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Subject: Re: new user questions

Re: new user questions

From: Brian Wolven <brian.wolven_at_verizon.net>
Date: Wed, 09 Jun 2004 13:53:02 -0400

rinty wrote:
> Hi all, I'm a new user of the rockbox software, and it's certainly
> made a difference to me, thanks to everyone who helped develop it. I'm
> totally blind, and have it talking, so I get the menus and directories
> spoken. I now have an accessible MP3 player, thanks!!!.
>
> I've a few suggestions for future releases, and a few questions.
> Again, thanks in advance to anyone who takes the time to reply.
>
> 1. would it be possible to add an option to completely disable the
> display, whilst retaining the speech? if we could, for those of us who
> can't see the display anyway, the batteries would last longer. I don't
> know how much difference it would actually make, and clearly that's
> got to be a consideration before investing the time in developing the
> software, however...

I think the power draw of the display is always going to be minimal when
compared to the HD requirements.

> 3. Is it OK to change the batteries in the archos for some higher
> rated ones? although this option is available in the system menu, I'm
> wondering if the charger unit would charge them. If not, it's
> probably not worth doing, as I understand that taking the batteries
> out isn't particularly easy. I've not looked at the options in
> detail, I've only just got my unit, however I've got some 2300MAH
> batteries, which presumably would increase the playing time of my
> archos by upwards of 50%. I also wondered if it was possible to have
> the state of the batteries spoken, I.E. how much charge is left in
> them.

Definitely, assuming you have a recorder with NiMH rechargeables. Use
the best batteries you have. Battery removal and replacement is not
particularly difficult for this model. I'm not sure what the current
state of the voiced battery status is - maybe someone else can supply
that detail.

> Finally, At the moment, I appear only to be able to get the archos
> either to spell filenames, or to say "file1" etc. A friend told me
> that it is possible to get the archos to speak the filenames as words
> using rockbox, however he didn't know how to do it. Could someone
> help me out with this? I'm not a computer expert: I had to get someone
> to install the software for me. I've got my unit to help me to
> record lectures and from the radio, and to play music books and
> lectures, I very much doubt that I'll ever become a developer.

You can't get every filename spoken at the moment, but you can have this
done for folder names. Rather than trying to get it right myself, I'll
just paste in the description given by Aman Singer in an earlier post:


There are three ways to get the directories talking. You can have them
announced by number (folder 1, folder 2, etc), have them spelled
audibly, (M U S I C), or have them announced through recorded clips.
To have them announced by number or spelled, simply change the setting
in menu />general settings/> voice. There's an option called "voice
directories". You can set it to off, numbers, spell, on enter, or
while hovering. The last two options relate to voice clips, but the
first three don't need voice clips.

If you want your directory names spoken as words, rather than spelled
or given numbers, you need to know that rockbox doesn't have any TTS
capabilities. It wants to see a file called _dirname.talk in the
folder. That _dirname file contains the name of the folder in MP3
format. One of the rockbox programmers has released a script to create
these _dirname.talk files automatically see

  http://joerg.hohensohn.bei.t-online.de/archos/speech/mp3ClipGen.vbs

to get that script and

http://www.mp3-tech.org/software/encoders/lamewin32.exe

to get the lame executable which it requires. Install lame, copy
lame.exe and the mp3clipgen.vbs script you get from the first link
above to the same directory, then run the mp3clipgen.vbs script. You
will be asked to enter the folder where all your music is stored.
Enter the path to your jukebox (make sure it's connected). That is, if
your jukebox is drive letter J:, enter

        j:\

and hit enter. The script should, in a few minutes, give you a success
message. Note that, if you get an error about a missing wscript.exe,
you'll need to download the Windows Scripting host.

Windows Script 5.6 for Windows 98, Windows Millennium Edition, and
Windows NT 4.0

http://download.microsoft.com/download/4/c/9/4c9e63f1-617f-4c6d-8faf-c2868f670c1c/scr56en.exe

The XP and 2K version is here:

http://download.microsoft.com/download/2/8/a/28a5a346-1be1-4049-b554-3bc5f3174353/scripten.exe


Thanks to Brian Wolven for the above links.

Disconnect the jukebox and reboot it as usual. You'll need to set the
voice directories option alluded to above to while hovering or on
enter, depending on whether you want your directories spoken when you
enter them with play or right arrow, or as you hover over them.

To get names or numbers spelled or spoken for your files, you need
only set the "voice files" option in the voice submenu of the general
settings submenu off the main menu to either spell or numbers. Your
files, as you go through them with the arrows, will either have their
names spelled or numbers spoken for them.

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Received on 2004-06-09

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