LingoDrop
Chinese · Pronunciation Guide
How do you pronounce "电脑" in Chinese?
dyen-NAO: a hard-falling first syllable with a tight "eh", then a low sagging second.
diànnǎo
A plunge into a sag, with no conversion since diàn falls. On the right edge, nǎo is a dipping tone and would convert before another one, though in practice the word usually ends a noun phrase where the full dipping contour can be heard. The two nasals — a final n and an initial n — sit next to each other, which is worth articulating cleanly.
Listen: 电脑
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Sound it out
Hear it in a sentence
我的电脑坏了。
Wǒ de diànnǎo huài le.
My computer is broken.
Listen: 我的电脑坏了。
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我的电脑坏了。 keeps wǒ at a full dip because de is toneless, then diàn plunges, nǎo dips, huài plunges again, and le fades. Two falls separated by a dip, with the sentence expiring on a toneless particle at the low pitch huài reached.
Where English speakers slip
That -ian ending opens out to "dyahn" when it should be a tight "eh". Aspirating the d gives tiàn. And the two adjacent n sounds tend to fuse into one, so the syllable boundary disappears — make the first n a genuine closure before releasing into the second.