{"id":2478,"date":"2014-06-17T09:00:28","date_gmt":"2014-06-17T13:00:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.equipmentlink.org\/blog\/?p=2478"},"modified":"2014-06-17T09:01:43","modified_gmt":"2014-06-17T13:01:43","slug":"2478","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.equipmentlink.org\/blog\/?p=2478","title":{"rendered":"New products on their way, 6\/17\/14"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>Contributed by Joel Zimba, Special Projects Coordinator, MDTAP<\/em><\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s that time \u00a0of year again.\u00a0 In the days leading up to the NFB (National Federation of the Blind) and ACB (American Council for the Blind) conventions, Assistive Technology companies begin announcing new products and upgrades. Today, we have one of each on the menu.<\/p>\n<p>Users of the Hims line of notetakers will be pleased to know about the release of Sense Notetaker V8.1.\u00a0 A Facebook interface has been added to the Social Networking menu as well as various password functions.\u00a0 A macro function, which scripts sequential functions has also been added.\u00a0 There are also many improvements to the wireless connectivity and file manager menus.\u00a0 This version will run on all current models of Hims notetakers including the BrailleSense On-Hand, which MDTAP staff would be delighted to demonstrate.<\/p>\n<p>In other news, BAUM USA, just announced the VarioUltra, a new line of portable Braille displays.\u00a0VarioUltra will come in 20 and 40-cell models.\u00a0 Of note is the ability to easily switch between five previously paired devices.\u00a0 On the software side, VarioUltra will sport notetaker functionality, as well as a PDF viewer and scientific calculator.\u00a0 BAUM USA claims the VarioUltra is the lightest Braille display on the market\u2014thanks in part to its brushed aluminum chassis.\u00a0 Pricing and availability will doubtless be forthcoming.<\/p>\n<p>The MDTAP ship will be struggling to stay afloat as the waves of the 2014 product tsunami continues.\u00a0 We will report in regularly via smoke signals and blog posts once we\u2019re sure this bucket of bolts is going to stay in one piece.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<div class=\"al2fb_like_button\"><div id=\"fb-root\"><\/div><script type=\"text\/javascript\">\n(function(d, s, id) {\n  var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];\n  if (d.getElementById(id)) return;\n  js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id;\n  js.src = \"\/\/connect.facebook.net\/en_US\/all.js#xfbml=1&appId=149587675112835\";\n  fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs);\n}(document, \"script\", \"facebook-jssdk\"));\n<\/script>\n<fb:like href=\"http:\/\/www.equipmentlink.org\/blog\/?p=2478\" layout=\"standard\" show_faces=\"true\" share=\"false\" width=\"450\" action=\"like\" font=\"arial\" colorscheme=\"light\" ref=\"AL2FB\"><\/fb:like><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Contributed by Joel Zimba, Special Projects Coordinator, MDTAP It\u2019s that time \u00a0of year again.\u00a0 In the days leading up to the NFB (National Federation of the Blind) and ACB (American Council for the Blind) conventions, Assistive Technology companies begin announcing new products and upgrades. Today, we have one of each on the menu. Users of [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_s2mail":"yes","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,27,18,31],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.equipmentlink.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2478"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.equipmentlink.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.equipmentlink.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.equipmentlink.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.equipmentlink.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2478"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/www.equipmentlink.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2478\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2481,"href":"http:\/\/www.equipmentlink.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2478\/revisions\/2481"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.equipmentlink.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2478"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.equipmentlink.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2478"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.equipmentlink.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2478"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}