Existing users, 
I am disabled and find typing difficult. As a result I have tried a lot of speech recognition programs including IBM's ViaVoice, Dragon NaturallySpeaking, iListen and now MacSpeech Dictate. Of all of these Dragon NaturallySpeaking is the most developed and so just has the edge in usability. The problem is it only works on a Mac if you are using Windows with programmes such as Parallels Desktop etc.
MacSpeech Dictate, when it first appeared, started shakily but was a vast improvement on iListen. The latest version however is almost as good as Dragon NaturallySpeaking and is just as accurate. Version 1.5.1 is worth the upgrade fee if only because it works more accurately and more quickly than version 1.5. I would now have no hesitation in recommending this program to anyone. I couldn't live without it. Some of the criticisms that I have seen of this program are down to the fact that people have not read the documentation.
Even MacSpeech's customer service has improved. Version 1.5.0 came with a bug that affected the British English version. Mac Speech quickly e-mailed me a workaround within two days. This update (version 1.5.1) seems to have sorted out the problem.
MacSpeech Dictate
Speech recognition and dictation.
Version: 1.5.7
Has developed into an excellent program!
Feedback Type: Review
Contributed by: philip.playfer Thursday, May 28 2009 @ 08:22 AM PDT
Product Platform: MacOSX
Used Product For: Over One Year
Recommend Product: YES
Overall Rating:
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Has developed into an excellent program! - VancouverRMT
Yes, some people criticize Dictate for the wrong reasons, and they need to actually read the documentation. And, yes, the recognition engine is good. Unfortunately, there are also so many good reasons to criticize Dictate. You know you are going to be dealing with some user-unfriendly design when it launches, throwing up a window that floats above everything else you have open, so you can’t do anything else while it launches. This is the kind of brain-dead development sensibility that underlies the application apps overall poor infrastructure. Another good example of a what-the-hell-were-they-thinking irritation is the lack of a close button on the status window. Yes, that’s right, after 18 months of development, it still hasn’t occurred to anyone at MacSpeech with power over the code that it’s nice to be able to close a window without having to switch to the application that owns it and drill down into a menu. Seriously, what the F? These aren’t critical flaws, but they reveal a serious lack of interest in user experience.The critical flaws are the routine hanging and crashing!
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Wednesday, June 24 2009 @ 10:39 AM PDT