Telephone headset as mic?

[unclebear]

I have an ancient SoundBlaster 16 PCI card, and an equally ancient plastic Creative Labs "computer microphone" that I have never really wanted to use before.

Now, suddenly, I need to record voice prompts for a computer telephony application. Even after trying to adjust my expectations of this so-called microphone, I'm still appalled by its wretched, abysmal sound quality.

I'm assuming that the first thing I should do to improve this situation is to get a better mike. I'm impressed with telephone headsets. Even cheap ones sound pretty good over phone lines--better than a really good telephone handset. Can I use a telephone headset as a mike on a sound card? On this old SB16 in particular? Can I get the appropriate adapter at Radio Shack or Best Buy, or do I have to order it from some specialty outlet on the Web? If the latter, what do I need to ask for?

If I'm headed off in the wrong direction, please let me know.

Thanks in advance.


<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1><EM>Edited by unclebear on 11/01/03 03:13 AM.</EM></FONT></P>

 

[Crashman]

You can get top quality Computer headsets with either one or two earphones (two is handy for stereo), but they tend to cost a bit more, generally $20 to $30 buys the same quality as a $12-$20 telepone headset.

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[Guest]

I am in the same situation here. What did you end up doing?

 

[etk]

What is your mobo chipset? Newer onboard audio might actually be an improvement over an old card.

 

[alyoshka]

Who's Mike?
Well, you can get a nice new soundcard and a new stereo 'mic' dirt cheap, and if you want to experiment with the phones mic, all you need to do is pic up one from any phone spare store or repair guy, make and model of the phone you prefer, they're like a dime a dozen these days.
Solder the 2 leads to a 3.5mm mono audio jack ( make sure the lead is long enough and low impedance wire) and walla!! you have a nice mic at your service......
Radio shack will do fine too......