November 1997

Dragon Systems
320 Nevada Street
Newton, MA 02160
Ph: 617-965-5200;
Fx: 617-630-9707
Web site: www.dragonsys.com

Price: $349.

System Requirements
Size: 1.4” (H) x 9.5” (W) x 6.5” (D).
Minimum: 133MHz Pentium
Processor IBM-compatible PC.
Operating System: Windows 95 or Windows NT 4.0.
Hardware: Industry-standard 16bit sound card or built-in audio systems on desktops and portables, including the Creative Labs SoundBlaster 16 and other selected cards.

Memory Requirements
Windows 95 — 32 MB
Windows NT — 48 MB

Throw out your keyboards. Dragon Systems has a better way to type words into the computer. Dragon Systems’ revolutionary NaturallySpeaking is an amazingly accurate continuous speech recognition software product. Using this software and its high-quality headset (included), you can dictate quickly and accurately into the NaturallySpeaking application. Dragon Systems claims speeds of up to 150 words per minute and better, which is quite impressive indeed.

INSTALLATION
Installation was a breeze. The software is contained on a single CDROM, which we installed without any difficulty. After installing the software, we had to initiate a training procedure for the software to recognize our voice. Dragon Systems includes novels that you can read to better acquaint the software with your voice. Two of the available works include Dr Arthur C. Clarke’s 3001: The Final Odyssey and Dave Barry’s Dave Barry in Cyberspace. We chose the latter and read the text into the NaturallySpeaking software. Our only problem was that the novel so funny that our engineer found himself laughing as he was reading. We’re not sure how much that affected the recognition accuracy of NaturallySpeaking, but we’re sure it didn’t help!

DOCUMENTATION
The documentation included a Getting Started user’s guide, although, to be frank, we didn’t use it. The software was easy enough to figure out without it. A Quick Reference guide containing all the voice commands was also included. We found this piece of documentation very helpful in acquainting us with the product’s features.

Surprisingly, the main user’s guide didn’t contain a complete listing of all the voice commands. So, you have to be careful not to lose the Quick Reference guide. We would have preferred a copy of the Quick Reference guide — with its complete listing of voice commands — in the main user’s guide, since these thin reference guides tend to get lost or buried between think manuals on the bookshelf.

FEATURES

• True continuous speech recognition.
• 95 percent and higher accuracy ratings.
• 230,000+ total vocabulary.
• Customizable 30,000 word active vocabulary.
• Delayed correction capability.
• Adapts to your voice to become more accurate as you use the system.
• “Select-and-Say” — select text through your voice and then replace it with a new word, or add formatting.
• Dictation shorthand to replace spoken text with other text.
• Natural spelling — just say the letter “a” instead of using military lingo (for example, “alpha”).

OPERATIONAL TESTING
In a word — amazing! We were blown away by the accuracy with which NaturallySpeaking could detect our voice and translate it to text. One of our tests included reading some of the reviews we did in the CTI Labs section of a prior issue. NaturallySpeaking was impressively accurate.

Recognizing proper names, such as Dialogic or RightFax, posed a bit of a hurdle. Funny thing, it detected Microsoft with no problem. Go figure.

We wanted NaturallySpeaking to learn some of the more obscure CTI companies, so we had the Vocabulary Builder scan one of our review files. It scanned the Word document and presented us with a dialog box with words it did not recognize. We then selected which words to add to the dictionary. The program then prompted us with each of the words for training. The Vocabulary Editor is similar to the Vocabulary Builder, except the Editor is one word at a time — not bulk training. To distinguish custom words from built-in dictionary words, custom words are designated by a “snowflake” icon next to the word.

Another test involved taking 100 words out of an article and dictating the text into NaturallySpeaking. The screen into which we dictated also displays a Tip of the Day. NaturallySpeaking got 93 out of 100 words correct, for a 93-percent accuracy rating. We decided to repeat the test with 100 other words since one pass of 100 words is not statistically valid. We needed a larger test sampling. The second test scored 96 out of 100 words. Averaging the two scores together, NaturallySpeaking scored a 94.5-percent accuracy rating. With further testing, and as NaturallySpeaking adapts to our engineer’s voice, even that percentage should grow.

ROOM FOR IMPROVEMENT
We did notice some inconsistency with the way the program dealt with the spelling of months. Certain months would be abbreviated, while others would not.

The minimum system requirements are a hefty 48 megabytes for Windows NT with a 133Mhz processor. This may be cost-prohibitive for the average user, but for the power and accuracy of this software, it’s likely worth it. We used a Pentium-200MMX with 64 megabytes of RAM.

We were going to suggest just one more improvement, but it seems Dragon Systems beat us to the punch. Multiple users should be able to use NaturallySpeaking on the same computer. Our version only allows one person to train their voice into the program. The version that was sent to us was a “justreleased, hot-off-the-presses” copy, which did not have this capability. However, we recently read a press release from Dragon Systems, stating that the next release offers the capability to allow multiple users to use the program on the same machine.

CONCLUSION
Dragon System’s NaturallySpeaking is the finest, most accurate, continuous speech recognition software we have seen to date. This product is perfect for individuals who don’t type well, as well as lawyers, professionals, and doctors, who tend to use their own jargon. People with carpal tunnel syndrome or people with disabilities will find this product especially useful. General users will also see benefits, although they will need a quiet cubicle, with little background noise, to prevent the accuracy from dwindling . Dragon Systems’ NaturallySpeaking is, without doubt, a great productivity enhancer, and comes highly recommended by CTI Labs.