I do remember the Speaqualizer. I never got a chance to use it, but, it was a great idea. I'm glad to know you could go that far with it. A lot of us would love to have access to the system before OS boot up.
Thanks for sharing this. -----Original Message----- From: Talk [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Kevin Minor via Talk Sent: Tuesday, October 25, 2016 5:08 PM To: Window-Eyes Discussion List <[email protected]> Subject: RE: Reminiscing about old Screen Readers and Synthesizers Hi. I know I'm late in this thread, but I'd like to add my own experience with screen readers. My first computer with speech was an Apple II E with the Echo II board and software from Street Electronics. I got that for my graduation from high school. I remember the speech package costing $150, which was a steal in 1984. It didn't read everything, but it did all right for what I used it for. I got my first PC in October of 1986. I didn't have speech for it for two years, so I had to use the little vision that I had to use it. In the fall of 1988, I got a speech package that I haven't heard anybody mention. It was the Speaqualizer from APH. What made this package unique was it didn't rely on a program loaded from the PC's disk drive. It was totally hardware based. It had a board that was placed in the PC, and a box that controlled it was connected to the board. What was really nice about this synthesizer was it worked right when you turned on the PC. In 1990 I got an 80/386, and I updated the Speaqualizer to work with this PC. Since it wasn't software based and worked before the PC booted, I was able to access and change settings in the BIOS. The speech wasn't the best, but it served me well for ten years. Now I use software speech, so I can't delve into the system before it's up and running. Just thought I'd share my experiences. Have a blessed day and don't work too hard. Kevin Minor, Lexington, KY _______________________________________________ Any views or opinions presented in this email are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of Ai Squared. For membership options, visit http://lists.window-eyes.com/options.cgi/talk-window-eyes.com/joseph.norton% 40gmail.com. For subscription options, visit http://lists.window-eyes.com/listinfo.cgi/talk-window-eyes.com List archives can be found at http://lists.window-eyes.com/private.cgi/talk-window-eyes.com _______________________________________________ Any views or opinions presented in this email are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of Ai Squared. For membership options, visit http://lists.window-eyes.com/options.cgi/talk-window-eyes.com/archive%40mail-archive.com. For subscription options, visit http://lists.window-eyes.com/listinfo.cgi/talk-window-eyes.com List archives can be found at http://lists.window-eyes.com/private.cgi/talk-window-eyes.com
