[bksvol-discuss] Re: OT listening to DAISY books
- From: Monica Willyard <rhyami@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: bksvol-discuss <bksvol-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sat, 14 Aug 2010 02:12:39 -0400
Hi Jill. I do a combination of three things, depending on my moods and
the type of book I'm reading. First, I use a Book Port as my primary
reading device. I love it and use it around 90 percent of the time,
even when I'm near my computer. It has full daisy navigation, support
for bookmarks, and reads the text effectively. The BookSense, Stream,
or the new Book Port Plus work in a similar way. I've been told that
the Samantha voice works better for reading on the Stream, so you
might want to try that. I carry my Book Port with me for several hours
per day and often sleep with it at night so I can read while falling
asleep.
Second, Freedom Scientific has a completely free daisy player for JAWS
11 users as well as a free player for the Pac Mate. It handles
Bookshare files very well, and the computer-based version can run on
portable devices like netbooks. If I read a daisy book at my computer,
this is the player I use because it works reliably. I use the daisy
player on my Pac Mate since I get both audio and Braille at the same
time on there. To me, this is the gold standard for reading
comprehension. And did I mention that it's free? (grin)
Finally, for some of my fiction, I use a program called Text Aloud
from http://www.nextup.com along with a voice they sell called Acapela
Heather to make mp3s of Bookshare books. I put these either on my NLS
digital player or on the Pac Mate. These also play on my Windows
Mobile based cell phone. The Acapela voice is very clear and
comfortable to listen to.
Since you have Kurzweil, you could do something similar. There is a
big trade-off though. When you make mp3s of your books, you totally
lose navigation by page or chapter. You have a sound file, and all you
can do is move backward or forward by time in seconds or minutes. This
makes use for nonfiction or books with multiple stories cumbersome.
I'd never use this process for a cookbook, for example. It's a
delightful way to read a mystery though. (smile) By the way, this mp3
technique is how most people are reading Bookshare content on the
iPhone right now.
--
Monica Willyard
Visit my GoodReads book shelf at http://www.goodreads.com/plumlipstick
To unsubscribe from this list send a blank Email to
bksvol-discuss-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
put the word 'unsubscribe' by itself in the subject line. To get a list of
available commands, put the word 'help' by itself in the subject line.
Other related posts:
