With hundreds of microphones to choose from to use with your favourite speech recognition application (which is hopefully ‘Dragon NaturallySpeaking 12’), how can you decide on the right one for your specific needs?
It needs to suit your environment (whether you work in a quiet or busy office with a lot of background noise), the way you want to wear (or hold) it, whether it works with both your PC and telephone and whether a wired or wireless microphone solution best suits you.
A great entry level wired headset is the Andrea NC-181VM USB headset microphone. It works well in noisy environment by cancelling out background noise, is comfortable on the head and uses a built-in USB adapter to link to a PC.
For entry level wireless headsets, why not try the Plantronics SAVI W440 USB wireless headset. It links to a PC using a USB base unit (which also charges the headset whilst docked). It has excellent accuracy with Dragon and enables you to move around without being tethered to your computer!
If you prefer a hand-held microphone that you can pick up, dictate and put down again, we highly recommend the Olympus DR-1200 handheld USB microphone (compatible with all editions of Dragon NaturallySpeaking/Medical). The unit includes built in trackball mouse and a large microphone on/off button. If you are using Dragon Medical Practice Edition 2, then the Powermic II hand held USB microphone is the microphone of choice. Great accuracy, rugged construction, multiple programmable buttons and enhanced integration into the Dragon software.
If you want to use a headset for both Dragon and making phone calls, the wired preference is the GN Netcom 8050 telephone switch box with a Jabra 2100 headset. A single rocker button allows to switch between dictating to your PC and then talk on the telephone. Compatible with many analogue and digital phones, with good noise cancellation, it’s a great all-round multi-purpose device.
A great wireless telephone switch is the Plantronics SAVI W740 wireless splitter. Giving you the same functionality of the GN Netcom switch, the wireless headset is light, compatible and offers great accuracy with Dragon. A bonus is that it can operate the PC, a landline telephone and also a mobile phone all from the same headset!
We hope this has given you a flavour of the exciting technology enabling you to use speech recognition software productively. For further information, pricing or to discuss your specific requirements, contact us on 01903 263007 or info@freedom-speech.co.uk.