deth » gadgets

Amazon kindle 2′s text-to-speech

Carl — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 14:54:27 +0000

Amazon’s new kindle 2 looks pretty intersting. I’d consider getting one if I coud just see it first. It seems like you can change the text size on it so that might just be the perfect thing for me but I’d like to see it in person too so I can tell whether the contrast is good for me.

It also seems to includee a feature to read the book to you. That to me is huge and could give other low vision users the freedom to have a book read to them when they want. Sure there are other options but this just seems so convieniant. It could allow sigted people to listen to a book while doing something else too where reading it isn’t really an option.

This is where the shit comes in. A group that represents writers is saying having the device read the book outloud violates copyright. Thanks autheor’s guild. Isn’t it enough that you can only use the book you bought on the kindle? You want me to have to buy it to read on the kindle then buy a seperate audio book? How about if I buy neither instead?

I just love when greed gets in the way of innovation.

Delorme pn-40 is nice but not for me

Carl — Sat, 10 Jan 2009 14:36:37 +0000

Well I had a DeLorme Earthmate PN-40">Delorme pn-40 which I liked a lot. It had good accuracy from what I could tell but I never really got the chance to use it. The first time I got very short battery life. I returned it and they repaired it. The second time I got it back and it just didn’t power on. Then I received it again and If I had to guess I put the batteries in backwards and it didn’t work. The markings are all but impossible for me to see. I am returning it for a refund which I’m very disappointed to do but I just don’t see it working out for me.

It seemed to be on par with my Garmin 60csx as far as getting and holding a lock on satellites. The screen is smaller but very bright and clear and I could see it just as well as the 60csx. I will surly consider any other gps Delorme may come out with. The best thing about it is the maps are included with the gps unlike some of the other hand held gpsrs where they are an aditional cost (and not cheap.)

Garmin Colorado

Carl — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 21:25:54 +0000

I just saw that Garmin is releasing a new gps. From what I read they may have actually improved over the 60csx. I think I will be getting on as soon as I can. I’m looking forward to playing with it.

The best thing about it is the fact that it seems to support paperless caching better by having the cache writeup and previous logs right on the gps. That means we wouldn’t have to use the ipaq for caching which would be a good thing since Molly has a habit of letting the battery die completely in it.

Garmin Colorado 400t Handheld GPS Unit with US Topographic Preloaded Maps