My Thoughts On 3GS Voice Control

I’m gonna’ be straight with y’all… I was never too impressed with voice control for iPhone 3GS’s.

I remember having an argument with a friend about iPhones back before I had gotten the Neocell. I wasn’t an iPhone owner, but my bud, who had Sprint for whatever stupid reason, and had just gotten a Samsung Instinct, which as we know, is nothing more than an iPhone clone. I knew a little about iPhones, and when I had mentioned how much I respected iPhones, he mentioned that I outta’ get a Samsung Instinct, that iPhones were crappy and over rated… compared to his phone at least.

I heard him out and checked out info on his phone… I quickly discovered that it was a piece of crap compared to iPhones. One of his only argue points was that iPhones don’t have voice control. What I explained to him was that, with other phones, like my then current Motorola Krzr, you needed voice control because the user interface was nothing like the ease of use of iPhones. My exact words were “Man, did you see how the contacts thing work on iPhones? You simply flick your finger to scroll to your contacts dude.”.

My explaining to him was that my current phone (the Motorola Krzr) had a more advanced voice system than his phone (being able to launch apps via voice, ect), and yet iPhones blow all current phones out of the water. I said “There’s a reason they don’t have voice control… they don’t need them. Why speak to some goofy computer voice that’ll miss understand most of what you tell it when you can actually ‘touch’ what you need to do in a few seconds??”.

Well that was my thinking then and, once I heard the announcement of the 3GS’s voice control, that was still my thinking. But now that I have the Neocell 3GS, I can give my experience with it.

As far as the quality of the voice, it sucks. I mean, everything Apple puts into the iPhone is just the best, top notch quality… since the 2G, all the way to the 3GS. But the voice quality is so average, not compared to other phones, I mean compared to the best that’s out there. The best that’s out on the consumer market, that I’ve experienced, is the computer voice system used in TomTom GPS’s, like my 910. You can’t tell a computer is speaking it sounds so realistic. With the iPhone’s voice system, it sounds like a woman is trying to do an imitation of a robot. In other words, it sounds like a female robot speaking to you… but not in a cool way.

Now, I (believe) I understand why they did this. They did it because the voice speaking system of Tomtom’s is very advanced and, if they used the same kind of system to run in the background of iPhone 3GS’s, it would slow the system down too much. That, there, is the reason 2G and 3G iPhones never had voice command… it would slow down the system too much (iPhones do, remember, run a full version of OSX). So we, as users, would choose a fake sounding voice with a fast system over a realistic sounding voice with a slow system any day.

So ok, that’s the quality of the sound… so how about the quality of the system to be able to understand commands? Well that’s one thing that’s as good of quality as everything else on iPhones. It’s one of the best systems I’ve used for understanding phrases, including in loud, harsh environments. I’ve had the Neocell understand me, even while someone was stupidly talking in the background at the moment.

But remember my thoughts on voice command not being needed for the iPhone? Well that’s pretty much true… but there are some major exceptions, mainly when you have the Apple ear buds in. That, then, makes voice command great. You just hold down the middle button of the headphones and speak your commands. I mean, when you have your iPhone out in your hand, it’s just as quick to touch what you need most of the time than it is to speak it. But when your phone’s in your pocket and you have the ear buds in, that’s a completely different story. Then using voice command is so convenient… and fun! In fact, when I’m out somewhere with the headphones in, I have full control of the next or pause commands from the button control on the headphones… but I’ll rather just speak my command because it’s that much cooler.

Some complaints I do have though… your not able to play by genre. Honestly, when do I ever play by artist, album or… playlist?? Please. Not having “Play genre…” is a huge thing. And also, for my contacts, voice command doesn’t seem to recognize any contacts that don’t have “mobile” or “home” numbers attached to them. Basically, it won’t dial any business entries. I don’t know what’s up with that.

So back to the point I made at the start of all this… is voice control needed for iPhones? I’m gonna’ say no… I mean all you 2G and 3G users, ya ain’t missin’ much not havin’ voice control. But, having voice control, is it useful and a good feature to have? Surprisingly, yeah, it is.

What I would LOVE to have would be a voice speaking ringer system, like a really old (and really bad ***) Sanyo phone of mine had back in the day. It would be great if they added a voice speaking system for contacts, where if someone called you, your phone would make a ring sound, then speak “Call from John Appleseed…” or “Call from John Appleseed’s mobile” and repeat until you picked up. That would be crazy tight.

Peace, J

Control Your Music While Locked

Well I learned somethin’ new. Did you know that you can control the iPod of your iPhone while it’s still locked? No, I don’t mean through the headphones or through a remote or some other hardware. I mean directly from the screen itself.

I discovered it by accident. I was chillin’ in bed one afternoon, readin’ an ebook (Gibralter Stars). I wasn’t feelin’ too hot, that’s why I was in bed… and eventually I decided to go to sleep with the Neocell laying next to me. I woke up ‘cuz the Neocell made a beeping noice and spoke to me “I have downloaded new email for you…” (somethin’ I created just for the Neocell). I went to hit the home button, to wake it up, but because I was tired, I hit the home button too many times and this is how I discovered it. At first I thought it was a glitch.

Try it out for your self. Play some music or don’t play any music at all, turn your iPhone (or iPod touch) off and turn it on so that you see the locked screen. When you do, hit the home button twice quickly and bam… your now able to control your iPod while your iPhone is still locked.

Pretty tight, huh?

Peace, J

Put Your Music On A Sleep Timer

So here’s a bad *** feature I found on the Neocell. I was going to select a new sound for the timer, the clock app, and when I was going through the sounds, I saw at the very top was “Sleep iPod”. I thought to myself “Man, what junk sound file got transfered over.”. But then I realized it was a sleep funtion for your music.

You set this to stop playing your music after a certain time, the same thing as a sleep timer on your TV.

Freakin’ too cool, baby.

Peace, J