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Wed, 23 Sep 2015 21:46:42 -0700
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Hi all,

I finally found Dropbox on my windows 10 tablet. After a couple of 
weeks, I broke down and installed NVDA, and as soon as I did, I found 
the All Apps button, so I found Dropbox amid all my apps.

The Narrator experience was interesting. I have to admit that I wasn't 
very systematic about learning narrator commands, so I don't feel I can 
say that Narrator is or isn't usable. I just know a few of the basic 
commands, including scrolling, learned a couple more, and figured that 
would get me by, but ... well ... no. for example, using NVDA, I find 
the All apps button by pressing the Start button to get to the search 
box, then arrowing up once or down about six times. when I was using 
Narrator, I never found that button with the keyboard, and yes, the 
first thing I tried was arrowing up once. My lack of familiarity with 
Narrator hit me hardest when I dealt with tool bars. I'd get stuck in 
them and forget how to get out.

Exploring the screen is a little disorienting. I know from my desktop, 
which has a touch screen, where things are located, but since I don't 
have to locate them very often, I don't have to think about it. When I 
was using Narrator, I sometimes found it quicker to get to a button by 
touching the screen, so I had to try to understand where things were in 
relation to each other, not so much as it concerned buttons, but as it 
concerned the different windows.

The most annoying thing to deal with was the sluggishness of Narrator or 
probably the voices. Whenever I would launch an app, I'd go through a 
very long period of silence, maybe 20 to 30 seconds, so I wasn't sure 
whether the tablet or the TTS was slow. Speech seemed to be a more 
likely culprit because, once the "app launched," everything worked fine. 
Then I'd change screens, and I'd have to wait another 20 seconds. As I 
spent more time with the tablet, these pauses became more and more 
frustrating.

Narrator's sluggishness also interfered with working with the touch 
screen. Generally, swiping worked better than exploring. when I ran my 
finger over the screen to locate controls, Narrator tended to forget to 
announce items, especially smaller ones. But swiping wasn't ideal 
either. For instance, when I pressed the Start button and started 
swiping to find the All Apps button, the first thing I heard was Account 
picture, then an item, then Account Picture again, then another item, 
then Account Picture, etc.

I was starting to gear up for returning the tablet when I installed 
NVDA. The experience is so much better. I'm finding things where and how 
I expect, and the tablet is surprisingly responsive. It's slower than my 
desktop, of course, but it might be a little faster than my little netbook.

One thing I'll mention is that all the information I found on the web 
said that desktop mode isn't available on tablets smaller than 8 inches. 
I bought a 7-inch tablet because I hadn't read that yet, so when I came 
across that tidbit, I panicked. My HP Stream does go into desktop mode. 
Press enter on Settings, which is near All Apps, and press enter on 
Tablet Mode On to toggle it to Off.

Just letting everyone know.

Ciao


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