Category: accessible Devices
Hi,
With tech changing so rapidly, I'm holding off on buying a notetaker, but I would love a braille display to use with my laptop, so I can use braille more (apart from labeling etc.) How much are they used, and what should I look for? Thanks!
I should clarify, I ment to ask: How much should one expect to pay for a used braille display?
Thanks!
Hi, I just bought a used older Brailliant 24 to use with my IPhone for $500, and so far I'm loving it. 500 is as low as I've ever seen a braille display being sold for, and that's for the Pac Mate braille displays, since they're older and don't have bluetooth capability, and for the smaller displays like mine.
What you should look for will depend alot on what you would prefer in a braille display. If you haven't gotten to play with very many, this can be hard to know.
Do you like braille to be more firm or more soft? As far as I've seen, the Freedom Scientific displays, I.E. the Focus and the Pac mate displays have the softer filling braille. The humanWare displays have the more firm feel, I.E. Brailliant and Refreshabraille. Some people don't care how their braille feels.
Do you want bluetooth capability? Most of the newer displays I've seen have this.
Do you care about the size of your display? Some of the smaller displays are the older Brailliants, and the Brailleconnect12 and the refreshabraille18. I'm meaning fit in your pocket or purse small. still, with the newer displays, even the eighty cell ones are I'm guessing about two to two and a half feet long and much slimmer than the older ones.
Do you want a cursor router above each cell so you can navigate more quickly and easily? I'm not sure which displays don't have this, but I know there are some out there. All of HumanWare's and FreedomScientific's displays have it as far as I know.
If you go with an older display, make sure that it will work with your software. I've heard that they've stopped making the old BrailleConnect for this reason, they no longer work with the newer software. I keep saying older Brailliants and BrailleConnects, and newer Brailliants and BrailleConnects, because they are two different groups of displays entirely, not just older and newer versions of the same display.
You might also want to look into the battery life of the displays.
I'm sorry I can't give a breakdown on which displays are better than others as far as durability in software and hardware. There are some who will sware by one display, and others will sware by the other, and both groups will claim there display is better. This doesn't mean that one display isn't better than the others, it just falls alot on preference. I know that the older BrailleConnects and older Brailliants are cased in aluminum, so that would make them longer lasting as far as hardware goes. The Refreshabraille18 is aluminum also, but I've heard that it is not quite as well made as the other two.
I hope this has helped and not made things more confusing. I hope I haven't turned you off a display with too much information, it's just a matter of figuring out what you like and don't like.
Have a great day.