For the Typing Challenged Writer.

Why I like Voice Recognition Software:

I like to write longhand, taking my favourite pen, put it to paper and see the words flow in front of my eyes. Eventually though, these words will have to be transferred to the computer to be edited, formatted and spell checked. This is where I used to have quite the challenge.

I can't type.

The best I can achieve is the hunt and peck method, hunched over the keyboard trying to add my prose to my hard drive with as much speed as I can muster.
Which isn't much.

Then I discovered voice recognition software. For those of us who are typing challenged it is a blessing, just read the pages into a microphone and watch them magically appear on screen. Granted your words are sometimes mangled and misheard, but no more so than your average typing error, and well it can all be fixed in the editing process.
Sometimes I just use it to let the ideas flow from my head straight into the computer, especially when I'm editing.

I have two voice recognition programs: My computer has Vista, and came with pre-installed voice recognition software; my laptop needed to have such software installed so I went with Dragon Naturally Speaking (a very reasonably priced option).
The software is fairly easy to use, you simply train the program with your voice patterns and it continues to learn as you use it. The hardest part is remembering the program commands, so make sure you are familiar with them; in other words, read the tutorial.

All I can say is my writing life is far easier since I traded my poor typing skills for voice recognition, but I do need the occasional extra throat lozenge.