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Forget Dragon Naturally speaking

by Mark Alan
25 replies
The voice dictation in Mountain Lion is much more accurate, and you don't even have to bother training it. I spent hours trying to get Dragon NaturallySpeaking trained to my voice, and it still has a horrible recognition rate. No matter which headset I use I get very poor results. However, with Mountain Lion the built-in voice dictation has a really incredible recognition rate with no training. I don't even have a headset on I'm just speaking with my head 2 or 3 feet away from my iMac. It is much more efficient for cranking out content.
#dragon #forget #naturally #speaking
  • Profile picture of the author MartinM93
    i totally agree with your views with dragon , if anyone has a slight accent , its pick up rate is horrible !
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  • Profile picture of the author ryanmilligan
    Banned
    Dragon was horrible for me.

    Being Scottish, at least 2 or 3 words in every sentence would be wrong and it just made working with it as annoying as hell.

    That being said, I've come to terms with typing now - I much prefer it in comparison to any software.
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  • Profile picture of the author FrankWellington
    Anything for the PC???
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    • Profile picture of the author briantymes
      Originally Posted by FrankWellington View Post

      Anything for the PC???
      Just about every version of windows, comes with a speech to text application. You can find it in the control panel of your computer listed under "Speech Recognition Options"
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      • Profile picture of the author Mark Alan
        I have played around with the built-in Windows speech recognition. I find it's really good for voice commands like Open Windows Explorer or Close Windows Explorer, but when it comes to actual text dictation it is very poor, and that is why I initially bought Dragon because I was looking for something better.

        Originally Posted by briantymes View Post

        Just about every version of windows, comes with a speech to text application. You can find it in the control panel of your computer listed under "Speech Recognition Options"
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  • Profile picture of the author eibhlin
    I love the built-in voice recognition software that comes with Windows 7. Here's where to find the software on your Windows computer: What can I do with Speech Recognition?

    And, here's my article about using different kinds of voice recognition: Write Faster - Free Voice Recognition Software

    The short version: Out of the box, the free Windows voice recognition software works as well or better than any comparable software I've tried. After the short (maybe 30 minutes) training session, the software has had at least a 90% accuracy rate.

    Now and then, it just doesn't seem to get what I'm saying, and I end up spelling it. Most of the time, I can just talk & talk, and the software types the whole thing, error-free or close to it. I can dictate my books -- about 5k words/day -- comfortably. That saves me a lot of time!
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    • Profile picture of the author ShyleyMacFarland
      As a writer who has Lupus (which in turn makes typing very difficult on some days), I've tried COUNTLESS speech-to-text programs. I also have a heavy southern drawl. After trying out so many products, I decided that I hate them all, not because of how well they work or don't work, but because I don't think as well when I'm talking. The flow of my articles is much more natural when I type than when I talk. I always say "I'm a thinker, not a talker!" For me, personally, those programs interfere with my creative thought processes.

      ...well, let me rephrase that. My mouth moving and sound coming out of it interferes with my creative thought processes. I shouldn't blame the software LOL!

      Of the ones that I have tried out, if I were to be forced to use one, I would actually choose the one that is installed with Windows 7. It's easy to use, and I used it for about five articles to give it a fair try, and it was very quickly learning to recognize how I say certain words, despite the southern drawl.

      Despite how much I like the Windows speech-to-text program, I dread the day when I have no other choice but to use it.
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      • Profile picture of the author lewiswharf
        Me and Dragon are bed buddies. It's still the best voice-recognition product on the market. Voice-recognition in general, however, just isn't ready for the masses. Whatever you use, it still takes time and patience. Many people become frustrated and if they can fall back on there old methods, then they do.
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    • Profile picture of the author cjreynolds
      Originally Posted by eibhlin View Post

      I love the built-in voice recognition software that comes with Windows 7. Here's where to find the software on your Windows computer: What can I do with Speech Recognition?

      And, here's my article about using different kinds of voice recognition: Write Faster - Free Voice Recognition Software

      The short version: Out of the box, the free Windows voice recognition software works as well or better than any comparable software I've tried. After the short (maybe 30 minutes) training session, the software has had at least a 90% accuracy rate.

      Now and then, it just doesn't seem to get what I'm saying, and I end up spelling it. Most of the time, I can just talk & talk, and the software types the whole thing, error-free or close to it. I can dictate my books -- about 5k words/day -- comfortably. That saves me a lot of time!
      Previous versions of Windows had speech engines that were considerably worse than DNS, but after I upgraded to Win7, I have to agree with you. The one thing I don't like, however, are the training modules - only one (or was it two?) - WinXP had about a half dozen fairly long documents you could read (and re-read), and after going through all of them once or twice, recognition was improved quite a bit. It still 'learned' while you were using it, but the modules provided kind of a "cram course" for the speech engine.
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  • Profile picture of the author easternodyssey
    I get suggestions on using the program in university. However, i think its far more easier to use normal typing and a dictionary. The amount of gramatical and spelling error that come out of using those programs is not worth while.
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  • Profile picture of the author Madrona
    Banned
    You should use an accent which is easily understood by mass of public.... and forget all things..
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  • Profile picture of the author mlab
    Dragon is 99.9999999% accurate for me - so I love it.

    Having used voice recognition for many years (and I have set up many others to use it as well) I think that the accuracy rate is determined more by the interference (noise) in the mic/computer setup than by your accent.

    One example..on a laptop, it is common to have background noise when you use the mic or audio in/out plugs. If you record silence...then play it back you often hear noise. That noise throws off all voice software.

    The work-around is so simple....use a USB plug instead. :0
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  • Profile picture of the author Rod Cortez
    I love DNS, have been using it for many years. Now, having written that it doesn't work as well with certain accents, which means it will take a lot longer for someone to "train" it. It took one of my VAs from Ireland almost a month to train it properly (at about 2 hours a day, 5 days a week)! It wasn't a microphone or interference issue either.

    Also mblab beat me to the punch. You definitely want to make sure you've got a solid microphone or headset and that there's no interference. And ditto on the Windows 7 speech recognition. After some training I found that it worked well, though not as good as DNS (I've got 3 different versions on 3 different machines and they all rock).

    RoD
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  • Profile picture of the author Ducksauce
    How does it go with Aussie Accents?
    ( I am referring to Dragon Naturally Speaking with my Q above)


    Chinese whisper curse strikes Apple Dictate

    Sam Spade would never have got his mitts on the stuff dreams are made of if his creator had had to deal with Mountain Lion.

    HAVING spent an hour or so last week downloading and installing Mountain Lion, Apple's latest version of the Mac OS X operating system, Doubleclick had great ideas of dictating, rather than typing, this column.

    Apple bills the new Dictation feature as a highlight of the upgraded operating system, and claims it has been trained to recognise Australian accents as well as British and North American ones. more...
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  • Profile picture of the author howoodra4
    Banned
    [DELETED]
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    • Profile picture of the author jficarro
      Originally Posted by FredJones View Post

      Spam here - mods, please consider removing.
      I just flagged it. It's been popping up on various threads all day.

      Great thread here. I can't believe I didn't know I had voice recognition software installed on my operating system. I started it up, but chickened out since I'm outside with no "real" mic finishing up a cigar. haha
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      • Profile picture of the author DJL
        What if you started out with text-to-speech software, fed its output into voice recognition software, then put them in a loop for 5 or 6 iterations?

        That would be awesome!
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        • Profile picture of the author cjreynolds
          Originally Posted by DJL View Post

          What if you started out with text-to-speech software, fed its output into voice recognition software, then put them in a loop for 5 or 6 iterations?

          That would be awesome!
          You would open up a black hole that would swallow your entire office!
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  • Profile picture of the author ichuck
    That is a great tip. You can pay a service like Speechpad to transcribe audio or video but the cost can add up quickly.
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  • Profile picture of the author ahlexis
    Anyone here considered using Google Voice and then calling your own number and dictating?

    I've had better recognition that way and through Android than through Dragon software.
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  • Profile picture of the author Leo Wadsworth
    I don't have a Mac or an accent (or you could say I have a bland american accent ). I have tried both Dragon and Win7 recognition. After a lot of training on each one, Dragon wins hands down on recognizing my words accurately. However, Win7 wins when it comes to automatically adding the right punctuation as I talk. There's an option to turn that on in Dragon, but unless you talk very naturally without pauses then it doesn't work very well. Win7 seems to understand grammar in how it punctuates.

    I'm using Dragon 11. 12 just came out, and is supposed to be even better at recognition. I don't know if they've improved the punctuation.
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  • Profile picture of the author Ducksauce
    I wonder how much better V12 is?

    Anyone have experience here?

    I saw a couple of weeks ago it was $75 for home, now $99.
    Emm, frustrating when trying to do the right thing !
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  • Profile picture of the author Oscarfishlover
    I recently updated to the latest version of Dragon, which is 13. It's absolutely brilliant, the accuracy is awesome. There are just a few niggling annoyances that I'm finding. Firstly, I'm finding that I'm having problems with Facebook. When Dragon has been opened, but not necessarily awake, I simply cannot enter any information into Facebook, it will not let me and I often get a strange message. However I found that I don't have any problems dictating into private messages. Occasionally it will let me start a new message, but when I come to leave a comment, it won't let me. If I switch Dragon off completely everything starts working again. Has anyone else found this problem? Apart from that, I couldn't be without Dragon, like I said, the accuracy is astounding. If you speak clearly than in most cases it is 100% correct
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  • Profile picture of the author winnermarketing
    ahhaha!
    there are some alternatives (see windows)
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  • Profile picture of the author Carol_A
    I agree!

    Love the voice recognition software that comes installed on my MacBook Pro!

    Had DNS prior to buying my Mac, but will never look back.

    :-)
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    • Profile picture of the author professorrosado
      OK OK I started of my AM Software as a speech recognition software on the Mia the my computer and I figure the I would give it a test than just posted as a reply and here on this suffer at to this is by having use it for a long time and unsure when I first the us started using it I gave it a few run through Zion speech contests and ½. And the thumb and use it because of the am a fair as if it does have them a symptom of the sea in the list continues to have a difficulty with certain words here and there is sold to keep it short this is they crew can run to test and the reason why is usually just better to type things of them make corrections to the overlay still, think the software of that comes in with via a computer PC windows is um still the not there yet
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