I'm pretty lazy about drying herbs. I just pick them, tie them up in a shady place (my kitchen) and hang them from something until they're dried. Sometimes they get a bit dusty because I'm a major procrastinator too. Native Americans would just tie their herbs up in their abodes for the winter or so I've heard.

I've also heard that the best times to pick herbs are early in the day once the dew has dried from the leaves. Then once they are dried enough I just put them in a clean glass jar and put the lid on. I've heard that a good way to save basil (depending on what you want to do with it) is to get fresh basil, throw it in the food processor with some olive oil (IF you are making pesto or want to cook with it) and freeze it in ice-cube trays. Then you can make pesto or add it to spaghetti/pizza sauce whenever you want it. Thyme, oregano, rosemary are hardier herbs and I just put them dried into a glass jar. Keep the leaves whole if possible as when they get crumbled they usually lose their essential oils faster. Keep them in the dark if possible to prolong 'shelf life'. Most herbs eventually lose their zing except for laurel, or bay leaf, they're supposed to get stronger in storage.

I'm in CA and just lay them out on the counter for a couple of days. Whether or not you need to use a drier - set on the very lowest setting - would depend on your humidity levels, and, perhaps, the space you have to hang or spread-out the herbs.

Even here in the UK (a lot damper than California) I just put woody herbs on a kitchen surface. In fact for bay, sage, and rosemary I always have some branches lurking about next to the stove. I don't even remove the leaves once dried but just break off a few stems when I need them. I don't dry basil. I prefer to use it in season and eschew it in the winter.

We don't know where you live but for many of us the woody herbs are available fresh year round. I really only dry them because the bushes get too big and I can't bear throwing the prunings away.

Tarragon dies off where I live, and comes back in the spring. I can't imagine it dried, it seems like the fresh taste and smell of it would not survive the drying process. I've smelled dried tarragon, but it's not great.

This year we are going to try a pesto base with excess basil and freeze it.

I dry lots of herbs in my dehydrator to store for later use. The key is to dry them past where it is "not enough" yet not over dry them to where you start losing the oils that hold the flavor. I dry them to just where all the stems snap. I don't use the dehydrator for bay leaves - just hang them. I don't dry basil because you just lose all the flavor - always do the food processor with a little olive oil and into ice cube trays (pop out into freezer bags once frozen). I now do a pretty good job of keeping track of how much I use dried through the year, and work to keep the amount I process to just a little more than that amount. For tea herbs, I keep my dehydrator going a lot during the summer. I wrap up most of my culinary herb drying fairly early in late spring/early summer.