the cord and the handset.

United States on Jun 21, 2020

Mike Cohn: The device seems to work well. I had been using an old Radio Shack device to connect my digital voice recorder to my phone for many years to record interviews for articles, but it eventually stopped working after the cord got caught in the desk drawer. After I missed out on some interviews that didn't get recorded and had to reconstruct them from my notes, I finally searched for a replacement, and I'm glad I bought this one. It seems to do the job well, and so far all the recordings I've tried to make have worked. The sound quality is decent, and perhaps even better than I had with my old Radio Shack connector. It only took about a minute to set up. It doesn't have the record/play switch that the old Radio Shack adapter had, but that's actually a blessing because that means I don't have to worry about it being on the wrong setting.

United States on Mar 08, 2020

RogerRoger: So far, great sound quality or has a seemingly high signal to noise ratio. Also, very easy to install and versatile.

Two misconceptions, this VEC TRX-20 device does include the spiral cord and the 3.5mm or 1/8 mini jack. The device also connects to the headset rather than at the telephone jack. (Far better on the handset, for maintaining audio quality.)

My setup, I plug the output or the 3.5 or 1/8 mini-jack of the VEC TRX-20 into a pre-amplifier, then from the pre-amp into the line-in of an Asus Xonar Essence STX PCI/PCIe computer card. (The ASUS STX cards are one of the best sounding or highest signal to noise ratio sound cards on the market.)

Trying to connect this device directly to a computer sound card without using a pre-amplifier may require enabling "mic boost" through the computer operating soundcard frontend settings, and greatly degrading the sound quality or signal to noise ratio depending on the quality of sound card used. I would strongly suggest using a (microphone) preamplifier, costing another $50-100 and can be readily bought through most music stores. The better pre-amplifiers tend to use XLR micrphone connectors, include +20dB mic boost...

United States on Apr 18, 2019

Cheryl U.: I'm a reporter for a small town newspaper. The paper doesn't supply us with much in the way of equipment - we work in print, so our margins are pretty small - so I don't get many "toys". When I was hired and wanted to record a phone interview, I either had to type as quickly as possible and hope my notes were good, or take the interview on speakerphone in the conference room. On top of the bad acoustics in there, it didn't make for very private interviews.

I didn't even know something like this was possible until recently. When I ordered mine, I also ordered a second one for another reporter in the bull room. When they arrived, I installed both in less than 10 minutes, total. Works like a charm, and records both sides of the conversation. It's nice that it doesn't seem to pick up any of the ambient noise in the newsroom, where it's pretty constantly noisy.

United States on Oct 04, 2016

Tom Mugleston: I use a NEC D-term Series E phone with a Plantronics wireless headset. I tried recording on several digital recorders. The volume coming in is loud and clear. However, my voice calling out is so quiet that I can hardly tell it is there. I tried attaching the adapter at several points in the system and get the same volume issues. Maybe it works with a different phone. Maybe it's the adapter. Hard to tell at this point.

Update: The adapter works fine on our NEC D-term phones without the Plantronics headset. I did some fiddling with my headset to increase the microphone volume and viola, it now works. Also, I was having some trouble getting the audio to work through the microphone jack on my laptop. The adapter has a 3.5mm mono plug and I had to pull the plug out slightly to get a connection. I have ordered a 3.5mm mono female to 3.5mm stereo male adapter. We'll see if this fixes things. Stars went from 2 to 4 now that I have the volume working right.

United States on Apr 22, 2013