Category: accessible Devices
Just curious to see what mp3 players people use out there. I just got a Muvu from Creative Labs, which came free with my membership to Audible.com. It's a tiny little thing that primarily uses buttons for navigation and is probably the most accesible mp3 player I've ever worked with. (I used to have a Reo but that was very visual and hard to figure out, though I'm sure some people might be able to) The only drawback about the Muvu is that it doesn't hold as much music as other players might, but the sound quality is good and I'm very happy with it over all. And if I want more music I can always put it on my Braille Note's Media Player.
I have a Rio S50 which is a few years old. I don't mind it much now that I don't have to use the Rio Music Manager anymore. It has 128 mb, which means it can hold about 32 songs, but you can expand the memory by adding an MMC card. The controls are fairly easy to operate because it just has a dial which is used to go backwards and forwards between tracks, like a CD player. I heard that Rio now makes MP3 players that can read SD cards. I'd eventually like to get a player like that and a BrailleNote mPower so I can just pop the card in either device. But then I'd have to get a card reader as well.
I have a very simple, basic mp3 player, no bells and whistles, just for playing my old time radio cds. It only has about 11 buttons. The search and display are inaccessible, but I can play my mp3's very easy. There's the play/pause button, and the stop button is just to the right, then there is the skip forward button, and the skip backward button. I forgot exactly what the others are, all except the resume button. It's very easy to use, just for playing my otr cds.
wonderwoman
I have an Archos 6000 with the Rockbox firmware. It holds 6 gigs, and that just isn't enough, so my next venture will be the Ipod.
I have a creative mp3 player. it has a volume buttons, and a single button for changing the tracks. there is a pour on and of button on the frunt, and you hold it in for about 3 seconds for play or stop, and press it once lightly for pause. its very accessable, if i don't want to use the inbuilt mike, wich complicates things. it can hold about 3 cds worth of songs.
I have an Iriver h320. It holds about twenty gig, and I love it. It acts as another hard drive with my comp, so downloading music is a breeze. Don't get an Ipod. They're not all that accessible. Seriously. I'm not the best with technology, so if I say that the Iriver is pretty easy to use, it's pretty true. If anyone wants an mp3 player that holds a lot of music, and is pretty accessible, I suggest that you check out the Irivers. They're pretty. PS mine can play Ogg files, which makes it cool.Meaghan
I just bought the lexar jump gear to go with my jump drive sport. It's pretty cool! All the basic functions are accessible. I like it because if you have a couple of these jump drive sports, then you can have a few different playlists. A friend also just got the asono; I think the is the name. That one is also easy and accessible. The asono is cheep and this particular one only holds 128mb, but pretty cool for under $30. The jump gear I bought off of Ebay for under $20, and it may be simple, but I like the flexability. Lol, I'm clueless; it tickled me to know end that if you have one of those tape connectors, you can use these things in the car! A whole lot better than lugging around a bunch of CDs. *smile*
I've got the book curier text reader/mp3 player. it plays mp3's daisy books etc, and is basically a totally accessible mp3/text reader. it works off cf cards.
I have a rio s10 whitch is verri accessable because it has the simplest controls on the planet.
I took the iPod plunge soon after I posted anything to this topic! I got the iPod with color display, 20GB. I wholeheartedly recommend them! They're small, and tons of manufacturers make accessories for them such as docks, transmitters that work with the dock connectors, and microphones for podcasting. Anyone who tells you accessibility is a problem has obviously never used one, so pay no attention to them. They don't know what they're talking about! Try it! You'll fall in love!
Hey all; any of your mp3 players... Is there an easy way to use the random function? Thanks!
Hey all; any of your mp3 players... Is there an easy way to use the random function? Thanks!
iPod's easy..From the main menu, which you can get to by pressing the menu button a bunch of times, spin the wheel till it stops clicking at the left, then count five clicks, and press select.
I looove my IPod. it's one of the second gen ones, so it's a bit bigger, but it's a wonderful lil toy.
I have an Archos Jukebox Recorder, it's quite old, with the Rockbox firmware, but I think I am going to buy a new one, that called Iriver H340, it works with Rockbox too.
Liam, that iPod you talk about: can it talk? Or not?
As I have a lot of mp3 and sound effects it is not a good idea to play with a toy that can not talk :)
My only experience is with CD players that will play mp3 files. Best one is my Panasonic boom box which seems to be able to handle any bitrate and sampling rate. This is important because I listen to a lot of old-time radio which is usually encoded at low bitrates to keep file size down, plus high bitrates are just overkill for the pre-hi-fi quality of most of it. Only drawback to both the Panasonic boom box and the portable CD player I had previously is that you cannot fast forward or rewind within a given file. We also have an RCA RCD-160 boom box which is fine, but a bit pickier as to what it will play. You can fast wind within files but it's pretty useless because it's very slow.
It's just a matter of points of view. I do not feel with cd players, as I have lots of cd's to take with me :) so I just use mp3 players, where I can store and delete whatever and whenever I wish
Currently, I am using the creative labs zen 60 gig player which also doubles as a hard drive. The unit itself is quite good and has a lot of buttons, unlike the I pod etc. The main drawback is the fact that the creative labs software is not accessible at all with speech! It's a real drag and when I spoke to creative labs, they weren't really keen on developing an application that would be accessible. It's their loss though if they don't want to work to gain the visually impaired/blind part of the market!
I am a cheap person so just my bN's media player. It works for me. I don't need to spend extra.
I use an RCA Lyra. I like it because it is very easy to use, and if I want more audio storage, I can just use one of those little memory cards; I forgot which ones they are but yeah.
man these Bord's are old!
Anyway, I use a ZMate mp3 player. Only five buttons and it works on SD cards. You hold down the middle button to tern it on or off. After that the button becomes the paws and play button. Left one is back. Right is forward. Top is volume up. Down is volume down. And when you change tracks the volume goes down so you don't hear any popping.
I use my booksense.
My poor old, inaccessible ipod nano 2nd gen, has been ignored since the booksense arrived. lol!
Is there anyway to hack the talking IPod touch so it becomes a UMS? I don't relish the idea that I have to have this program or that program in order to convert or move a file/folder from the pc to the mp3 player.
I'm still using the IRiver h10 20gb.
The latest rockbox well... it rocks.
I'm curious to know how those people who don't use speech compatible mp3 devices with 0 vision control things such as:
EQuilizer
playback modes
recording files
navigate through a list of say 1000+ songs and easily getting to the song you want to listen instead of cycling through and wasting your time.
navigate an asortment of folders like audiobooks/music/podcasts
I also don't like the card based systems. Its almost like having to carry a bunch of cds, granted they are much smaller, but the idea is the same.
I use my nokia phone, its fully acessible and with a bluetooth headset the controls are right on the headphones so you don't have to go fumbling for the player for your basic controls. While iPods have become more accessible over the years i still don't like to play in apple's walled garden so i probably will continue to avoid them untill something like an ipod touch or the iphone becomes compelling enough with the benefits outweigh the those issues. I personally like players that have built in memory, but still gives the ability to expan it with SD cards and the like. and
If you have big enough cards you won’t need to. I believe my two Gigabits card holds 518 songs and a few more. Say you have a four or even an eight gig card, you are pretty much covered. Maybe you need one more, but… not much more.
Well, we now have accessible Ipods, so.. some of these posts are pretty funny! Yeah, I have an Ipod fifth generation, but it for whatever reason won't work. I'm considering an Ipod touch, but we'll see how things go. I love the simplisity of the ipod and there are programs such as Xplay to help you paste your music onto your Ipod.
For me, 4, 8, and 16 gigs isn't enough. I know they make 32 and 64 Gig cards now, but they're about as expensive as some MP3 players so... yeah
ipod nano, the 16 gig with voice. wouldn't get rid of it for anything, using itunes 8 and jaws 10, so, i don't have a problem at all... metalic blue but that really doesn't make a difference...
I hope they come out with an Ipod classic with voice over on it. I'd like to have an Ipod larger than 16 GB. Plus, I'm not sure if the touch is right for me. I'd have to try it out.
Simplicity .. thats not the word i would use to describe the iPod experience, i mean the thing still doesn't support alot of other file formats outside of mp3 and aac. and the only ipod classic still made is i think the 250gb one. it may work with voice over now not sure though.
Well, the Ipod I have, when it worked, it was very simple. I had no problems memorizing my menus. I didn't even need for the thing to talk. Now, I never used Itunes. I'd love to learn how since it appears to be more accessible.
i have a ipod namio or however you spell it and with the new voice over option its very accessable it notonly speeks the song and ablem nams but allof the menus too
they don't make the 16 g ipod nano anymore, they are now either 32 or 64 g. don't know if they have voice, i'm going to assume they do, but, yeah...
I have a 16 GB nano which has very sharp corners.
The Nanos come in 8 and 16 GB, and the Ipod touch come in 16 and 32 GB at a much higher price.
No one has said this one yet...
I use my 32 gig iphone 3GS. Love it, and it doubles as my laptop when I wanna check my mail or IM, or check the weather...how I lived without it this, I don't know.
and i can do the same thing with my nokia .. and no touch screen .
I might, might, might, use a Ipod classic if it had voice over. I like the touches but I don't like being stuck with itunes. I could just buy one of the 5.5 gen ipods off ebay and reload with rockbox and have 80 or 120 gb of music and books that way and not have to worry about itunes. but the nano's don't hold near enough music to make it apealing for me. That's probably because my collection is quite diverse
Yes, but I didn't have to pay the price for a phone and software for it. Also, I didn't have to pay anything for mine as it was a graduation gift that I got when we got the rebate from ATNT otherwise theirs no way I could've gotten it. It was $300 I think.
yeah you are right th eupside to an iPhone is the screenreader comes as part of the package. But the options of phones, and being able to add additional capacity to your phone, and stuff like the KNFB reader are options that keep nokia's viable, and while we'll see some of this if not all in iPhones and Android phones down the road they aren't their yet so if you are willing to pay something extra for those options thats cool too. Competition and choice will only benefit us comsumers in the end. So while i am a fan of nokia's right now, at the current rate of iPhone and android development whose to say i wont jump ship when due for a new phone in a nother year or 2?
I just bought 4 g Sansa Clip Plus. it's a brand new player, and I can buy a memory card if necessary. I don't know If I'd use an IPod, cause I really think ITunes sucks. Unless I'm doing something wrong, (which is entirely possible), I've just never gotten the damn program to work.
have you re tried it with jaws 10 and up and itunes 8 and up?
I have, but I find some of it really confusing. Everyone seems to talk about how accessible it is, yet no one is bothering to explain how to work it which is frustrating!
use F6 to tab around the different windows (tab also works at times as well) and then the up and down or left and right arrows to navigate through things.iTunes usually creates a default music library in th My Music Folder on windows. In your my music folder there is an Itunes Folder and in that an iTunes Music folder thats where it stores all the stuff it imports or rips. You can change this and other prefereances by going to edit menu and preferences to bring up that dialogue box. Control tab to tab around the different tabs and tab to change check or un check items in a particlar tab. any specific questions just ask them and we'll see if we can get them answered.
i use my 4th gen ipod nano for all my music and stuff. and even record lectures with it. and listen to audiobooks but i think the ipod is being kinda ignored since I already got my VR stream i also listen to music and stuff on it
I have a Ipod nano its a 8 gig and I love it. Just to add here it does click when you are using the circle control which is used to control the device. Also it has one button to select your choice. Adventually I want the Ipod touch 32 gig or the Ipad.
I've now been using my Braille Sense, which I got exactly a month ago to listen to all my music. I was able to store all my music on a SD card, so I'm happy for that. I don't mind carrying the Braille Sense around to listen to music since I use it to write in and stuff anyway. But I still have the RCA Lyra and still use it for if I want a much smaller thing to carry around for just listening to music.
Well, I fixed my 5th gen Ipod, so I'm happy again. 80 gigs is awesome to have handy, and it's really portable. I would like to check out the Ipod touch 64 gig eventually though.
if you have 80 gigs why go down to 64 gb?
Well, I'd like to see how the speech works. Plus, I'm not using all 80 anyway!
The 64GB iPod touch holds plenty for me. Music, Audible.com books podcasts etc. I also like the ability to run many 3rd party apps on it.
I also think the 5th gen 16GB nano is a wonderful piece of hardware. It will not hold all of my music, but I use it extensively when working out because it is very small and light.
Just curious, how are you guys getting speech on your IPods? And are the touch screen devices difficult to use? I've never owned an IPod. What's the cost for speech software? I've heard crappy things about Rockbox, but I've never used it, so don't have anyexpierence with the program.
the ipod touch has a screen reader called voice over built in, the ipod nano's and shuffles has some amount of accessibility but its not the greatest as it it generates a speach file with the names of your track using hte default tts voice that you have set on your computer. rockbox is rather limited as it only will spell out the names of your songs and folders or call them folder 1, or track 1 etc. but will read all the players menus though.
i won the ipod shuffle at a convention, and i do use it for when i can't fit anything else in my pockets. i think i should use my ipod nano as part of my ihome speaker since i can't really use my iphone on it because it's not supported
Hmm you all might think I am odd or have fallen off my rocker but I have a ipod touch, and a HD2 from t-mobile. Fore music most of the time I use my HD2 because its with me more then the Ipod touch is, my wife uses it more then I do. I like the way moblespeak supports windows media player.
I use a victor stream.
I have sense ditched my Ipod, gave it to my little sister inlaw and use my mytouch 4G as my main music player.
I had an ipod as well, but gave it to my mom.
I've used a third generation Ipod Shuffle for years. Only five buttons, two switches and a small .exe file which makes itunes completely unnecessary. It's only a gig, but as I usually use it for books and one or tow albums at a time, it works great.
the newer ipods have optional text to speech.
And it's even good. The only problem is these days, if your music's ID3 tags (the tags which transcend the filename and contain artist track and album info) aren't correctly labeled, Itunes gets very confused.
so does the vr stream I think, but I think I was thinking of ogg vorbis.