longevity of braille printers?
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Josh Kennedy
Hi, I just bought a new viewPlus compatible braille buddy embosser as you may know… My question is: how many years can I expect it to last? And how do I set the correct paper size for embossing on those junkmail postcard-type flyers I get in the mail? Or will I need one of those plastic braille rulers from APH to measure paper sizes before embossing?
Josh
Sent from Mail for Windows 10
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Monte Single
That’s a pretty big question. If the printer is being used for personal use, it could last for many many years. As with all electronics, keep it cool, dry and dust free. I worked for a school board and one of it’s embossers, a single sided versapoint, purchased in 1991 was still working in 2011 when I left that department. It was a lightly used umbosser. Others will have greater experience.
From: main@TechTalk.groups.io <main@TechTalk.groups.io> On Behalf Of Josh Kennedy
Sent: January 16, 2021 9:32 AM To: main@techtalk.groups.io Subject: [TechTalk] longevity of braille printers?
Hi, I just bought a new viewPlus compatible braille buddy embosser as you may know… My question is: how many years can I expect it to last? And how do I set the correct paper size for embossing on those junkmail postcard-type flyers I get in the mail? Or will I need one of those plastic braille rulers from APH to measure paper sizes before embossing?
Josh
Sent from Mail for Windows 10
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Donald L. Roberts
Josh and other interested persons,
My Juliet Classic purchased in 1994 is still going strong. The funny thing is that I purchased it used for $1500 1994 dollars. It is so old that I have to use it with a USB to parallel adapter.
Don Roberts
On 1/16/2021 8:11 AM, Monte Single
wrote:
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Ron Canazzi
Hi Jack,
I did a search on your product and I find it is quite expensive. This is from the manufacturer. Might I ask what you paid for your unit and where you obtained it. Thanks in advance. On 1/16/2021 10:32 AM, Josh Kennedy
wrote:
-- They Ask Me If I'm Happy; I say Yes. They ask: "How Happy are You?" I Say: "I'm as happy as a stow away chimpanzee on a banana boat!"
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Monte Single
The u s b to parallel adapter has extended the life of many devices. Not just braille embossers. And as matrha says, that’s a good thing.
From: main@TechTalk.groups.io <main@TechTalk.groups.io> On Behalf Of Donald L. Roberts
Sent: January 16, 2021 11:56 AM To: main@TechTalk.groups.io Subject: Re: [TechTalk] longevity of braille printers?
Josh and other interested persons,
My Juliet Classic purchased in 1994 is still going strong. The funny thing is that I purchased it used for $1500 1994 dollars. It is so old that I have to use it with a USB to parallel adapter.
Don Roberts
On 1/16/2021 8:11 AM, Monte Single wrote:
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Jaffar Sidek
Hi. Just as a point of interest, how do you brave gals and guys
live with braille embossers in your homes? They are noisy beasts
you know, and i don't think I can take the noise levels when they
are embossing braille in my sitting room. Perhaps the newer
embossers are quieter, but oh my sainted aunt! those oldies do
certain cause a racket. Cheers!
On 17/1/2021 1:56 am, Donald L. Roberts
wrote:
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DAVID GLOBE
I love my braille printer, and I think the reason I like it so much, is that I only use it when I need to have items with me for a meeting. Yes, they are noizy, and yes they can create dust, but when you need to print something for yourself or other blind people, it's nice to have the abillity to do so. David
From: main@TechTalk.groups.io [mailto:main@TechTalk.groups.io] On Behalf Of Jaffar Sidek
Sent: January 16, 2021 4:24 PM To: main@TechTalk.groups.io Subject: Re: [TechTalk] longevity of braille printers?
Hi. Just as a point of interest, how do you brave gals and guys live with braille embossers in your homes? They are noisy beasts you know, and i don't think I can take the noise levels when they are embossing braille in my sitting room. Perhaps the newer embossers are quieter, but oh my sainted aunt! those oldies do certain cause a racket. Cheers! On 17/1/2021 1:56 am, Donald L. Roberts wrote:
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Josh Kennedy
I payed $1495 for my braille buddy embosser from www.irie-at.com
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Josh Kennedy
the irie-at and viewPlus embossers such as the braille buddy are a little louder than a perkins brailler, not much, just a little louder. The braille buddy at least has plastic pieces that just snap together. The single sheet or cut sheet feeder tray snaps into place using two pegs on the sides of the printer. There is another small plastic tray that snaps into place below that... and the whole top cover in front of the 4 button control panel also comes off and you can get to the carriage mechanism and solenoids and solenoid housings to make it easier to clean the printer and clear any paper jams. I have not used it with tractor feed paper as I do not have the room. So far I just used it with single sheets of 8.5x11 inch thermoform plastics and braille paper. It will also feed through smaller items like 3x5 index cards. I did ask irie-at to consider making a less expensive embosser. If they make tiger software suite an optional purchase, this would bring the price from $1495 united states dollars down to $1295. And if they reduce the speed by 25 percent, from 25 characters per second down to 18 to 20 characters per second and get rid of the tractor feed option, making it a cut-sheet-only printer, they may be able to get the price down to $1195 or maybe a bit less.
One more thing. If you guys want to build your own high quality embosser and start selling it, you can do so! Just go to www.braillerap.com ... and follow directions there. Supposedly that braillerap embosser is a cut-sheet printer that will also emboss soft aluminums. It does text and graphics. Josh
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Josh Kennedy
the braille buddy that I have is about the size of an hp inkjet printer or one of those small cannon inkjet printers. It is sitting on a coffee table beside my laptop, on its own coffee table. I have a small work area. Oh and did I mention this embosser hardly vibrates the table at all even during heavy embossing... It's about 10 to 11 pounds in weight. So if I want to I can easily move it off that table after unplugging it and put something else there such as my electric perkins brailler. Only thing I do not like is the USB connection port is underneath the tractor feed mechanism. Unless I get a bigger work area I think I will always be using cut sheet paper with this braille printer. That is fine though, I printed several pages with it and unlike index embossers, I have had absolutely no paper jams yet! I love this little printer! I think there are ways, though, to reduce its cost such as reduce speed by 25 percent down to 18cps, get rid of tractor feed option, and make TSS rtiger software suite an additional optional purchase rather than including it. After all, people can use braille blaster for basic printing and its a smart printer so you can set legacy printing options for old devices such as brailleNotes and duxbury and braille blaster and print from those devices. It also does microbraille, normal, and jumbo braille with tactile graphics up to 20 dots per inch with higher dots representing darker colors and lighter lower dots representing lighter colors if you wish. You can also print tactile graphics directly from microsoft paint or ms-word. I like how it draws a text box as a tactile graphic and wraps the text that is outside or around the box, left and around the bottom of the box drawn as a tactile graphic. Back to lower cost embossers, I hope someday irie-at or some other company builds and sells viewPlus tiger software suite compatible braillerap embossers from www.braillerap.com ...
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Josh Kennedy
Oh just to let you all know, yesterday I got a clipart image of mickey mouse from google images, opened it in microsoft paint in windows10 which is now very accessible even if you are totally blind and it works with screen readers, printed it to the braille buddy and now I have a tactile graphic of mickey mouse on an 8.5x11 inch thermoform sheet.
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Monte Single
Hi, Glad to hear your new buddy is working well for you. What is the print speed?
Cheers,
Monte
From: main@TechTalk.groups.io <main@TechTalk.groups.io> On Behalf Of Josh Kennedy
Sent: January 17, 2021 9:43 AM To: main@TechTalk.groups.io Subject: Re: [TechTalk] longevity of braille printers?
I payed $1495 for my braille buddy embosser from www.irie-at.com
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Pat Seed
toggle quoted messageShow quoted text
Hi,
Well, Then, you might be able to make your own
colouring books.
I remember colouring in thermoform colouring books
as a kid. Some of them even had numbers in
Braille in the empty spaces, where the colouring
would go. The numbers in those spaces were matched to colours in a box of
crayons.
Blessings and All the Very Best,
Pat Seed
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Josh Kennedy
the print speed is 25cps or 25 characters per second, it is a single side only printer.
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