From: Curtis Chong X-Sender: Chong99@galileo.cris.com To: Yael Ulmer Subject: Mountbatten Brailler Hello Yael: Following please find a review of the Mountbatten brailler as performed by the International Braille and Technology Center of the National Federation of the Blind in the United States. I trust you will find this information to be helpful. Yours sincerely, Curtis Chong chong99@concentric.net ================================================================= Mountbatten Brailler Type: Single-side printer, electronic Braillewriter, and note taker Manufacturer: Quantum Technologies Importer: HumanWare, Incorporated Address: HumanWare, Incorporated, 6245 King Road, Loomis, California 95650; (916) 652-7253; (800) 722-3393; FAX: (916) 652-7296 Price: $2,595 to $3,250 Lines per Page: 26 Cells per Line: 40 Manufacturer Rated Speed: 8 characters per second Size: 17.5 inches wide by 9 inches deep and 3.5 inches high Weight: 10.75 pounds Reviewed: 1993 Description: The Mountbatten is fundamentally an electronic Braillewriter which can also work as an electronic note taker similar to a Braille 'n Speak or a BrailleMate. The unit also has the capacity to back-and-forward translate Braille and transfer files to and from a PC. Finally, it can also be used with a regular computer keyboard to produce Grade 2 Braille. The Mountbatten Brailler is approximately seventeen and a half inches wide by nine inches deep by three and a half inches high. It weighs ten and three quarters pounds and can run on its built-in batteries. According to its manufacturer, it can print approximately thirty pages of Braille while battery-operated. When used as an electronic note taker, without printing, it will operate for approximately sixteen hours, according to the manufacturer. It has a carrying handle that slides out of the front of the machine and a plastic snap-on cover which protects the embossing area. However, it does not have a full carrying case. The feel of the keyboard is more similar to a computer's than to a Perkins Braillewriter's. The keys are quiet and don't require much pressure. This would offer advantages to a young child or a person with physical weakness in the hands or arms. We have heard of people with arthritis successfully using the machine, although paper loading isn't particularly handy or simple. The keys differ from those of a Perkins Braillewriter in their placement and layout. The regular brailling keys (dots one, two, three, four, five, and six) are not lined up straight across the machine but are arranged in a shallow v shape. It does take some getting used to. The producer maintains that this layout keeps the user from twisting and therefore possibly injuring the hands and wrists. This may be true, but the position does not seem inherently more comfortable. Perhaps being very familiar with the keyboard of the Perkins makes this one take a good deal of getting used to. There is a small round key located between the two sets of three brailling keys, but this is not the space bar. It is the Command Key, used in conjunction with other keys to issue commands. The space bar and the line space keys are located in the middle, below the brailling keys. For those used to the Perkins keyboard, this also takes a good deal of adjustment. Most people likely would prefer the space bar in the more traditional, higher location. However, the apparent rationale is that with the lower placement the user can hit the space bar or line space keys easily with the thumbs while brailling. The machine can produce either six-or eight-dot Braille. There are two extra keys with which to produce dots seven and eight. The machine also has the capacity to switch to a wide variety of foreign language Braille codes and keyboard layouts. The Mountbatten Brailler can be set so that it automatically goes to the beginning of a new line when the user Brailles to the end of the current line. The embossing mechanism prints at about eight characters per second. A good Braillist can write faster han that, but the machine is able to buffer the characters and doesn't seem to drop any. When Brailling, the Mountbatten is a little on the noisy side; it makes a sharp clacking sound. This could be a disadvantage in a classroom. The machine is grey, black, yellow, and blue in color. The body is grey, and the keys are black or blue. The area under the keys and some other parts are yellow. The Mountbatten Brailler uses single sheets of Braille paper. It can handle a variety of thicknesses and sizes, and it adjusts to new paper automatically. Loading paper is a little tricky. The sheet must be all the way to the left, or the machine will not operate at all. It does not automatically position the paper for Brailling on the first line. The user must position the paper by hand so that the first line appears where he or she wishes. This is a little awkward because, if one is not careful, the paper will become crooked. The paper insertion is tricky enough to constitute a problem for small children, one of the target audiences for this device. Most people will use the Mountbatten Brailler as an electronic Braillewriter. It does aid in correcting mistakes. The user can rub out an incorrect character and replace it with the right letter. There are actually two ways to correct a mistake: have the machine rub out the bad cell by pressing the space and backspace keys simultaneously or replace the wrong letter with the proper one by pressing the new letter while pressing the backspace key. Though convenient, this method does not erase the dots as completely as the first. Commands for the Mountbatten Brailler are issued from the keyboard. In general the user first presses the command key, then types in the command and terminates input by pressing the margin release key, located on the right side of the machine. While there are a large number of commands, most of them are logical words or mnemonic abbreviations for words or phrases. As an electronic Braillewriter, note taker, printer, and translator the Mountbatten has a full complement of easy-to-use features. It is also possible to move text to and from a computer and do basic page formatting. A good manual in Braille is provided with the machine. Interestingly enough, the International Braille and Technology Center for the Blind has received a number of very expensive Braille devices without Braille manuals or with totally inadequate manuals. The Mountbatten manual is divided into several volumes. Each is self-contained, and users can tackle a new one as they need the features it offers. There are, for example, a basic manual, an advanced manual, and manuals for forward- and back-translation. The manuals are well written and easy to understand. There are also instructions for using the Mountbatten with other devices such as the Braille 'n Speak and the Eureka A4. The Mountbatten Brailler comes in two models. The Mountbatten Brailler Standard has 32K of memory, which will hold approximately thirty-five to forty pages of text. It costs $2,595. The Mountbatten Brailler Educational Package, which costs $3,295, has additional memory (160K) and comes with forward and reverse Braille translation software and an interface box. This version has serial and parallel ports and a connector for a standard computer keyboard. The interface features greatly amplify the power of the Mountbatten, facilitating its connection to other computers, Braille or ink-print printers, or regular keyboards. With a keyboard and the Braille translation software, a sighted person who knows little or nothing about Braille can enter text into the machine and produce relatively well-formatted Grade II Braille. This would be particularly useful in public schools. The basic model does come with one serial port and an external keyboard connector. However, the educational model is needed to get a second serial port and a parallel port. In fact, it has two parallel ports. Comments: Everyone has heard the definition of a camel as a horse designed by a committee. Though it may be stretching a point, in some ways the Mountbatten Brailler strikes the panel as a Braillewriter designed by a technology committee, every member of which had individual notions of what was essential. All in all, however, the Mountbatten Brailler does accomplish what it sets out to do. It can perform a variety of functions and is a compact and portable unit. However, if a user is just looking for a Braille printer, the Braille Blazer is faster and cheaper. If one seeks merely an electronic note taker, both the Braille 'n Speak and the BrailleMate are more powerful, smaller, and cheaper. If a person wants an electronic Braillewriter, then the Mountbatten is worth considering, although it is on the expensive side. It appears that this device is best suited for an individual or school that could use a number of its functions. It would then be much easier to justify the steep cost. Nevertheless, for what it costs to purchase the Mountbatten Educational Package, one could purchase a Braille Blazer, a Blazie disk drive, and a standard Braille 'n Speak. While not a compact, one-piece unit, each of the Blazie components is better or more powerful then the comparable features in the Mountbatten, and the disk drive gives one the ability to store unlimited numbers of files. When asked how the multi-colored machine looked, one sighted person consulted responded succinctly, "It looks like something from Fisher-Price." [a prominent toy manufacturer] This high- contrast color scheme is intended to aid the visually impaired. The feature holds no great appeal for most who have seen it, but it may be of assistance to some. One fails to understand, however, what advantage is gained by watching the brailling keys. The real objection is that such a color design is not typical of machines used in business and would draw more attention to the equipment than one would wish it to receive.