Sandy and I purchased the Solar Powered portable Bibles from
Speak To Me Catalog.  I've wanted one since they started selling
them a long while ago.

     When they came Friday, I unpacked them and put them in our
kitchen window which faces south.  Within minutes, the solar panel
started charging the batteries.  You can also place them in a room
with a 60 watt light bulb and they charge three time faster.  You
get up to 14 hours of play back time.

     It uses a real human voice, that is, somebody read the Bible
and it was burned into the unit probably using MP3 files.  The
unit is pocket size and somewhat larger than the Road Runner
Bibles which uses the double talk synthesizer.  The reader of the
solar Bible is very good.

     The unit has a built in speaker.  You can use earphones if
you like and they come with it.  What doesn't come with it is a 9
volt AC DC adapter which will allow you to charge the unit faster
or to play the Bible when the batteries have run down.  We went to
Radio Shack and purchased two 9 volt adapters just in case.

     It has a push button control panel just below the speaker,
which you can access easily and the volume can be turned up very
high, but everything is controlled from the panel with the four
buttons across the control panel.  Off and on, volume low and
high, pause, bookmark setting, and then a row of three buttons
down the left and right side of the panel.  The top left and right
buttons jump from book to book or if held down, it will skip large
sections of the Bible which enables you to get to other places
quicker.  The next two buttons, right and left, skip forward and
backwards by chapters.  The bottom two buttons skip verse by
verse.

     You cannot speed up or slow down the speech but it would
sound uncomfortable to me if you could change the speed.  As I
said, as far as I am concerned, the reader is excellent and for a
hundred dollars, it is well worth it.

     You can go to

www.speaktomecatalog.com

and cursor down to the search engine.  Type in a search using the
words Talking bible and it will take you to the single entry.
There is an audio clip which allows you to hear the reader.  They
have the King James Version and the New American Standard if you
prefer an easier to read version.  According to their catalog,
they must also have just the New Testament for 50 dollars because
someone at church today found it listed in their print catalog.

Phil.