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tagged: Free Speech Recognition and Windows 7
Free Speech Recognition and Windows 7.
So this morning I woke up and decided I wanted to do something new. Every so often I have some free time I like to take that free time to play around with the new features of Windows 7. I have to say, Windows 7 is probably the most impressive Windows operating system I’ve seen yet. It runs well on moderately sized computers, it looks great, it’s very simple to use; and even after eight months of using it I still find cool features I had never used before.
I’ve always been fascinated by voice technology. The idea of talking to your computer and getting it to do what you want is just so appealing. In the past, programs like Dragon Dictate & IBM ViaVoice were the leaders. But the systems never really seemed to work the way they should. So I gave up on voice technology. That is until today.
Windows 7 has speech recognition built directly into it. So I decided to play with it. To my surprise Windows 7 speech recognition works well with a minimum of training. It’s not perfect, but I am using it to write this blog post. Here’s how to enable Windows 7 speech recognition so you can try it for yourself.
How to use Windows 7 Speech Recognition.
Before speech recognition works properly, there a few things we’ll have to do:
First you’ll need a good microphone. Avoid desktop microphones as though pick up a lot of noise around the room. Background noise can cause really unpredictable results. I recommend a headset microphone. I’m currently using a $15.00 Logitech headset that I usually use for gaming and the results are pretty good.
Set up the microphone:
- Open speech recognition by clicking the start button, click control panel, click control panel, click ease of access, now click speech recognition.
- Click setup microphone.
- Follow the instructions on the screen.
Start speech recognition:
- Open speech recognition by clicking the start button, click control panel, click control panel, click ease of access, now click speech recognition.
- Click Start Speech Recognition.
Once speech recognition has been enabled, just say “Start WordPad” and Windows 7 speech recognition will open Wordpad for you. Now just talk to your computer and you might be surprised to see how well the system recognizes your voice already.
This is just the tip of the iceberg for voice recognition in Windows 7. You can improve the speech recognition by training your voice. So far I have really enjoyed playing with this feature and I hope you will as well.
Tell me how it worked for you and share your experiences in the comments below.
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