Hi George, I have experience with at least 5 braille displays, and have tried to summarized it below. most of these devices have bluetooth, to use them with your PC, you would need bluetooth dongle. However my observation is that braille displays can not be used for faster access to information, but they do allow you to work without speech which might create interference in some environments like meetings. also they can be useful if you are tired of speech.
1. EasyLink12: by it's name we can make out that it is a 12 cell display targeted to cell phones and PDAs. It does not have in built note taker, but has braille keys and other keys to aid in navigation. Braille keys can be used to enter text using braille and the text should appear on screen as usual. But I have not been able to use it with desktop software, only used it with PDAs. 2. Connie: A braille display from Baum is 12 cell very thin device, which also has braille keys, navigation keys, and other keys. I have yet not seen a braille display smaller than this one with so many keys. it also has bluetooth. Braille keys can be used to enter text using braille and the text will appear on screen as usual. The device is very small to be nicely fitted in your pocket. But it's keys are so small that one may not be able to enter text at a good rate. 3. Pocketvario: this is a very sturdy 24 cell display from Baum, it has everything what connie has but it does not have braille keys so one can not enter text. 4. Braillino: it is a 20 cell display with in built note taker. This also has bluetooth option and can be used with your cell phone if the phone has bluetooth. but if you want to connect it with PC, you have options to connect via serial port or may have to get a bluetooth dongle. It has 8 keys to enter 8 dot braille. it's design is urgonomic, i.e. it has concaved keys and concaved braille cells (I have only seen concaved cells in this device). 5. Alva: when I saw the device some 2 years ago, it did not have bluetooth and has no in built note taker. but it had 44 cells and could be placed beneath your laptop. It did not have braille keys for entering the text. the display was too big if I compare it with the recent ones. Regards Dinesh ----- Original Message ----- From: "George Abraham" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <accessindia@accessindia.org.in> Sent: Thursday, July 27, 2006 8:29 AM Subject: [AI] Braille Display! > Hi, > > Does anyone on the list use a Braille Monitor or a Braille Display unit > attached to the computer, if so which one ? > > George > > > To unsubscribe send a message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] > with the subject unsubscribe. > > To change your subscription to digest mode or make any other changes, > please visit the list home page at > http://accessindia.org.in/mailman/listinfo/accessindia_accessindia.org.in > To unsubscribe send a message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the subject unsubscribe. To change your subscription to digest mode or make any other changes, please visit the list home page at http://accessindia.org.in/mailman/listinfo/accessindia_accessindia.org.in
