Hi Rick Most interesting, thanks. Obviously what I was told isn’t quite correct. Amazon UK told me that the Show’s configuration wasn’t accessible, as it uses the same visual interface as the new Fire TV. The latter is definitely not configurable as a blind person. I own one of these pendants, as they now are called, and as I say, you have to use the Voice Remote to set the options up. You can turn on VoiceView in the accessibility preferences from which point you have direct access to all features. But you can’t do this until the device is network-enabled. The reason for this is that the device needs to download the firmware and apps appropriate for your country before it starts working properly.
But it may change my mind abut buying an Echo Show now that I know that the information I was given when I had a look at one of the devices was not valid. I shall also advise Amazon accordingly. ======================================== My compliments and kindest regards Gordon Smith: <gor...@mac-access.net> Accessibility & Information Technology Support Specialist.. This Message Was Created Using 100% Recycled Electrons. If you can avoid printing it, please do so. Think of the environment, save a tree! Contact: • UK Free Phone: 0800 8620538 • UK Geographic / Global: +44(0) 1642 688095 • UK Mobile/SMS: +44 (0)7804 983849 • Vic. Australia: +61 38 82059300 • US/Canada: +1 646 9151493 ---------------------------------------- On 4 Dec 2017, at 18:03, Rick Alfaro <rick.alf...@gmail.com> wrote: Sorry, correction on my Echo show description of the buttons. The camera/mic button is the first button on the left, not the right like I mistakenly said in my message. The buttons from left to right are Camera/Mic, Volume down, and Volume up. -----Original Message----- From: Rick Alfaro [mailto:rick.alf...@gmail.com] Sent: Monday, December 4, 2017 12:40 PM To: techno-chat@techno-chat.net Subject: [Techno-Chat]: RE: [Techno-Chat]: Amazon Echo Show / Fire TV + Fire TV Stick – 2017 Model Hi Gordon. Regarding the Echo show, you can enable VoiceView to configure everything yourself as a blind user. There are 3 buttons going across the top of the Show. The first one on the right is the button to toggle the camera and mic on /off. The other 2 buttons are volume down and volume up respectively. To enable VoiceView you press and hold the camera/mic button until you hear a beep at which point you have to place 2 fingers slightly apart on the screen and you will hear VoiceView be enabled. From there on, it's just like using VoiceView on one of the amazon tablets. The Echo Show is really quite accessible once you enable the screen reader. If you Google "VoiceView on Echo Show" you will get a result link pointing you to all of the gestures that are useable on the Show. HTH -----Original Message----- From: Gordon Smith [mailto:gor...@mac-access.net] Sent: Monday, December 4, 2017 7:34 AM To: Techno-Chat ... Technology Enthusiasm! <techno-chat@techno-chat.net> Subject: [Techno-Chat]: Amazon Echo Show / Fire TV + Fire TV Stick – 2017 Model Good afternoon everybody Today I’ve had the opportunity to play with both the new Fire TV Pendant, and also an Echo Show. The Fire TV belongs to yours truly, and the Echo Show to a neighbour who asked me to set it up for her. In the event, it was a bit of an anticlimax. For reasons best known only unto themselves, Amazon’s latest devices which are capable of playing video content cannot be set up via the Alexa app, as can previous devices. Instead, you have to use an on-screen menu system, (touch screen, in the case of the Show). There is no other way to configure your WiFi settings. The Echo Show, once set up, works very similarly to the previous Echo and the current Echo and Echo Plus series. For example, Have not yet discovered how, or even if, you can turn on two-way Alexa responses, as you can with the previous version of the Fire TV stick. I set up the Echo Show, played around with it for a few minutes, then left her to learn how to drive it via video. You can speak to it, but it doesn’t always respond in kind. Instead, it seems to pop up video messages which, for a blind person, is pretty damned hopeless. I am very glad that I reverted my previous decision to buy one. The Fire TV is something which, again, cannot be configured via the Alexa app. Nor is there any other way of accomplishing this than with the Voice Remote. You need to be able to see the thing in order to scroll down to the required network, and enter the password. Once that is done, you have a few minutes to wait while the device downloads and installs country-specific firmware. I still need to play around with it further to establish how useable it will be. If all else fails, I still have my old Fire TV stick. So I can soon swap them back. More as I discover it. ======================================== My compliments and kindest regards Gordon Smith: <gor...@mac-access.net> Accessibility & Information Technology Support Specialist.. This Message Was Created Using 100% Recycled Electrons. If you can avoid printing it, please do so. Think of the environment, save a tree! Contact: • UK Free Phone: 0800 8620538 • UK Geographic / Global: +44(0) 1642 688095 • UK Mobile/SMS: +44 (0)7804 983849 • Vic. Australia: +61 38 82059300 • US/Canada: +1 646 9151493 ---------------------------------------- ------------------------------ This post, like all posts to the Techno Chat E-Mail group has been scanned by our server-side antivirus/malware solution. This should not, however, be viewed as a substitution for your own security strategy. 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