Dragon torture

[Random]

It may just make me totally batty. Not that there's any shortage of unbearable things, but this ranks right up there among the worst torments of losing my hands.

Sometimes it works pretty well, but most of the time it is incredibly slow and moody. Sometimes it writes things that bear not even a phonetic relationship to what I've said. I have learned that using the word I want in a common context helps it get the word right, and then I just delete everything else. But sometimes everything is on and I just talk and talk, and it takes several minutes for it to start to write -- literally, several minutes. Sometimes it eventually comes up with everything I've said -- including all the swearing I did it that I have then to wait for it to finish. That seems to vary randomly, and irrespective of whether I've tried turning the microphone on and off to get it to start registering.

Do you think it's just a memory problem? I got four gigs of RAM to try to avoid this kind of annoyance. Any ideas?

[Lewis]

Dragon performance is contingent upon 1) computer, 2) microphone, and 3) user.

Can you give us more information about your setup including your computer specifications and type of microphone?

Random issues can sometimes be solved by performing defragmentation on the hard drive.

[PN]

Randy, I would recommend that you follow Lewis' advice. 4 GB of RAM is plenty so it is not a memory problem.

Intel iMac
Core 2 Duo
4 GB RAM
Windows XP SP2
DNS 10.1 Pro
Plantronics C550-USB headset

[Random]

It did flesh today "attempting to recover from low system resources." I do tend to have a lot of things open, but I thought for a 4gb of RAM would prevent problems.

Dell Vostro I got last year. Does that tell you enough? I’Ll attach the sales info if i scanned to the right format.

4gb ram. It says only three, but the woman assured me that's just for some random reason I didn't understand about what it recognizes or something, but it was really 4GB. My computer guy -- disastrous as it turned out to be -- seemed to understand and accept this explanation. And when I look at help it does say nearly 4 GB physical memory available.

Windows XP pro, service pack three, version 5.1

DNS 10.10.000.078

i can’t find info on the headset but it’s wired (though also have plantronics wireless with a bit worse performance). When things work, the headset works fine.

Thanks.

no dice on the attacment. Will try tomorrow.

[Van Quad]

Shouldn't happen with a new computer.

But I know what you mean about the moodiness of the program. I have posted in this forum before about my DragonDictate woes. Frequently it will place the proper series of words second on the list, and something wacky in the number one position. It's like it's mocking you. But I strongly suspect my problem and your problem is microphone. I'm using an older USB model that I used with my version 7 computer. And it was a cranky version.

[Random]

Can anyone point me to defrag instructions?

[PN]

Go to START, ALL PROGRAMS, ACCESSORIES, SYSTEM TOOLS and click on DISK DEFRAGMENTER.

Keep us posted.

[Noname33]

Try cleaning stuff up.
http://www.iobit.com/advancedwindowscareper.html
Also uninstall programs your not using, killing unused processes will greatly improve your speed. To uninstall go to Control Panel > Add or Remove Programs
A reinstall of windows always helps too! (not recommended)
The reason it says you only have 3.5gigs of ram is because your running a 32bit operating system, which can only recognize 3.5gigs of ram. To use 4+ gigs you must run a 64bit operating system and have a 64bit processor. I wouldn't recommend upgrading because you would need vista which would counter speeding up your pc.

If you want more tips PM me.

[takenaback]

I wouldn't recommend upgrading because you would need vista which would counter speeding up your pc.

I'm pretty sure you can get 64bit xp.

[gypsylady]

Darn I just hit my laptop with a rubber mallet and the screen changed colors

[dan_nc]

It did flesh today "attempting to recover from low system resources." I do tend to have a lot of things open, but I thought for a 4gb of RAM would prevent problems.


4GB should be plenty. It could be hardware (I've had bad RAM cause symptoms similar to yours), but my first thought is running software that has a memory leak or malware running on your system. Make sure your antivirus definitions are up-to-date.


4gb ram. It says only three, but the woman assured me that's just for some random reason I didn't understand about what it recognizes or something, but it was really 4GB. My computer guy -- disastrous as it turned out to be -- seemed to understand and accept this explanation. And when I look at help it does say nearly 4 GB physical memory available.

You can get a technical explanation of the why Windows reports less than 4GB here.
http://blogs.msdn.com/hiltonl/archive/2007/04/13/the-3gb-not-4gb-ram-problem.aspx

[David Berg]

Just a quick question. Should I even bother trying out Dragon on my laptop? It's a Thinkpad Z61m. It's built like a tank (pretty much literally, with the titanium cover), but the processor isn't anything to brag about. Intel Core Duo 1.66 and I have 4gb RAM, running Vista.

I've been tempted by the $30 deal on Dragon 10 at tigerdirect.com.

[PN]

Just a quick question. Should I even bother trying out Dragon on my laptop? It's a Thinkpad Z61m. It's built like a tank (pretty much literally, with the titanium cover), but the processor isn't anything to brag about. Intel Core Duo 1.66 and I have 4gb RAM, running Vista.

I've been tempted by the $30 deal on Dragon 10 at tigerdirect.com.
I think Dragon 10 will work okay with your Core Duo with 4GB RAM running Vista. I have a Dell laptop with the same processor with 1GB RAM running Windows XP without any problems. I understand the concern is Vista because it is somewhat demanding on system resources.

Recommended Specifications
CPU: Intel Pentium / 2.4 GHz processor (1.6 GHz dual core processor) or equivalent AMD processor

Memory: 1 GB RAM

[ChinaDoll]

I've been using dragon for a good 5 years...
if your cpu speed is 2.0 Ghz or faster it's good.
DNS Versions 6, 7, 8 works okay with 1Gb of RAM. versions 9. 10 should have at least 2 GB of RAM.

1- Sometimes, background noise will corrupt your user file and make the computer or DNS slow. The computer runing DNS slows down b/c it's trying to do too many things. SOLUTION, delete the user profile and retrain.

2- Norton antivirus sometimes makes the computer slow.

advanced users:
3- go to start, then run, type msconfig. goto startup and see whats all runing when u have your computer on. Stop all programs you don't need. then restart.

hope this helps.

[David Berg]

I think Dragon 10 will work okay with your Core Duo with 4GB RAM running Vista. I have a Dell laptop with the same processor with 1GB RAM running Windows XP without any problems. I understand the concern is Vista because it is somewhat demanding on system resources.

Thanks. I'm able to type just fine for now, but in less than a week my shoulder is getting sliced up by the surgeon and for awhile I won't have full use of one arm. I figure that for $30 it's worth giving Dragon a try if I have a reasonable shot at it working with my old Thinkpad. I'm in classes this semester and have several papers due in the next month. This looks like it might make life a little easier.

[rybread]

I use version 9.5 all the time. You just have to make sure you keep up on correcting mistakes and running the Acoustic Optimizer every few days. All of my typing is done using Dragon. It's about 90% accurate most of the time. It really makes a difference when you have enough memory and to restart your computer everyday. I found that out just recently. Got my memory resources going up to over 2 GB because I hadn't restarted in a couple of daysand it is really really important that you have a good microphone or headset. I have one that I got for $15 online that plugs into the soundcard and a works excellent. The brand is Andrea but I couldn't tell you the model or anything. Otherwise, I wouldn't be able to type since I'm on bed rest. Good luck with it and learn to speak clearly.

[David Berg]

Good to know. And thanks for the tip on the mic, I was wondering about cheaper ones that would work well.