Recording a saved voice mail...

[Gudasau]

Forgive me if this has already been addressed, but I need an answer quickly. My son had a death threat left on his voice mail this morning. We have filed a police report and they are asking for a recording of the message. I called Verizon and they don't have a way to retrieve the saved voice mail and save it as an mp3 or something. I tried video recording it with my Bionic, but it comes across rather distorted. Is there a way to plug his Bionic into the computer and save this voice mail? If so, I need specific instructions because I can't afford to screw this up and lose the message.

Thanks in advance for any help.

 

[jwilly216]

I need to do this too because I'm sick of going to check my VoicemAil & it says YOUR MESSAGE FROM BLAH BLAH BLAH... is gonna be erased

 

[FoxKat]

Forgive me if this has already been addressed, but I need an answer quickly. My son had a death threat left on his voice mail this morning. We have filed a police report and they are asking for a recording of the message. I called Verizon and they don't have a way to retrieve the saved voice mail and save it as an mp3 or something. I tried video recording it with my Bionic, but it comes across rather distorted. Is there a way to plug his Bionic into the computer and save this voice mail? If so, I need specific instructions because I can't afford to screw this up and lose the message.

Thanks in advance for any help.

Simplest way is by using the headphone jack. Get a 1/8" Male to Male extension, plug one end into the phone's headphone jack, the other into the back of your computer where it says "Mic" (often color coded as Pink).

View attachment 53248

Then using the Windows Sound Recorder tool which comes pre-installed in Windows XP on the PC;

View attachment 53249

...set up the source for the recording to the sound card, and to the input. Then start the phone at a VERY LOW volume setting, start the recorder on the computer, and SLOWLY increase volume on the phone while playing the voicemail, until you hear it coming out of the speakers on the computer. Continue increasing until the sound is as loud as you can get it until it begins to distort, then back down one tap of the volume control. You can also use the meters to see the sound level. You want to get the peaks to come close to top and bottom but not touch for the best saturation and lowest background noise.

Now restart the recording, restart the voicemail, and you're good to go.

Instructions on the sound recorder built into Windows XP are here (Microsoft Corporation)

 

[Gudasau]

Thank you soooo much! My husband just found the cord in a box of old computer goodies. I'll be recording it shortly. Thanks again, you have no idea how relieved we're feeling after reading your response!

Simplest way is by using the headphone jack. Get a 1/8" Male to Male extension, plug one end into the phone's headphone jack, the other into the back of your computer where it says "Mic" (often color coded as Pink).

View attachment 53248

Then using the Windows Sound Recorder tool which comes pre-installed in Windows XP on the PC;

View attachment 53249

, set up the source for the recording to the sound card, and to the input. Then start the phone at a VERY LOW volume setting, start the recorder on the computer, and SLOWLY increase volume on the phone while playing the voicemail, until you hear it coming out of the speakers on the computer. Continue increasing until the sound is as loud as you can get it until it begins to distort, then back down one tap of the volume control. You can also use the meters to see the sound level. You want to get the peaks to come close to top and bottom but not touch for the best saturation and lowest background noise.

No restart the recording, restart the voicemail, and you're good to go.

Instructions on the sound recorder built into Windows XP are here (Microsoft Corporation)

 

[FoxKat]

You'll see from the number of "likes" I have, that I really do take this personally and want to help EVERYONE I can. I am thrilled you are already in possession of the cord so that means you're good to go! Good luck! :biggrin:

 

[Gudasau]

It's recorded and saved! I'm getting ready to save it to a CD and drive it over to the police department. It's certainly not easy for a mom to listen to, but a relief that it was able to be saved for evidence. Again, I truly appreciate your speedy reply and easy to follow instructions. As wigged out as I am right now, I needed it clearly spelled out for me. You, FoxKat, just lifted a huge weight off of one concerned mom and dad. Thank you again!!!

You'll see from the number of "likes" I have, that I really do take this personally and want to help EVERYONE I can. I am thrilled you are already in possession of the cord so that means you're good to go! Good luck! :biggrin:

 

[aaf709]

Thanks, FoxKat, although the need was tragic, it's good to know in case it's needed in the future. I suppose the "quick and dirty" method would be to use a flash voice recorder. The messages are stored as MP3.

 

[grgguy]

Another easy way is if you use the Visual Voicemail app just long press it and choose save . Then transfer it to your computer. Make a copy on a flash drive and viola.

 

[aaf709]

Interesting. I did a long press on a message from Google Voice and it gave me the option to "Archive." Where that is kept I don't know. Google Voice is good because you can have the message sent to your Google email account.

 

[grgguy]

Interesting. I did a long press on a message from Google Voice and it gave me the option to "Archive." Where that is kept I don't know. Google Voice is good because you can have the message sent to your Google email account.

If you have a file manager(astro) just open it up. I just did and there was a separate folder called voicemail.The saved/archived voicemails were in there. The folder was in the internal memory (/mnt/sdcard).

 

[FoxKat]

It's recorded and saved! I'm getting ready to save it to a CD and drive it over to the police department. It's certainly not easy for a mom to listen to, but a relief that it was able to be saved for evidence. Again, I truly appreciate your speedy reply and easy to follow instructions. As wigged out as I am right now, I needed it clearly spelled out for me. You, FoxKat, just lifted a huge weight off of one concerned mom and dad. Thank you again!!!

I am so pleased things worked out for you. You know of course, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, and in this case you are doing the right thing. There's no way to know if a threat is imminent or if it's empty but there's NO sense in second-guessing. Let the authorities sort it out. Your son is safe with his family and the issue is out of the bag now. I don't need to tell you how ignoring things like this can turn bad.

I am glad I was instrumental in getting this issue addressed immediately. Please keep us updated and best wishes. :hail:

 

[FoxKat]

Thanks, FoxKat, although the need was tragic, it's good to know in case it's needed in the future. I suppose the "quick and dirty" method would be to use a flash voice recorder. The messages are stored as MP3.

Certainly so, and if they had one with a mic input it would be even better. However trying to record that off of a phone with a digital recorder and using the mic on the recorder, the quality would be lacking and some key information that can be pulled from that recording might be buried in background noise created by the mic. The things they can do today with sampling and filtering is amazing and they might actually be able to isolate something in the background of the original recording that can be crucial to the prosecution's case, such as a unique noise or other "environmental" sounds that help them to conclusively identify the culpret and his/her location at the time of the recording.

Interesting enough, lots of these threats made by kids on their cell phones are done while on school property and in the company of their "friends", so a voice, a school bell, school bus going by, anything could be the key to conviction versus a hung jury or dismissed charges.

Let's hope this was from one cell to another because with the LUDs (phone records obtained by subpoena), they can isolate it to a particular MEID (ESN) of the initiating phone. Otherwise they may be able to isolate it to a land-line in a home or at school, a local restaurant or other student hang-out.

One thing's for sure, it's a smart boy to take this to his parents! They should be very proud of him.

 

[FoxKat]

Another easy way is if you use the Visual Voicemail app just long press it and choose save . Then transfer it to your computer. Make a copy on a flash drive and viola.

I actually use YouMail (https://play.google.com/store/search?q=youmail&c=apps). YouMail sends all my voicemails to my phone as MP3 files already. I can listen to them anytime I want. You (and the OP) ought to consider it, it's great!

It's got SOOO many other features like "smart answer" where it answers the call with the caller's name (as obtained from caller ID), you can have custom answers with your own voice for anyone you want, so if "Jim" calls, you can say;

"Hey, Jim, I'm so sorry I missed your call, but you know me...all work and no play. Hey, let's catch a beer and the game on Saturday. Leave me a message and pick the place! CYA!"

When Jim calls you, he's going to flip with a message like that.

I often get calls from customers and they are both thrilled and impressed, saying how "professional" it was that my voicemail answered their call and spoke to them by first name.

 

[grgguy]

I actually use YouMail (https://play.google.com/store/search?q=youmail&c=apps). YouMail sends all my voicemails to my phone as MP3 files already. I can listen to them anytime I want. You (and the OP) ought to consider it, it's great!

It's got SOOO many other features like "smart answer" where it answers the call with the caller's name (as obtained from caller ID), you can have custom answers with your own voice for anyone you want, so if "Jim" calls, you can say;

"Hey, Jim, I'm so sorry I missed your call, but you know me...all work and no play. Hey, let's catch a beer and the game on Saturday. Leave me a message and pick the place! CYA!"

When Jim calls you, he's going to flip with a message like that.

I often get calls from customers and they are both thrilled and impressed, saying how "professional" it was that my voicemail answered their call and spoke to them by first name.

I am a small buisness owner and that is a GREAT idea!!! Thank you!

 

[FoxKat]

It has certainly been a conversation starter for sure! People love it. They all ask how I used my own voice (for those who I had it configured as such). There are also some really neat things you can do to get rid of telemarketers, like for instance you save their number into contacts, then set this message for them;

http://www.payphone-directory.org/sounds/wav/bell/disconnected.wav

Or this one;

http://www.payphone-directory.org/sounds/wav/bell/notthru.wav

or this one;

http://www.youmail.com/community/greeting/national_do_not_call_registry

or this one;

YouMail Voicemail Greeting - Lewd or Threatening Caller

The last one works exceptionally well.

In fact, here's a link to all the potential answering machine messages they provide (some uploaded by me).

http://www.youmail.com/community/greetings.do