Using NextUp Talker with Telephone

[D.Leikin]

The other day, I got NextUp Talker to place phone calls over regular telephone line. I placed several calls to both landline and cellular phones, and NextUp Talker seems to work great in telephone conversations.

I will try to minutely describe the setup in kind of FAQ style to help readers skip uninteresting sections. Here goes.

Q. What does the setup look like?
A. To use speech synthesis technology for calling I used a PC, NextUp Talker, a voice modem, and free BVRP Classic Phone Tools package bundled with the voice modem. Optionally, one can add a telephone set or a speakerphone, PC speakers, or headphones, depending on which sound device you prefer in conversation.

Q. How does it work?
A. NextUp Talker and BVRP Classic Phone Tools must be up and running. You type a phone number (or just pick it from the phonebook) and BVRP goes online to dial. When it connects to remote landline or cellular phone you will be prompted to pick up. So your conversation starts. You input text from the keyboard, NextUp Talker converts it into audio, and modem feeds the audio stream into the telephone line. PC speakers monitor the line and you hear both NextUp Talker’s voice output and the incoming replies. When the conversation is finished, you simply hang, as usual.

Q. How should the modem be connected?
A. Normally, analog voice modem should have two RJ11 jacks, one of which is labeled as ‘Line’ or ‘Telco’ and the other as ‘Phone’. Just plug telephone cable into the ‘Line’ or ‘Telco’ jack, and use phone cable bundled with the modem to connect the phone to the ‘Phone’ jack.

So that’s how the telephone setup looks before you install the modem:

Telephone line ---------------------------------------------------------------- > Phone

And this is what it looks like after the voice modem is added to the PC:

Telephone line ------ > [line] Modem [phone] < ---- phone cable ---- > Phone

Q. How should the software be configured?
A. In my setup, I didn’t make any particular changes to system settings except for checking the Mono Mixer box under the recording level control and setting its volume to very low to avoid overload.

Q. I have to dial through private branch exchange and have to first select an outside line. How should I use BVRP dialer in this situation?
A. When you are dialing a number through a PABX, and have to dial a number to select an outside line, pause, and then dial the remote number, you should use the [,] modifier after the prefix. For example:
9,1234567890
will instruct the modem to dial the digit 9 and then wait for 2 seconds before dialing remote number 1234567890.

Also, if you are dialing through a PABX you may need to wait for a second dial tone after dialing an outside line. In this situation you should use the [W] command modifier to instruct the modem to wait for the second dial tone. For example:
9W1234567890
will instruct the modem to dial 9 for an outside line, then wait for the dial tone and then dial the remote number 1234567890.

Q. Is it possible to use NextUp Talker to reach both regular and cellular phones?
A. Yes.

Q. Can I make a call without using a telephone set?
A. Yes. You can use desktop speakers or headphones connected to PC soundcard. You will hear how NextUp Talker is reading the text you type and you will also hear incoming replies.

Q. I only have desktop speakers and don’t have a telephone set. How do I switch NextUp Talker between telephone and face-to-face operating modes?
A. You won’t have to manually switch anything. In both operating modes NextUp Talker will use desktop speakers to read aloud the text you input from the keyboard. In telephone mode, NextUp Talker will feed synthesized speech into the telephone line, but the speakers will monitor the line and you will hear both NextUp Talker’s voice output and the incoming replies.

Q. I need to make a private call and don’t want my conversation to be heard through the loudspeakers. What should I do?
A. You should turn computer sound off by using master volume control in system tray. You can also just turn the desktop speakers off. In both cases, you should use either handset or headphones in the conversation.

Q. I don’t have neither desktop speakers nor headphones and I don’t want to use handset. What then?
A. You can make phone calls using speakerphone. You will hear how NextUp Talker reads aloud your input and you will also hear the incoming replies. Both sound streams will be played through the speakerphone.

Q. Can I place a call without using speakers, headphones, handset, and speakerphone?
A. Most likely yes. There are tiny loudspeakers in modems that can be used to monitor both sound streams.

Q. Will NextUp Talker work with programs other than BVRP Classic Phone Tools?
A. Probably yes, if the program fully supports voice functions of the modem.

Q. Will NextUp Talker work with Microsoft Dialer bundled with Windows XP?
A. Dialer is supposed to work, but I had no luck with it so far. Most likely, the problem is it doesn’t support the modem I used in my setup. Perhaps it will work with a different voice modem.

Q. What is ‘voice modem’?
A. Voice modems are much the same things as ordinary Data or Data-Fax modems but have additional ‘voice’ features that let your PC send and receive analog audio signals over the telephone line. BVRP software bundled with voice modems lets you use PC as answering machine, fax, and regular phone.

Q. Where can I find a voice modem?
A. A voice modem may already be sitting inside your PC. You should check hardware documentation or contact your dealer to find that out.
Also, the presence of modem wave driver in Windows Device Manager will most likely indicate that your modem supports voice. Just click Start > Settings > Contrlo Panel, double click System icon, click Device Manager button under Hardware tab, click + next to Sound Controllers and check if Unimodem Half-duplex Audio Device is there.

Q. Which modem to buy?
A. Basically, there are four types of voice modems.

1. Software internal modems.
These are PCI cards to be installed in PC.
Pros.: Lowest prices starting at about $10. Software is easy to install.
Cons.: Software modems use CPU to process voice data, which may result in some audio artifacts like delays and echo. Also, software units may not work great when used to connect to the Internet or receive data and faxes.

2. Hardware internal modems.
These are also PCI cards to be installed in PC.
Pros.: Software package is easy to install. Better data throughput and error correction, which might be important if you need the modem to connect to the Internet or to send and receive faxes. High-quality hardware modems may probably give better sound quality when used with NextUp Talker.
Cons.: Higher prices ranging up to about $100.

3. Software or hardware external COM-port modems.
Basically, these are much the same things as internal PCI modems.
Additional pros.: you can carry external modems along and they are easier to install since there’s no need for opening PC case.
Additional cons.: external modems are more expensive since they have case, external power supply unit, and additional cable.

4. USB modems.
These are external units connected to PC or laptop through the USB port.
Pros.: You can carry the USB unit along, some units being the size of a PC mouse, some even working without power supply units.
Cons.: Software installation may be tricky.

Perhaps, it might make sense to first try NextUp Talker out with something like the cheapest D-Link DFM-562IS PCI card
http://www.dlink.com.au/Products.aspx?S ... 2=7&PID=69
that seems to work fine. Unfortunately, this unit doesn’t seem to be currently sold in the US, but I’ve seen a similar model AOpen FM56-SVV http://www.directron.com/fm56svv.html that uses the same chipset CX11252-11. Some models that should probably work can be found at http://store.myaopen.com/mosoca.html
If you buy a modem make sure the device is marked as DATA/FAX/VOICE or DATA/FAX/VOICE/SPEAKERPHONE and not just DATA/FAX. I wouldn’t recommend buying OEM versions because these may not be supplied with free BVRP application package. If you purchase from a foreign dealer make sure the modem complies with your local telephony standards. Voice modem prices start at about $ 10.

[kdwhite]

This is fantastic. OK if I post it also on the TTS Blog?
http://www.texttospeechblog.com

[D.Leikin]

Bonjour,

Seem to have worded a minor suggestion on the use of NextUp Talker with telephone.

The problem is that in telephone conversation, an accidental typo or incorrect pronunciation of a word can make synthesized phrase difficult (or even impossible) to understand, let alone sad incidents a typo may result in. Just imagine someone, who immediately before hanging up would tell you something like ‘Take cane’ instead of ‘Take care’.

So the idea was that Talker could help users avoid sad typos if it was able to work in kind of
‘Verification mode’ in which:

1. Mono mixer, or some other device used for mike with Talker is turned off by default (or its volume is set to zero), and

2. Talker is set to word-by-word reading mode, so you will hear every word you type and thus will be able to catch typos on the fly. Since the recording level is set to zero, the word-by-word audio would not go into the telephone line.

3. When a phrase is completed, you hit ‘Enter’ and Talker carries out the following tasks:
- Turn mono mixer on (or just return its volume to preset value)
- Read the whole text aloud (and now the audio will be transmitted into the telephone line!)
- Turn mono mixer off again and return into word-by-word reading mode.

Not sure if the suggestion on ‘Verification mode’ is any good and easy to implement, but still decided to post it here just in case.

Thanks

[kdwhite]

One thing that will help is the latest version of Talker has a spell checker built in. Just put it up at the end of last week.

[D.Leikin]

Dictionaries for NextUp Talker in a variety of languages may be downloaded from this page by the courtesy of contributers.

To start using a new dictionary just unzip it into Talker's folder.

[kdwhite]

Jim did a really nice job on this.

[mtnwalker]

Hi, I am helping someone who can't speak due to vocal chord damage get set up to use Next Up Tlker with her phone. I can't seem to get the output from NUT to go to the modem. Here is the setup:

Windows XP
Next Up Talker
BVRP Classic Phone Tools v9
USR 56k Voice PCI modem

I can get the modem to go offhook in speakerphone mode, and I hear the modem speaker, but nothing I have done, and I have tried every setting for recording - microphone, mono, stereo, etc. - but I can't get the speech to go to the modem.

Help? what am I missiong?

Thanks

[D.Leikin]

Here is something that might help troubleshoot the problem

1. Launch Classic Phone Tools 9
2. Press F6 or just click the "Setup" button to enter General Setup, select Communication tab, press "Change modem" EVEN IF your modem is indicated as already selected, and then run the "Device configuration wizard" to fully configure the device.
3. Press OK when done

ALSO MAKE SURE THAT

(a) cables are PROPERLY connected
(b) mono mixer is selected as recording device BEFORE you start Classic Phone Tools
(c) CALLS ARE PLACED USING BVRP SOFTWARE AND NOT the telephone set