Rosetta Stone Software
 

Has anyone used the Rosetta Stone brand language software?

I've seen it advertised alot lately in the airline magazines and am looking at their site right now. I want to work on getting my Spanish back up to where it was when I was traveling to Spanish speaking countries frequently as well as potentially pick up some level of competency in some other languages.

Rosetta Stone is the only self-teaching method I've ever stuck with long enough to really learn something useful. So far I've only used it to learn Italian after having a decent knowledge of German and French from school and travel. The previous knowledge of French helped a lot. I've taken a brief look at Mandarin, but I think for a language where you have no "foothold," so to speak, the Rosetta Stone approach may not work as well unless you complement it with some other beginner's reference.

I just picked up the French and Spanish versions. I tried the Spanish and it seems pretty good.

Now I just need to find the time to actually spend completing the lessons.

Hola!

afaik, its really the ONLY good option out there.

As someone who's been in the exact same situation as the OP, I'd disagree. Rosetta is quite good if you want to acquire new vocabulary, but if you want to brush up on a language you used to know quite well, Rosetta (or any software) is quite useless. I've found that the ONLY thing that actually works is taking conversation/refresher classes. I'm very happy with the options at my university.

In the case of total beginners, Rosetta works quite well, but my SO, who has been a reluctant student of German for a year or so, is just as happy with the language software sold at Costco. So I'm not so sure if Rosetta is worth the money.

It's not software but Pimsluer is something we found to be great in learning Chinese. This however does not assist you in reading / writing if that is part of your objective.

I just bought Rosetta Stone Italian levels 1 and 2 (it arrived yesterday and I haven't installed it yet), based on the recommendation of friends that found it very helpful. I also leave on Thursday for two weeks at language school in Florence, so I'm hoping that between the classes and Rosetta Stone, my fluency will improve.