Computer Recommendations for a recently Blind man....

[Rilescat]

Good Afternoon all,

My uncle (43 years old) was in an electrical accident last year at work. He has since gone blind and has lost much of the feeling in his fingertips and nerve endings. He is still in good spirits and would like to try to do something with himself while he is at home during the days. My family and myself have put together a healthy amount of money with the help of a couple of local churches and organizations. We would like to assist him by getting him a computer that can help him in his daily routines or just to stay in touch with everyone.

Could anyone recommend any equipment, hardware, or software that could assist him. He has little feeling left in his fingers so Brail will not work for him. What else can we use?

Thank you for any input.

Riles

 

[DaiShan]

Hmm, that is a tough one, I guess the loss of feeling would make it difficult for him to read brail? I don't know if there are other voice operated programs out there (I'm sure there have to be) but something like naturally speaking might be good for composing documents, it can be run on any PC, I'm not sure, you may try checking on the internet for plugins that allow Windows to be controlled verbally?

 

[dirtboy]

Do some research and you'll find software that is designed to help blind people.

 

[Nohr]

I've got experience with this sorta thing since my wife is blind. Arguably the best speech software is JAWS. It does not need any special hardware, it speaks out what is on screen using a software synthesizer combined with a sound card. So long as you have a decent sound card it should work fine.

Hardware-wise you won't be needing a supercomputer. A low end Athlon XP or P4 would do great, preferably with at least 256MB of RAM. Even better if you can throw in 512MB. For a video card most people say to stick with Nvidia for compatibility reasons. I can't recommend a specific chip, but probably a GF2 of some sort would be fine. Some people even get along well with an old TNT2.

You'll find that most adaptive computer hardware and software for the blind is highly expensive, supposedly because of the limited customer base. The standard version of JAWS is $895 and even more for the Pro version. There is a demo of it available so you can test it out, it requires a reboot after 40 minutes.

Good luck to your uncle!

 

[Ornery]

"JAWS is $895"

Isn't there some kind of financial assistance available to help knock down the price? Our government finds so many sorry ass things to spend money on. THIS is exactly what our tax dollars should be helping with!

 

[Nohr]

Originally posted by: Ornery
"JAWS is $895"

Isn't there some kind of financial assistance available to help knock down the price? Our government finds so many sorry ass things to spend money on. THIS is exactly what our tax dollars should be helping with!

I think that varies from state to state. Here in Texas the Texas Commision for the Blind is who my wife would turn to for adaptive equipment. However, before they even think about helping you must either be enrolled in school with a full class load, ie 12 hours. Or you have a 40 hour a week job, at least I'm pretty sure it's 40 hours. If you don't meet those requirements you're on your own.

I don't know what other institutions are available, if any.

 

[Red Dawn]

Originally posted by: Nohr
I've got experience with this sorta thing since my wife is blind. Arguably the best speech software is JAWS. It does not need any special hardware, it speaks out what is on screen using a software synthesizer combined with a sound card. So long as you have a decent sound card it should work fine.

Hardware-wise you won't be needing a supercomputer. A low end Athlon XP or P4 would do great, preferably with at least 256MB of RAM. Even better if you can throw in 512MB. For a video card most people say to stick with Nvidia for compatibility reasons. I can't recommend a specific chip, but probably a GF2 of some sort would be fine. Some people even get along well with an old TNT2.

You'll find that most adaptive computer hardware and software for the blind is highly expensive, supposedly because of the limited customer base. The standard version of JAWS is $895 and even more for the Pro version. There is a demo of it available so you can test it out, it requires a reboot after 40 minutes.

Good luck to your uncle!

Excuse me for asking this obvious question but why would a blind person need a Video Card (let alone a computer)

 

[Nohr]

Originally posted by: Red Dawn
Excuse me for asking this obvious question but why would a blind person need a Video Card (let alone a computer)

I don't know exactly how it works, but from what I've heard JAWS accesses the video card to see what's on screen.

Why wouldn't a blind person need a computer? There's tons of webpages out there that are easily accessibly by a blind user with screen reading software. Many programs made specifically for the blind are available, everything from games to PDA type software. Usually they can use regular software just fine. My wife regularly uses Outlook Express, Winamp, MSN Messenger, Internet Explorer, etc.

 

[Red Dawn]

Originally posted by: Nohr

Originally posted by: Red Dawn
Excuse me for asking this obvious question but why would a blind person need a Video Card (let alone a computer)

I don't know exactly how it works, but from what I've heard JAWS accesses the video card to see what's on screen.

Why wouldn't a blind person need a computer? There's tons of webpages out there that are easily accessibly by a blind user with screen reading software. Many programs made specifically for the blind are available, everything from games to PDA type software. Usually they can use regular software just fine. My wife regularly uses Outlook Express, Winamp, MSN Messenger, Internet Explorer, etc.

Well that's cool to know!

 

[BeauJangles]

Originally posted by: Nohr

Originally posted by: Red Dawn
Excuse me for asking this obvious question but why would a blind person need a Video Card (let alone a computer)

I don't know exactly how it works, but from what I've heard JAWS accesses the video card to see what's on screen.

Why wouldn't a blind person need a computer? There's tons of webpages out there that are easily accessibly by a blind user with screen reading software. Many programs made specifically for the blind are available, everything from games to PDA type software. Usually they can use regular software just fine. My wife regularly uses Outlook Express, Winamp, MSN Messenger, Internet Explorer, etc.

I assume she uses these by having JAWS read it out?

Also, don't products like Dragon Naturally Speaking suck? So what sort of input alternatives are there? (sorry, im just curious )

 

[Nohr]

Originally posted by: BlinderBomber

Originally posted by: Nohr

I don't know exactly how it works, but from what I've heard JAWS accesses the video card to see what's on screen.

Why wouldn't a blind person need a computer? There's tons of webpages out there that are easily accessibly by a blind user with screen reading software. Many programs made specifically for the blind are available, everything from games to PDA type software. Usually they can use regular software just fine. My wife regularly uses Outlook Express, Winamp, MSN Messenger, Internet Explorer, etc.

I assume she uses these by having JAWS read it out?

Also, don't products like Dragon Naturally Speaking suck? So what sort of input alternatives are there? (sorry, im just curious )

Yes, JAWS uses a configurable male or female voice to speak through the computer's speakers what the user wants to read.

I don't know much about voice recognition software except that I don't use them because I most likely can type faster anyway.

 

[Reel]

Originally posted by: BlinderBomber

Originally posted by: Nohr

Originally posted by: Red Dawn
Excuse me for asking this obvious question but why would a blind person need a Video Card (let alone a computer)

I don't know exactly how it works, but from what I've heard JAWS accesses the video card to see what's on screen.

Why wouldn't a blind person need a computer? There's tons of webpages out there that are easily accessibly by a blind user with screen reading software. Many programs made specifically for the blind are available, everything from games to PDA type software. Usually they can use regular software just fine. My wife regularly uses Outlook Express, Winamp, MSN Messenger, Internet Explorer, etc.

I assume she uses these by having JAWS read it out?

Also, don't products like Dragon Naturally Speaking suck? So what sort of input alternatives are there? (sorry, im just curious )

My grandma uses Dragon because she has bad hands and can hardly type. The way it works is you spend a long time "teaching" it to recognize your voice by reading it long passages off of the screen. Then when you type by speaking, it will still make stupid mistakes that you have to see and correct. I do not think this software would be a perfect solution for a blind person though it works well in my grandma's case.

 

[Harvey]

I didn't chase any of the links, but I entered "computers for the blind" in Google. Here's the result. Hope it helps.

 

[Rilescat]

Thanks for all the help guys. My Uncle will appreciate it.

 

[Aceshigh]

I don't have any info to add really. Just wanted to say I am really sorry about your uncle's accident. And I hope you are able to find a good computer that he can enjoy.

 

[ATLien247]

JAWS is great, but expensive.

IBM has a product called "Home Page Reader" that retails for about $150. I've never compared it with JAWS, but it might be worth a look.

Also, there are a lot of web pages out there that were designed without giving accessibility a second thought. This is extremely evident when using a screen reader. Sites that are "Bobby" approved try harder than most to accommodate those with disabilities.

If you're interested in web design from this standpoint, WebAIM is a great source of information.

 

[sandorski]

It would be a good idea to contact the nearest organization for the Blind(dunno what that would be where you are, in Canada we have the CNIB--Canadian National Institute for the Blind). They will have a lot of good info on this type of thing. I had a friend who was blind and he received PC training in the late 80's/early 90's, so the technology should be quite mature by now.