Dragon Dictate For Mac – Software Review

Dragon Dictate literally allows you to dictate to your Mac, but not only full scale documents but also to switch around applications too. The original idea behind this software was that trying to find the correct letters on a keyboard can slow you down and disrupt your creative thought process. This is certainly true if you don’t know how to touch type, of course.

When you open the box you will find a headset which is quite comfortable in use and allows you to dictate to your Mac. Of course, being a Mac and knowing how inclusive that is, you don’t have to use the headset as a mic. If you prefer, there’s a free Dragon Remote Microphone app that literally converts a users’s iPhone 3G, 3GS, iPhone 4, iPod Touch (4th gen), iPad and iPad 2 into a wireless microphone via WiFi.

You can download this free app by clicking here.

In this update v2.5, there are also new Facebook and Twitter commands, so you can say ‘post to Facebook’ or similar and of course capture tweets by saying ‘post that to Twitter’.

Of course, that’s the key question with any product but with the experience and pedigree of the Nuance software we’d be very surprised if it didn’t perform well.

Once you have loaded up the software, you will be presented with some text on screen to dictate. This gives the software information to learn and adapt its recognition algorithms to match your own speech patterns, it even takes into account background noise. As with all things, the more practice Dragon Dictate gets with hearing your voice, the greater accuracy will be displayed.

This software is very simple to install and set up and that’s another big bonus its got going for it. It is also compatible with Microsoft Word 2011 as well as Apple Mail, iCal, iChat, TextEdit, Safari and Pages.

In use we found the software to be very accurate but there were times when the incorrect word was ‘typed’ in. Fortunately it is very simple to amend this and you can do this verbally too. For example if you wanted to Dragon Dictate to write ‘the quick brown fox jumped’ and it actually wrote ‘the quick brown socks jumped’, you only need to say ‘delete socks’ and it is taken away immediately. The cursor also stays in place so you can then correct it by saying ‘fox’. This will then be added into the sentence. There is also a read back prompt enabling Dragon to read back what it has captured from your voice. This gives you another opportunity to correct any errors. When you have finished listening to the playback you can also say ‘Spelling Mode’ to spell check the complete document.

There’s also a quick set up guide in the box and this gives you a list of the most common commands to use to Dictate to express your wishes. When you’re just getting used to this software it is a good idea to have this list close by.

There’s no question that this software is a real time saver, it does take a little while to get used to but if you persevere you will be rewarded with your creative juices flowing and with time on your hands.

This software is currently on sale and available direct from Nuance for $174.99, down from $199.99 – you can pick it up here.

In the UK, it’s the same price for a physical shipment or an electronic download and it is £179.99 including VAT. You can find out more here.

If you’re from an educational establishment you can save around £30 on the above price.

This is a sponsored advertorial piece written on behalf of Nuance all opinions expressed are of theappwhisperer.com