Houdy Pam, Thanks for following up on this and informing us of where things are currently standing. I was explaining this problem to a good friend of mine who's got a bit more experience in this game than I do. Though he's mainly a hardware and chips guy he knows quite a bit about software. He then put me in your situation and asked me what would have been the first thing I would have done? I told him that since all I had to go on was a bunch of thoughts and theory and that this behavior was so strange that it may be some type of operating system instability and not screen reader related at all. He told me that I was definintely on the right track and that's where I should start probing. So all this being said, do you know what Dave is using for an operating system? Is it a microsoft genuine windows system which is just windows without any additional bells and whistles or an OEM system laced with a bunch of other products and how long has he had the computer. This may not sound like an important piece of info, but it actually is good to know the things age. Kind a like dealing with automobiles. If it's a straight ahead windows system to fix the DCM troubles he should reformat the thing and then re-install the screen readers. He shouldn't be having video intercept errors with jaws if window-eyes was originally giving him the trouble. The unfortunate part of all this in either case is that all the data's going to go. If it's an OEM version of windows, I can't say for sure what will happen since in my own practice I don't use those types of software do to their limitations. That's the best advice I can give for now but have him try that and keep us posted on everything.
Tony ----- Original Message ----- From: "Pam Drake" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[email protected]> Sent: Thursday, July 24, 2008 2:20 AM Subject: FW: My experiences with the beta thus far. Long Post I am forwarding this message from Dave, who would like to hear any thoughts on the issues he has discussed. His address is listed below. It also serves as a follow-up to my cross post of last night concerning the strange problem he was having when attempting to reboot after returning home to find the computer unable to process a web page. I may add a comment or two here, and will so indicate. -----Original Message----- From: Dave McElroy [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, July 23, 2008 6:45 PM To: 'Pam Drake' Subject: My experiences with the beta thus far. Please forgive the forward, as I've asked Pam to send this along since she is on the list and I am not as of yet. I am a relatively new Window-Eyes purchaser, having bought 6.1 at the beginning of the year. Therefore, I have downloaded V7 beta and installed it on a desktop PC, 512 MB ram with tripppletalk outboard speech, the PCI card. Initially, I seemed to have no problems. However, yesterday afternoon after some time away from the PC I seemed to be unable to navigate away from the web page I'd been using previously. As no keyboard command seemed to work, I gave the system a hard reboot. At the time the musical intro started, the whole system froze and the last chord of the intro just kept repeating like an endless loop. I attempted to reboot several times throughout the evening, believing that there might be some kind of a heat issue, but had the same result every time. With the help of a friend by phone, I managed to get the system into safe mode and then out again; I believe he hoped that running it in safe mode and then closing it might clear up whatever the issue was; it did not. Today, I had a sighted friend come in and he advised me that upon hearing the music, a failure notice appeared on the PC, talking about failure, a memory "dump" and indicating some problem with win32. We next went back into safe mode and uninstalled Window-Eyes 7.0, which was the most recent program I'd installed. The PC booted up without a hitch. Now not having Window-Eyes on the PC, I went into Jaws and I now get a video intercept error which I cannot correct. That is to say, I have taken the steps to reinstall the video intercept and it simply does not reinstall. I'll check this one out with FS tomorrow. As a final note, I attempted to report this situation to GW Micro this PM and was rather rudely advised by someone named Aron that unless I could reproduce the problem he was not going to accept the report as valid. I advised him that not having sighted assistance in this home on a regular basis does not incline me to attempt to reproduce this problem which I was unable to correct without sighted assistance. Now perhapse Aron thought that I was calling to lodge a complaint. What I was calling him for was nothing more than to offer an advisory and to advise him of the actions I'd taken to that point to address the issue. To be fair, arron did ask about the synthesizer, and did state that there *might* be a problem with the driver and its interaction with Window-eyes. This is something, however, which has not come up with version 6.1 and, until this time, I've been able to freely use both Jaws and Window-Eyes interchangeably with no problem. So in review, here is where we now stand. I have uninstalled Window-Eyes from my desktop intending to at the very least reinstall version 6.1 at some future date. However, as Jaws is now also mis-behaving, I believe it most prudent to address that video chaining issue prior to any reinstall of 6.1. For now, it might be wise for anyone operating an older Trippletalk to be aware of this potential. BTW, I'm open to any suggestions regarding the video chaining issue as well. Much thanks. David McElroy Pam's comments: Perhaps it would have been helpful if our friend Bill had dictated the exact text of the on-screen error message to Dave so he could repeat it word for word to Aaron. I had left the house for a dental appointment shortly after Bill arrived, so was not able to mention this at the time. Also, Bill had only a few moments to spare so Dave was trying to get the most work done in the shortest amount of time. This, indeed, is why he was reluctant to attempt to duplicate the error. Bill was not able to come to our home until some 20 hours after Dave telephoned him, and he is the closest person to our location who knows enough about computers to attempt to troubleshoot our issues when they occur. He is a computer technician recently retired from our County employment. As for duplication, the error occurred several times last night as Dave attempted to restart the computer, only to find the process reverting to a loop at the exact point in the boot sequence. So the error was in fact duplicated, but Dave lacked the empirical data to fully report it. I have assured Dave that the seeming lack of interest or concern he inferred from Aaron's failure to take a report is not the typical way in which the GW-Micro Staff respond to customer issues. Indeed, Aaron himself may not have realized how his response would be interpreted. It was fifteen minutes to closing time in Fort Wayne, but three hours earlier here in Visalia, California. Perhaps Aaron believed the Triple Talk issue was going to be researched, so there was no need to take a report. Dave believed he was providing valuable info to the testers, while Aaron was looking for supportive data which didn't exist. As Dave pointed out, he has only recently purchased Window-Eyes, and perhaps I have said too much about Staff's positive responsiveness, totally forgetting about the fact that everyone is human, especially at a quarter to closing time. <smile> Also, Dave has set Window-Eyes, and JAWS prior to his purchase of W/E, to load at startup. I have not installed the beta, but I do not use the load at startup option. I wonder what might have happened if he were to re-install the beta and load it manually. I may suggest he try this, but first he will contact Freedom Scientific for help in solving the video issue. I plan to check to see whether there have been any updates to the Triple Talk PCI software. In conclusion, I am sure the issue will be resolved, and trust Dave will continue to use and become more familiar with Window-Eyes as time goes on. I do believe this experience may have pointed out some issues needing examination, especially if the installation and subsequent of the beta may have interfered with the video dcm issues which are now so rare we've almost forgotten them. We would appreciate any thoughts anyone may have on these matters. I will forward any replies I receive to Dave, but please feel free to send me copies of any responses sent to him if you would like. Thanks for bearing with this very long post. Pam Drake If you reply to this message it will be delivered to the original sender only. If your reply would benefit others on the list and your message is related to GW Micro, then please consider sending your message to [email protected] so the entire list will receive it. All GW-Info messages are archived at http://www.gwmicro.com/gwinfo, and can be searched through and sorted using the search form at the bottom of the page. If you wish to unsubscribe from this list, send a message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] and include leave gw-info in the body of the message. No virus found in this incoming message. Checked by AVG - http://www.avg.com Version: 8.0.138 / Virus Database: 270.5.5/1569 - Release Date: 7/23/2008 1:31 PM If you reply to this message it will be delivered to the original sender only. If your reply would benefit others on the list and your message is related to GW Micro, then please consider sending your message to [email protected] so the entire list will receive it. All GW-Info messages are archived at http://www.gwmicro.com/gwinfo, and can be searched through and sorted using the search form at the bottom of the page. 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