Digitaltext’s Weblog

Here at Landmark College we currently rely upon Kurzweil 3000 for students requiring text to speech software. We have a beta computer, named Bertha, with several other software programs installed for students to try other options and this summer we are doing a small sample evaluation of Read/Write Gold. It seems that a simple thing like having a computer read digital information on a computer is not at all simple. Enter little details like PDF’s and you run into many, “only if’s,” “only whens,” “and “ya buts” instantly. Kathy Burris, Landmark College’s assistive technology trainer compiled a great chart comparing a variety of screen readers. Some of the for fee software programs are loaded on Bertha, our dear beta machine, so current students can experiment with them before they leave Landmark. Most of the for fee programs also have a free 30 day trial version available to download.
https://intranet.landmark.edu/oit/tls/documents/Alternativeschart_withlogos_final_6.17.pdf You can also create your own comparison chart for text to speech software and other assistive technology programs by going to Tech Matrix 2.00
http://www.techmatrix.org/.