My traveling computer of choice because of size and weight is my MSI U120 netbook. This is the model where they hard-wired the memory into the board so you cannot increase it. I'm having trouble getting DNS to run with any accuracy on the machine and, since I cannot increase the memory, I have some questions about potential work-arounds:

1. Is there any program or manual reconfiguration of the XP OS that I can use when I want to use DNS that will free up as many of the machine's resources as possible?

2. These machines have notoriously poor audio systems -- is there any USB external and portable sound card that might improve recognition?

With the volatility of the development market today, I really don't want to buy another netbook just to run DNS just to find it obsoleted by something that comes out next week. So, if possible, I'd like to get this working, even if it is slow, for my dictation on the road.

Will appreciate any ideas!

maestrogn

 

maestrogn,

In answer to your first question, there are some things that you can do, but most of them will have pretty much a minimal effect. Nevertheless, you can try them. However, in general the answer to your question is NO as far as the OS is concerned.

First, I wouldn't worry about Netbooks. Netbooks are pretty much dead. I don't think anybody is going to be selling Netbooks for much longer and Intel certainly is moving away from that to the Ultrabooks. Unfortunately, your Netbook is not only a dinosaur, it's already gone the way of the dinosaurs. Regardless, I wouldn't buy a Netbook if my life depended upon it. That is, I wouldn't before when they were first released and I definitely wouldn't now particularly relative to using Dragon NaturallySpeaking.

Second, since you have to use a pagefile, you can set the pagefile from its current default (dynamic – controlled by Windows) to static (Custom with the minimum and maximum allocated size set to the recommendation at the bottom of the virtual memory dialog, or, rule of thumb, 1 1/2 times your RAM. By using the Custom settings and setting the minimum and maximum to the same number as recommended, you reduce the propensity for Windows to have to check and resize the pagefile every time that you open or close an application, or use an application. This also eliminates the pagefile becoming fragmented. While this can give you a slight boost in performance.

As you continue to use DNS, the amount of RAM used by DNS increases as your profile size increases (i.e., the amount of RAM that DNS uses). You may be able to reduce the RAM foot print for DNS by periodically closing and reopening your user profile. You might also try setting the DNS Options | Data tab "Conserve disk space required by user files (for portability) to enabled (put a checkmark in the checkbox). Also, periodically run the Acoustic and Language Model Optimizer. While this probably won't have a dramatic affect, it may tend to reduce the overall size of the amount of RAM DNS uses.

One other thing that you can do to minimize the amount of resources being used is to simply ensure that you don't open and keep open applications that you're not using with DNS. I have no doubt that you've already discovered that the more applications you open while DNS is running, the slower DNS becomes. This is because you will only have 1 GB of RAM and opening more than DNS and one application at a time is very likely resulting in something being swapped out to the pagefile, which can slow down the performance of DNS to a crawl. Therefore, minimize the amount of RAM that you're using by opening DNS and only the application that you intend to work in. In addition, if there are applications and utilities that are running in the background that you do not need, get rid of them, or, at least, disable them if and when you don't need them. By this am not referring to antivirus or anti-Malware/spyware software. However, depending upon what you're using for such purposes, you may find that you get better performance with a smaller footprint using the free Microsoft Security Essentials, which doesn't interfere with DNS and which doesn't require a lot of manipulation being that it pretty much takes care of itself. Is reliable, it's free, it's designed to work with Windows because it's by Microsoft, and it is handled pretty much in the background via the Windows update (automatic). I recommend this to my clients and I have been using it myself for almost a couple of years now.

Lastly, make sure that your Windows XP is fully up to date with SP3. Remember, Microsoft no longer supports Windows XP SP2.

This is about the limit of what you can do. On the other hand, a little more detail in terms of what's installed on your Netbook and what applications you're using might also be helpful in expanding on your questions.

Unfortunately, I've never seen a "various" microphone. Just kidding. Nevertheless, it might be helpful to know exactly what microphone(s) you are using.

The basic answer to your second question is "Yes", a USB SoundPod would help to improve accuracy, and using the built-in internal soundcard may very well be part of the source of your accuracy problems. Depending upon whether or not your microphone is simply a microphone without headphone(s), I would recommend either the Andrea half duplex USB SoundPod, the Buddy USB 6G USB SoundPod, or the Andrea PureAudio USB-SA USB SoundPod. All of these are designed for use with speech recognition in mind and will generally provide you with better performance and accuracy than your internal soundcard.

In general, I would provide you with the following advice. DNS is necessarily resource intensive, primarily with regard to the amount of RAM it uses. With only 1 GB of RAM you're basically pushing the outside of the envelope. You can get away with using DNS 10.1 Preferred on a Netbook, but the bottom line is that when you give up performance because weight is an issue, you can't expect optimal results from DNS. Cutting corners has no cost-benefit when it comes to the performance of DNS.

Chuck Runquist
Technical Project Manager
VoiceTeach LLC
Home of VoicePower®: We don't make Dragon NaturallySpeaking, We make it better!

"Life's Rule #1: Once you pull the pin, Mr. Grenade is no longer your friend."  (Variant of Murphy's Law  -  Edward A. Murphy, Jr)

-------------------------

for what it's worth: I run DNS 10 on a Toshiba N.B. 100 net book (atom CPU, 1 GB RAM, XP pro).  With a $15 line-in Plantronics cheapo headset microphone from Amazon the results are amazingly good -- not as fast as the same headset with Sandy Bridge/8 GB RAM/gigabyte GA-H67M-UD2H-b3 motherboard, on my desktop but accuracy quite comparable.  Both systems use on-board sound.  I do dictate with a  standard UK English accent so maybe that helps.  Also, I mainly use it for text since I'm a bad typist so I will readily admit that I'm using only part of DNS is potential.  So, if I'm out and about, the lightweight 9 inch Toshiba is a real help --   Connect it up to a large screen when I'm home.    Maybe the sound board on the Toshiba is good?

 I would be very interested to see the performances of both computers with a top quality microphone and soundcard but for my needs, I cannot justify the expense.  The other interesting thing I've noted with my Windows 7 setup is that the accuracy from Windows speech recognition appears to be very similar to that of Dragon 10.1 -- not a scientific analysis that just my day-to-day gut feeling.

( all this dictated with cheapo headset on Sandy Bridge PC  Using Windows Speech Recognition).

 

-------------------------
Intel Core i5-2300 CPU @ 2.80GHz; 8Gb RAM; Win7 64-bit; Gigabyte H67M-UD2H-B3;

maestrogn, I agree with the advice given to you by Chuck. I have utilised both DNS Version 10 & Version 11 on a netbook. Utilising DNS on a netbook can be unbelievably frustrating; if you were used to dictating on a system that has plenty of processing power. The latency lag particularly with Version 11 is unbearable. Additionally, I did note that if I had Speed Vs Accuracy slider all the way to the left, dictation was just about tolerable.

I utilised the Buddy USB 6G soundcard and Sennheiser ME-3 headset, which I found to be indispensable for speech recognition on a netbook. While, I note the comments of DB in his response to your posting, the inbuilt microphone / soundcard on the Toshiba netbook is actually very good. In fact, I would say it is actually better than the inbuilt soundcard on my current laptop.



-------------------------
DNS 12.0 Professional, Windows 7, Intel Core i7 2630QM, 16GB of RAM. Second-Generation SpeechWare 6-in-1.

DB,

Accuracy is not a function of CPU, RAM, or system performance. It doesn't matter how fast or how slow, how high powered or low powered, or anything else related to the CPU and RAM as far as accuracy is concerned. Accuracy is solely a function of Dragon. The only hardware that affects accuracy is the microphone/soundcard. Once of Dragon is loaded into memory with your user profile and you start dictating, it's the recognizer (MREC.dll) coupled with the quality of your microphone/soundcard, as well as your dictation style, that determines how accurate or inaccurate Dragon is. The long and the short of it is that it doesn't matter whether you're running DNS on a Netbook or a Core™ i7 3960X (Sandy Bridge-e Extreme), all things being equal, accuracy should be exactly the same. The only thing that your hardware impacts (i.e., CPU, cache, or RAM) is performance (speed).

Windows Speech Recognition (WSR) in Windows 7, if you take into consideration that the vocabulary and other related factors are not as good as Dragon, is pretty much as accurate as DNS. Accuracy is not the issue when comparing Windows Speech Recognition (WSR) to Dragon NaturallySpeaking. The problem with Windows Speech Recognition (WSR) is that it's simply doesn't have the bells and whistles that DNS has, which simply makes its overall performance like trying to win the Indianapolis 500 on a bicycle.

Chuck Runquist
Technical Project Manager
VoiceTeach LLC
Home of VoicePower®: We don't make Dragon NaturallySpeaking, We make it better!

"Aiming for the moon and missing it is better than aiming for the ditch and hitting it."   - Author Unknown

-------------------------

Chuck, what a fabulous, educational reply. I always do better when I have the background with which to understand a problem better and your reply was a gem.

I just did all kinds of things to try to decrease calls on RAM (with the exception of PageFile) on the netbook and things are the same ... but now, I may have the evidence that it is a crappy or faulty on-mobo sound system in this machine. When I try to dictate, the speed is acceptable (in the most generous sense of the word -- my only requirement is that it recognizes a little faster than I can type) but the accuracy is unusable. I get about 20% of recognized words and the rest is wild gibberish.

I have an external sound card (USB) over in my University office and I'll connect that to bypass the onboard sound to see if that makes a difference. Your answer to the last post leads me to believe that everything points to sound system/microphone in this case.

Thanks so much.

 Garyth

 

 

Well, Chucker, other than that what do you really think of netbooks? LoL.

First, thanks to the three of you for your answers, especially the long effort from Chucker. Please know that I am well aware of the limitations of the netbook, and mine in particular. Having said that, I have lugged larger and heavier laptops around the world (literally) and the overhead of weight and size just wasn’t worth it. Most of my needs on the move have to do with email, browsing and writing in M$ Word. Given those needs, the dinosaur netbook has worked just fine (it even allows me to do PowerPoint presentations when away). Just so you know -- in my office, I have a self-built tower that has 4 gb of Ram, a 4-core processor, a 1 tb HD, etc and I fully enjoy all that it offers including how it runs DNS.

I have no illusions that my netbook could ever come even close to the office machine. However, when on the road, I would like to get DNS working so that I can reasonably dictate instead of type all the time on the little keyboard (BTW, I’ve already written two published books using DNS).

I will try Chucker’s suggestions as well as some others that sprang into my mind from his writing.

• Turn off the Internet connection and Kaspersky while dictating – don’t need those during the DNS session nor do I always have the net available.

• There are two programs that shut down programs and services for the duration of a computer session (like DNS or FSX) – AlacrityPC and SmartClose – do you have any experience using these to free up memory for DNS?

The idea here is that I would like to just get DNS to function adequately on the road. Yes, eventually I will get an ultrabook or what every the flavor du jour is. But until then, I’ll stay with my trusty little netbook while hoping to add an adequate DNS to its services. I will freely confess that Chucker is correct (as he almost always is) and that the netbook will never be able to work adequately -- but it's one of those things that I feel compelled to try.

maestrogn

Maestrogn,

First, might Toshiba Satellite Core™ i7 2670QM laptop weighs 5.3 pounds with a 17 inch screen. Yes, it can be a pain in the neck when traveling, but I had a special case build for it that has an aluminum exterior and sufficient padding on the inside. It's very light which means that the total weight is about 7 pounds with the laptop and the case. The way it's designed it makes it very easy to carry, very secure with a combination lock, and it's the only thing that I take on the plane with me. I can even drop it and the laptop is protected from damage, not to mention the fact that Toshiba has a built-in protection for the hard drive in case it's dropped.

All that being said, my needs are more significant than yours when I'm on the road because I'm giving demonstrations at tradeshows and other venues where the noise level is exceedingly high and I like to use my Sennheiser MD 431 II for that purpose because it's easily transportable in the same case, provides exceedingly high noise canceling, which I need in the environments that I'm demonstrating, and I have a 15 foot XLR cable and the Andrea PureAudio USB-SA USB SoundPod. My point in bringing this up is that I need it. If I could get by with a Netbook, I might have gotten one. But, I can't. I'd also go with an iPad if I could get away with it and be able to use speech recognition on it.

My point is that I understand all the reasons why you have what you have and you are using it for the purpose intended. If you look at my previous post, the problem is not accuracy, it's performance. Accuracy is unaffected by anything other than your dictation style and your microphone/soundcard. Accuracy occurs in RAM and is a function of MREC.dll (the recognizer). It's not a question of whether or not you can get good accuracy out of a Netbook. It's a question of how fast. Unfortunately, that's a limitation I can't live with doing what I do professionally. If accuracy wherein issue relative to hardware, other than microphone/soundcard, Nuance wouldn't even bother supporting Netbooks. The same applies to whether you're using DNS Home, DNS Basics, DNS Premium, or one of the professional versions. Achievable accuracy is the same because the underlying recognizer is exactly the same.

The problem that you have is less processor performance and more the fact that you only have 1 GB of RAM. Unless you can prevent Windows from swapping out to the pagefile one of the applications that you have loaded in order to function with DNS, the performance of DNS is going to come to a screeching halt because it takes a long time to page out and page in given that you're working with the hard drive under this condition which is many magnitudes of times slower than RAM. Unfortunately, you're caught between a rock and a hard place because you can't increase the amount of RAM in your Netbook. I wasn't trying to criticize you or criticize the use of Netbooks with DNS. I was simply trying to point out where the bottlenecks exist in doing so. All things being optimal, accuracy shouldn't be an issue.

As I pointed out, there are few things that you can do to try to get around the bottlenecks created by the amount of RAM that you have installed and what Windows does or doesn't do. However, aside from that, you can't get 50 gallons of water into a 1 gallon bucket. At least in this part of the universe the laws of physics are incontrovertible. I wish you all the luck in the world using your Netbook and you may be able to find a happy median. 20 or 30 years from now everything you need will fit in your shirt pocket, run continuously for three years without having to turn it off or replaced/charge the batteries, and it will be as fast or faster than the current supercomputers with unlimited storage and RAM. The only problem then will be significant information overload.

Chuck Runquist
Technical Project Manager
VoiceTeach LLC
Home of VoicePower®: We don't make Dragon NaturallySpeaking, We make it better!

"What you are aware of you are in control of; what you are not aware of is in control of you." - Anthony de Mello

-------------------------

Thank you so much to everybody who answered. I learned SO much and it will help in my quest.

maestrogn

 

Dear BrainyBannana:

A special note -- you might not be so quick to assume that a potential customer asking for information will be "churlish" (Rude in a mean-spirited and surly way) and not buy the equipment through KB. To the contrary, I had already decided to buy a headset and will now add a USB sound card.

When trying to convince potential (in this case, about to be) customers to buy with KB, labeling them as rude in a mean-spirited and surly way in advance is not the greatest marketing inducement.

Thanks for all of your other information ... it helped (also, thanks for the explanation of the inside academic joke).

Garyth

 

 

To everybody who helped me, especially Chuck:

Thank you so much for your help regarding running DNS on my netbook.

I purchased the KnowBrainer headset and the full-duplex USB soundcard. They arrived yesterday and I was able to install them on both the office computer and the netbook.

Holy mackerel! On the office computer, I am now attaining accuracy levels that are claimed in the advertising – virtually no errors.

The netbook, the subject of our correspondence, and is now a working DNS machine with these two new equipment additions. As I suspected, the audio that was on the mobo was totally insufficient. With the USB soundcard plugged in, the machine is usable now is a DNS dictation device.

Please understand that I am not claiming that the netbook is now performing up to the exalted standards of this group. It is slow, but its accuracy is now up to where my office computer used to be without the addition of the new equipment. I would say that the accuracy is somewhere between 85 and 90% on the netbook – certainly within my parameters. As we all know, engineering is always a compromise – one gains here and looses there – the gain is that I can go on using this tiny little machine on the road without the overhead of carrying a large computer. Yes, there is probably an ultra book in my future, but that's the future. So, I am willing to accept the lesser performance of the DNS on this machine to gain the extreme portability and battery life while on the road.

Keep in mind also, that this little netbook only has 100 MB of RAM that is installed on the mobo so one cannot increase it. Especially considering the limited RAM, DNS is doing extraordinarily well.

Again thank you very much for all of your help – it certainly got me going in the right direction.

Garyth

PS I wish there were a utility and DNS that would simply allow me to press an F key and go through the list of homophones  (like their/there) so that when DNS misrecognizes it, one doesn't have to go all the way through the correction dialog but just simply be presented with a list from which one could choose. Wouldn't that be wonderful?