[access-uk] Re: Sight Village

  • From: "Dave Taylor" <dave@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • To: <access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 19:02:54 +0100

Hi, I must say I completely agree. Given that there are now 32 gig SD cards 
that will go in many players, the Xtreme, and the forthcoming tiny daisy 
players from Plextor and Caretech look much, much more exciting to me. I 
gather both of the latter should cope with 64 gig cards when they come out. 
Price wise, I think you'll be getting a better package with any of these, 
and you will end up with more storage possibilities and less to carry round.

I'm quite excited also having seen all the notetakers this year. They all 
have something slightly different to offer, but the Pronto series could 
prove to be very interesting in time with the ability to clip braille and 
qwerty keyboards in and out of a single unit!

Cheers
Dave


--------------------------------------------------
From: "Andrew Hodgson" <andrew@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Friday, July 18, 2008 3:50 PM
To: <access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [access-uk] Re: Sight Village

Hi guys.



I am probably in the minority here but I wasn't that impressed with the 
ITell.  I think that Cobalt have done a sterling job with the user 
interface, etc, but I just think that the choice of device was not the best.



When you use this device, it turns the Ipod into an external hard drive, and 
the ITell itself appears to become the MP3 player.  It reads the information 
from the Ipod's internal disk, and presents it to you with speech.  When you 
plug the ITell into the Ipod, the Ipod functions are disabled, and the IPod 
is just ready to become the external drive, ready for connections etc.



I wish that instead of this, the manufacturer had designed a system that 
would work with any USB flash drive, to create a much smaller and cheaper 
package.  I have seen USB stick players on the market that do this, that 
have small screens on them, and just play any MP3 file found on the drive.



The issues I have with using the IPod are as follows:



 ITunes accessibility - ITunes is very much for me not accessible out of the 
box on Windows.  It is much better on the Mac platform.  There are scripts 
and third-party solutions available, however, these are at extra cost.



Battery life - Not sure how much battery life is used by the ITel, as it 
uses the IPod battery to power itself.



System updates - The IPod and associated software may get updated at some 
time, which may cause format changes in the internal IPod's database 
structure.  I would be interested to know whether the ITel is updatable if 
an when this may arise.



Quality of audio components in the ITel verses the IPod - I wonder how good 
the audio quality is through the ITel verses the IPod?



One advantage though to using the IPod rather than any USB stick is that 
Apple have their database containing artist, album groupings and other such 
related groups such as genre etc.  It is quite nice to be able to browse 
those groups on the ITell.



This is just my personal opinion - I haven't played around with the ITell 
other than on the stand.



Andrew.



From: access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of 
Jackie Cairns
Sent: 18 July 2008 07:44
To: Access UK Mailing List
Subject: [access-uk] Sight Village



Hi All



Can I just thank all those who came to say hello at Sight Village this week. 
It was lovely to put voices to some very familiar names on the list.



I didn't get much of a chance to wander around because of strutting my stuff 
on the Sight and Sound stand, but I did have enough time to pop over to the 
Cobolt stand, and look at their new ITell gadget.  For anyone who doesn't 
know about this, it is a small device that plugs into the bottom of an Ipod 
that enables us mortals with little or no sight to use the Ipod with speech. 
I thought this was a really interesting gadget.  It doesn't work on either 
the Shuffle or Itouch, but all the other models seem to support it.  The 
only thing that concerns me, however, is how one would transfer material 
from their PC to the Ipod if Itunes software isn't accessible.  Perhaps some 
who do this already would like to elaborate as it might potentially be a 
stumbling block.



The ITell retails at £59.95 I believe, but I thought it was the most 
interesting gadget other than the K-Reader phone, of course! (smile).



Anyone else see anything interesting and "different" this year?



Jackie


Email: cairnsplace@xxxxxxx
Skype Name: Cairnsplace






Internal Virus Database is out of date.
Checked by AVG.
Version: 8.0.100 / Virus Database: 269.24.1/1469 - Release Date: 5/27/2008 
1:25 PM 

** To leave the list, click on the immediately-following link:-
** [mailto:access-uk-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx?subject=unsubscribe]
** If this link doesn't work then send a message to:
** access-uk-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
** and in the Subject line type
** unsubscribe
** For other list commands such as vacation mode, click on the
** immediately-following link:-
** [mailto:access-uk-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx?subject=faq]
** or send a message, to
** access-uk-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with the Subject:- faq

Other related posts: