Text to Speech voip software

Hi,

My mum can no longer speak due to Motor neurone disease and she uses text to speech software on her laptop. It would be great if she could use a phone again, is there any software out there that will use the sound from the computer for the outgoing voice? So she can hear them with a headset and they can hear her using the text to speech engine on vista? I already use freecalls.com for the sip service.

Hope someone can help

Presumably you could split the headphone output with a standard cable splitter and feed one side back into the microphone input...

In reply to:

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is there any software out there that will use the sound from the computer for the outgoing voice

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Most softphones allow you to select the default audio in and out devices, so if the text to speech thing presents itself as a discreet audio device to windows you may have a chance. Look under Sound devices in Control Panel to see what's in the drop down list.

Thanks for the replies. Im sure the sound of the other person talking would get looped from my speaker output back to the microphone and so on?

The text to speech software uses the built in vista support for speech, theres no seperate option. Ive found vemotion but that cant find any speech? Is there something like this on the market?

I appreciate your help.

I'll have to have a look at vista to see.

A softphone that takes a text to voice synthesiser as its mic input and uses a headset / speakers as its output doesn't sound too difficult. May need a second sound card.

http://www.icthubknowledgebase.org.uk/accessibilityinclusion might have some hints or more specifically

http://www.mndassociation.org/news_and_events/news_room/press_releases/new_computer.html
http://www.abilitynet.org.uk/

Edited by yarwell (Tue 29-Jan-08 08:22:52)

Yes, a second soundcard - a USB external would probably be the easiest to sort- should do the trick.

Route the voice synthesizer output through the 2nd (external) sound.

Feed the output of that into the line/mic input on the other (internal) card.

Then use the softphone as normal using the internal soundcard ins & outs - it doesn't need to be aware of the source of the sound that it is sending out to the other party, so would need no modification.

Unfortunately its a laptop, only one input/output. Is there a usb device that can help?

Thanks for your help.

Something like this one from Creative needs 1 USB port & is powered by the USB too, so doesn't need a separate power supply.

is listening to a USB phone handset an option, while typing into the text -> speech thing ?