Kathy,

Yes, it is a bit confusing isn't it?  While there is supposed to be
this Daisy standard, for various reasons, not all players support all
DAISY features or sources of books.

For example, the software Victor reader that you get with a
bookshare.org membership only plays books from their library and will
not support the audio portion of the standard.  This is undoubtedly to
keep the cost down and the copyright protection scheme in place.  You
can always convert bookshare books to HTML for viewing in a browser,
but it does not retain the markup, so there is no links for
navigation.

The reason for the price difference between the older players such as
that offered by RFB&D and others, and the new ones is simply that the
technology is getting faster, smaller, and cheaper all the time.

I once saw a run down on the various software and hardware players,
their costs, features, and supported formats, but I don't see to be
able to find it again.  Maybe it was on the bookshare site or the
daisy.org site.

Hope this helps,

Jim