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55 of 56 found the following review helpful:
 Save your money!Jul 26, 2004
By DaktariEd
"Bibliophile & MacAddict"
I purchased ViaVoice for Mac Enhanced version and immediately had problems with it. Foolishly I upgraded to ViaVoice for Mac OS X, release 3, and thought the problems would be over. I was wrong. This software has very poor overall performance. It slows, hangs and freezes at the drop of a hat. There is no rhythme or reason to the freezes. I've tried stoping and restarting, reloading, various combinations, and it never seems to work properly. Being a Mac Addict since 1986 I think I know a thing or two about this system. It's not a user issue, it's a software issue!
35 of 35 found the following review helpful:
 Dying productJun 27, 2006
By Bruce Carlson
I find ViaVoice an important tools to save my arthritic fingers. Once trained, its dictation is reasonably accurate (even sorting out most homonyms), and the voice-directed correction (available only in SpeakPad) makes it useable. It learns as you correct it and can easily be taught specialized words in your business vocabulary or proper names.
Direct dictation into applications other than SpeakPad, such as MS Word or Safari, is less successful (interaction with Word's automatic formatting is particularly annoying) and not voice-correctable, so I only dictate to SpeakPad and then Copy&Paste to Word or the Browser. Using ViaVoice to control the Mac is messy, and I think you're better off using the Mac's Speech PrefPane to activate Speakable Items.
I started with ViaVoice Enhanced v2 under OS 9; and I was disappointed v3 for OS X couldn't import my OS9 voice model, meaning I had to train it all over again. Once trained and customized under OSX 10.1, it worked barely adequately on a 500MHz PPC Powerbook. Upgrading to a 1.25MHz eMac and adding a GB of RAM improved performance and recognition significantly, and I was happy with it until, starting with OS X 10.3 it became harder to make it work reliably. I've gotten it to work under 10.4.6, though it requires a bit of TLC (knock on wood.)
But, I must strongly advise readers not to jump into ViaViace now. IBM sold the product line (including the name "IBM ViaVoice") to Dragon Software, who have dumped it on Nuance. There hasn't been an update since OS X 10.2, and the Nuance website only lists 10.1-10.3 as supported OS. There's no sign ViaVoice for Mac will ever be upgraded; and now, with the arrival of Intel Macs, this is most likely a dead-end product.
I think you'd be better served considering iListen for Mac, or even using an Intel Mac to run both OS X and Windows and use Dragon Naturally Speaking on the latter instead.
39 of 43 found the following review helpful:
Has never worked well in OS XMar 18, 2004
Due to a spinal cord injury, my hands do not work. Obviously, typing is difficult, especially extended word processing. I use my computer 8-10 hours/day for work, email, etc., and frequently need to type more than a few lines. So, Viavoice seems to be the obvious choice for me. I have owned viavoice and each upgrade since the first version. Despite updates, this program has never worked well on OS X. On a few occasions I have gotten it to operate briefly, but usually it crashes, fails to open, does not respond, or dissappoints me in some other way.Training the program is a long process, and the fact that I cannot use it now is ridiculous. I consider myself a mac expert, and use many programs. I have never been more frustrated with a program than I am with this one. Support is poor, and updaters are few-and don't help. Save your money and more importantly your time-don't buy this program..
16 of 16 found the following review helpful:
ViaVoice Mac OS X doesn't work beyond 10.3.5Jul 27, 2005
By cargeo
I recently purchased ViaVoice MAC OS X because I had used the OS 9 version and liked it. When I up-graded to a new G4 Powerbook running OS 10.3.7, I purchased the new version so that it would work with OS X. After installing it and going through the training, I found that I could not use it, because it kept unexpectedly quiting when I tried to launch Speakpad. I called Scansoft and was informed that it only works with 10.3.5 or below. I have searched many descriptions of the product and no mention of this was found. Tech support said that they had been working on it, but saw no new release in the near future. I would not recommend the product if you plan to use an up-to-date operating system. ScanSoft ought to make this clear in their product requierments.
15 of 15 found the following review helpful:
Find an AlternativeDec 18, 2005
By J. Stephens
"DoctorJ"
I've been in touch with Nuance to ask about compatibilty. The reviewer above is right that ViaVoice doesn't work with later versions of Mac OS 10.3/Panther. Neither does it work with any version of 10.4/Tiger. I was told that Nuance is working on a Tiger-compatible upgrade, but that no release date for the upgrade could be given-- not even an approximate one. Unless you're willing to postpone upgrades of your OS indefinitely, order iListen instead. It isn't Naturally Speaking, but at least it runs on the current Mac OS.
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