Does anyone have Dragon Naturally Speaking? Version 9.0? Is voice recog. Software. I was gonna buy a copy but then my buddy said that he used it six or so versions ago and it wasn’t worth it because it took forever to train it . He said he had to train it as four different guys “Sober Errol” “Drunk Errol” “Stoned Errol” and “Drunk and Stoned Errol” because it wouldn’t recognize his voice across those categories and because he’s a writer and likes to write when he’s messed up. Anyway, I’m not looking for anything complex and wonder if it really doesn't need any training now like it says here: ( http://www.nuance.com/naturallyspeaking/ )?<o></o>

 

There is training involved. The software needs to learn your voice and you need to learn how to speak slow and clear. Also you need a good quality microphone and a noiseless environment.. Any extra noise the computer will try and translate it into text...

It is not foolproof, but with some work it can be made tolerable...

Note: I do not have or use voice software, but have set it up for a few of my customers.. They don't really use it after the initial setup..

If you are a writer it may be worth the investment and time.

Just my 2 cents...

 

It has been about 4 years since I set up this software for someone and played with it myself. So, the version I had may not have been as good as a current rev.

But, When I played with it, I noticed that it would have trouble with some words and I had a heck of a time getting punctuation setup, not sure I ever did get it right. The person I set it up for tried it but never really got to using it since he had an accent and the software would mess everything up. I think if you are a touch typist, that is better than voice recognition. You probably save time in the long run.

As a funny related note... I worked with a lady years ago who helped design a voice recognition chip for one of the big IC makers. The chip worked kind of OK, but since she was Iranian and had somewhat of an accent, the chip couldn't recognize anyone else but her.

Voice recognition has been tried for at least since the 60s and so far, it still is pretty error prone and highly dependant on the user properly "training" the system, and then talking like that everytime.

I have used text readers and those seem to work better, but tend to make run on sentences.

Jim Henderson

 

Had a freind with ms who used it.... He had no choice, he passed away a couple years ago, but used it up untill then. It did have some training, but he couldnt do much else so his was trained great!!!

 

As already stated, training, training, training.....and more training. Even after that, from what I have read, there is about a 92% accuracy.

Makes it even worse but a good laugh if you have a dog, birds, kids, almost any kind of noise as the software will write "something" from every noise it hears. That part is at least 100% accurate

 

Oh that sounds annoying. Well, it's pretty quiet in here. I noticed the new version of Dragon comes with a headset/microphone so at least I don't need to worry about that, or compatibility issues or anything. I ordered a copy.

Yeah, I am. And I note that I write better when I dictate into a tape recorder and then transcribe it, was hoping Dragon would cut that down. I ordered "Preferred" which says that it works with digital voice recorders... now I just need to get one.

 

I haven't used the newer versions but the older one was not worth buying, it was a complete waste of my money. I worked on it for quite some time trying to teach it but it would still come out with words that were all messed up. If anything about your speech would change (cold, flu, allergies) it would mess the words up. Maybe they have caught up, but if they haven't save your money for an ink cartridge and type on your computer.

 

I have exactly the opposite report - I haven't used the older versions, but I did get and install Dragon. It worked out of the box with about 90% accuracy. I added a few slang words to the dictionary and I've been correcting it when it fails, and now it's up to about 98% accurate. It does what it's supposed to - produces a document in less time that it would take me if I typed it. I type about 75 WPM, so not slow. Anyway, my only complaint is that it's hard to remember to speak the punctuation, but I guess that's my problem, not a problem with the software.

 

What version did you get, standard or preferred?

 

how many wpm can you speak?

 

I've used these programs in the past and have had relative success. I think they are great for someone who is into writing and is going to go back and work on the text again later on; double checking mistakes and punctuation.

Remember that old annoying thing they used to have online, something buddy. It was the other way around where you would type into it and it would actually pronounce it for you. I'm suprised that thing isn't still all over the net.

- Chris

 

Answering questions: I got Dragon Standard. I now sort of wish I'd gotten Preferred because I could import/export user files to other computers with Dragon, but oh well. I speak about 135 WPM.

Speaking of that pronunciation thing, I just realized that Dragon will read aloud text as well. Wonder if I could get my gramps turned on to it, he has a lot of trouble viewing the screen but is a big reader.

 

The old Amiga computer had a text to speech processor that sounded a lot like the Terminator, Arnold Schwarzenegger.

The PC has one utility called Narrator that I think is with the accessibility tools.

There are also screen magnifiers and all kinds of things for visually impaired people. Some work better than others tho.