[access-uk] Re: Sight Village - my review
- From: "Justin R" <mypc128@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: <access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Tue, 19 Jul 2005 19:21:55 +0100
Hi Andrew,
thanks for that. I enjoyed reading the review. I'm going to Sight tomorrow
as it happens so, very early start for me, lol. Your review will give me a
starting point to which stalls to visit first while I work out what I want
to see. I'm interested in the note detector and what it is and, whether I'd
benefit from that.
I'm looking forward to tomorrow.
Justin
----- Original Message -----
From: "Andrew Hodgson" <andrew@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>; <bcab@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Tuesday, July 19, 2005 6:26 PM
Subject: [access-uk] Sight Village - my review
Hi all,
Since I actually took time off to go to Sight this year - thought I would
give you a small review for those who were not able to make it - here are
some of the product highlights. Note I only went round a few sights, and
these were mainly ones I had heard about before. Although Cobolt were
showing some new products, I just couldn't get in without a major attack
from dogs and people, so didn't bother.
I did, however, manage to get a quick look at the note detecter, which I
found to be very small and compact. Unfortunately, however, I did think
that it would take a bit of getting the note into the device, since it had
to go in quite a long way into it. I had imagined something you could
just pass the note through or put the note on in order for it to work.
However, I can really see a target market for these devices, especially if
you have a lot of notes you want sorting.
One of the companies I think we can see some good inivations coming in the
next year or two is called Code Factory. They first came out with the
Mobile Accessability package, which is still being sold today, which gives
VI people using a series 60 phone a comfortable interface with which to
perform specific key tasks. However, they have now got out a few more
products, including Mobile Speak and Pocket Mobile Speak. These two
products are screen readers, mobile speak being for series 60 and pocket
mobile speak being for any pocket PDA. Mobile speak comes with some extra
tools, and there are add-ons which can be purchased, which include a
colour detector/light probe, as well as a product which allows you to use
your PCs keyboard as a phone keyboard. They also have a user friendly
installation system, but I didn't see this in operation. The Pocket PC
version works with any PDA, as long as you have a bluetooth keyboard for
input. A company called Optilec also do a bluetoo
th braille keyboard, which certainly works with the Mobile Speak product,
but I didn't use it with the PDA product. I certainly think it's a good
thing to have a good competition in this area, especially since Pocket Hal
was the only PDA product which worked on a _standard_ PDA, and Talks was
the only product you could get as a screen reader for a mobile phone.
Code Factory's site is at http://www.codefactory.es/.
I also looked at the new media system from Portset. Now those who
remember the teletext systems they did and loved those will love this
product. It is a talking audio described freeview receiver, which speaks
the EPG facilities (including 7 day EPG) as well as providing a hard disk
recorder (and live pause), time record facilities and also talking
teletext. The product is in a prototype state at the moment, and as such
I couldn't really explore it. It also has a DVD drive, although this
facility is not working currently due to accessability of DVDs. I must
say a few things about this product, because I think Portset have been
very brave in designing a product which [A] replaces the old teletext
reader, [B] provides a modern equavilent of the television receiver (where
no license is required) and [C] gives a VI person a small box with all
these features installed. They have a battle with teletext currently,
since in the Freeview world each operator has really their own c
hoice over how things are done, and there is no standard in making these
accessible or presentable to anything other than a standard Freeview box.
If you were going to Sight Village this week, I would definitely give this
a look.
I also met up with Blazie who explained about the new version of the
Pacmate software, and they were updating current units whilst there
(although I was very early in the morning, and it was very quiet in the
stand). Unfortunately I did not have my unit with me, and when trying to
download update from FS direct, it told me my serial was not allowed!!
Will need to get that sorted.
At Steve's stand I looked at the new System Access from Freedombox, which
I was very impressed with. There are two versions available for portable
use - one on a CD and one on a USB key. The USB key version I think came
in at just over £300, including all the software. I am not sure whether
you need to keep a Freedombox subscription up with that as well yearly. I
was very impressed with the plug in, use it, remove it and no trace being
left approach, which unfortunately is not the same with the Dolphin Pen
(although the Dolphin Pen has magnification, and needs no yearly
subscription). The system also has a recovery option, which means if the
contents gets damaged, you can re-install the contents if you have an
active Internet connection. Unfortunately, due to no connection being
available, we were not able to look at the Freedom Box itself. I have
downloaded a copy, but am only able to look at the desktop bit, and not
System Access, so can't say how well the screen rea
der performs. There was also the GW Micro notetaker there, but
unfortunately I got so swampt with notetakers today, I didn't get to
memorise what the specialities with this one were.
I also saw the Oacis (spell) mobile from RNIB, which although has only
basic features, is smaller than any series 60 phone, and the battery also
lasts a lot longer.
This had been my first Sight at the new venues, and overall I found them
slightly better than the old stuffy venue of QAC, however, I think that
companies like Cobalt would do a lot better with larger stands, where they
could get more people in. I certainly think that notetakers will be an
interesting development over the following years, with even bets on
whether we loose the specialist models for blind people approach and go
with standard PDAs with bluetooth accessories, or wether these go
altogether.
Thanks.
Andrew.
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