1. Setting up the Currah Microspeech

The CURRAH MicroSpeech is an allophone speech synthesiser, which means that it uses individual speech sounds strung together to make intelligible speech. This is different to some speech synthesiser available today which have a fixed vocabulary; unlike these systems the MicroSpeech has an unlimited vocabulary and can synthesise any word or sentence in the English language. The user merely has to become familiar with he speech sounds of English (which are different from letters) and the allophone symbols used to represent them.

To set up the unit, remove it from its packing tray if you have not already done so, UNPLUG THE SPECTRUM FROM ITS POWER SUPPLY, and plug the unit into the port on the back of the Spectrum, CURRAH logo uppermost. You will find that there are two short leads at the back of the MicroSpeech unit:

  • A UHF lead (this is the one with the Phono plug)

  • A line lead (this has a 3.5mm jack plug on it)

Remove the Spectrum's TV lead from the "TV" socket on the back of the Spectrum and plug in the short UHF lead instead. Then take the Spectrum's TV lead and plug it into the Phono socket on the back of the MicroSpeech. This now allows speech to be "mixed" with the Spectrum's video signal so that it comes from the TV speaker.

Now take the line lead and plug it into the "MIC" socket on the back of the Spectrum (you cannot do any harm if you plug it into the "EAR" socket by mistake). This lead allows the sound generated by the Spectrum's own internal loudspeaker to come from the TV speaker - simply remove this lead when you wish to use a cassette recorder with your Spectrum.

Plug in the power lead to the Spectrum. The Spectrum will initialise and the message:

"Speech System (c) CURRAH 1983"

will appear at the top of the screen, as well as the normal Sinclair Research Ltd. copyright message. If this does not happen, unplug the power, check that you have connected the unit up correctly, and try again.

Turn up the volume on your television (about half-way will do) and press ENTER. The unit will say "enter". If it does not, there are two simple checks you can do:

  • Make sure you have pressed ENTER - the unit will remain silent until the first ENTER is pressed after a power up, a NEW, or after a "report" has been printed at the bottom of the screen.

  • If you can hear the voice but it is very quiet or a little distorted, the UHF trimmer on the top right corner of the case may need adjusting. Using a small screwdriver, carefully turn the trimmer until you get the best quality speech with the least interference - keep pressing ENTER as you do this to hear the voice. Don't worry about turning the screw too far - it goes round and round without a stop - but you should find that an adjustment a fraction of a turn is all that you need.

Now try pressing any of the keys (remember to press ENTER first if you have just switched on). All BASIC keywords and printable characters are voiced, (with the exception of the "~" character) so when LET appears on the screen you will hear the word "let" - go on - try it! Note that all graphics characters are voiced as "graphic", whatever their shape.

All keyvoices "repeat" - if you try holding down ENTER for a few repeats, the unit will say something like"

"E...E...E...E...Enter".

The old keyvoice is "chopped off" and a new one started each time the repeat occurs. If you type very fast the same sort of effect is obtained.

Try all of the keyvoices now. Apart from being useful in themselves, the keyvoices serve to illustrate what can be achieved by allophone speech synthesis.

When you are bored with this, go on to the next chapter. If at any point you get stuck, remember that all you have to do is unplug the power, wait a moment, and start again - the unit initialises automatically each time.