Audio Collins Mini Gem Thai-English & English-Thai Dictionary app for iPhone and iPad
Developer: MobiSystems, Inc.
First release : 08 Oct 2010
App size: 29.29 Mb
Collins Mini Gem Thai-English & English-Thai Dictionary is an up-to-date, easy-reference dictionary, ideal for learners of Thai and English of all ages. The dictionary covers about 10,000 words from each language with Collins pre-recorded audio pronunciation for each word.
From Europe’s Leading Bilingual Dictionary Publisher:
* Get it right: all essential words and phrases you need in English and Thai
* Get there fast: the fast search takes you quickly to the words you want
* Colour layout helps you find what you are looking for quickly and easily
* Easily learn the correct pronunciation with the native speaker pre-recorded audio pronunciations
The dictionary is powered by the MSDict technology especially enhanced for iPhone, iPad and iPod with the following key benefits:
* No connection to the Internet required - you can use the dictionary on your iPhone, iPad or iPod touch without connecting to the Internet and with no additional charges
* Ability to change the font size in the word definitions – this feature is available from the phone Settings
* Bookmarks - you can use the Bookmarks feature as a learning tool and create your own topics and wordlists
* Filters added to help you locate the word you are searching for:
* Fuzzy filter- used when you are not sure of the correct spelling of a word
* Keyword- used to locate the instances of a key word within other compound words
* Wild card - "?" and "*" replace a letter and group of letters in words
* Fast article scrolling
* Quick search of words while you type
* Hyperlinks between words and articles
Latest reviews of Audio Collins Mini Gem Thai-English & English-Thai Dictionary app for iPhone and iPad
Two glaring problems with this dictionary are: 1). Hard to read Thai text. (one must ask why on earth the text is so small given that there is a ton of available whitespace on every screen) 2) Extremely poor quality audio. This is a serious problem. It is often hard to determine what the consonant is because the audio is such poor quality. Again, its hard to imagine why the publisher decided to compress the audio files down to oblivion. The product would be much better with sample sentence usage, and romanized tonal character pronunciations, but those issues could be overlooked if the basic product were better quality. This product badly needs a new release with larger fonts and higher-quality audio compression.
Well, I have been looking for a dictionary that will have audio for each Thai word. This one has the audio for BOTH English AND Thai words! This is fantastic. It lets you switch painlessly from one language to another for searches for meanings. For example, when you are on a page with the definitions, you can double-click the Thai or English word and, when you go back to type in a word for the translation, it will be in the language of the word at the top of your screen. I like this, rather than having to tap the "Switch" button at the top right in the search window to change the language. Of course, one has to develop the habit of this as one goes along. With the speech included, I am finally happy as most people cannot read Thai characters right away. Some dictionaries only give anglicized pronunciations of words and no Thai characters at all. I only have one complaint (maybe two, really). This is not a phrasebook; it is a dictionary. There are not any common phrases at all in this dictionary: just words and translations. However, HERE IS MY REAL COMPLAINT: the Thai characters are all rather small and difficult to read on the screen. I tried to enlarge the screen as one would do a web page or whatever to no avail. The English words are huge compared to the Thai words. I would hope that Collins would either allow the two-finger swipe to make the words bigger or smaller or just make them as large in Thai as they are in English. In the pictures on this page, you see the English and Thai characters as being equal in size. No, instead, the Thai words are about half the size of the English words. So, I gave this app a 4 star rating. Now if they up the size of the fonts for Thai words and also include some practical examples of the use of these words in common sentences, it would be a 5-star of better app. In the words of the guitarist of Spinal Tap, it would be "one more"!
I just purchased this because I like the audio feature and the switching from Thai to English and vice versa; however Im disappointed this dictionary doesnt even have the word for papaya!!!