Re: Software Speech (Re: ibm tts run-time engine purchasingalternatives)

["John G. Heim" <jheim@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

T. V. Raman wrote:
>Most of the crashes you are seeing -- both the  older ViaVoice
>and Software Dectalk are a result of their writing directly to
>the audio device using OSS.

DECtalk stops talking pretty regularly for me. In an hour I probably have 
to use the C-e C-s key sequence 2 or 3 times. But sometimes it stops when 
the machine is idle. It's no great shakes to restart it so it's more of a 
minor nuicance than it is a huge problem. It's a couple of seconds to 
realize it's down and then a couple more to restart it.  So I'm wasting 
maybe 10-15 seconds an hour restarting it.

JAWS for Windows stops sometimes too and that product costs $1200.  I used 
to have to restart JAWS 2 or 3 times a day. To be honest though, I now use 
version 7 and it almost never crashes.   My point is that IMO, for the 
price, DECtalk isn't too bad. I haven't tried flight or festival since I 
bought DECtalk 4.6. But I bought DECtalk because to my ear,  it was worth 
$50 for the added clarity of speech.  I would have bought ViaVoice had it 
been available because, again to my ear, it was the clearest of them all.

Honestly, I have no complaints with any of the linux stuff. Emacspeak, 
oralux, speakup, DECtalk,  ... Compared to the cost of other accessibility 
equipment and even compared to Windows products, they work really well and 
are either low cost or free. This stuff is really great.

I looked into a new "low cost" brailler  called a Jot A Dot. It was $345. I 
saw a new accessible cell phone announced recently for $200. JAWS for 
Windows is $1200.

Emacspeak flight, festival, and speakup are free. DECtalk is $50.  How can 
you complain?



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