So today I downloaded bus voice dream reader on Speech Central. I didn’t go anywhere else voice dream reader.
It wanted me to do the trial, it wouldn’t let me continue and less. I got that trial, which is $99 Australian and $.99 which is basically $100. To absolute iMac G4 stat!
After getting voice dream reader, I downloaded Speech Central. And I instantly knew that I would be able to get through the Cilla process.
So there is voice dream reader, sitting on my home, screen, useless… It’s lucky. I still have voice dream reader on my android device, a braille sense, six. It has a PK file of it, so I can use it forever without any of the problems, and it’s already paid by blind health.net so, great.
Observations of fridge central sofa
Activation and setup.
I found that voice dream wouldn’t let me get past work clothes on and on and on about how it was such a good services How they had no car in the world. Also press the continue button, I was brought to the usual thing where you install your applications, but it was to pay for the trial, I’m backed the absolute Beneze out of their heck nah! Score, one for speech Central.
I open up the Speech Central app, I want for the steps easily, X ask for support, I collect okay
Score, one for speech Central for generosity.
Voices.
No of course voice dream has way more options, but I’m Farms, the Apple voices for speech Central.
No, I just gotta go get my Microsoft KPI, Kãy👑👑💍, I hope Microsoft neural voice engine set up on microsoft.com Doesn’t involve me paying for stuff.
Score, 1.5 for speech, Central four
Supplying Apple voices, and along use of the Microsoft, neural engine new one I will update you after this after I have played runs the app so far, I’ve only used it for five minutes.
Leader, speech Central.
Voice dream doesn’t even have any points, but I will give it some points for having support for a cappella, Ivanna, nearest beach and some other speech synthesises
Current leader so far, speech Central on 3.5, voice dream reader on one.
I will update as I continue.
Not to go put my Microsoft Word document in Speech Central and see how it goes reading that.…
Cheers
By Dominic, 29 April, 2023
Forum
iOS and iPadOS
Comments
First Impressions
I’m trying out Speech Central on an iPhone 14 Pro Max. I’ve only got one book on here so far. I will see if I can do much with folders (I have over 600 books in Voice Dream divided into about 20 folders and I’m not looking forward to porting all that to a new app).
So far it’s okay. The chapters being separated within a book is interesting. I miss being able to more easily tell how much time I have left to read in a single chapter or book. Right now if I want to find out, I have to exit the book to check on the book list, which stops the book playing. But the book keeps playing in the background when I leave the app so that’s good. There is a tiny number in the bottom right corner but it’s mostly blocked by my phone case (which isn’t a case that blocks much). I actually have no idea what that number is; chapter time?
My big problem is that the speed is limited. I use the Karen voice almost at max on my phone and I read my books at that speed too. But even at the fastest speed settings in Speech Central, it’s still slow. That’s pretty frustrating and certainly a deal breaker for buying the app right now.
Haven’t been able to see if the app will start in my current folder or prefered reading list yet. When I can get some more books in there I’ll update.
Overall it’s alright so far. I’ll keep messing with it and seeing how it goes. I’m glad it’s around and that we have an option that’s a little more advanced than Apple Books and Kindle.
Hi
Regarding the chapters - this is more like a testimony that the app has started very old than that it is some sort of design decision. Many, many years ago it could be challenging if the user used navigation in the car and used Speech Central to play something in the background. Saving a memory was important thing at that point. It isn't anymore almost on any device, but I think overall users more liked this than they hated it and it stayed like that.
Regarding the speed - the iOS supports something like 4.0x speed at maximum (Apple doesn't declare anything regarding those speeds, but most of their voices are around 4x faster when set to the maximal speed compared to the default speed when being measured). It is correct that at the current design the app is limited to 3.0x speed which might be somewhat slower. The current design was made in mind to be the best compromise across various users groups. It is already hard to visually adjust the slider precisely and extending it to 4.0x would make it much harder while being of help to just a very limited number of users. However I have already talked about the new version that should appear by the end of the year and it will have some tweaks and tricks that would allow 4.0x speeds while being even easier for precise visual adjustment than the current version.
Microsoft voices
Microsoft neural voices are completely free for 500,000 characters a month (you need to set the free tier but you have probably set that). If you use you quota you won't be charged anything automatically just you will get the message from the server. That should be enough to read almost any book.
If you decide to pay it isn't cheap, to get the same paid amount on top of that would be around 8$.
In some future (and it is likely to be next year as there is already too much for this year on the plate) I will also add Google neural voices and they have a million characters a month for free. And if they expire you can switch to Microsoft's free quota. So it should be enough for most of the reading one can think of.
I've been trying Speech Central as well.
I'm running the IOS public beta, and there are significant problems with another major text reading app and crashing voices. This problem doesn't seem to be happening as much with Speech Central and the current beta. I could only wish for a couple of things: please allow the book to be read without having to stop at the end of each chapter, and please allow for faster speeds. I really don't mind using just the IOS Tom Enhanced voice like I usually use, i grew up on SI-263, nearly anything modern is good enough.
Pauses
I have tried the app with VoiceOver on and I couldn’t hear any pauses among chapters.
The first thing to do is to check whether you are using iOS 16.4.1, many of previous versions of iOS 16 were buggy regarding the text to speech.
The second thing is that if you use Microsoft voices check for the quality of your data connection.
API key
How do I get the API key for the Microsoft voices to use with Speech Central? What happens when I finish my characters quota?
RE: API key
I have provided explanation with some more info why the link is only in the app help and the itself link in another thread, but here is the link again: https://speechcentral.net/ios-help/#azure
Regarding what happens if your quota expires that is written few comments above, but in short you just get the message on that and Microsoft voices won't work.
Pause after chapter
I am also experienceing that the reading pauses after a chapter is complete. Generally I tend to play the book and listen to it by locking the screen. Depending on how the book is formatted to be navigated, the reading would stop and I would have to unlock the phone and press play again in the app. I don't remember to have changed any setting. This is happening at chapter-end, so don't think it is to do with the connection.