Dragon NaturallySpeaking Premium 11 Student Edition [Old Version]

It is a lot better now but I still like this version and it still works! It is a lil difficult to train but if you got time it is great!

Works really well!

I have to admit I was a bit nervous ordering the student/teacher version of Dragon, given all the negative reviews because of the difficulties that people had activating this product. But as I sit here writing this review using Dragon NaturallySpeaking premium 11 student edition, which took less than 30 min. to install and activate, and extremely glad that I gave it a chance. Im not sure why others have had so much difficulty, but I certainly did not. Please note that this version of Dragon NaturallySpeaking requires proof of academic status either as a school staff person or a student, without verifying the status you will not be able to activate it. I would highly recommend this version of this product to other school staff members and students.

I was very disappointed in the software. I purchased this product under the assumption I would be able to use this for my graduate classes. My plan was to record the lectures and then the software would transcribe the lectures for notes. Did not happen. You would have to make a profile for each voice to be transcribed, and even then I am not sure it would have worked for this. I have not reviewed the product description again to make sure, but I thought it said it was for lectures, so this was not correct. I tried getting help from the software company, but they never clearly gave instructions or help in solving this issue. So I have returned the product, hoping for a full refund. Bummed to say the least.

I bought the student version of Drangon Naturally Speaking for my grandson who lives with me. I called Nuance on Friday about getting the serial number and she said to follow the instructions on the product. I sent in the required information yesterday (9/11/10) and am still waiting for the serial number. I called them today and got no help. It seems like Im going to go through some of the hoops that another writer talked about. Why they have to make this such a big deal is beyond me.

I tend to talk fast and mumble a bit and run my words together. Once, I got the hang of talking to Dragon, he and I seem to be on the same page most of the time. When, I am tired, well lets just say, Ive learned a few new words. As long as you speak clearly and at an even tone this program is great for typing in word and e-mail programs. Sucks in Excel, and takes over the +/- keys on my wireless numeric keypad. Corrections seem to take time, though some are relatively quick. I think that its me. There seem to be less mistakes every day.

Very poor service. the product I cannot rate because I could never use it. I bought it, tried to jump through the rediculiuos hoops to get a code and never could. Called customer service which took forever to get a hold of. I finally got somebody with an american sounding name that could hardly speak english. They wanted more money to give me a code. I imediately sent their product back.

still using it

I ordered this Student/Teacher version because Im a college instructor. Obtaining the serial number was not a problem. However, the DVD I received is warped, emits a loud clicking noise in my computers DVD drive (the same noise is audible on two other systems so the problem is clearly a defective disk), and it is unable to read the disk to install the program. Thats when I had the misfortune of contacting Benjamin in customer service. He is semi-literate in English and apparently located somewhere in India. He asked for all my order data from Amazon (order number, etc.). He even listened to the loud clicking of the disk in the drive, and agreed it sounded like there was clearly something wrong with the disk. Then some additional hoops to jump through: 1. E-mail him screenshots of the Windows Explorer interface to prove that my computer cant fully read all the files on the warped disk. 2. E-mail him digital photographs of the disk itself (top and edge) to prove that I have an authentic disk and prove that it is warped. Okay, this was a strange request, but using my digital camera not too much of a problem if it would have satisfied Nuance and gotten me on the road to receiving a new disk. Were these thoughts ever naive. 3. Ben replies. He now wants the POP proof of purchased of the Dragon 12 that came from Amazon. Huh? What exactly does POP proof of purchased mean, and why wasnt it requested during the original phone call? I send him a screen shot of my order record from my Amazon account and the scanned barcode label from the box. (Maybe the latter is what he meant by proof of purchased [sic]?) 4. Ben replies again. This time he wants the email from amazon indicated the the payment you made from them if there is please attached it with this email as you reply. LOL. This reads like work from one of my grade-F students. Again, if this is what was required, why wasnt it clearly requested in the original phone call? I forwarded him the original invoice e-mail. I made a little wager with myself that this would magically prove insufficient as well. Sure enough, it did. 5. Sorry its me again, as i can see in your screenshot [sic] of the email you got from amazon one last favor, can you please take a screenshot also of that the same email but open the VIEW INVOICE option. Take a screenshot of an e-mail he already has right in front of him and at the same time click some link. Boy, that sure makes sense. Sorry, but Im now done with this: from the bizarre request for photographs of the defective disk, to one illiterate and cryptic request after the other. Anyway, Ben made clear on the original call (after we had spent about 5 minutes entering my Amazon order information into his system) that the system screenshots showing the disk as unreadable along with the disk photos would be sufficient. Now theres another new and nebulous obstacle course to run every day. I am a very busy college instructor who doesnt have time for this. If I dont receive a response from this review within a week from a literate adult at Nuance, I will immediately initiate a chargeback on my credit card and look at other options, particularly Windows Speech Recognition. Not only is it free, but its been reported to be a decent program with even more improvements expected on the forthcoming Windows 8. Ive been a solid Dragon customer since version 9, but after this experience Im done with Nuance.

Im Aiden and Im not a native English speaker. Just bought a copy of DNS Premium 11 few weeks ago. DNS was able to listen to what I have to say, after some initial training. I would say the time youre going to put into the initial training is very important. Ive registered myself at Nuance website, and their staff was replying to my questions, feedbacks in a very fast and good manner! So all in all, I got the value out of what Ive been paying for. I love DNS 11 so much, it ease out my pain on wrist and arm. Im not used to it yet, so whenever I want to try to correct something or talk to DNS about a command, it doesnt understand it. But overall, this is a very good software to be used. If youre a native English speaker, and you speak good English, and you have a lot of things to be typed out, then you would really want to grab a copy of DNS. Aiden Chong