Customer Reviews: Read 1 more reviews...
 Good recognition, but very unstable program May 14, 2004
37 out of 40 found this review helpful
This is my first experience with dictation software, so I don't have anything to compare it to. All I can do is offer observations on how this one has worked for me.
Training this software takes quite a long time; a few hours if you want to get maximum performance. I actually wouldn't mind so much, except that you need to retrain it every time you buy a new microphone or work in an environment with a different sound level. For me, this has meant having to train the software several times. Reading the provided material so the software can sample your voice is actually kind of fun, but after you've done it a few times (reading the same passages to train for different microphones or environments), it is exceptionally tedious. I wish they had provided a larger selection of reading material.
The headphones which come with the software are adequate, but I heard you can get better recognition with a higher quality set. (I upgraded to a Plantronics Audio 90, which is better, but not one I'd recommend.)
My biggest complaint about the software is that it consumes a tremendous amount of system resources on your computer. I can not be running any other programs at the same time, or it crashes. I am using a computer with a 1.40 GHz Centrino processor with 512MB of RAM. Even when I am running only IBM ViaVoice and MS Word, I clearly run into performance issues. After a while my computer starts to bog down and I have to restart it. My computer's specs are way above what IBM recommends, so that *shouldn't* have been an issue. If a beefier computer would solve my problems, I think IBM should specify "minimal" and "optimal" system requirements. I don't mind if a program is a system hog if the developer is willing to *admit* it and tell me what I need.
More complaints: ViaVoice types with unusual quirks which it seems would have been easy for IBM to have prevented. For example, it often fails to capitalize the first word in a sentence, especially when dictating in chat software. When you dictate for a passage to be in quotation marks, it leaves a space between the quotation marks and the words inside the quote. For some words, it seems impossible to get the software to recognize that you are dictating a word, and not issuing a command.
IBM's ViaVoice is considerably cheaper than the competition. Unfortunately, I have no idea if the higher price of the competing product (Dragon) is justified by being a higher-quality product. ViaVoice is probably adequate for most casual dictating needs. If you've never used dictation software before, it's really impressive the way it can usually understand what you're saying. The more you use it, the better it gets at recognizing what you are saying, and the better you will get at enunciating in a way it can understand. After a few months of casual usage, I would say my software is hitting 90 to 95% accuracy (higher under ideal conditions with simple words).
The bottom line is, for the price, this is pretty good software (though I sure do wish it was more stable). If you use dictation a lot and know that the competing products are better quality, they would be worth the price. But for a casual user, this software is fine.
 Dragon Preferred is better than ViaVoice 10 March 17, 2006
William H. Schutten (Cape Cod, Massachusetts)
31 out of 33 found this review helpful
I am a physician and dictate multiple letters every day. I was spending thousands of dollars (literally) a year for a transcriptionist to type my letters for me in the early 1990's. Not only that, there was about a one week turnaround time from when I dictated the letters into my tape recorder until the time they were typed and ready to be signed. When IBM first came out with speech recognition, I called IBM and actually spoke to the person who was the head of their R&D for speech recognition. From what he told me, I felt this new technology might save me a lot of time and money. I have used IBM for speech recognition since 1995 when they had Voice Dictation which was run off their own IBM OS2-Warp operating system. That required that you speak each word distinctly and separately. You needed a computer with a dual operating system (OS2 Warp and Windows 3.1). After dictating a letter into the OS2-Warp platform, you copied it, opened Windows and pasted it onto a Works letterhead. Lots of futzing around, but hey, it worked. When ViaVoice came out (in 1998, I think) I got their Executive 98 edition and have used it until recently. It worked fine, but my eight year-old computer finally died, and when I got a new Dell I figured I'd try the new ViaVoice 10. Big mistake!!! Initially it worked, but it was always kind of quirky. Made me wish I still had my old Executive 98 version. Anyway, one day, after spending a weekend programing in a bunch of macros, it totally died. I called IBM ViaVoice support and they had me do this thing and that to the computer, all to no avail. Finally, the technician asked what operating system I was using. I told him Windows XP service pack 2. He said that ViaVoice 10 is not compatible with service pack 2 - something about a "hostile environment". I asked him what I should do and he said return ViaVoice to Amazon (which they took back for a full credit even though the package had obviously been opened) and to get Dragon. That's right - the IBM technician said Dragon is a better product. Well, I ordered Dragon Preferred from Amazon and set-up was a breeze compared to ViaVoice. About 5 minutes of reading to the computer to adjust to my voice vs. 35 minutes for ViaVoice. Installing macros (addresses, common phrases, etc. where you say a couple of words and the whole address or paragraph comes up) was easy. One annoyance with the macros is that you always have to reset the font and size for each macro. I use Times New Roman 12-point and had to set it every time. The default font is something weird and the default size is 8-point. If you don't reset it, the macros show up in your letter in the 8-point size. Training new words is very simple and quick. Dragon says it is 99% accurate - I think that's a bit of a stretch, but I find that Dragon will make maybe 2-3 mistakes in a typical 3-4 paragraph letter that I dictate, including all the medical jargon. I can live with that - it is comparable to what I was used to with my old ViaVoice program. Correction is easy - either say Select _ and then choose the correct spelling from the dropdown list, or highlight the misspelled word and push the minus (-) sign on the numeric keypad. Dragon is very good when you have to correct a single word; not as hot if you have to correct a phrase or macro. It takes maybe 15-30 seconds to make corrections to the letter once I have finished dictating. Another annoyance is that Dragon doesn't seem to learn from it's mistakes. If, for example, I say Andersen, it will type Anderson no matter how many times I run the correction window, spelling the word ending with -sen not -son. ViaVoice, at least my old version, would usually spell the word correctly after I had corrected it once or twice. Another annoyance is that when I am dictating, often Dragon seems to hold back on typing, then suddenly an entire sentence will appear. It does show what you are dictating in a little box at the top of the screen though. ViaVoice shows every word as soon as you dictate it. I have had no problems with the microphone that came with Dragon - it's not the most comfortable, but it doesn't seem to be adversely affecting the dictation quality. Unless you have money to burn, there's probably no reason to buy a more expensive microphone. Overall, I am pretty happy with Dragon Preferred. I have been using it for a couple of weeks now, and it does what I need it to do. It is a definite improvement over my old IBM ViaVoice Executive 98 version. I am not sure I can accurately rate ViaVoice 10 because of my computer's "hostile environment". However, even the IBM technician said Dragon is a better product. If you have Windows XP service pack 2, don't even think of getting ViaVoice.
 Continuous speech recognition needs a VERY fast CPU and RAM September 14, 2004
FERNANDO CASSIA (Buenos Aires, Argentina)
26 out of 28 found this review helpful
Those that say this software is "unstable" do not take into consideration the VERY high cpu usage needed to perform continuous speech recognition (as ooposed to "discrete" speech dictation used in IBM VoiceType, which was possible on a Pentium 1 233 Mhz, and required users to pause between words).
In short: get a gigabyte of ram, specially if you're using WinXP. If you run Win2000 with 512MB ram, try to add an extra 256mb stick.
And your cpu should be at the very least a 2Ghz Pentium 4, or higher, despite what the box claims. With these requirements in mind, the software works as advertised in my experience.
 Might change my fiance's life!!!!! September 24, 2005
Howard Lee (Islandton, SC United States)
11 out of 12 found this review helpful
My girlfriend has Multiple Sclerosis and has become limited in her ability to type. She was using an on-screen keyboard with a mouse, when I met her. One day I watched her type a short note to her mother she spent hours on two paragraphs. I told her that there had to be a better way and after a short search found ViaVoice. It was affordable and we decided to give it a try. We installed it the day it came and right away she was able to use its built in word processor to write letters to friends and family. We've only been working with it for 2 weeks, now, but it is a vast improvement over the onscreen keyboard. She can dictate a letter and make corrections in a fraction of the time possible before.
I hate that it seems tied to Microsoft but it seems to be adaptable to other software systems. We are learning togather, it's fun.
You should find something else. February 9, 2006
I bought it (US)
10 out of 11 found this review helpful
I just bought this product and tried to install it. It did not install right. Naturally I called customer service at Nuance. Then there comes the surprise. They give you free tech support only for first time on installation problem. From second time, you have to pay about $19 for support. I did not remember if it was one time fee or each time. Another surprise took place when I finally could talk to tech rep after about 10 min. wait. First thing he told me was that there are compatibility issues with Windows XP SP2. Tech Rep also told me that because of this, there is a really good chance you will have to call tech support more than twice which means you will have to pay and best thing I can do is to return this product and get refund.
as for installation problem, I did not even try to fix it knowing that this will have another problem.
If you are thinking to buy this item anyway you really have to make sure you are not using XP SP2 or they have already fixed this problem
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