Tutorial:The Manager:Global settings - speech, messages, media order, audio formats, file associations and portable installation:
SpeakOn supports some media types 'out of the box'; others can be supported by installing Windows Media Player / Direct Shows plug-in or external applications.
If you are interested in this additional media format support you have first to install the relevant plug-in / filters / external applications explained below, and then configure SpeakOn to recognize these by selecting the relevant options as explained at the foot of this page.
- Real format: to play Real format radio streams SpeakOn requires an external program that supports this format. RealPlayer from Real works well with SpeakOn in all Windows operating systems. For those who want to use Real Alternative from Edskes, the author has had good experience with this program in Windows XP but not Windows 7 where the 'Real Alternative' option during the installation was greyed out preventing selection of the Active X component required for communication with SpeakOn. The author is unsure as to the reasons for this and your experience may differ.
- FLAC, OGG and SPEEX formats: To provide FLAC OGG and SPEEX support install the Xiph direct show filter which you can get directly from:
http://www.a-technic.net/SpeakOn/codecs/oggcodecs_0.81.15562-win32.exe
Note that SpeakOn already supports out of the box the Ogg and Speex formats but with the above filter, navigation within a media is also provided.
- Windows Video format - audio support: You don't need to install anything to check this option. If you check this option, you will find in the Radio Time task's library another entry called 'TV Shows'. This contains some stations not all of which are reliable. This is a section which is being developed by Radio Time and therefore the support for this in SpeakOn is at this stage experimental. Note that SpeakOn only plays the audio part of the TV show there is no visual element. Also audio support for video in SpeakOn is not yet fully tested and may cause instability.
- AAC audio format (as used mainly by iTunes): This format, which includes the '.m4a' file extension, is supported by an increasing number of radio stations.
Windows 7 supports the AAC format out of the box (with Windows Media Player 12 which is installed in Windows 7 by default) but only for local files, not streaming.
The Orban plug-in Windows Media Player filter which adds AAC support in Windows XP and Vista is unfortunately no longer available from the vendor. The following instructions are for those who have saved this filter before or manage to get it from other sources.
If you want to listen to AAC radio stations in Windows 7 or need AAC support in any other version of Windows, you need to install the Orban Windows Media Player plug-in.
Note that once you have installed this plug-in it will put two shortcuts on your desktop; one pointing to a readme file and the other to a website which plays AAC music with an extra toolbar that you are encouraged by the vendor to download. I have not tried this, and you don't need any of these shortcuts with SpeakOn; they can be deleted.
If you installed the application / plug-in / filters for any of the media above in the Manager, bring up the Menu and select:
Global Settings > Additional audio formats
Simply select [Enter] (5) the media you want supported (based of course on the software installed). Bring the Main menu and select 'OK end task, return to Manager' to confirm your selection.