Viavoice for Windows Pro Usb Edition 10.0

by IBM

Product Details

• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Shipping: This item is also available for shipping to select countries outside the U.S.
• ASIN: B00006IS9R
• Item model number: 45P8702
• Date first available at Amazon.com: September 4, 2002
• Average Customer Review: 2.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #24,325 in Software (See Top 100 in Software)
• Discontinued by manufacturer: Yes

Product Description

Amazon.com Product Description

ViaVoice Pro USB Edition 10 contains not only the award-winning, updated ViaVoice software, but also a Plantronics DSP-300 stereo headset microphone. Together with this excellent hardware, ViaVoice's new speech engine provides better, more accurate dictation and voice command accuracy in a host of PC applications.

The new speech engine comes complete with improved background noise adaptation, which leads to superior dictation and command accuracy. It's also snappier, able to quickly respond to dictation and voice commands. Starting with over 300,000 words in its vocabulary and backup dictionary, ViaVoice Pro USB Edition lets you add customized names, acronyms, addresses, terms, and more.

ViaVoice for Windows Pro USB Edition 10 works with a vast number of programs. Dictate, edit, format, and correct in ViaVoice's own SpeakPad, Microsoft Office XP and 2000, Outlook, Internet Explorer, AOL, Netscape Messenger, and other e-mail applications. You can also dictate directly and use customized voice commands in many other popular PC applications.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

21 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars A buggy program, December 25, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Viavoice for Windows Pro Usb Edition 10.0 (CD-ROM)

ViaVoice's recognition accuracy is excellent (although it is annoyingly inclined to pick up all sorts of surrounding sounds and interpret them as short words). My problem is that it's a buggy program beset by software conflicts, notably with MS Word and Outlook. These other programs may be slowed down dramatically - up to 90% - when ViaVoice is open even if one is not using it. These software conflicts are attested to by the extraorinarily lengthy Readme file, which only begins to list the numerous conflicts.

On some systems it apparently works fine while on others - often more powerful, state of the art systems - it just doesn't, and no-one seems to really know why. If you are one of the unlucky ones - or perhaps become one on a software or hardware change - the advice set out in the Readme file, and re-iterated by Microsoft on its website and by the ViaVoice technical support staff, is to disable functions in ViaVoice and the other programs that it interferes with until it works. You may or may not be willing to live with what's left.

Dragon seems a more robust program, but is far more costly.

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars I don't understand why this product is not more widely used, June 9, 2003

By 

K. Funk (Yakima, WA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Viavoice for Windows Pro Usb Edition 10.0 (CD-ROM)

I am a physician who dictates, on average, 5,000 word/day in patient records. I have been using ViaVoice exclusively for 2 years and am very happy with it's performance. I used release 8 with the medical vocabulary add-on initially, and recently upgraded to release 10. The upgrade has improved recognition.

The program works best with streams of text, particularly with the multisyllable technical terms. I average over 95% recognition and I can dictate very fast and still get good recognition, even though my computer is 2 years old. Unlike the other reviewer, I always dictate into "SpeakPad" and copy into "Word" if necessary. I very, very rarely have problems with the program picking up extraneous sounds, but if you breathe into the microphone it will do that.

On the downside: The User Manuel is pretty bad. The installation would be intimidating for an inexperienced user. There is lots and lots of discussion of using the program for program navigation and internet navigation. Why would you want to do that when it is quick and easy to do on a keyboard? This program is best used for text.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Cheap Microphone, January 26, 2004

By A Customer

This review is from: Viavoice for Windows Pro Usb Edition 10.0 (CD-ROM)

Watch out. The reviews that I had read before buying this product claimed that it came with a Plantronics DSP-300 stereo headset microphone but when I recieved it a cheap Andrea NC-61 was included. I paid the extra money believing I would recieve a quality microphone. For this reason alone I gave it a one star rating. I returned the product for a refund.