Good with the right expectations

• Category: Productivity
• Developer: SpeechCloud
• Version: 1.1.0.0
• Cost: Free
• For: iPhone, iPhone 3G
• Download URL

As much as I love my new iPhone 3G, there are some features on my blackberry that I do miss on the iPhone.  Some of those features, I keep hoping will be added with future firmware upgrades (the ability to send and forward meeting requests on Exchange, for one).  Others, I’ve been adding slowly through third-party apps.  Voice Dialing is one of them.

From an interface perspective, SpeechCloud is as simple as they get (not that voice dialers in general have too many features from what I’ve seen).  Hold onto a button, say a name, and the program will do its best to find the best match in your address book and dial the number for you.

In terms of performance, I’d say it’s good - as long as you have the right expectations.  Having been using the BlackBerry’s voice dialer and the built-in voice dailers in cars for a couple of years now, I know that you have to work with the program in order for it to work. E-nun-cia-tion is key.  Having enough length in the name for the program to uniquely identify the name is the other.  This is no different than any other voice dialers I’ve used; which is why in my address book even my wife’s entry has full first and last names.  If you stick to the rules, it does a decent (not perfect job)

Conclusion

Personally, I think VoiceDialer is pretty good for a free app.  Speech recognition is a tricky art, and personally I’ve found it to work no worse (but no better) than a lot of other voice dialing capabilities of hands free sets out there.

App Score: 3.0 out of 5.

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