question about DECtalk express voices and pitch

question about DECtalk express voices and pitch

[Kenny Hitt]

Hi.  I just started using a DECtalk express.  I notice a strange problem
when I use any voice except 0 (Paul).  If I change to another voice, it
seems to work.  However, the pitch will change if I do anything like
spelling a word with a capital letter.
For example:
change to voice 4 (Betty).  She sounds ok, but not exactly like my
software DECtalk.  If I change the pitch by spelling a word with a
capital letter or use insert 2 then inssert 3 to mess with the pitch the
voice changes.  After that point, changing the pitch has little
effect.  Voice 0 (Paul is the only voice that doesn't have this problem.
In the case of Betty, the pitch becomes to low and you can't get the
voice back unless you echo 4 to /proc/speakup/voice.
Does anyone else have this problem, and does anyone know a solution?

Thanks in advance.
          Kenny

Re: question about DECtalk express voices and pitch

[Jayson Smith]

Hi.
I think I know the problem you're talking about.  It's probably a Speakup
bug, or a bug with whatever software you're using.  Each of the nine Dectalk
voices specifies a default pitch.  If a software program is not aware of the
different voices and which one is currently selected, it probably uses
standard pitch values all the time, which are appropriate for certain voices
and totally inappropriate for others.  If you know how to make use of this
information, the command to change the pitch is [:dv ap xx] where xx is the
frequency of the average pitch, in hz.  For example, Paul's default average
pitch is 120 hz so [:dv ap 120] would restore Paul to his default pitch.
There are many, many other parameters you can change with Dectalk.  For
example, try the command [:dv pr 250] [:dv sr 50] and see what that sounds
like.  I think that makes Dectalk sound much more lively!
If you are at all interested in all things Dectalk, particularly in making
Dectalk sing, you are invited to join the unofficial Dectalk mailing list.
To do so, send a message with the word subscribe in the subject line to
dectalk-request@freelists.org.  This is a very low-traffic list and you can
probably get most if not all of your Dectalk questions answered there.
Hope this helps!
Jayson.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Kenny Hitt" <kenny@hittsjunk.net>
To: <speakup@speech.braille.uwo.ca>
Sent: Wednesday, September 08, 2004 9:05 PM
Subject: question about DECtalk express voices and pitch


> Hi.  I just started using a DECtalk express.  I notice a strange problem
> when I use any voice except 0 (Paul).  If I change to another voice, it
> seems to work.  However, the pitch will change if I do anything like
> spelling a word with a capital letter.
> For example:
> change to voice 4 (Betty).  She sounds ok, but not exactly like my
> software DECtalk.  If I change the pitch by spelling a word with a
> capital letter or use insert 2 then inssert 3 to mess with the pitch the
> voice changes.  After that point, changing the pitch has little
> effect.  Voice 0 (Paul is the only voice that doesn't have this problem.
> In the case of Betty, the pitch becomes to low and you can't get the
> voice back unless you echo 4 to /proc/speakup/voice.
> Does anyone else have this problem, and does anyone know a solution?
>
> Thanks in advance.
>           Kenny
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Speakup mailing list
> Speakup@braille.uwo.ca
> http://speech.braille.uwo.ca/mailman/listinfo/speakup

Re: question about DECtalk express voices and pitch

[Ameer Armaly]

The problem is that the "pitch" value is initialized before the "voice"
value, and the voice value modifies pitch.  When you type a capital letter,
it resets it back to the default pitch because it is returning from a
capital letter.
The fix is to take the line in speakup_dectlk.c dealing with pitch and put
it after, rather than before, voice.
Ameer
----- Original Message -----
From: "Kenny Hitt" <kenny@hittsjunk.net>
To: <speakup@speech.braille.uwo.ca>
Sent: Wednesday, September 08, 2004 9:05 PM
Subject: question about DECtalk express voices and pitch


> Hi.  I just started using a DECtalk express.  I notice a strange problem
> when I use any voice except 0 (Paul).  If I change to another voice, it
> seems to work.  However, the pitch will change if I do anything like
> spelling a word with a capital letter.
> For example:
> change to voice 4 (Betty).  She sounds ok, but not exactly like my
> software DECtalk.  If I change the pitch by spelling a word with a
> capital letter or use insert 2 then inssert 3 to mess with the pitch the
> voice changes.  After that point, changing the pitch has little
> effect.  Voice 0 (Paul is the only voice that doesn't have this problem.
> In the case of Betty, the pitch becomes to low and you can't get the
> voice back unless you echo 4 to /proc/speakup/voice.
> Does anyone else have this problem, and does anyone know a solution?
>
> Thanks in advance.
>           Kenny
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Speakup mailing list
> Speakup@braille.uwo.ca
> http://speech.braille.uwo.ca/mailman/listinfo/speakup

Re: question about DECtalk express voices and pitch

[Kenny Hitt]

Hi.  I'm replying to myself because I didn't keep ano of the replys from
the list.

I changed line 221 of speakup_dectlk.c from

{ PITCH, "[:dv ap %d]", 80, 0, 100, 20, 0, 0 },

to read
{ PITCH, "[:dv ap %d]", 80, 0, 200, 20, 0, 0 },

Basically, this changed the max value for pitch from 100 to 200.  The
female voices are about 100 higher in pitch than the male voices.  To
get everything working the way I want, I had to change the caps_start
and caps_stop in /proc/speakup to higher values.  My script for betty
looks like this.

#!/bin/bash
#changes the default voice on the DECtalk express to Betty
echo 4 >/proc/speakup/voice #changes voice
echo 150 >/proc/speakup/pitch #makes sure the pitch stays right
echo 300 >/proc/speakup/caps_start #needed cause female voices are
higher
echo 150 >/proc/speakup/caps_stop #keeps pitch from going to low

My editor wrapped a comment in this message, but you get the idea.

Hope this helps.
          Kenny

On Wed, Sep 08, 2004 at 08:05:15PM -0500, kenny wrote:
> Hi.  I just started using a DECtalk express.  I notice a strange problem
> when I use any voice except 0 (Paul).  If I change to another voice, it
> seems to work.  However, the pitch will change if I do anything like
> spelling a word with a capital letter.
> For example:
> change to voice 4 (Betty).  She sounds ok, but not exactly like my
> software DECtalk.  If I change the pitch by spelling a word with a
> capital letter or use insert 2 then inssert 3 to mess with the pitch the
> voice changes.  After that point, changing the pitch has little
> effect.  Voice 0 (Paul is the only voice that doesn't have this problem.
> In the case of Betty, the pitch becomes to low and you can't get the
> voice back unless you echo 4 to /proc/speakup/voice.
> Does anyone else have this problem, and does anyone know a solution?
> 
> Thanks in advance.
>           Kenny
> 
> 

Re: question about DECtalk express voices and pitch

[Jayson Smith]

Hi,
>From what I can tell, it looks like the actual range of the [:dv ap XX]
command is from 50 to about 360.  Hope this helps.
Jayson.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Kenny Hitt" <kenny@hittsjunk.net>
To: <speakup@speech.braille.uwo.ca>
Sent: Saturday, September 11, 2004 2:16 AM
Subject: Re: question about DECtalk express voices and pitch


> Hi.  I'm replying to myself because I didn't keep ano of the replys from
> the list.
>
> I changed line 221 of speakup_dectlk.c from
>
> { PITCH, "[:dv ap %d]", 80, 0, 100, 20, 0, 0 },
>
> to read
> { PITCH, "[:dv ap %d]", 80, 0, 200, 20, 0, 0 },
>
> Basically, this changed the max value for pitch from 100 to 200.  The
> female voices are about 100 higher in pitch than the male voices.  To
> get everything working the way I want, I had to change the caps_start
> and caps_stop in /proc/speakup to higher values.  My script for betty
> looks like this.
>
> #!/bin/bash
> #changes the default voice on the DECtalk express to Betty
> echo 4 >/proc/speakup/voice #changes voice
> echo 150 >/proc/speakup/pitch #makes sure the pitch stays right
> echo 300 >/proc/speakup/caps_start #needed cause female voices are
> higher
> echo 150 >/proc/speakup/caps_stop #keeps pitch from going to low
>
> My editor wrapped a comment in this message, but you get the idea.
>
> Hope this helps.
>           Kenny
>
> On Wed, Sep 08, 2004 at 08:05:15PM -0500, kenny wrote:
> > Hi.  I just started using a DECtalk express.  I notice a strange problem
> > when I use any voice except 0 (Paul).  If I change to another voice, it
> > seems to work.  However, the pitch will change if I do anything like
> > spelling a word with a capital letter.
> > For example:
> > change to voice 4 (Betty).  She sounds ok, but not exactly like my
> > software DECtalk.  If I change the pitch by spelling a word with a
> > capital letter or use insert 2 then inssert 3 to mess with the pitch the
> > voice changes.  After that point, changing the pitch has little
> > effect.  Voice 0 (Paul is the only voice that doesn't have this problem.
> > In the case of Betty, the pitch becomes to low and you can't get the
> > voice back unless you echo 4 to /proc/speakup/voice.
> > Does anyone else have this problem, and does anyone know a solution?
> >
> > Thanks in advance.
> >           Kenny
> >
> >
>
> _______________________________________________
> Speakup mailing list
> Speakup@braille.uwo.ca
> http://speech.braille.uwo.ca/mailman/listinfo/speakup
>