Applications

OS X’s Missing Audio Recorder - Tape Deck

By Steven Coburn ⋅ June 23, 2008 ⋅  Email This Post ⋅  Print This Post ⋅ Post a comment

The Mac can do almost anything you want it to. And what really sets the Mac apart is how elegantly and simply the Mac does these things. But it can’t always do everything so wonderfully, and when it came time for me to recorded some simple audio, quickly and without hassle, I had a problem. All I wanted was to talk for a few minutes and then have the freedom of a simple .mp3 file that I could do pretty much anything I wanted with. You could use GarageBand, but its a large, somewhat bloated application with poor support for anything other than full-blown podcast and music production. (which it’s great at) This is where TapeDeck comes in. It is your perfect application for quickly recording audio, always never than two clicks and five seconds out of reach.

Tape Deck is incredibly simple, and aim’s to provide an experience similar to a regular analog tape recorder, but on your Mac, and pretty much idiot-proof. To record audio, you click the big red record button and then a new tape is automatically inserted and you can start recording. when your done, you can click stop, and then to review any part of the tape you can toggle the fast-forward and rewind buttons. You can also quickly pause the tape. Tapes pretty much represent any one recording in Tape Deck, just like an old analog tape, and are organized in a shelf/space on the side of the window so that you can easily organize, see and search through your recordings. You can label, give important information like date, time, etc… (which are automatically added) and then any notes you wish to add to a tape. You can even change the quality of the recordings (the demo only allows for low quality recordings), the volume, and change between stereo and mono. After you’re done, you can find your tape(s) in the Finder, which Tape Deck can easily reveal to you or email them as plain MP3s, or open the audio in iTunes. Either way, its easy and convenient.

Overall, I think that Tape Deck is a great application, filling one of the gaps I found in the Mac in a very Apple-like fashion. Its ease of use, vintage feel, and ingenuity certainly help to round-out my over general Macintosh experience. TapeDeck is available at Tapedeckapp.com for only $25.

Tags: Audio, Mac, recording, software, Tape Deck