Lost Voices in Win 10 update

[John_Metcalfe 0]

Having a problem since Windows 10 updated itself the latest update with the Game Mode. It seems to have installed some different voices (George Mobile etc) and these do not appear in the voices set within the A2P Config settings window. Instead it shows the old voices (eg Microsoft Zara Desktop etc). When I try and preview the voices within the config, silence! When I go into Windows settings and to speech, the new voices don't work - or at least they can't be previewed. This seems to be a Windows inflicted problem rather than a P2A issue. Not sure what to do! Anyone else had this problem. I knew something was amiss as soon as ATIS stopped being transmitted by A2P in X-Plane11.

John

[jabloomf1230 2,445]

This is one of the reasons why I blocked the Creator's Update. The update sets everything in Windows 10 back to default. Your browser is back to Edge, your antivirus is again Windows Defender and all the voice options in Windows speech synthesis get messed up too. Not to mention other issues like that TrackIR doesn't work either. Other than the TrackIR issue, it should be possible to undo the damage. Check which voices are installed by the Win 10 update and install the ones that you had previously. You may have to modify the Windows registry to make those voices work again. You also need to keep in mind which voice type (32 bit/64 bit) each app uses. Since I blocked the Creator's update, I can't help any further with this, but maybe someone else has figured out a workaround.

[vc10man 732]

 

59 minutes ago, jabloomf1230 said:

This is one of the reasons why I blocked the Creator's Update. The update sets everything in Windows 10 back to default. Your browser is back to Edge, your antivirus is again Windows Defender and all the voice options in Windows speech synthesis get messed up too. Not to mention other issues like that TrackIR doesn't work either. Other than the TrackIR issue, it should be possible to undo the damage. Check which voices are installed by the Win 10 update and install the ones that you had previously. You may have to modify the Windows registry to make those voices work again. You also need to keep in mind which voice type (32 bit/64 bit) each app uses. Since I blocked the Creator's update, I can't help any further with this, but maybe someone else has figured out a workaround.

That's why I too blocked it. And this has also been reported in an FS2Crew Forum as voice being lost.

[John_Metcalfe 0]

Thanks chaps - that is bad news indeed for me! I don't feel confident messing with the registry! It should have come with a warning from MS that it will mess things up.

[jabloomf1230 2,445]

https://mspoweruser.com/windows-10-creators-update-bring-support-braille-input/

https://www.webbie.org.uk/blog/new-text-to-speech-voices-in-windows-10-anniversary-update/

 

[Gridley 257]

2 hours ago, jabloomf1230 said:

This is one of the reasons why I blocked the Creator's Update. The update sets everything in Windows 10 back to default. Your browser is back to Edge, your antivirus is again Windows Defender and all the voice options in Windows speech synthesis get messed up too. Not to mention other issues like that TrackIR doesn't work either. Other than the TrackIR issue, it should be possible to undo the damage. Check which voices are installed by the Win 10 update and install the ones that you had previously. You may have to modify the Windows registry to make those voices work again. You also need to keep in mind which voice type (32 bit/64 bit) each app uses. Since I blocked the Creator's update, I can't help any further with this, but maybe someone else has figured out a workaround.

Thanks for posting this - I didn't know it breaks TrackIR, that's a deal-breaker for me!

[Dave-Pilot2ATC 864]

Just to be clear, it's the Windows 10 update that causes the problem, not Pilot2ATC.

Also, be aware that the Mobile Voices don't work with Windows Desktop applications like Pilot2ATC.  That is why they are not visible in P2A's voice selection drop-downs.

I assume you can re-install any 3rd party voices and they would be OK.  Not sure how one would re-install Windows Desktop voices, especially on the versions of Win10 that do not support installing language packs.

I'll be looking into this further.

Dave

[John_Metcalfe 0]

Thanks Dave for coming in. I did purchase one 3rd party voice in the new year sale - 'Heather' from CerePro. She seems also to have been cancelled out and doesn't work. Sad for me as A2P now only functions as a (really great) flight planner. Needs to be flagged up in capital letters for others to not allow MS to update their Win 10 to this disaster!! You would have thought someone on their team would realise the potential negative effect that this would produce - and give a warning.

 

John

[jabloomf1230 2,445]

For TrackIR if you are daring (I'm not as I don't want 378 or higher drivers forced on me again):

https://forums.naturalpoint.com/viewtopic.php?f=60&t=14327&sid=3979c076083aae2b1c6a4e003c22492c

2 hours ago, Dave-Pilot2ATC said:

Also, be aware that the Mobile Voices don't work with Windows Desktop applications like Pilot2ATC. 

Actually, it is possible to make the mobile voices work with SAPI5 apps. Check my thread in the VOXATC subforum. Personally, at this point, it's not worth the effort to edit the Windows registry just to be able to use those mobile voices.

[John_Metcalfe 0]

After reading Jabloom's helpful links, where MS seem to mess up our install, then say it is up to developers to comply with new system, will it be possible Dave to make P2A compatible with the new mobile voices? I know this will be extra development that you probably don't want, but I think quite a few will be caught out like me!

 

John

[Dave-Pilot2ATC 864]

Still must research exactly how this is done.  I have not seen where Microsoft supports the use of Mobile voices in Desktop applications, which means if there is a "hack" to make it work, Microsoft is likely to come along and plug the hack and render it unusable.

Will continue to investigate, but there is no quick fix. 

This is clearly a bug in the Windows 10 product.  I would suggest that we flood the Microsoft support sight with posts about this issue and everyone vote up the fix.

Dave

[bjwoody61 3]

I don't know, but David and zera still work for me

 

[John_Metcalfe 0]

Would you believe it, just turned XP 11 on and P2A and suddenly the voices are working. After nearly 72 hours of pulling my hair out (not much to start with!) it has suddenly inexplicably snapped into operation. Thanks everyone for all the information, support and advice. Panic over. No idea why or how it happened but seems to have solved itself. Dave - you can rest a bit easier!!

 

John

[Dave-Pilot2ATC 864]

Thank goodness.  My investigation did not turn up any good alternative solutions.

 

[jabloomf1230 2,445]

Just to update this thread a bit. I read that MS patched some of the Windows Creators Edition update procedures so as to be less intrusive. So, I thought that I'd finally update to the CE. And guess what, nothing was destroyed. Google Chrome and Kaspersky A/V were still my default apps. TrackIR and my Saitek hardware worked perfectly after the update. All the 3rd party voices worked fine in both P2ATC and VOXATC (see John M's comment above, which must have happened for him when MS did one of its recent CE patches). Unfortunately, I also got back the 378.77 nVidia driver, but if it is still as bad as it was previously, I'll just roll back to the 376.33 version. So far I can't see a big drop in VAS in P3d, but I haven't flown that much since the CE update.

Alas, Microsoft did eliminate some of the previously installed  MS TTS voices (Richard for example) and some like Mark didn't work in 32 bit mode, but the registry edit fixed that. BTW, I didn't see any new MS voices (George??).

And Game Mode? Bah, it's not  helpful if one has addons that run as EXEs in parallel with the sim. The GTN gauges won't update, as a good example of this problem.

All in all I don't see the point of the CE update.