When I was starting out as a general transcriptionist, I was using a pair of Sony ear buds, ear phones or whatever you can call them and they were perfect for my audios. But then, if I use it for several hours, I have this pain under my right ear, I don’t know what it is so I decided to change my ear buds to a headphone. The first brand that I used was A4 Tech, thinking that it would really be of use to my transcribing work.
At first, it did. But when there were loud audios and no matter how I tone it down, the sound from the headphone sounds terrible. It either sounds muffled or way too loud. So, when I had the money, I went out and bought another headphone.
Believe me, when I was starting out, I really wanted to try out the best headphone there was in the market. I would go out and buy a headset probably a week after another until I found what I was looking for. I got one headset which was Genius, I used this for my DJ stint online and it worked well because the microphone was sharp enough. But then, when I saw this Logitech headset with a microphone, I wanted to give it a shot too. I got one and compared it with the Genius brand. I liked Logitech in terms of its quality with the output of the microphone. With Genius, I liked the audio quality I get from the ear pieces.
As time went on, I was still searching for that headphone that would suit my transcribing needs. When I got accepted as a business transcriptionist in a financial company, we were issued our own A4 Tech headphones. These were the low-end type of headphones that was loud enough to hear the audios from the computer. But when you use it for four hours, you’ll definitely feel pain in areas surrounding your ears. Which meant that the headphones were too tight, they weren’t comfortable enough to use for long hours. My output was also terrible. I couldn’t get the words right.
So when our bonus came, I thought of buying myself a better headphone brand that I could use for a long time. I checked out a headphone from Sony. It had this 70 Ohms or impedance. I’m not really sure what that means but I checked out most of the headphones available in our music stores, computer stores, they all turned out to have just either 24 Ohms or 32 Ohms. It could probably be the quality of the audio output or something, I’m just guessing so you can correct me if I’m wrong. When I got my Sony, it had 70 Ohms and I tried it in the office.
It worked wonders for my grades. I kept getting grades of 93 + and was even promoted to a business transcription editor. Cool, isn’t it? Although there were some people who would stick to the headphones they were issued and still got good grades than I did. Haha. I wonder what’s their secret?
But, anyway, most of my colleagues tell me that it’s not in the headphones that’s the problem. It could be the audio itself or the speakers’ accent. For me, if they had better headphones than the ones that were issued, they would probably be getting better grades too. Because for me, I’ve had several headphones/headsets that I used over the years and I know if it’s a good kind of headphone to use for my work.
Right now, I’m using a new Audio Technica headphones or my old rusty but still good Sony headphones.
Do you think having a pair of good headphones will help you do better in your transcriptions? In my opinion, it helps a lot. Now you know why I’m a headphone freak. Of course, your hearing acuity is also a big factor in this profession.
And that is another topic I will try to talk about in my next blog. Thank you. Hope that helped somehow.
The Cat in the Bag Blog 