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Newsletter, July 08
Dear Customer
The last newsletter, which focused on Milestone 312, caused quite a stir. Our mailboxes have been filled over night. About this huge interest we are very happy and would like to say thank you for the feedback.
We are pleased to inform you now about some improvements concerning Milestone 311 and other products in this newsletter.
A new PAVIP-development has been introduced to the public on 23. May in Bern. Framed by a press conference, an acoustical tour for visually impaired and blind people has been presented in the Swiss Museum for Communications. Henceforth the system, which is based on „PAVIP Audio Guide (PAG)“, is accessible for visitors of the Museum for Communications and provides a new kind of tour experience. Visitors can borrow a PAG Milestone at the museums entry. The two permanent exhibitions «Near & Far: Human and their Media» and «As Time Goes Byte: Computers and Digital Culture» are equipped with check points that give detailed information about objects. Authentic audio sounds and interviews related to the object are given and enrich the experience, beside share factual information. For instance, in addition to the history of the postal horn, various sound examples are given, rendering the passion that ancient postmans brought into their profession.
The checkpoints are equipped with Bones RFID transponders from the Speakout system. The Milestone units have the Speakout RFID reader completely built-in.
The setup in the Museum for Communications is carried by the Swiss Federation of the Blind and Visually Impaired (SFB), the Swiss Library for the Blind (SBS), the Library Sonore Romande (BSR) and Bones Inc.
More details about PAG can be found in the added product flyer. For informations about the Museum of Communication in Bern please look at www.mfk.ch.
Bones is going to release a new firmware for Milestone 311 shortly after the market launch of Milestone 312. This update is planned for September. The following 5 improvements already are confirmed:
- Support of DAISY books, which are stored on several CDs.
- DAISY play back: No interruptions/delays between phrases.
- Audible signal appears at breaks during longtime record is.
- Line-In record bug: After using the pause function the recording continuos in stereo. (today: After pause, continues only on left channel)
- Folder names will also be announced with a higher number of folders. (today: Only up to 9)
After our latest meeting with our manufacturer, it is not possible to deliver Milestone 312 in July 2008. We plan to deliver to distributors by mid of August 2008. We are asking for your patience. Thank you.
Milestone 311 plays MP3 files. When you buy a music CD the music files are saved in WAV format. Due to this the files have to be transformed into MP3 files. Therefore you will find many conversion programs in the internet. We advise the program CDex, which one you can download from the Internet for free. How to use CDex you will find below.
For Milestone 312 we suggest the same procedure. Indeed Milestone 312 plays WAV files but when you put a CD in a windows computer, the files have their own format - CDA, which can not be used with Milestone 312. However Mac computers are creating their own format too - AIFF, which can be played with Milestone 312. Nevertheless we advise a conversion in a compacted format, because WAV and AIFF need lots of memory capacity. A conversion into MP3 reduces files into a fraction of their previous size. For Milestone 312 there are some other compressed formats which can be used, as for example WMA for Windows Media Player, AAC for iTunes, OGG and so on.
Install CDex:
Download CDex from the internet, for example via following link (we do not guarantee for the content of the following link):
http://sourceforge.net/project/downloading.php?groupname=cdexos&filename=cdex_151.exe&use_mirror=heanet
Afterwards you can extract the folder and open CDex.
Initial settings:
Set language.
You can change the language in „Options“ and then „Select Language“. Choose your desired language.
Enter a destination folder for converted music files.
Select for this „Options“ and then „Settings“ or go directly via F4 to the settings. You arrive at CDex configuration. Go to the form „Filenames“ and in „Recorded Tracks“ you can enter the destination folder. If you want you can choose directly a folder on Milestone. Therefore Milestone has to be connected to the computer.
Set quality of new music files.
When you are not located in CDex configurations anymore, just press F4. Go to the form „Encoder“ and you can enter the desired quality via „Bitrate Min“. The higher the music quality is the more memory capacity will be needed. We advise 128 kbps as the presetting is.
Make CD information available.
When you convert a CD by CDex you can download CDDB service with information to the current music CD. For example you receive the title of each song as file names. For this you have to do a initial setting. If you are not located in CDex configurations anymore, just press F4. In the form „Remote CDDB“ enter your e-mail address under „Your E-mail address“. Press „Ok“ and you go back automatically to the CDex main surface.
Convert a CD:
When you have done the initial settings as described above it is very easy to transform a CD into MP3 files. Put the CD in the computer. Press F9 and the CD is going to be converted. This procedure will take several minutes. When you want to make available the music information enter „CDDB“ and press „Read Remote CDDB“ before you start the conversion.
In case you should have any questions, please ask your distributor.
Kind regards,
Your Bones-Team
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