Garage Band is an application that comes with the iLife suite. It is very useful for creating music and voice recordings. I deffinately recommend that application.
Your iBook should allow you to use your built-in mic with Garage Band.
If not, go to System Preferences, Sound, Input, and turn your input volume up. That should help.
I used MS Word 2004 while typing notes in one of my classes. The voice record option is very useful... though I'm not sure that you can access the file for use in other programs.
You can export the audio from word to use with any other app, even to take out in your iPod or in a CD player. Select export audio in the Tools:AudioNotes menu.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Be careful about reading health books. You may die of a misprint.
Mark Twain