From: Jens Arnold <arnold-j_at_t-online.de>
Date: Fri, 11 Jun 2004 22:57:51 +0200

Hello Brian

>> Voices that will show up in the speech applet are SAPI 5
>> only. I'm not sure if mp3clipgen can be made to use SAPI 4
>> voices (any comment, Brian?), and I don't know if any one has
>> released anything that will do the scanning of the directory
>> tree as well as speak through SAPI 4, though there are files
>> that will allow the making of language.voice files using SAPI
>> 4 voices.
>> Aman

> I've only used the SAPI 5 voices; I don't think SAPI 4
> supports some of the methods the mp3clipgen script uses to
> write the audio stream directly to a file. There was something
> posted recently (Jens Arnold) about a script that could use
> either version, IIRC. That may have only been for the voice
> files, however. The methods used in that script ought to be
> adaptable to the creation of the .talk clips, though.

Yes, my MakeVoice.vbs script (available at
http://arnold-j.bei.t-online.de/Rockbox/) is able to use both
SAPI5 and SAPI4 for voice file generation. The method for using
SAPI4 voices could be easy adapted for use in mp3clipgen.vbs

Although it is possible to use SAPI4 from VBScript I do not
recommend it, since the actual conversion is then done in realtime
(i.e. 1 minute conversion for a 1 minute speech), while with
SAPI5 the conversion is done as fast as the PC permits (which
should easily exceed 10x speed with a decent PC).

The "ActiveVoice" ActiveX control used by the script should allow
speed changing according to the docs, but it doesn't. Apparently
this is a bug in the control.

It should be possible to get faster-than-realtime conversion
with SAPI4 if someone writes a "real" program (VB/ VC), since
this would then use DCOM to control SAPI and not the ActiveVoice
control. I think it is not worth the effort, since the SAPI5
voices are more advanced and sound more pleasant than the SAPI4
voices anyway.

Regards, Jens

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Received on 2004-06-11