Differences between Standard / Preferred /Professional ?    Technical Requirements

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What is the difference between Dragon NaturallySpeaking Standard, Preferred and Professional ?

Can Dragon NaturallySpeaking be used to transcribe other speakers/meeting/interviews?

Am i receiving version 9 or version 9.5 ?

Here's a brief rundown of the differences:

Dragon Standard cannot be upgraded whenever version 10 arrives. You must buy a complete new licence. You cannot buy an upgrade from Standard to Preferred. A new licence of Preferred will be required. Hence you can see that in the long run it is better and ultimately cheaper to maintain a current Preferred licence than to purchase new Standard licence's on every new version release.

Dragon standard is not have the ability to manage the user files. This is critical if you wish to backup or export your user file. ( you cant import/export your user with standard). If you have been training/using Dragon for three months do you really want to start from scratch again if there is a problem with your computer or user file? For this reason alone I believe Dragon preferred is a better value package than standard.

Dragon Standard does not have support for Microsoft Excel as preferred does.
Dragon Standard does not have support for digital recorders or PDA's,preferred does.You cant use a digital recorder at all with Standard.

Dragon preferred has a text-to-speech engine so you can have your documents read back to you for the purposes of proofreading. Standard does not have this.
Dragon preferred also has the ability to create basic text macros which can insert a signature, logo or boilerplate text with a simple voice command. Standard does not have this ability.
Essentially if you just want to dictate for perhaps one hour a day into Microsoft Word or Internet Explorer, using a basic non technical vocabulary,then standard will suffice. However, if you expect to be using Dragon in the long-term for more than one hour a day and wish to perform more advanced tasks then Dragon NaturallySpeaking Preferred is a much better entry-level option. Dragon NaturallySpeaking Preferred version 9 with USB NC7100 is our most popular product by far for this reason.

Dragon Preferred vs Dragon Professional Solutions v9

There are many differences between Dragon preferred and Dragon professional. Again it is important to look at the Comparison Guide. I will not attempt to address every difference just the core differences.

Dragon professional can be preloaded with a variety of specialised vocabularies. For example medical and legal. Dragon professional also allows you to fully customise your own vocabulary for your specific needs. That may be a scientific field or a vocabulary that is focused on your exact requirements. This vocabulary can be managed and manipulated, this allows for a high degree of accuracy .Dragon preferred is not have this degree of control over the vocabulary. Dragon preferred cannot be preloaded with medical and legal vocabularies.

You can install and manage Dragon NaturallySpeaking 8 Professional from a central network location. You can even access your unique Dragon NaturallySpeaking 8 Professional "profile" from any PC on your organization's local area network .Dragon preferred not have these network features.

Dragon NaturallySpeaking Professional is fully integrated with Microsoft outlook. This is a key benefit over the other versions of Dragon. for example, in Microsoft outlook using Dragon Professional you can simply say"New Message" or "New E-Mail" and Dragon will automatically generate a new message window. You can then simply say "Go to Subject"to move to the subject field in the e-mail.you can then say "Go to Body" and the program will move the cursor to the body of the text. You can then dictate directly into the message. What's the message is completed you can simply say" Send Message" and the message will be sent. In other words you can completely voice-enabled and control Microsoft outlook. This is a very powerful feature of Dragon NaturallySpeaking professional. Some more examples of what you can say are "reply to message" "forward message" "delete message" "open message" "close message" "next message" "previous message"and many more others.

The ability to voice control Microsoft outlook is extremely useful in most work environments. Not only is it fast and efficient and allows users to minimise their typing and mouse usage. None of these commands are available with Dragon Preferred ONLY Dragon Professional.

Dragon Professional can not only import/export the user file but it can import/export the vocabulary independently. This is a crucial feature. Imagine that in specific company or government department that there are 10 users who require a vocabulary to do with pharmaceuticals for example. One user could create a comprehensive pharmaceutical vocabulary by using the application over a period of time and using the vocabulary building tools. That user could then export that vocabulary to the other users enabling them to be using exactly the same vocabulary. This means that everyone is using a consistent and accurate vocabulary within their company/government department that is relevant to their area of expertise. It also allows a single user to back up their vocabulary. The users vocabulary can be exported and at a later time re imported if the user has to retrain Dragon NaturallySpeaking. This can save an enormous amount of time as the user does not have to spend time rebuilding the vocabulary from scratch. Dragon preferred does not have this capacity.

A: All editions sold here are Dragon version 9.5. The boxes are marked a v9 because the 9.5 update was just a compatibility update and they don't manufacture new boxes for minor revisions. If for some reason you get a v9 disc in the box go to www.nuance.com/vista and download the free 9.5 patch.