Text to speech and speech to text?

I'm looking for the cheapest way to intelligently read text.txt to speech that is not annoying or error ridden, and alternately speak into a mic. And have text pop out. I would prefer a Device* like some iphone accesory suite, a portable device of some type that is fairly cheap… Uses a usb or something to bring files in and out… Its a gift for Christmas… Anyone know?

Everything's annoying and error ridden until it's tuned and tweaked to personal tastes. The cheapest would be to use the built-in Accessibility Options already on the computer for "reading" text. Places like Spencer Gifts and Johnson Smith have some neat little 'travel companions' that "speak" whatever you type into them.

For text to speech, you can use a netbook with Text Speaker -
http://www.deskshare.com/text-to-speech-software.aspx

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