I'm not sure you need to worry; it'll be more than a couple of years before
cf cards are obsolete. I say this of course with crossed fingers:)
You have a good point in regard to key size, and you made me think about the fact that the current model has high contrast numbers and letters on the keys. If the keys are smaller then the letters and numbers would have to be smaller too.
As far as the flash memory cards; I really wonder how much longer they will be around. It seems that most newer devices are going to SD or mini SD. It makes me wonder if two years from now we won't be able to find compact flash memory cards. Of course I am also surprised that it seems that one can only get the 4 gigabyte cards if they go to the web. I recently checked our local Best Buy, Circuit City and Comp USA and the largest card any of the three were selling was the 2 gigabyte cards. they seemed not to even know that a 4 gigabyte memory card exists. Oh one place had a 4 gigabyte micro drive they wanted to sell for $150, but that wouldn't work on a Book Port.
----- Original Message ----- From: "Walt Smith" <walt@xxxxxxxxxx>
To: <bookport@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Sunday, April 23, 2006 10:21 AM
Subject: [bookport] Re: New Bookport ideas
:A BP with smaller keys might be okay, but I do wonder about the elderly or
: multi-handicapped user's ability to manipulate something that would enable a
: design of the size you mention here--a cigarette pack. While I don't know
: this to have been the case when the original device was designed, the
: present keypad certainly looks as if this section of the potential market
: was considered. I know from experience and observation that many elderly
: users just can't cope very well with buttons the size most of us find
: usable. Since NLS, from what I gather, isn't planning to produce a truly
: portable player when they move to digital Talking Books, I can imagine APH
: wanting to fill this gap, provided they can work with NLS to get the
: necessary permissions and work out the technology, so these folks would
: absolutely have to be taken into account in any design considerations.
:
: I think that on balance, I also like the idea of moving to SD cards from
: CompactFlash, particularly if industry forecasts indicate that even
: higher-capacity SD cards may be forthcoming in the future and if NLS decides
: to move in that direction. Right now, 4 gig is the largest available size
: and if APH succeeds in removing all card size limitations, I can see that
: some folks may very well want to buy even larger-capacity cards. My sole
: concern about using SD cards is their relative fragility when compared to
: CompactFlash--I just see them as being too easy to damage or lose.
: CompactFlash is certainly going to continue to be around for a long, long
: time, given the number of devices that are dependent on them, but using SD
: would certainly aid in designing a smaller player.
:
: ----- Original Message ----- : From: "David Tanner" <david-tanner@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
: To: <bookport@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
: Sent: Saturday, April 22, 2006 8:20 PM
: Subject: [bookport] Re: New Bookport ideas
:
:
: It's size is about half to two thirds an inch thick, about 2 inches wide,
: and about 5 inches high. I am guessing it would need to be a bit larger
: than this unit in order to have decent size keys, but it would be nice if
: the BP could be a bit smaller; say the size of a cigarette pack.
:
:
:
:
:
:
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