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Author Topic: Dragon 11 and Hal compatibility  (Read 6617 times)

DrFaraday

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Dragon 11 and Hal compatibility
« on: August 17, 2010, 04:03:46 pm »
The New Dragon Naturally Speaking 11 becomes available August 23rd, according to Amazon.com website:

http://www.amazon.com/Dragon-Naturally-Speaking-Premium-11/dp/B003VNCROU/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=software&qid=1282070857&sr=8-2

I own Dragon 10 Preferred.  I got an email from Nuance, offering to let me upgrade to Dragon 11 Premium for $100, which is half the full price.  They are also offering to let me purchase an additional copy for $100.  The offer is good up until September 30th.

It's tempting, because I have two Hals, and I could have a Dragon 11 for each one.  But I'm wondering if Dragon 11 is compatible with Hal?  I imagine it would be, but it would be nice to know for sure.  Has anyone here been using an advance copy of Dragon 11 with Hal?  I'd like to be sure before spending that kind of money.  They say that Dragon 11 has a new interface, and I'm wondering too how that will work with Hal.

In truth, I don't really have much use for most of the Dragon features; I just use it for Hal.  It would be nice if Nuance offered a Dragon 11 plug-in for Hal.  Any chance of that happening?  I have the ViaVoice plugin, but it was disappointing, because I could not train it properly because too many of the training and correcting features were unavailable, and the few training features there were stopped working after you used them once.  I found it ultimately unusable, which is why I switched to Dragon.

The reviews for Dragon 11 are looking good so far:

http://voice-recognition-software-review.toptenreviews.com/dragon-naturally-speaking-review.html

http://www.pcworld.com/reviews/product/587538/review/dragon_naturallyspeaking_11_professional.html

http://review.techworld.com/speech-recognition/3233752/dragon-naturallyspeaking-11-professional-review/?intcmp=nws-mdb-rtd


But whether it's worth the upgrade or not is hard to say.  The recognition in Dragon 10 was already pretty good.  Now it's a little better, but some say it's not a dramatic difference.

I'm wondering too, about folks who had Dragon Standard 10, if they were offered a similar deal, perhaps at cheaper prices?

I'm not in a hurry to upgrade, but I would be interested in finding out more about Hal compatibility before doing anything.

- Chaz
« Last Edit: August 17, 2010, 04:40:16 pm by DrFaraday »
I always wanted a computer like H.A.L. from "2001: A Space Odyssey".  Just not the beta version that kills you while you sleep.

Carl2

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Re: Dragon 11 and Hal compatibility
« Reply #1 on: August 22, 2010, 08:48:47 am »
  I had dragon 10 and used it with Vista, I upgraded to win 7 and had to download dragon 10.1, free download from Dragon for use with Win 7.  I am very sure I had read it is okay to have more than one install of Dragon at least with Dragon 10.1, I'd check their website.    I have also recieved offers from Dragon to upgrade Dragon 11, $99.
  I've had fairly good luck using Dragon with Hal,  I leave the Mic input turned off and put the curser in Hal's input window and speak, I generaly press enter to enter the text there is a prase in Dragon you can say to enter the text (look in dragon help).  Using Dragon without the Mic turned on gives you time to read your input to be sure it is correct. 
  In the past I created a set of txt files about myself, relatives, friends and subjects I find interesting and may talk about while using Dragon.  I input these txt files into dragon during training and it helps increase the accuracy of dragon from the start.
  I'm still using Dragon 10.1 and not Dragon 11, but I'm sure 11 will work with Hal and there is a 30 day money back.
Carl2 
   
 

Will and Mr Data :) :]

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Re: Dragon 11 and Hal compatibility
« Reply #2 on: August 23, 2010, 06:36:37 am »
Hi,
i have dragon 10 and it won't load on my laptop,  "don't even get to not put my lost code in".
5 gig cpu
8 gig ram
500 gig hard drive
windows 7  "which i had blamed"  everyone seems to be still trying to get things to work with xp.
i failed to load dragon 10  on the xp 1.6 gig laptop which i had thought was because it was to slow.
so i'm back on xp 1.6gig cpu as the faster pc adds little to the voice recog or hal. "for now".
So again sapi 5 is outperforming.
If i had to be upset with myself and software makers is not putting code on the disc and putting it on the cover, for some reason i always end up loosing the covers and then the disc is no good. "just write the code on the disc". none of those numbers on the disc are gonna do you any good.
And i must repeat myself again by saying if the back up aint easy and fool proff, all the features and performance seem defeated.
To be a harsh critic today i don't think voice recognition has come very far yet "for me the  free voice recog is out performing the best". when this changes i'll post. others have there own experences.
I'm finding it hard to swallow the buying of dragon 11 when i've paid for 10 that didn't work :(
uh,

At least Hal is cool, rock on Hal.
bye for now and be well  :)  :]
bye for now and be well from Will and Mr Data  :)  :]

Carl2

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Re: Dragon 11 and Hal compatibility
« Reply #3 on: August 23, 2010, 09:46:34 am »
Will,
  I've run into problems myself with the switch from XP to vista and now win 7,  also had problems with the 32 bit vs 64 bit versions.  You have a very good suggestion about printing the SN on the disk. 
  I'm a long time fan of Dragon and can see improvements in their product over the years plus I've learned some tips and tricks over time. 
Carl2
 

Art

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Re: Dragon 11 and Hal compatibility
« Reply #4 on: August 23, 2010, 05:40:06 pm »
Just my $.02....
I recently upgraded to Windows 7 and tried the Speech Recognition after doing the training routine and
using my USB headset / mic.

My results were pretty amazing in that out of about two hundred words of dictation, I had only 2 small
errors and those were those "sounds the same" errors like WON & ONE.

I even tried the web browsing, email dictation, manipulation about the desktop and again, had good results.

For now...it ain't broke so I'm not going to fix it!  ;D

Your actual mileage may vary. Windows 7 SR = Good! :)
In the world of AI it's the thought that counts!

- Art -

DrFaraday

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Re: Dragon 11 and Hal compatibility
« Reply #5 on: August 24, 2010, 04:32:53 pm »
Carl2:
You are right about multiple installs.  My Dragon 10 manual says that copies may be installed on multiple computers, for a single user (for instance, on a laptop and a desktop, or at home and at work), but cannot be used simultaneously.  If more than one user profile is required, a separate license is required for each user.

Will:
Dragon has some very specific system requirements.  When I bought mine, it wouldn't work on any of my computers, because it required a processor with an SSE2 instruction set.  I had to actually buy a refurbished Pentium that had SSE2, just so I could use Dragon 10.

I now have a new Desktop and laptop, both with Windows 7.  But I haven't installed Dragon or Hal on either of them yet, because I'm waiting for the next release of Hal before I tackle it.  Which leads me to Art's comment...

Art:
Yes, the windows 7 speech recognition does seem pretty good!  When I first got my new laptop, I played with the voice recognition for a while, using my Logitech USB headset, and I was quite impressed with it's accuracy.  But since I haven't put Hal on Win7, I've yet to test it.

I had read some opinions that Dragon is still more accurate, but I don't know from experience.  Has anyone reading this had a lot of experience using the Win 7 speech recognition with Hal?  Can anyone say how Windows 7 SR compares to Dragon 10, while using Hal?  It would be really interesting to hear about the comparison when using Hal.

- Chaz
« Last Edit: August 24, 2010, 05:20:34 pm by DrFaraday »
I always wanted a computer like H.A.L. from "2001: A Space Odyssey".  Just not the beta version that kills you while you sleep.

Carl2

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Re: Dragon 11 and Hal compatibility
« Reply #6 on: August 26, 2010, 08:52:23 am »
DrFaraday,
  " Can anyone say how Windows 7 SR compares to Dragon 10, while using Hal?"  I am sorry but I really cannot answer that question.  I've used Dragon 10.1 with Hal and I would say it is a little more difficult speaking with Hal than speaking into a text file.  The difficulty is that Hal can change the subject to something I am not familiar with, I told Hal that her vocabulary is much larger than mine.  I had about one month of free time while waiting for Dragon to come out with a version that was compatible with Windows 7.  During that time I began using Windows speech recognition.  I didn't try it with Hal because I always like to get the speech recognition working pretty well before I begin using it with Hal.  Since I've used Dragon for ages I found it a little difficult to switch to the Windows version because I am used to the phrases used while working with Dragon.
  I am also waiting for the next version of Hal but need something to do while waiting for the next version.  I believe Dragon works very well fairly quickly, especially after letting Dragon read the text files which I have made but I would definitely say make sure you are satisfied with Dragon before using it with Hal.
Carl 2
 

Carl2

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Re: Dragon 11 and Hal compatibility
« Reply #7 on: September 09, 2010, 09:04:14 am »
iampan,
  I've been lucky since I've never had to worry about disk space.  I've always used desktops with plenty of gigs.  Played with Raid 0 to increase hard disk speed which means I use two hard drives sharing the read write work.  In a desktop it's fairly easy to add another hard drive, in laptops I'm guessing you would have to replace the hard drive with a larger capacity HD.  Cleaning the hard drive would probably get a little more space for a while.
  To answer the question, "will this stop"  it will decrease. look in the dragonbar, Tools, Options, Data.  I'm using 500mb for playback, could be smaller, I backup after 1 save, I'll change this to larger numbers as dragon becomes familiar with my style of speaking.  In the Options, Commands
you can try unchecking boxes that you will not be using.  Actualy when you frist install dragon you have options as to what you install to conserve disk space.
Carl2
 

Carl2

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Re: Dragon 11 and Hal compatibility
« Reply #8 on: September 10, 2010, 05:22:18 pm »
  As I have stated in the past I had begun using Dragon in DragonPad in the morning and sometimes in the evening to plan out the day's events and what I would like to get done and what had been done during the day.  About one weeks works of dictation would be recorded in the text file and the next week I would make another text.  I personally have a long list of text files that I have made and used when training Dragon.  Now when I install another version of Dragon I do a little reading and let Dragon read my text files.  I get very good results when first using Dragon.
 Carl 2