You are welcome to try our web-based recording tool. Please note that the built-in microphone on a laptop is not sufficient for creating high-quality recordings. We require users to record with a headset mic with a USB interface. Many consumer-grade USB headsets will be acceptable as long as they do not have Automatic Gain Control (AGC). The Logitech G330 or H530 are possible choices, as well as the Sennheiser PC 36.
To use our web recording tool, go to https://www.asel.udel.edu/vrec/ and login with the username and password you chose when registering. Read the information on the Help page.
Click Settings and enter ‘screen’ (without the quotes) in the inventory box. Then click Measure (at the end of the Silence box). Your browser will ask you if you want to to share your microphone. In Firefox, this is via an alert box that opens at the top left. In Chrome, a tool bar is exposed along the top of the page. (Currently the recorder will not work in Safari or Internet Explorer.) Make sure the correct microphone is selected and click the button to allow it to be shared.
The silence measurement will begin immediately. Be sure the room is quiet and you do not make any sounds during the silence measurement. When the silence measure completes, click the Start button.
You will be prompted with each sentence you need to record. Click the Rec button and repeat the utterance, trying to follow the pronunciation and speaking rate of the aural prompt. The recorder should automatically detect when you finish speaking and will advance to the next sentence. You should never need to click the stop button.
After you have recorded three or four sentences, use the Listen->Recordings menu and review your recordings. Do you hear any background noises like fans or heaters or air conditioning? Do the recordings sound “hollow” with echoes from the room? Do you hear any electrical hum in the recordings? These are all problems that you will need to correct in order to record speech for a good quality synthetic voice.
If your recordings sound OK to you, finish all 10 sentences of the screening set. We will review your screening sentences and get back to you as soon as possible about the next step.
Please let us know if you have any questions or problems, and thank you for being a part of our beta program.