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gweather's avatar
gweather
Brass Contributor
Jan 14, 2021

Read aloud - natural voices stopped working

A couple of weeks ago I noticed that when trying to use the Read Aloud feature, the natural voices were not working. The regular/old voices still work, but when any of the natural voices are selected, it will appear to be working, but there is no audio and the word highlighting doesn't move.

 

I'm currently on 89.0.760.0, but had the issue in the previous release as well. I know it's an issue with my PC though because my work laptop is not having the same issue with the same version of Edge.

 

I'm on Windows 10 Insider channel with build 21286. I don't use the Read Aloud feature daily, so I can't pinpoint what else might have changed to have caused it, but wanted to ask for some help because its something I depend on when I do need it.

  • Thelonewolfxd's avatar
    Thelonewolfxd
    Copper Contributor
    Feb 01, 2022
    I have noticed the exact same issue today and it is so frustraiting. I am a university student and always use the read aloud setting to proof read my work, however today the read aloud voices are just the old 'Hazel', 'Susan' and 'George' voices, not the nice natural 'male' and 'female' voice. I have good internet connection, I updated word and ensured all the correct english voice settings were installed, but I cant seem to be able to get the read aloud voice back to the natural voices again! Would really appreciate a fix! I work in English UK and would just like to add that all my documents have the issue too!
    • MarkNoble's avatar
      MarkNoble
      Brass Contributor
      Jun 08, 2024
      HotCakeX josh_bodner I recently noticed a similar issue and tracked it down to the EFF's Crome Plugin "Privacy Badger".

      For now, we've identified a work-around by using the Edge-specific version of the plugin that uses an older approach to blocking.

      We're working on fixing the issue here:
      https://github.com/EFForg/privacybadger/issues/2976#issuecomment-2155644507

      If anyone has info on which specific domains are required for "Read aloud" to function properly, it'd be nice if they would drop the hint in our GitHub discussion on the issue.
      • HotCakeX's avatar
        HotCakeX
        MVP
        Jun 09, 2024

        MarkNoble 

        Spoiler
        MarkNoble wrote:
        HotCakeX josh_bodner I recently noticed a similar issue and tracked it down to the EFF's Crome Plugin "Privacy Badger".

        For now, we've identified a work-around by using the Edge-specific version of the plugin that uses an older approach to blocking.

        We're working on fixing the issue here:
        https://github.com/EFForg/privacybadger/issues/2976#issuecomment-2155644507

        If anyone has info on which specific domains are required for "Read aloud" to function properly, it'd be nice if they would drop the hint in our GitHub discussion on the issue.

        Hi, looks like the root cause of the issue is found and it is due to how that extension works.

         

        FYI, I always use Ublock Origin and read Aloud works fine with it.

  • cdiggs1234's avatar
    cdiggs1234
    Copper Contributor
    Aug 30, 2023
    This is incident is occurring again in 2023. Some of the voices have been out for a couple of days now. One of the many voices that are out is "Microsoft Abeo Online".

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