We can and have I won't tell you which one we chose because you will have to wait and hear it either at CSUN or online. I will say though I agree with you I like Kendra. ken -----Original Message----- From: programmingblind-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:programmingblind-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Phil Vlasak Sent: Wednesday, March 09, 2011 9:16 PM To: programmingblind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx Subject: Re: Announcing the Orion Smart book Hi Ken, I checked out the IVONA voices. http://www.ivona.com/studio.php I liked Kendra - American English the best. I hope you can choose which voice to use on the Orion Smart book. Phil ----- Original Message ----- From: "Ken Perry" <whistler@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> To: <programmingblind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> Sent: Wednesday, March 09, 2011 8:25 PM Subject: RE: Announcing the Orion Smart book >I understand your argument and know it has merit. I also know there is a > market for these devices. The one thing that all the cool touch screens > do > not have is a quick and easy input method. I personally use both an > IPhone > and a G2 right now. The main thing I hate about both is having to write > documents and take notes. You can record with them fine but if you're > trying to use it as a document or even a good messaging system the input > is > terrible. This new device improves on the input by 100 % and the output > I > will leave that up to the people as they try it. I can tell you this > though > Ivona speech engines are the stuff dreams are made of. > > > Look we can all argue that one thing is better than the other. We can all > say it's too expensive even though I am working on the project and don't > know the cost yet. One thing we all have to agree on is that the more > accessible devices the better. > > Ken > > -----Original Message----- > From: programmingblind-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx > [mailto:programmingblind-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Dale Leavens > Sent: Wednesday, March 09, 2011 8:10 PM > To: programmingblind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx > Subject: Re: Announcing the Orion Smart book > > But so far we don't have the price for the braille display. > > What I quoted was the current hardware as shown on the LevelStar Site. > > Unless they have some new refreshable braille technology the Orion will be > a > > lot more than two grand and you can have braille on any number of devices > these days. > > I agree. A netbook and at least you have a fully compatible word > processor, > one used by the rest of the world assuming one shares documents with the > rest of the world. > > for a hundred bucks you can buy a 32 GB card for your Stream. Modern SSD > drives are used these days maybe the Orion will upgrade to a solid state > drive. Even that on the Icon wouldn't justify $1,300. > > I will say that I approve the use of braille but for the speed of speech > it > will have to get a bunch cheaper before I'll be buying int. > > I guess there is a market but I don't see it. > > > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Alex Midence" <alex.midence@xxxxxxxxx> > To: <programmingblind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> > Sent: Wednesday, March 09, 2011 7:00 PM > Subject: Re: Announcing the Orion Smart book > > >> Well, if it does braille output, it's got my vote sight unseen. At >> the price it's selling for, it looks like you can have a little >> braille display for under 2k. That's really cool. I still can't >> afford it, mind, but it's really cool. I wonder if you can use it as >> an external speech synth and/or braille display for a screen reader on >> a laptop or desktop. That would be really nifty. The note taker >> stuff isn't really that exciting to me. I can grab a $150 netbook off >> of craigslist and load up soemthing like Vinux on there and I have a >> powerful note taker right there and then. You don't even need all the >> stuff Vinux comes with pre-installed really. All you really need is >> Pico, abook, tudu, mplayer and Lynx running on something with speakup >> installed and you got a decent note taker. Couple of megs more gets >> you emacspeak and you have something that is just as powerful as any >> word processor out there, imho. Add a menu feature of some kind which >> launches what you want at the press of a key and you don't even need >> to have the command line come up to bring up your stuff. That braille >> display and that speech synth though are very attention grabbing for >> me. Don't get me wrong, I am not knocking all the nice apps featured >> on there. I just can't see myself going into debt for them when I can >> get a comparable set of them for ffree on a much much cheaper machine. >> >> For daisy, I have a victor reader which also stores songs. I don't >> need 40 gigs of songs. IN fact, I have a 2 gig mini flash card for my >> music and an 8 gb one for my audio books. Podcasts, I get through my >> android phone and stitcher but a braille display, that for under 2 >> grand is not to be sneezed at. >> >> Alex M >> >> On 3/9/11, Dale Leavens <dleavens@xxxxxxx> wrote: >>> Well, I don't get it. >>> >>> The LevelStar Site doesn't give much information on the Icon, look like >>> you >>> don't get any input other than audio without the docking station which >>> means >>> $1,300 for the Icon and $600 for the keyboard, $1,900 altogether. For >>> that >>> you get 8 more gigs of hard drive than you get on an iPhone. >>> >>> I presume you can do input in some way outside of the docking station >>> but >>> they don't tell you anything about that. >>> >>> Having braille output albeit only 18 cells will add to the capability of >>> course but it seems redundant to me to have yet another isolated note >>> taker. >>> >>> The iPhone and come to that the iPod touch already does all that stuff >>> and >>> more for less. >>> >>> >>> ----- Original Message ----- >>> From: Littlefield, Tyler >>> To: programmingblind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx >>> Cc: Ken Perry >>> Sent: Wednesday, March 09, 2011 5:36 PM >>> Subject: Re: Announcing the Orion Smart book >>> >>> >>> I seen that! And even with no price tag, it's already making my wallet >>> clench up in fear. >>> On 3/9/2011 1:39 PM, Ken Perry wrote: >>> >>> >>> >>> >>> >>> >>> >>> >>> I can now show you what I am helping to work on. Here is the >>> announcement that was put out today. >>> >>> >>> >>> >>> > //www.freelists.org/post/accesscomp/Fw-icondiscuss-A-Glimpse-Of-The-Lev > elStar-Orion-SmartBooks-At-CSUN-2011 >>> >>> >>> >>> >>> >>> >>> -- >>> >>> Thanks, >>> Ty >>> >> __________ >> View the list's information and change your settings at >> //www.freelists.org/list/programmingblind >> >> > > __________ > View the list's information and change your settings at > //www.freelists.org/list/programmingblind > > __________ > View the list's information and change your settings at > //www.freelists.org/list/programmingblind > > > > ----- > No virus found in this message. > Checked by AVG - www.avg.com > Version: 10.0.1204 / Virus Database: 1435/3495 - Release Date: 03/09/11 > __________ View the list's information and change your settings at //www.freelists.org/list/programmingblind __________ View the list's information and change your settings at //www.freelists.org/list/programmingblind