Dave,

About #2. Please remember that these machines are aimed at a relatively
small market. Also, the QC on these units generally is VERY high. Most can
be expected to last 15 to 20 years.

You might check out used equipment. There are always good deals out there.

Yes, I am a low vision person, and, work in the retail part of the industry.

Tom Landon

On Wed, Feb 1, 2012 at 1:32 PM, <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

>  You're right -- I asked for advice about some specific solutions
> without fully stating what functions my wife wants the system to
> provide:
>
> 1.  Output text to a laser printer.  I've already had a separate thread
> here about trying to obtain the 64-bit Windows 7 drivers for the printer
> she already has (and installing them), and although I cannot yet report
> success, it turns out there have been suggestions I haven't tried yet,
> so hope is not dead after all.
>
> 2.  Our local low-vision resource center sells machines which basically
> have a small video camera and a big screen, to show magnified views of
> things like book pages.  Typical prices are around $3500 -- i.e., about
> twice what they're really worth.  I have not yet found a USB camera that
> actually works with her new computer (and OS).
>
> 3.  Text-to-speech input.  I got a nice deal on the latest version of
> Dragon Naturally Speaking, but haven't yet had a chance to install and
> test ir yet.
>
> 4.  3D games.  She has loved the EA(?) Harry Potter PC games, at least
> until the recent "LEGO" ones.  This will probably be the most strenuous
> use of the nVidia graphics card, and so far my hope is that anything
> that will run Win32 games with driver support for that card isn't going
> to have a problem.
>
>  So far I've attempted to achieve the first two without success,
> failing in ways that may be specific to the 64-bit Windows 7 OS.  So my
> question on this thread is about punting to a more familiar and mature
> OS, *possibly* retaining the ability to boot into this wonderful new OS
> sometime in the future if solutions become available.
>
>  Oh yeah -- being able to play DVDs would be nice, too.  I don't think
> we've actually tested that, but I'm not expecting any difficulties
> there.  Then again, I didn't expect most of the issues that have come up
> so far either....
>
>  Radio Shack were very nice about refunding my money for the garbage
> Microsoft USB camera.  At first they tried to say I was two days past
> the deadline to return it, but when I pointed out that I had only bought
> it two days earlier, they realized they were mistaken about that.
>
> David Gillett
>
>
>
> -------- Original Message --------
> From: mike stanz <[log in to unmask]>
> Date: Wed, February 01, 2012 7:10 am
>
> simplicity.. you never said what the problem was, only that your wife
> couldn't do what she wanted. what does she want to do? once you explain
> this then
> maybe someone could help find a solution.
>
>
>
>
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-- 
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Stanislaw Lec

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