Customer Reviews

Dragon NaturallySpeaking 9 Standard [OLD VERSION]

5 star:		(65)
4 star:		(43)
3 star:		(29)
2 star:		(12)
1 star:		(26)

 

 

UNCORRECTED VERSION
I dictated this review using Dragon NaturallySpeaking number nine. The first half of the review is the raw version, just as Dragon NaturallySpeaking transcribed it. Then I will correct the review so you can judge how well the program performs.

I will admit my expectations were low. I had previously owned an earlier version of a Dragon NaturallySpeaking, but it performed so poorly I removed it from the computer. I also seem to remember that Windows came with a version of the speech recognition that also did not work well enough to be worth the bother. I quit using it as well. The problem with each of these programs was that, although they did transcribe many words correctly, they made so many mistakes it turned out just to be easier to type myself more, since I generate a lot of letters for my business, to hire a transcription service.

I bought a Dragon NaturallySpeaking version 9, standard version, on only among on a whim. Magazine reviews of the program had been a favorable, and the price was only $99. Still, I expected poor results. As you have seen however, the program does a remarkably good job of transcribing my speech. This is with very little training -- no more than a few minutes. I now find that it is quicker to take dictate into Dragon NaturallySpeaking and later go back and correct the errors than it is to just type myself.

Still, the product does have a few drawbacks.

Number one: the user license is for only one person. Even if you install the software on only one computer, you must still pay in nuance separate licensing fee for each person who uses the program. Imagine having to pay a separate licensing fee for each person who uses Microsoft Word or Adobe Acrobat elements. That's crazy, and it just passes me off.

Number two: although I have a 3.2 GHz computer, Dragon NaturallySpeaking does seem to noticeably slow down the machine's performance.

Number three: I'm a little worried about the programs stability and compatibility. It sometimes seems to freeze for 30 seconds or so. It will sometimes accept dictation into Microsoft Access, other times it accepts the dictation then immediately erases the result. I've also found that my mission-critical retrospect backup software isn't working.

[Typed adendum: I've also discovered (Win XP Pro, Office 2003): DNat.Speaking
1) damages MS Access so that quitting Access leaves an orphan instance of Access running--and you can't then reopen Access.
2) Damages MS Word so that you can no longer select text with the mouse.
3) Damages Adobe Acrobat Standard so that the only way to get it's OCR function to work is to restart the computer]

Number four: related to number three is Nuance software's policy of charging for technical assistance. I'm worried that the company puts out a product with obvious flaws [it's seeing number three above], then turns fixing those problems into a profit center.

Finally, I've discovered that dictating letters and reports results and of very different prose style then typing does. Part of the reason is that when you're dictating you must think carefully about each sentence, but once the sentence is a dictated there's no good way to go back to change it. Your output is a wordier. Your thoughts and paragraphs are much less tightly structured. That means that Dragon NaturallySpeaking is good for in a formal e-mails and job progress notes, and for highly structured, repetitive, business reports. It is much less useful for writing that requires careful thought and structure.

-------------------------

CORRECTED VERSION; I've ALL CAPSed corrections.
I dictated this review using Dragon NaturallySpeaking 9.0. The first half of the review is the raw version, just as Dragon NaturallySpeaking transcribed it. Then I will correct the review so you can judge how well the program performs.

I will admit my expectations were low. I had previously owned an earlier version of XXaXX Dragon NaturallySpeaking, but it performed so poorly I removed it from the computer. I also seem to remember that Windows came with a version of the speech recognition that also did not work well enough to be worth the bother. I quit using it as well. The problem with each of these programs was that, although they did transcribe many words correctly, they made so many mistakes it turned out just to be easier to type myself, OR since I generate a lot of letters for my business, to hire a transcription service.

I bought XXaXX Dragon NaturallySpeaking version 9, standard version, on XX a whim. Magazine reviews of the program had been a favorable, and the price was only $99. Still, I expected poor results. As you have seen however, the program does a remarkably good job of transcribing my speech. This is with very little training -- no more than a few minutes. I now find that it is quicker to XXtakeXX dictate into Dragon NaturallySpeaking and later go back and correct the errors than it is to just type myself.

Still, the product does have a few drawbacks.

#1 The user license is for only one person. Even if you install the software on only one computer, you must still pay XXinXX Nuance A separate licensing fee for each person who uses the program. Imagine having to pay a separate licensing fee for each person who uses Microsoft Word or Adobe Acrobat Elements. That's crazy, and it just PISSES me off.

#2: Although I have a 3.2 GHz computer, Dragon NaturallySpeaking does seem to noticeably slow down the machine's performance.

#3: I'm a little worried about the programs stability and compatibility. It sometimes seems to freeze for 30 seconds or so. It will sometimes accept dictation into Microsoft Access, other times it accepts the dictation then immediately erases the result. I've also found that my mission-critical Retrospect backup software isn't working.

#4: Related to number three is Nuance Software's policy of charging for technical assistance. I'm worried that the company puts out a product with obvious flaws [SEE number three above], then turns fixing those problems into a profit center.

Finally, I've discovered that dictating letters and reports results XXand ofXX IN A very different prose style THAN typing does. Part of the reason is that when you're dictating you must think carefully about each sentence, but once the sentence is XXaXX dictated there's no good way to go back to change it. Your output is a wordier. Your thoughts and paragraphs are much less tightly structured. That means that Dragon NaturallySpeaking is good for XXin aXX INformal e-mails and job progress notes, and for highly structured, repetitive, business reports. It is much less useful for writing that requires careful thought and structurING.

I was impressed with Dragon NaturallySpeaking 8, but version 9 is vastly improved in terms of speech recognition. Version 8 was excellent; perhaps in the 95% range. Version 9 comes very close to 100% right out of the box, without any special training.

Nuance is clear about the product requirements. A processor faster than 1Ghz is required along with at least 1GB of RAM (with 512MB minimum free). At least 650 MB of drive space is required.

Installation on a computer running Windows XP SP 2 was entirely uneventful. Setting NaturallySpeaking v9 up with two different microphones was a snap. Recognition in a variety of applications was literally 100% without any training. It was, in fact, amazing. Setting the program up to run with a digital voice recorder, however, didn't go so smoothly - and that's why my rating is only 3 stars for what technologically is a 5 star product.

Nuance's tech support is absolutely awful. They charge $ 9.95 even for an e-mail response, which they call an "incident." The manual has virtually no information on troubleshooting. Their online knowledgebase is not well indexed. Or, more accurately, they are running it on a particularly poor platform. Their user community is sparsely used and a lot of the information is useless.

Nuance should learn that turning out a superior product isn't enough. It has to be supported competently as well and it is here that Nuance falls flat on its face.

On the other hand, I recognize that the product is working with two microphones and hopefully I will find the answer to my problem somewhere, some day. As a long-time (and long-suffering) voice recognition software user, I will say the accuracy of NaturallySpeaking 9 is phenomenal. Only the support stinks.

Jerry

Every now and then you get a product that not only does exactly what it says it will do, but works better than expected. [PLEASE SEE AMENDED COMMENTS BELOW] I fooled around with voice recognition software packages about five years ago, and they were far more headache than they were worth. On a whim, and after seeing positive reviews on computer sites, I gave Dragon Naturally Speaking 9 (standard) a try. After a brief (20 minute) orientation and start up period, it was taking dictation almost flawlessly. Now that I've been using it for about a week, I'm approaching 100% accuracy. In fact, I've dictated this entire review without making any corrections (I guess if you find any errors, you'll realize that the software isn't infallible).

I use this software to dictate reports containing a lot of medical terminology (I'm using the standard version, not the medical version). Apparently, it had scanned my existing documents to add my specialized words to its vocabulary before I even started, and it learns new words quickly. Its built-in list of places and names is impressive. I find it perfect for responding to e-mails, although I tend to be wordier than I would be if I were typing.

Another reviewer commented on its clunky command recognition. I admit that I use the mouse to move the cursor and click commands, and haven't tried the software for those functions. It's certainly not worth the trouble for spreadsheets. The power of the software is in saving you from typing text documents.

Overall, I'm extremely impressed, and my wrists are much less sore. I know I sound like I work for the manufacturer with this glowing review. I don't, I'm just a pleasantly surprised consumer.

AMENDED REVIEW (AFTER 6 MONTHS OF USE)

Some strong concerns that you should consider:

- software is unstable. It crashes my computer fairly often, and I've lost my user files several times. This means I need to reinstall and/or create a new user file, and the learning process needs to start all over. As mentioned by others, support is either nonexistent or prohibitively expensive, which is infuriating. Don't build a big database of specialized words ... you'll likely lose it soon enough.

- software is GREAT at taking dictation for formal documents; not so good at sentence fragments (eg, quick notes and emails). It searches for context and correct sentence structure. It often inserts words it thinks I want (usually incorrectly). To improve accuracy, you need to speak in full sentences, which often means it takes much more time than typing.

- basically, between the start-up time, correction time, and instability, you can't do anything quickly with the software. You need to make a major time investment. Great for long documents (or if you have typing problems), but useless for casual needs like notes, emails.

So the software still does exactly what it says it will do. I just find it much less useful than I first thought.

I haven't even used this product yet, but I have found out some important information that I wanted to share when comparing the "Standard" edition with the "Preferred" edition. I looked all around trying to find out what the actual differences were and could not find specific information even on the company's website. It was not until I ordered the "Standard" edition and received it that I found out it was not going to work for my needs. I have now returned it, and ordered the "Preferred" edition and am waiting for it to arrive. On the side of the box of the "Standard" edition it shows that the following items do NOT work with the "Standard" edition:
~~~~
* Microsoft Excel
* Automatically transcribe recordings from handheld digital recorders, Pocket PC's or Palm Tungsten
* Wireless microphone support, including Bluetooth
* Includes Nuance RealSpeak for turning text into human-sounding speech
* Play back your dictation for easier correction and proofing
* Insert your signature, logo or boilerplate text with a simple voice command
* Import/export your user files to use on any PC with Dragon Naturally Speaking.
~~~~~
Again, all of the above items are NOT included as part of the "Standard" edition, but are included on the "Preferred" edition. In my case, I hope to use the software both at home and at the office. Though it's true that only one person can use the software, I called the software company and you can indeed install it onto up to 5 computers. If you're not able to import/export your user files, then you're going to have to go through the "training" process with each computer, which is a pain. Not having complete access using Excel is another issue for me. Yes, you might be able to use the Standard edition in some ways with Excel, but it's not integrated as it is with the "Preferred" edition.

This is not a negative review of the product, but it's a "negative" review of the information given so that you can compare the products and make an educated decision as to which edition is going to work best for you. There is a great cost difference between the products, but if you are going to be using it on more than one computer, I think it's going to be a real hassle to have to "train" the software more than once and the import/export option of the "Preferred" edition might make it worth your while. . . along with the other features. . . . to consider using the upgraded edition.
Dragon NaturallySpeaking 9 Preferred Speech Recognition

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Update - 9/19/07
I have been using this product, off and on, for a little over a month now. Here's my take on it. . . . If you are either a slow typist, or have a disability which does not allow you to type, then I think that this software is probably going to be helpful for you. The box says that most people type no more than 40 words per minute. I type over twice that. I use this software when I want to send a letter to a friend. I would not use this for business purposes. You spend a lot of time correcting and "training" the system. I find far fewer mistakes when I'm typing it myself than when I'm using this software. But again, I type relatively fast. Having spent a LOT of extra money to purchase the "Preferred" edition, I really wish I had stuck with the "Standard" edition. Using it for Excel (not available on the Standard edition) is cumbersome at best, and being that often times numbers are so important in spreadsheets, it's quite "error prone" and correcting a lot of numbers in a spreadsheet is not fun. Again, I'm not really knocking the software. I think it does a relatively good job overall, and I'm sure that if you take the time to make all of the corrections it gets better. . .. but. . . I think if you type fast to begin with, you're probably not going to be too happy with this software.

I have tried the voice recognition software that comes with the Microsoft Office XP and after training it and giving it a run-through it just produced too many errors. So I had given up on the voice recognition for my computer a couple of years ago.

This product I decided to try after reading David Pogue's article about it in the New York Times. And as advertised and described in his article it is accurate, it is fast and it is a huge time saver.

If you are interested in typing less because of repetitive stress injuries or if you are simply interested in speeding up the amount of time it takes to "write" a document on a computer you should check this out. And if you're smart about it, try to get a rebate from Amazon or from somewhere else so that the price is very reasonable.

By the way, when I was researching the product it wasn't clear to me that it works in all programs. But yes the program works in my e-mail program, on the Internet (for browsing and for email) and for word processing -- actually it works anywhere I've tried it.

PS this review was spoken not typed.

I TRIED FOR ABOUT A WEEK TO INSTALL THIS PROGRAM AND COULDN'T GET IT IN MY SYSTEM. I FINALLY FOUND SOMETHING IN FAQ THAT SAYS IT IS NOT COMPATIBLE WITH XP MEDIA EDITION. WOULD HAVE BEEN NICE TO KNOW THAT BEFORE I ORDERED IT.

I've wanted speech recognition that really works for a long time. At last it is here! I am using Dragon to write this review, and now using it to do my blog too.

It takes a little bit to get used to saying "period" to get the punctuations to show up, but I'm getting the hang of it.

The big suprise - I can control my mouse and PC with it too. I say "open Internet Explorer" and presto - there it is. I can surf the web by voice and use Yahoo IM too.

Cool.

Pros: Fast, accurate, intuitive, inexpensive
Cons: Missing vital feaures
Nuance has deliberately ommitted some basic functionality from the Standard edition. I found this out the hard way. When dictating for a half hour or more, the program locks up and displays an error about reaching the limit of its data capacity. According to the Nuance online knowledgebase, this is rectified by changing a simple setting in the program options of Dragon NaturallySpeaking 9. What they did not indicate however, is that in the Standard edition THERE IS NO WAY TO DO THIS! Something as simple as being able to allocate more than a half hour's worth of hard drive space is not possible in this program. You will have to stop dictating, exit the program, and restart the program to get another run. Nuance customer service's solution was for me to buy the Preferred edition to gain the freedom to determine my own max data size.

Dragon 9 is supposed to have Vista compatibility, via an update that you can get from Nuance. Unfortunately, the update does not work very well, especially in the area of commands. Imagine opening Outlook and giving Dragon the command for composing new mail or even checking mail, and watching it do nothing but move to another message in the inbox. Then, imagine going to the Nuance site to get support. You have to answer about a half-dozen questions and provide you key, even if you have a registered account that contains that key. Finally, you are told that support will cost you $9.95. Ten bucks to fix broken software?! It's no wonder they don't have a support forum; it would be filled with irate customers. I won't even go into the problems with getting the support person to comprehend the problem, except to say that the software did a better job of understanding me.

I've moved on to using the voice recognition in Vista which, contrary to a popular YouTube video, actually works pretty well. At least when I need help, I can get it for free.

A number of years ago, I entertained the idea of dictating my articles and or books. Dragon NaturallySpeaking seemed to be the most popular and perhaps most effective software at that time.

I found that the accuracy was shockingly high. But even with such high accuracy, it was almost unreadable. This was very similar to my experience with the Apple Newton. It turned out that very high is not good enough, and proofreading automated dictation is horrifically difficult, because when dictation software makes a mistake, in inserts a word that no spell check is going to flag -- and your eye tends to see what it expects.

I'm pleased to say however that speech recognition has come a long way, and Dragon Naturally Speaking 9 is so much better at context-based recognition that many previous problem have simply gone away.

Right out of the box it was markedly better, and with just a little effort at training, it is is already incredibly better at recognizing my vocabulary, odd speech, style, etc.

In fact, even though I type very fast (100+), I'm able to dictate documents more quickly than I can type. Corrections are sometimes more difficult using Dragon NaturallySpeaking but there is nothing that prevents me from putting my hands on the keyboard and making corrections manually; and the more I correct, the smarter it gets.

I write software (in addition to books and articles) and for many years it has been my goal to keep a running set of lab notes while I work. I know from personal experience that if I would only write down what I was doing while I was programming. I could save myself a great deal of time (again and again I would fix a problem and then forget the steps and have to reinvent the solution; or I'd wish I knew exactly what order of steps I took that broke what was "just working.")

Over the years. I've tried keeping a Lab Book, then an open Word document , and at 1 point I purchased an HP Jornada and made my notes in that. The problem with each of these plans was that I had to turn away from whatever I was working on to enter my notes; I quickly gave up on each approach.

My hope is that I can now take contemporaneous notes as I'm working using Dragon NaturallySpeaking on one machine, while programming on the other. If this works out the program will be worth far more than I paid for.

Who knows, maybe my next book will be partially dictated; sure would cut down on the pain in my wrists. In any case, I'm very impressed.

-j