Wit my braille note, I am able to work in conjunction with sighted people. I share word files, put scanned text books onto the braille note, etc. Now, if I want full functionality I'll go get a laptop. But for now, my braille note works great and I'm happy to say if my computer were to break I'm sure I could get along fine with the braille note. Hmmm, too bad the braille note doesn't have kurzweil and come with a scanner. But I do think the pacmate has some things that the braille note does not. USB, the ability for streaming audio, and perhaps, even wireless. But hey, if I'm gunna get a 2000 dollar packmate, I might as well save myself 1000 or over 1000 dollars by buying a laptop, and putting jaws or window eyes on it, going into power options and disabling the monitor. And furthermore, just because the pacmate has jaws for windows ce and pocket pc does not mean every application will work with it. Pocket pc so I hear does not even have a good word processor. And not to get off-topic here. But what about the braille lites and braille n speaks by freedom scientific? once made by blazie engineering? That would be considered being separated from the sighted community. Those things don't even have word, or a word converter on them. They're just plain and simple notetakers. If I really want to stream audio and stuff like that, I'll buy a laptop. I'm sure you can do activesync with a laptop, right? But ... my braillenote does what I need it to do. Yes, the email databases could be re-designed, made to work faster. And keysoft running under windows ce is simple, yet powerful. If I had to, I'm sure I could write a term paper with it or create a table with columns and rows.
That's all I have to say. If you want the fancy stuff, save yourself some money and get a cheap laptop, put jaws or window eyes on it. Oh, and no matter what people send to me, my braille note cannot get viruses I love that! Josh
