Hmmm, some people collect stamps, others collect coins, some collect stuffed animals, all sorts of things. I want to collect notetakers, but that's an incredibly expensive proposition.

@coboldragon If you mean older ones, and you haven't searched ebay, it may be worth looking. I was pleasantly surprised when I did, at both availability and prices for working units. Of course, there's a good deal of waiting for the right thing to come up, but that's true of every collection. If you mean newer ones, I agree on the expense, but the quality has become a bit depressing, I'm sorry to say. Naturally, there's no accounting for the collector's zeal. One of everything would be nice so long as I don't have to actually use them and put up with the issues.

@techsinger Oh no, I actually use them. And I disagree about quality. My Braille Sense devices have been quite reliable for me for years. Nonetheless, there are definitely devices I would stay away from, I can't deny that. I dodged the Evolve earlier this year. I still think that was a good decision for me and my use cases.

@coboldragon All I can say is that my admiration knows no bounds. The older stuff wasn't terrible. As for the newer, for me (last one was the BS6 and a few weeks with the Elbraille), I was always relieved to get back to Windows/iPhone. As for the evolve, my temptation would be to say it's just settling down/experiencing its teething troubles. Someone here got it, had serious crashes, got them fixed, and is now happy. They just released new software which isn't a huge leap, but is a definite step forward. It might be a different thing in a year than it is now. They do have the models, as we all do, so it's quite possible we'll be seeing bigger steps forward than we did before, though I wouldn't like to place bets on reliability one way or the other. These things are specialized and a specialized programmer can do allot more now than even the most productive person could do even three years ago. It will be interesting to see how it... evolves. I'm still wobbling on the handheld gaming machines, they're far cheaper, but they're two units with the braille display. They're also a good deal easier to fix and the graphics card is good enough to run decent models.

@techsinger I use my BS6 (and BS7 now) with my iPhone. I hate the touch screen interface, and I like the way that the Mantis or the BS7 makes it much more fun and easy to navigate. I do realize that everyone's mileage may very with that; there are plenty of people who like the touch screen, and I certainly applaud them for it, but it's not for me. I absolutely read Braille daily, and often aloud to friends, so I enjoy the ability that a good notetaker gives me to make that an enjoyable experience. And you may be right about the Evolve. I will attend their webinar because I did see that they had some software updates, and I imagine more are on the way. And we absolutely agree on the Elbraille; that was a device that was just never going to realize its potential.