Good evening! I am doing some comparison shopping here. Lin and I were looking at some TV magnifying glasses at the request of a reader. We found the Eschenbach ones I have for $164 and another pair for $49.
What the hey, for $49, I will order them. The truth of the matter is, I am REALLY hard on parts. My CCTV has been replaced and then repaired. My handheld reader was smashed and I had to replace it. My max TV glasses have also been replaced once. And we cannot forget the crack I have in my iPad screen. Can you say “bull in a china shop”? The day is going to come that the people repairing and replacing my stuff are not going to be so understanding. Better have a spare available.
So, the $49 max TV glasses came today. I gave them to my husband to be my “comparison shopper”. Then we compared notes.
The Eschenbach pair is the superior product. They are heavier, possibly because they had solid temple pieces. The inexpensive glasses are not quite as “solid state”. When I leaned forward the telescope part slipped and I had to readjust my focus.
That said, I can see just as well through the $49 pair as I can through the $164 pair. Nice and clear at 2.1 magnification, same as the Eschenbach ones.
Moral of the story: if you are not hard on parts, you don’t mind adjusting the wheel regularly and you do not have $164 to spend the more inexpensive pair may be for you. They are manufactured in China by Joyutoy and are available, of course, on Amazon.
Those of you who are using assistive technology and have any comments on it, please share. I would like to do more of this but there is a limit to the funds and we still have not found a multi-millionaire corporate sponsor (although we remain forever hopeful?)
Moving right along, Lin sent me an article written by Dan Roberts, the guy who wrote The First Year: Age-related Macular Degeneration. Roberts apparently does a yearly wrap-up on the progress, medical and technical, that has been made in fighting and dealing with vision loss. I followed one of the links to Living Well with Low Vision and glanced through some of the technology.
Under text-to-speech readers was something called the Aries Smart Reader. Available from Enhanced Vision, the Smart Reader weighs under 5 pounds. The cost is $1800.
That is pretty much what I know about it. I have not seen it nor do I have a clue how well it works. For me, personally, it is going to stay in the warehouse. Two big sellers for me are portability and price. I have enough to carry and I do not have a spare $1800 to burn.
I have limited need to have text to speech capabilities at this time. When I do need them, I have my KNFB reader on my iPad. Zero additional weight and a $100 price tag. Of course, for some unbeknownst reason my KNFB ‘girl’ is Australian! No problem. The couple of Aussies I have met have been good people.
Again, I am speaking totally personally about preferences and have never laid eyes on this product. Different opinion? Let us know and we will publish it.
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