From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Received: from cantata.rednote.net ([66.92.170.86]) by speech.braille.uwo.ca with esmtp (Exim 3.35 #1 (Debian)) id 1A00M9-0003Yx-00 for ; Thu, 18 Sep 2003 11:06:05 -0400 Received: from cantata.rednote.net (localhost.localdomain [127.0.0.1]) by cantata.rednote.net (8.12.3/8.12.3/Debian-6.4) with ESMTP id h8IF64fB001088 for ; Thu, 18 Sep 2003 11:06:05 -0400 Received: (from janina@localhost) by cantata.rednote.net (8.12.3/8.12.3/Debian-6.4) id h8IF64On001084 for speakup@braille.uwo.ca; Thu, 18 Sep 2003 11:06:04 -0400 Date: Thu, 18 Sep 2003 11:06:03 -0400 From: Janina Sajka To: speakup@braille.uwo.ca Subject: Re: 16k voices Message-ID: <20030918150603.GU9372@rednote.net> References: <000101c37d92$bc92f270$6501a8c0@quantum> <20030918082621.VWWU15938.mta6.adelphia.net@beavis> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline In-Reply-To: <20030918082621.VWWU15938.mta6.adelphia.net@beavis> User-Agent: Mutt/1.3.28i Sender: speakup-admin@braille.uwo.ca Errors-To: speakup-admin@braille.uwo.ca X-BeenThere: speakup@braille.uwo.ca X-Mailman-Version: 2.0.11 Precedence: bulk Reply-To: speakup@braille.uwo.ca List-Help: List-Post: List-Subscribe: , List-Id: Speakup is a screen review system for Linux. List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: Right on, Jacob. But, there is another software synth that's worth the money, and it's less money than software DEC Talk. Go check out the Linux voices available at http://www.cepstral.com. Cepstral are the commercial side of Festival and Flite, by the way. Jacob Schmude writes: > From: "Jacob Schmude" > > Hi > Honestly, I'd recommend a hardware solution at this point. There are 16k voices out there for festival, flite and freetts. However, that doesn't necessarily > have anything at all to do with the quality of the voice. Festival, flite, and freetts (software synthesizers) all use the same basic voices. These voices are, in > my opinion, terrible. Oh, they're clear due to there being 16K, but their inflection is almost nonexistant and, due to the pronunciation they use, they tend to be > difficult to understand. You can get the software synths and voices at: > festival: http://www.festvox.org/ > flite (festival lite): http://cmuflite.org > freetts (java-based speech engine) http://freetts.sf.net/ > As of right now, festival is the only software synthesizer supposedly supported by speakup 1.5. I say supposedly because I've never gotten it working > satisfactorily. You need to apply a patch and run an add-on daemon, but it's incredibly slow to respond, doesn't allow changing of voice parameters like rate > and pitch, and hasn't been updated or changed since april according to the filename. You can get the patch at: > http://users.wpi.edu/~blinux > if you want to try it. > IMHO, the only good linux software synth is software dectalk, but that costs $50 and speakup doesn't work with it yet. Hint, hint, speakup developers? Any > chance it'll ever be supported? > If you need help getting the software synthesizer working, let me know. It can be a bit of work, especially if you're going to try festival. Software Speech is > one of the two major areas in which linux lags behind, I think, the other being OCR. > HTH > On Wed, 17 Sep 2003 23:12:47 -0400, Sina Bahram wrote: > > >Hello, I read a few earlier posts on this and other lists about some 16k > >voices availible for linux. I was wondering what would be availible, and > >if 16k voices are truly the highest quality availible these days. > > > > > _______________________________________________ > Speakup mailing list > Speakup@braille.uwo.ca > http://speech.braille.uwo.ca/mailman/listinfo/speakup -- Janina Sajka, Director Technology Research and Development Governmental Relations Group American Foundation for the Blind (AFB) Email: janina@afb.net Phone: (202) 408-8175