WillowTalk from Willow Pond Corp., priced at $39.95, can read text in a
document window triggered by a user-definable hot key, as well as read
scripts in multiple voices and also announce the time with alarms.  

WillowTalk has a funky, non-Windows interface that is, by default, shaped
roughly like a sideways L and looks like a piece of electronic equipment
straight from the set of "Alien". You can collapse the arms of the layout to
reduce the application‘s size and have it run permanently on top of all
applications.  

WillowTalk has a range of predefined voices that imitate male and female
tonality quite well. You can also define your own voices in terms of pitch,
speed and volume, and the product allows for custom dictionaries so you can
define the pronunciation of special words.  

The reading scripts feature is odd, to say the least: You fill in a grid with
the voice you want in one column and the text for that voice in the other and
the voice reads the script.  

The WillowTalk speaking clock is cool. You can have the time announced in a
12- or 24-hour format on the hour, half hour and quarters with a greeting
(for example, "Good morning," "Good afternoon") and also include the date.
The alarm can play a WAV file or speak whatever text you require. What is
really useful is the ability to save the speech to a file that lets you
include synthesized voices in other applications.  

Another fun speech utility is Saylt from AnalogX. AnalogX has a lot of public
domain software for Windows on its Web site, including something called
Saylt.  

Saylt is simple and was designed along the lines of Speak and Spell. It has a
text entry window where you can enter up to 500 text characters and four
sliders that let you change pitch, speed, modulation and cascade. (AnalogX
omits explaining what these last two attributes actually do - get them wrong
and the voice can sound awful.)  

You can simply have the text read to you or you can save the synthesized
voice to disk. Some of the voices from Saylt were great - clear and easily
understood.  

These speaking programs are great fun and can be used to generate speech for
other application programs or Web sites.  


WillowTalk: http://www.willowpond.com
SayIt: http://www.analogx.com/contents/download/audio/sayit.htm