Category: Geeks r Us
hey all i'm thinking of changer my windows screan reader from jaws to system and was just wundering what do you guys think of system access what are the pros and kons? peace sound warrior
For an every day screen reader, it seems to be alright, and even have some good points. It's easy to learn, and fairly intuitive. It's also portable, and doesn't need video hooks like JFW or Window Eyes. IT's fine as long as your doing every day stuff, internet browsing, email, etc. Last I knew you could do word processing with it fine, but I haven't tried it on 2007 / 2010. Where I started running into issues is when I started trying to do things with applications that were off the beaten path as it were. Applications where I would've used my Jaws curser. SA does have a mouse mode, but it didn't pick up everything that the jaws curser did, and for applications that didn't conform to windows standards quite as strictly, I really started having issues. My other issue with it was that it didn't seem quite as responsive as Jaws, though part of this could've been the system I was using. They also could have updated certain things since I used it.
One thing that has always bugged me about SA is that while they do update their product, they don't tell their users about it really. To keep your customers interested and involved, especially the more technically minded, you should at least have a changelog someplace.
SA does have a 30 day trial you can use.
I'd also suggest trying NVDA. It really has become a viable screen reader, and in a lot of ways is nearly on par with the other screen readers. I'd say it's on par or better than SA. And it's also free.
system access is all right. I used it a little bit until I got my jaws from vr on this computer. It's an ok scren reader. I used it a bit on 2007. It seemed useable enough but definitely jaws or we is a lot better on the office products.
Overall I am disappointed with SA. Marginally better, may be, than NVDA for some things (though NVDA is much better for web browsing) and it still costs $400. You can try the Satogo (the free browser based version) on your computer. You have to have a browser session open but then it works just like SA would if installed.
That is a novelty and I applaud them for that.
I just find that the SA guys use big statements, they'll change this forever or have that unique fantastic superior product at much better price, but I see very little action. We never know when things are updated, braille support is not up to par and over-all I'd take NVDA.
I hope this will change and they'll step up their game, may be have a contract with IBM or some big PC manufacturer to offer it as part of their Windows installation, preinstalled, that would impress.
I wish them all the best, but I would not recommend purchasing System Access, unless something drastic has changed in the last 6 months.
-B
I haven't used it in a couple years, but I did review it during my senior year. I remember that it was pretty decent software but that it had a lot of glitches to be ironed out. You might try NVDA (Nonvisual Desktop Access). It's free and although I'm not a huge fan of it, it's extremely reliable.
Lady
What do you dislike about NVDA?
Not saying you shouldn't dislike it at all, and it is no Jaws .. but I am just curious what you like least about it.
I use it for some things and it works nicely for those, I have translated it, I don't like the fact it does not work in Excel (not in any meaningful way), and braille support has been lacking (though 2011.2 is supposed to be a big improvement), but always happy to hear more disgruntled opinions than my own.
I found satogo a handy thing to have in a pinch. If the "regular" sa is as full-featured as satogo, I wouldn't buy. Now that NVDA is as good as it is, I may not use satogo, if I had to do something in Win. Think I'd just run a portable instance of NVDA, instead.
I agree with post 7 about SAToGo. I've used it when I needed to do schoolwork when NVDA wasn't working well with IE; it made it easier to fill in things because you don't have to use a forms mode or similar thing to enter text into something, and Mom could put me on wherever I needed to fill something in for me to just start typing. I've also used it one time at school to read and fill in an online form I needed to sign. I pretty much only use SAToGo if I can't do something with NVDA or if a sighted person's helping me with something I need/want to get done fast.
@Wildebrew: It's probably just a matter of preference. When my mom and sister first used it, it still had a lot of glitches, but now it's quite a bit better. Honestly, I use it as a backup for when Window-Eyes crashes. IT really is a good software, but I just don't like the way it lays out webpages. I am actually pretty savvy, and it took a while to get used to that. As far as anything else, I use Outlook 2003 with Vista (not the best idea), and the two in tandem tend to war with screenreaders, let alone each other. Anyway, it reads most of Outlook to me now, but if I open a message to read it, NVDA says nada.
@Gemi: SA To Go is a rather expensive "just-in-case," though lol.
*smile* Oh no; I use the free version. SA seems like an alright program in general, but there are still some little things I don't like, so I wouldn't purchase it, at least not yet anyway.
I've already forgotten how to get into combo boxes, and can't seem to get into some programs unless they're already opened and running as a window. For instance, if I close Windows Live Messenger, I can't go to the Programs Menu or System Tray to bring it back out, and that really annoys me about SA. Although most keystrokes are the same as other screenreaders, there are also some others like getting into a combo box, that take some relearning for that screenreader. That part I wouldn't mind learning though. The main thing I like with that screenreader is that it beeps for password characters (it's less distracting to me than a voice saying star or asterisk), and that you can go straight to typing in an edit field without messing with a different mode.
Hmm. Maybe I'll have to play with it again, but I think for the combo boxes you do ALT+DOWN or CTRL+DOWN...something of that nature. Let me know if it doesn't work.
Oh also, for those of you who don't have a quick solution on a thumb drive, such as NVDA or SA To Go or Wineyes or JAWS or anything like that, as long as the work you need to do on a foreign computer is on the Internet, say like the form Gemi mentioned, you can use a web-based screenreader developed by Washington State at http://webanywhere.cs.washington.edu. It's not perfect but it's amazing what they've come up with so far. MAke sure you tweak it a bit on your own computer before trying it on a foreign computer, though, because you might be a bit confused your first time which would hamper your productivity.