How the Nokia N82 Helps the Blind

By: Mark Hirst | Posted: 25th June 2008

The Nokia N82 is a rather bulky piece of equipment. Its 0.68 inch thick and 114 gram frame can be a little cumbersome to carry around. Some people also complain of the tiny alphanumeric keypad however, after a little time mastering it, some people will realize that the keys were designed to lessen the chances of accidentally hitting the other keys. It’s actually easier to type emails and text messages.
The N82 prides itself with its 5 megapixel camera with xenon flash and 2.4” LCD screen. A quad-band phone, it supports an HSDPA (speeds up to 3.6 mbps) and EDGE capabilities which can make surfing and downloading faster and easier. Video formats that the N82 supports are MPEG4, H.264, AVC, H.263 and 3GPP and they can be played back using RealPlayer. The music player supports MP3, AAC, AAC+, eAAC and WMA file formats that plays back quite superbly with almost 10 hours of playback time. A playlist option is also available and music can be downloaded to your phone without difficulty.
All these features are nothing compared to the usefulness that N82 gives to the handicapped. A software called knfbReader Mobile from KNFB Reading Technology, in association with the National Federation of the Blind and Kurzweil Technologies, can be downloaded to allow character-recognition and text-to-speech capability.
How this works is quite impressive. A blind person uses the phone to capture pictures of books, signs, pamphlets, menus, recipes, etc. and the software processes the words and converts them into read-aloud words. It is so helpful that a blind person can read the newspaper, what is on the menu or if you are handing the waiter a $1 tip or a $20 tip. However, it cannot read street signs, handwritten texts and signs wrapped around cans or bottles. The software is a bit expensive but the advantages that if offers is priceless. Currently, only the N82 is the only phone that supports the software.

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