Hi Bill,
Well I think you are mixing Apples and oranges. The ELBA is not a
laptop. It is called a notetaker however, I believe it fits the palmtop
category even better. If you look at non blindness products in this
category, you will find that they also have limited memory. I totally agree
with your statement concerning proprietory operating systems. It has been
one of my pet peeves for years. I don't think that Linux falls into this
category though. As a matter of fact I just read a news blurb about a new
palmtop from Sharp that will use Linux. In this case, maybe blind people are
actually leading the way rather than following years behind.
Btw, Papenmeier as well as at least two other companies have marketed
full blown laptops with a built in Braille display. The Papenmeier models
were called the Notex 486 and the Braillex Compact. Baum marketed a product
called the David and of course there was the SuperBraille. I believe all of
these ran Dos and Windows as well as any other os you wished to put on them.
Keep in mind what the product is meant to do. It is primarily a
notetaker, It has a lot of really powerful features that make it much more
desirable but it doesn't profess to take the place of your desktop computer.
I do however, believe that it will largely replace my laptop.
Tommy