[nabs-l] VR stream pros and cons

Sat Jan 2 23:38:20 UTC 2010

Beth,
To download books from RFB, do you download to a card  on your computer and 
place that in the Stream?  Other than purchasing a user key from RFB, is 
there other charges to download books?

Ashley
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Beth" <thebluesisloose at gmail.com>
To: "National Association of Blind Students mailing list" 
<nabs-l at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Saturday, January 02, 2010 9:05 AM
Subject: Re: [nabs-l] VR stream pros and cons

> My VR stream is the bomb!  I love the MP3 player portion of it because
> it's better than the inaccessibility of the I-pod and I-tunes.
> Although I know the I-pod and I-tunes are getting there, I hope
> they're getting optimally there.  But as for the VR stream, I like
> downloading books from RFBD using the Download manager you have to
> download.  I also get the DAISY books from Bookshare as well.  I get
> mostly the newspaper from there, and then I download the books to a
> little flash card which I can insert into my computer's reader.  I
> figured it all out when I got the thing.  The only thing I don't like
> about the VR stream is that you have to get a user key for it unless
> your state agency paid for it.  Which mine did and I didn't know it.
> Also, with RFBD you have to get a user key forthe BrailleNote because
> if I wanted to read the books on my BrailleNote, I couldn't because
> the VR's user key doesn't work on the BN.
> Beth
>
> On 1/2/10, Katie Wang <katie.Wang at yale.edu> wrote:
>> Hi, Ashley,
>>   The site for downloading talking books is nlsbard.loc.gov. You will 
>> need
>> to create a user name and password the first time you visit the site, and
>> your state NLS library will approve your account in a few days. After 
>> that
>> you can download books onto your computer and transfer them to the 
>> Stream. I
>> just got a Stream myself and haven't played with it much, but I have 
>> heard
>> many good things about it. A good resource you can check out is the 
>> Access
>> World journal published on-line by AFB; I have seen several detailed 
>> product
>> reviews of various talking book players, including the Stream. Hope that
>> helps!
>>    Katie
>>
>> ----- Original Message -----
>> From: "Hope Paulos" <hope.paulos at maine.edu>
>> To: "National Association of Blind Students mailing list"
>> <nabs-l at nfbnet.org>
>> Sent: Friday, January 01, 2010 8:18 PM
>> Subject: Re: [nabs-l] VR stream pros and cons
>>
>>
>>> Hi Ashley. I've found it extremely useful for recording classes. Both
>>> classes I attend and classes I teach. It allows me to then transfer the
>>> recordings to the computer. I've not played around with the music 
>>> portion
>>> of the vr stream, so would be interested in hearing more about that from
>>> another subscriber.  You cansearch for a word if the book is in txt
>>> format. Otherwise, you can navigate to chapter or page.
>>> Hth.
>>> Hope and Beignet
>>> ----- Original Message -----
>>> From: <bookwormahb at earthlink.net>
>>> To: "National Association of Blind Students mailing list"
>>> <nabs-l at nfbnet.org>
>>> Sent: Thursday, December 31, 2009 11:47 PM
>>> Subject: [nabs-l] VR stream pros and cons
>>>
>>>
>>>> Hi All,
>>>>
>>>> I'm getting a VR stream.  I'd like to hear from users of it about your
>>>> experiences and what it does.  What do you use it for?  I know you can
>>>> download digital talking books; now I use the traditional cassettes.
>>>> What's the site to download books?
>>>>
>>>> What navigation capabilities does it have?  Can you search by words?  I
>>>> know on the VR Wave you can go to bookmarks as well as chapters and
>>>> pages.
>>>>
>>>> If you record stuff can you transfer it to your computer?  What 
>>>> functions
>>>>
>>>> does the MP3 player portion have?  Can you create playlists?  Can you
>>>> jump to certain songs by name or singer like with regular mp3 players?
>>>>
>>>> What are some of the cons of it?
>>>> I will likely use it for recording notes such as phone numbers and 
>>>> lists.
>>>>
>>>> I will also use the books feature to download books from RFB and 
>>>> digital
>>>> talking books.
>>>>
>>>> Thanks.
>>>> Ashley
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>>>
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>>
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