Talk to your car

[NissT]

Link (http://finance.lycos.com/qc/news/story.aspx?story=43427967)

[Wahhaj]

Honda will offer the system as standard equipment on the 2005 Acura RL and as options on both the 2005 Acura MDX and 2005 Honda Odyssey in the United States and Canada beginning this month.

Using IBM Embedded ViaVoice software, Honda is the first car manufacturer to equip automobiles with in-car navigation systems using advanced speech recognition and text-to-speech capabilities that can identify spoken street and city names that exist across the entire continental United States.



Glad they are offering it on the odyssey.

[Nismo]

Hmmm... wonder if my 2003 Accord's system can be easily upgraded. The 03's speech recognition is quite good (and accurate) but is limited to the system's built-in commands; street names still have to be entered via the touch screen keyboard or the joystick.

[FanaticZ]

Did anyone see that topgear review of the s-class or some other high end car with the voice recognition? Was too funny. In other words voice recognition is very touchy, most likely too much to be an effective system right now. If it were, there would be no need for i-drive, dash knobs, radio buttons, etc.

[Nismo]

Voice recognition is very touchy, most likely too much to be an effective system right now. If it were, there would be no need for i-drive, dash knobs, radio buttons, etc.



I've been using voice recognition in my Accord for 1 1/2 years and the system has worked great. Voice commands are best used when driving solo. With passengers in the car (or when I'm the passenger) I'll either use the touch screen, the joystick, or the console controls, depending on the situation. For example, the touch screen is great while stopped, but is harder to use while traveling on a bumpy road. And of course, the steering wheel controls are handy for most basic radio functions, while the touch screen is best for setting advanced options.

Voice recognition (in the Honda Accord at least) is a great addition to a well-though out control system. http://forums.freshalloy.com/images/graemlins/smile.gif