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Has anyone tried running Dragon NaturallySpeaking (for Windows) on Mac Mavericks?

Has anyone tried running Dragon NaturallySpeaking (for Windows) on Mac Mavericks? I have finally given up on Dragon Dictate for Mac, which alas, after years of buying every new updated version, is still exceedingly buggy and does not begin to compare in quality to the PC version. I love my Mac, and don't like my PC at all, but the third-party voice dictation software for Mac is so pathetic, that I have wound up dictating on my PC, and then sending it to my Mac: an truly annoying and Baroque process. I was able to train over 120 words in Sanskrit word perfect on Dragon NaturallySpeaking, but on Dragon Dictate for Mac, I can't even get it to train my name. I know this is not an Apple problem, but I'm trying to find a way around by possibly running the DNS version on Windows on my iMac.


I have a hand disability, so I really do need to use voice dictation, both for dictating and navigating on my computer.


If anyone is doing this, are you using Boot Camp, VM fusion, or Parallels? How well does it work? Has anyone discovered anything else I ought to be considering, before giving this a try? I had tried running this on an old on 2008 iMac (with much less power), using Parallels, but it was incredibly slow. Now that I have a much more powerful iMac, I'm wondering whether it would be worth another try. As it will be quite an investment to purchase all this third-party software to get Dragon up and running, I was hoping to get a sense of how well it works, before plunking down the cash. I would be extremely grateful for helpful feedback.




IMac, Mavericks OS X 10.9.4, 3.5 GHz Intel core i 7, 8 GB 1600 MHz DD3, Dragon NaturallySpeaking 12, Dragon Dictate 4.0.2

iMac, OS X Mavericks (10.9), iwork update

Posted on Jul 25, 2014 6:35 PM

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Jul 25, 2014 10:54 PM

You cannot run a Windows application on a Mac unless you run Windows on the Mac.


Windows on Intel Macs


There are presently several alternatives for running Windows on Intel Macs.


1. Install the Apple Boot Camp software. Purchase Windows

XP w/Service Pak2, Vista, or Windows 7. For Boot Camp

4.0 and above you can only use Windows 7 or later. Follow

instructions in the Boot Camp documentation on

installation of Boot Camp, creating Driver CD, and

installing Windows. Boot Camp enables you to boot the

computer into OS X or Windows.

2. Parallels Desktop for Mac and Windows XP, Vista Business,

Vista Ultimate, or Windows 7. Parallels is software

virtualization that enables running Windows concurrently

with OS X.

3. VM Fusionand Windows XP, Vista Business, Vista Ultimate,

or Windows 7. VM Fusion is software virtualization that

enables running Windows concurrently with OS X.

4. CrossOver which enables running many Windows

applications without having to install Windows. The

Windows applications can run concurrently with OS X.

5. VirtualBox is an Open Source freeware virtual machine such

as VM Fusion and Parallels that was developed by Solaris.

It is not as fully developed for the Mac as Parallels and VM

Fusion.


Note that VirtualBox, Parallels, and VM Fusion can also run other operating systems such as Linux, Unix, OS/2, Solaris, etc. There are performance differences between dual-boot systems and virtualization. The latter tend to be a little slower (not much) and do not provide the video performance of the dual-boot system. See MacTech Labs- Virtualization Benchmarks, January 2013 | MacTechfor comparisons of Boot Camp, Parallels, and VM Fusion. Benchmarks of all of the above except Crossover can be found in Benchmarking Parallels, Fusion, and VirtualBox Against Boot Camp - The Mac Observer. Boot Camp is only available with Leopard or later. Except for Crossover and a couple of similar alternatives like DarWine you must have a valid installer disc for Windows.


You must also have an internal optical drive for installing Windows. Windows cannot be installed from an external optical drive.

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Jul 25, 2014 10:54 PM in response to alvca

You cannot run a Windows application on a Mac unless you run Windows on the Mac.


Windows on Intel Macs


There are presently several alternatives for running Windows on Intel Macs.


1. Install the Apple Boot Camp software. Purchase Windows

XP w/Service Pak2, Vista, or Windows 7. For Boot Camp

4.0 and above you can only use Windows 7 or later. Follow

instructions in the Boot Camp documentation on

installation of Boot Camp, creating Driver CD, and

installing Windows. Boot Camp enables you to boot the

computer into OS X or Windows.

2. Parallels Desktop for Mac and Windows XP, Vista Business,

Vista Ultimate, or Windows 7. Parallels is software

virtualization that enables running Windows concurrently

with OS X.

3. VM Fusionand Windows XP, Vista Business, Vista Ultimate,

or Windows 7. VM Fusion is software virtualization that

enables running Windows concurrently with OS X.

4. CrossOver which enables running many Windows

applications without having to install Windows. The

Windows applications can run concurrently with OS X.

5. VirtualBox is an Open Source freeware virtual machine such

as VM Fusion and Parallels that was developed by Solaris.

It is not as fully developed for the Mac as Parallels and VM

Fusion.


Note that VirtualBox, Parallels, and VM Fusion can also run other operating systems such as Linux, Unix, OS/2, Solaris, etc. There are performance differences between dual-boot systems and virtualization. The latter tend to be a little slower (not much) and do not provide the video performance of the dual-boot system. See MacTech Labs- Virtualization Benchmarks, January 2013 | MacTechfor comparisons of Boot Camp, Parallels, and VM Fusion. Benchmarks of all of the above except Crossover can be found in Benchmarking Parallels, Fusion, and VirtualBox Against Boot Camp - The Mac Observer. Boot Camp is only available with Leopard or later. Except for Crossover and a couple of similar alternatives like DarWine you must have a valid installer disc for Windows.


You must also have an internal optical drive for installing Windows. Windows cannot be installed from an external optical drive.

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Aug 4, 2014 3:29 PM in response to Kappy

Thanks for replying about the basics of running Windows on a Mac. My main question is how well Dragon NaturallySpeaking works ( running Windows) on Mac Mavericks. It isn't just running Windows. The only reason I would need to run Windows on my Mac is to use Dragon NaturallySpeaking, rather than the ghastly, bug-ridden Dragon Dictate. As I mentioned, when I last tried this in 2008, with a far less powerful Mac, it was very, very slow. I was hoping to get some feedback from someone who had experience running Dragon NaturallySpeaking on a far more powerful Mac with the most recent OS.

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Aug 4, 2014 3:44 PM in response to alvca

There is no Dragon NaturallySpeaking that runs on a Mac without Windows. Dragon Dictate is the Mac version of that program. It's much different today than it was six years ago. Dragon NaturallySpeaking will run in Windows (running on the Mac) as well as it would run on a plain Windows computer with the same specifications. I once used Dragon on the PC about 10 years ago, and it was nothing special. I have used Dictate before it was a Dragon product and it worked fairly well. The newest version works extremely well from my short time trying it out.

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Sep 30, 2014 1:53 PM in response to Kappy

I'm looking at a similar issue. I'm using a Mac Mini with 2 meg of ram and Mavericks. I have installed Parallels 10 and Windows 8.1.

In trying to install Dragon Naturally Speaking on the Windows virtual machine, I get a message that there is not enough ram to install it. Yet the instructions for increasing ram allotted to Parallels or Windows don't work. They take you to a slider that is grayed out and can't be used. The instructions to "resume" and then "turn off" Windows make no difference: it doesn't work either way. So I have two issues:

1– how do I change the ram allotment?

2– will Dragon work after I do that?

Using Dragon is the only reason I want Windows or Parallels on my Mac.

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Has anyone tried running Dragon NaturallySpeaking (for Windows) on Mac Mavericks?

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