Anybody used Dragon NaturallySpeaking?

metalmackey · 4 Sep 2010 at 12:58

Hi Guys,

I was thinking about getting Naturally Speaking 11 to help me dictate and use my PC faster as I have cerebral palsy so type with 1 hand (slowly LOL), I am also very short sighted too. How good is the software and can it "read" emails and documents to you?

Ta

snowdog · 4 Sep 2010 at 13:02

Used to use it in the long past, at least 6 years ago, so probably a far older version.
I was surprised how fast it learned to recognize what I said, however, it used to be a hog and got confused with a lot of background sound.

I haven't used it in the way you describe though, to write with it, I can image it would be buggy for the first couple of weeks until it ''learns'' your voice... No idea about the reading emails and documents bit but can't windows 7 do that already from stock ? Is there a trial version or so of it available ? I'd first try that before buying the full version...

Dano · 4 Sep 2010 at 13:06

I was playing with built in speech recognition in windows seven just the other day, in fact I'm using it right now to respond to you.

As you can see it seems to work very well, has a few issues but I am sure it would get better as it learns.

metalmackey · 4 Sep 2010 at 13:17

Dano said:
I was playing with built in speech recognition in windows seven just the other day, in fact I'm using it right now to respond to you.

As you can see it seems to work very well, has a few issues but I am sure it would get better as it learns.

Did you dictate your post? I thought the built-in 1 was just to "command" the PC.

Dano · 4 Sep 2010 at 13:40

metalmackey said:
Did you dictate your post? I thought the built-in 1 was just to "command" the PC.

Yup, dictation and commands

metalmackey · 4 Sep 2010 at 13:52

Thats cool, ta. Might save myself a few quid then LOL. Can you add your own words?

SiriusB · 4 Sep 2010 at 17:47

Like LOL?

metalmackey · 4 Sep 2010 at 18:06

LOL yeah. It dont like my cockney voice LOL, gotta talk more propa english to it LOL

Burnsy2023 · 4 Sep 2010 at 18:25

If you want text to speech in a webpage, have a look at this: http://access.ecs.soton.ac.uk/ToolBar/

metalmackey · 4 Sep 2010 at 18:46

Ta Burnsy, will take a look

SiriusB · 4 Sep 2010 at 19:18

metalmackey said:
LOL yeah. It dont like my cockney voice LOL, gotta talk more propa english to it LOL

Tends to be Northern accents speech recognition struggles with most - especially Mancunian. Don't know if that still holds true anymore.

I remember when I used Dragon Naturally Speaking many, many moons ago. It took so much time and effort to teach the bloody thing!

Puppetmaster · 5 Sep 2010 at 11:04

We sell and train dragon @ work, tho im not involved in that part of the company.

I've had a short training session on it from one of the trainers at work (30 mins or something) and it picked up pretty much all my words fine. Obviously with strong accents it takes a bit longer but i think its fairly quick to learn.

metalmackey · 6 Sep 2010 at 16:50

Is there any way to get a trial of Naturally Speaking 11?

Simi · 31 Mar 2012 at 09:48

Sorry for the old thread resurrection but I've recently been thinking about using this to write as my ideas usually flow a lot faster than my hands can type (still haven't learnt to touch type).
So anyway, I was wondering if anyone used this nowadays.
It seems to be up to version 11.5 but it's also quite expensive and I can't see an available trial (which is crazy for something at that price - even windows has a trial!)
Some feedback from current users would be great.

Puppetmaster · 31 Mar 2012 at 19:55

You could look to see if you can get version 10 for cheaper. You probably want the preferred version. I think 11 does the same thing for the basic tasks just has support for ie9 and some other stuff.

Might be worth emailing Nuance (who make it) regarding a trial.

Where are you based?

I've used it at work a bit and it is very good, picks up most peoples voices very quickly.

Simi · 3 Apr 2012 at 10:50

Puppetmaster said:
You could look to see if you can get version 10 for cheaper. You probably want the preferred version. I think 11 does the same thing for the basic tasks just has support for ie9 and some other stuff.

Might be worth emailing Nuance (who make it) regarding a trial.

Where are you based?

I've used it at work a bit and it is very good, picks up most peoples voices very quickly.

Thanks for the reply, mate. I'm based near Wakefield in West Yorkshire.
Will have a look around for an earlier version. I've been a bit busy lately so haven't taken time out to email Nuance although if you say it works well for you at work then I'm thinking it might be good for me as I;d be using at home in a quiet setting (mostly).
Do you use it just for emails, memos etc, or have you used it for anything with more weight like an article or story?