voicing of obstruents and nasality under one approach
591068
The book is brilliantly written with an array of examples of contrastive data between Tohoku Japanese, Tokyo plain speech versus higher traditional Tokyo accents--as well as all sorts of languages from around the world. In this book, Prof. Nasukawa arguments for a unified approach of the voicing of stops and nasals in the construction of well-formed words (such as in rendaku of compounding and gerunds) in the Japanese language. The whole argument becomes quite daring once nasals are separated into two groups, and they are viewed from so many theoretical approaches. It is a profound theoretical book that even experts may have to take it in petit dosages, but it is well worth the read. It certainly sheds new light to modern Japanese linguistics and its theoretical associations to language universals.
903390
Excellent slanguage and pronunciation guide.
2487521
They do make it easier to hear yourself. Good for fine tuning your voice.
3322651
Easy to use and the people on the other end say they can hear me much more clearly and with less "in a tunnel effect".  I can certainly hear them better on my end with the larger speaker.  The mic is bi-directional, so words don't get chopped off by the speaker trying to decide which direction should take precedence in the conversation.  I tend not to use the controls on the speaker itself, preferring instead to use my phone's touch screen controls to manage the call.
2548035
GENERAL:  This is the continuation of the Level One course.  All of the comments to this course apply to level one.  The course starts with the introduction of the subjuntive mood via drills.

STRENGTHS:  This audio is excellent in terms of verbal drills.  The exercises train the mind and body in applying grammatical rules.  By replaying sections of the CD, it is possible to train not only the mind, but the tongue and mouth to speak Spanish clearly with minimum English accent.

Being forced to vary sentence structure in the exercises, translate from English to Spanish and build sentences using phrases are exemplary in inculcating Spanish into the subconscious.

The lessons present many nuiances of speaking Spanish, particularly intonation patterns, which are not presented in any other course.

WEAKNESSES:  Readers are primarily Mexican and have strong Mexican accents.  Voice tones of a couple of the readers are very similar and it is difficult to differentiate which character is speaking.  The reading presentations are often stiff; the readers are definately not trained actors.  The lack of verbal emotion make contextual understanding a little difficult.

There is no practice in the Vosotros forms.  The grammatical explanations of the textbook are weak.  This course should be used following or in conjunction with a rigorous grammar training course.

SUMMARY:  An essential supplement to rigorous grammar course, but it is not a stand alone course.
2755099
Depends on what you want to accomplish. For capturing dictation with adequate sound for listening playback or manual transcription, it's just fine; there are occasional blips/squeaks which I suspect are mainly compression artifacts obscuring a microsecond here or there, it's not the absolute crispest sound, and depending on your set-up and use there may be some obscuring background noise. Thus...for capturing dictation with the intent to use with voice-to-text transcription software which accepts audio file input, such as some versions of Nuance/Dragon Naturally Speaking, it can fall short; it works well for that purpose in a very quiet/isolated office environment, but I found it quite lacking (at times completely useless) in larger rooms with any amount of bustle, running water, etc., or in a running vehicle if dictating on-the-go, mainly because of obscuring background white noise.
4159192
It is very easy to understand and it goes increasing the difficulty level in a smart way. Anyway, I think I will have to get the CD's to master the pronunciation. I recommend it 100%!
756812
An excellent book on French pronunciation.  But as others have written, you do need a native speaker or recordings such as&nbsp;<a data-hook="product-link-linked" class="a-link-normal" href="/Pronounce-it-Perfectly-in-French-With-Audio-CDs-Pronounce-It-Perfectly-CD-Series/dp/1438072813/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_rvw_txt?ie=UTF8">Pronounce it Perfectly in French: With Audio CDs (Pronounce It Perfectly CD Series)</a>&nbsp;to help you.  Or you can use the YouTube videos from the University of Michigan's Language Resource Center (search for LRC Michigan).

This book, along with&nbsp;<a data-hook="product-link-linked" class="a-link-normal" href="/Essential-French-Grammar-Dover-Language-Guides-Essential-Grammar/dp/0486204197/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_rvw_txt?ie=UTF8">Essential French Grammar (Dover Language Guides Essential Grammar)</a>&nbsp;are the two books I read over and over again.
4067789
Having been raised in Norway, I can say that a non-native speaker or someone without previous exposure to the language will probably have difficulty with pronunciation. The book tries to sound it out for English speakers, but that only serves to make you sound like a foreigner :)  Nonetheless, it's a good, fun way to learn the grammar, vocabulary, and begin to put together some of the sounds. The variety of "games" and exercises help keep your attention while you learn.

A good intermediate step as a refresher, most definitely.
4462504
The authors cover the main ideas of audiology, for the student practitioner. The biophysics of hearing in the inner ear is explained. Then, there is a necessarily brief discussion of the various auditory disorders you might encounter in a patient. Which elides into how to objectively characterise normal and atypical hearing. Over the years, there have been quite a few methods devised and you need to be familiar with these.

Various hearing aids are now available. The chapter on these tells of the rapid improvement in usability and performance. Due to the increasing miniturisation of electronics, so that the aids are less cumbersome and intrusive. Plus, the use of digital signal processing has greatly helped give a more natural frequency response to the user.
1557822
Comfortable to wear. Easy to set up. Sound pick up from the microphone for phone use is a bit muffled and unclear. I have to speak loudly to make sure I am heard on the call
41115
The speakers on this series are generally extremely clear.  Many other chinese audio lessons have speakers that mumble.  The male speaker who does about half the material is extremely precise.  The female is still above average.

Having lived in China for the better part of a year, I had decent Mandarin at one point but it has faded.  This series has been great review.  If you've never used Pimsleur before, they do a good job of slowly introducing new concepts and vocabulary and reinforcing them over time.

There are a small number of mistakes where the English narrator incorrectly describes the tones of new vocabulary.  I've heard this twice in the whole series.  Once the speaker just says the word with the wrong tone.  Much more commonly the tones will appear incorrect but it's because they're glossing over the fact that two consecutive third tones (falling-rising as they call it) become a second (rising) and then a third tone when spoken together.  They never describe this phenomenon.  In fact my biggest complaint is that they really don't explain a lot of what's going on.

I think it would be hard to learn the language with this as your only material.  But for audio-only instruction it's really good.
2787109
I have only used it once so far, in a small class with participants who have hearing loss.  I got good feedback on clarity and volume.
Initially I had some confusion about the headpiece, and the directions are not very helpful;  I eventually figured it out.
I plan to try this out on another class soon;  I think it will work out well for my needs.
4157007
This book is an easy to understand program, with step by step instructions to diagnose and treat speech problems.  We just had a couple pronunciation problems, which were easily remedied by the games/therapy included in this book.
4152524
I was looking for dictionary software that would be simple to use and have the features I desire.  This product meets my needs and has audio pronunciations, a very important feature for me. It was easy and quick to install and use.  The cost is a real value as compared to similar software.  I am running Windows XP and do not know how it will function on Windows Vista.  As a result, I am holding back on a full 5-star recommendation.  Good product.
534852
Ladefoged's book is, simply stated, great. Complex ideas and principles are broken down into digestible chunks, yet not too simple for those already familiar with phonetics or speech science. The many examples are drawn primarily from English, but the underlying concepts are applicable to all languages.

An excellent resource for anyone interested in acoustic phonetics.
4392891
This book teaches through drawings of the subject matter plus English pronunciation; however without  translation.  You figure it out for yourself. Almost every page in the book is covered with at least three or four drawings or more. The introduction explains the Cyrillic alphabet with its English pronounciation and the grammer emphasizing the palatalization of the consonants which is very important to the correct speech. There are examinations from time to time and a small dictionary at the end of the book.