Sorry for the jargon. In server farms rather than having racks full of
complete PCs they have a single giant power supply into which you can
slip bare bones PCs, which they often refer to as blade servers. Without
disk or power supplies these blade servers allow a lot of compute power
to be crammed into a small amount of rack space. So this device without
a screen, keyboard or battery could make a nice blade server.
Here's a better explanation:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blade_server
CB
Alex Jurgensen wrote:
Hi,
I just don't know what you mean about blades. Do you mind to expand on
this?
Thanks for listening,
Alex,
On 18-Nov-08, at 8:37 AM, Chris Blouch wrote:
So would it be reasonable to make a slimmed down MacMini with flash
instead of a hard drive and a battery? Probably could shrink that
down quite a bit. Then have snap on or wireless input/output devices
like braille, qwerty, headset or whatever. Even if it's not tiny, I
could stick the thing in my bag and just deal with the wirelessley
tethered input and sound devices. The iPhone is just OSX under the
hood with a different UI. If you could bluetooth an input device and
have the functional equivalent of voiceover on it that would be close
to what I think you're describing. Actually a laptop sans screen and
keyboard could be made quite small with the same wireless input and
output devices. Folks could just choose what their favorite input and
output devices are. You could also re-market the boxes, sans battery,
as blade servers putting several on a shelf together.
CB
Alex Jurgensen wrote:
Hi,
It is fully modular, with three keyboard types, a qwerty, keypad,
and Braille
Thanks for listeninog,
Alex,
On 18-Nov-08, at 5:24 AM, erik burggraaf wrote:
Hi, Just a couple of points. From your description, it looks like
the unit is going to come wih braille input. This will instantly
render it useless for the sighted world, which seems to be a
feature of your product description below.
Second, I don't think that name will work, as It will be easily
confuzed with the IMac. How about the IPad, the Eye-Pad, or the
a-mac? A for accessible.
All right, now I sell these things for a living. Actually I
support them for a living, but I work for a very small company, and
we all have to chip in where we may. That means I'm stuck selling
the stuff once in a while. Note taker solutions have three main
problems. They're bulky. They're expensive. They're
proprietary. There's definitely a lot of interest in them, but
that interest doesn't translate to sales because of the three
factors I just mentioned. The funding for such things is screwey
here as well, so that is another pin prick in your balloon.
Any of my clients who want a speech only, qwerty note taker go with
a pda phone. It's half the price of a blinkware note taker, has
better and somewhat less proprietary features, and has individually
upgradeable parts, so that one piece doesn't lose it's value when
the others are redundant. For example, Suppose you fork out $2000
for a pda phone, mobile speak smartphone or pocket pc, and mobile
geo gps with an external holux m1000. When pda phones with half
again the speck come to the market next year and your current pda
phone works like garbo, you can fork out $500 for a new pda phone,
transfer your code factory licences, and be off to the races. Same
if you decide you want a new gps receiver. If you buy an external
braille display with input for 5 grand, That braille display
retains it's value, because when youpgrade your kit next year, your
braille display is still relevant and you just keep it running on
the new system. I feel sorry for any one who bought the gw braille
sense last year, because this year they brought out the braille
sense plus with gps and a bunch of hardware upgrades, and suddenly
your $6000 note taker solution, all be it one that probably still
works for you more or less, is now irrelevant to the market.
Therefore, I suggest you make the thing modular. So, I can remove
the qwerty keybord and buy a slide-on braille keybord or vice versa
if I want. When I trade in my base unit next year, I can just
slide off my braille display and keybord and buy a new base unit.
When I buy a new base unit, I can rip out my modular storage flash
and put it into my new base unit, and all my contacts,
appointments, notes, and so on will be right where I left them. If
my battery goes capoot, I want to wip the module off the back,
chuck it in the resycling repository, and get a new one. On that
basis, you could easily bring your price point up, since your
componants will retain maximum value.
The proprietary note takers are bulky. My braille connect 32 fits
in my pocket and weighs a little over a pound, and my phone is
negledgeable. The braille sense on the other hand, which is the
one we sell most often, and has the best hardware on the market
right now, weighs in at over two pounds and is the size of a hard
cover book and the thickness of a tri-county telephone book. It
has ginormous fisher-price toy buttons, and just screams, "I'm a
waste of space". If you can get it down to something the size of a
braille connect that really does fit in a pocket, you'll have
something. There is even room for a qwerty keybord option on
something that size, and the keys don't have to be pocked with a
stylus either.
The three features my clients want most in a note taker are: 1,
quick access to something to write with. Two, gps navigation
system, and Three, ability to use the note taker as a braille
terminal. This is how they justify the expense, since they often
have to lump the entire cost themselves.
If you can do all this with a note taker, then I expect we'll sell
them.
Best,
erik burggraaf
Certified Technician
Assistive Computing LTD Support and training
Sales department: 888-828-2445
Support and Training: 888-255-5194
Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Website coming soon
On 17-Nov-08, at 7:15 PM, Alex Jurgensen wrote:
Hi,
Would you buy this?
EyeMac -- The next generation of sleek notetakers
The EyeMac features aluminum housing, weighing in at under a
pound. This sleek and shiny notetaker is based on the state of the
art technology, featuring wireless and bluetooth. The six-key
input provides Braille users the ability to legally access the
world's most user friendly and advanced operating system. Built on
the foundation of Mac OS X, the EyeMac is the bleeding edge in
affordable portable computing technology. Costing around $500 us,
the EyeMac is an easy pick for the user with a tight budget. Its
portability make it ideal for not only end users but the
professional who needs a lightweight, portable solution. The
EyeMac measures less than 20 CM long by seven CM wide, and about
3 cm high. Durable, powerful! Take full advantage of the world
wide web. The EyeMac Pro has wireless anywhere capability. Need a
Braille display? EyeMac Plus models feature built-in Braille
displays that make reading Braille text messages and documents a
breeze. The EyeMac is built on a actively developed Operating
System, that features a well documented programming guide that
will ensure your EyeMac can be customized with the applications
that best suit your needs. Designed for ease of use, this
revolutionary device will change your portability experience.
Project status: Planning
Thanks for listening,
Alex,
