How do I get text to speech to work in XP?

[MotorCityRock]

I have not been able to get text to speech to work in Excel that has Windows
XP. I haven't used this function in quite some time and I don't know if it
is because of XP that it will not work or for some other reason. Should be
simple to set up and use.

 

[Gord Dibben]

We know you have Windows XP but what version of Excel do you have?

Earlier versions did not have Text to Speech capability.

Here are instructions found under Help in Excel 2003

Play back worksheet data
You must have speakers installed to perform this procedure.

Play back a group of cells

On the Tools menu, point to Speech, and then click Show Text To Speech
Toolbar.
Select a group of cells to read back.
Choose how the computer will read back your data by clicking By Rows or By
Columns on the Text To Speech toolbar.
Click Speak Cells if you want the computer to read back each cell in your
selection.
To correct an error, click Stop Speaking , and use your mouse and keyboard
to make the necessary changes.
Click Speak Cells to continue having the computer read back your selection


Gord Dibben MS Excel MVP

 

[MotorCityRock]

Thanks Gord - Yes I have Excel 2003 and went through all the help
instructions. The preview of the voice works fine, but when the toolbar
comes up for text to speech from the Tools menu -- it does not function at
all. It appears to be disabled in some way. I know I have used it before,
but it is not working now. I will try the speaker set up again. Also had a
help option to change the view from the control panel, but could not find
that option available.

 

[comcdp]

Thanks Gord - Yes I have Excel 2003 and went through all the help
instructions.   The preview of the voice works fine, but when the toolbar
comes up fortext to speechfrom the Tools menu -- it does not function at
all.   It appears to be disabled in some way.   I know I have used itbefore,
but it is not working now.  I will try the speaker set up again.  Also had a
help option to change the view from the control panel, but could not find
that option available.

Take a look at this freeware panopreter (www.panopreter.com) , it
reads text files, web pages in .htm format and Word documents in many
languages, It also converts such files into wave and MP3 files, so
that you can hear the reading of the files with a MP3 player.