a review by Tom Piper
In February 2009 I published a review of MacSpeech Dictate 1.0 with a speech recognition history and some glowing comments about Dictate like “persistance and patience have paid off in a great product.” To their credit, this program has gotten even better.
MacSpeech Dictate 1.5 is the first upgrade to their premier speech recognition solution for the Macintosh, introducing a new Vocabulary Editor, new English profile options, enhanced accuracy and much more. Users can add, delete, manage and train words in their profile's vocabulary using a new Vocabulary Editor which also lets people customize behaviors related to the included words, such as capitalization, pronunciation or the use of spacing surrounding the word.
The new MacSpeech Dictate v1.5.1 (a free maintenance upgrade) provides greater accuracy than ever before with up to 20% more accurate recognition than previous versions. From the initial profile accuracy rate, customers can continue to increase the accuracy rate of their MacSpeech Dictate profile up to 99%.
There are also new compatibility enhancements for working with Microsoft Word which include an automatic execution of the "Cache Document" command any time a Word document is opened while MacSpeech Dictate is launched. Also available on demand, the "Cache Document" command allows MacSpeech Dictate to read a document's contents, in order to navigate the document, and to enter and edit text.
Other enhancements include the addition of the top 100 web sites to the "Jump To" command options, a new Save Profile menu item for capturing Phrase Training information prior to Quitting, a new User Manual, and other enhancements and refinements to the user interface for a more efficient, intuitive experience.
MacSpeech Dictate is now the only desktop speech recognition solution for the Macintosh which provides unprecedented speech recognition accuracy with minimal training and works with existing Mac applications. It delivers a true Mac user experience, and conforms to behaviors already familiar to Macintosh fans worldwide. Beyond dictation, MacSpeech Dictate lets people perform basic navigation of their Mac and control it with their voice to launch applications, open new windows, execute menu commands, and other controls.
For more information, visit www.macspeech.com, where Macspeech Dictate can be purchased for $199 (or upgrade for $54.95 from version 1.3 or earlier). The program requires an Intel-based Mac, Mac OS X 10.5.6 or greater ("Leopard"). An Internet connection is also required for product registration, plus a MacSpeech-certified noise-cancelling microphone (included in box). If you are looking for a quick and reliable way to convert speech-to-text, and/or verbally control many commands on your Mac, this is the product to buy.
Think it . . . speak it . . . create it . . . speech recognition at its best!
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