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Over recent months, the technology world has become increasingly focused on the rise of portable electronic book readers such as the Amazon Kindle, Sony Reader and, most recently, the Barnes & Noble Nook. Remaining on that focus, but notably deviating with regard to core demographic, chipmaker Intel Corp. has this week announced the Intel Reader.
Intel reaches out. Image: Intel.
Specifically, Intel's debut platform has been developed to cater for people with reading disabilities who would otherwise struggle to use existing electronic reading devices. Roughly the size of a paperback novel, the Reader carries a high-resolution camera that works alongside Intel's mobile Atom processor and enables users to point, shoot and listen to printed text that's spoken back to them.
Set to be initially launched in the United States, Intel is hoping its Reader will prove a worthwhile text-to-speech companion for the approximately 55 million people across the country that have dyslexia, other specific learning restrictions, degrading vision, and even blindness.
“When the Intel Reader is used together with the Intel Portable Capture Station, large amounts of text, such as a chapter or an entire book, can be easily captured for reading later,” enthused Intel in an official release.
“User will have convenient and flexible access to a variety of printed materials, helping to not only increase their freedom, but improve their productivity and efficiency at school, work and home,” it added.
The device has emerged from an original concept put forth by Intel researcher Ben Foss, who, much like the Reader's target demographic, has battled against dyslexia since an early age, having to work at a snail's pace to extract individual words from a page or depending on others to read text back to him.
“As someone who is part of this dyslexic community, I am thrilled to be able to help level the playing field for people who, like me, do not have easy access to the printed word,” explained Foss in a statement.
“Feelings of loneliness are often the experience of not being able to read easily. We hope to open the doors for people in these communities,” he continued. “The Intel Reader is a tool that can help give people with dyslexia, low-vision, blindness or other reading-based disabilities access to the resources they need to participate and be successful in school, work and life.”
From a pricing and configuration point of view, the $1,500 USD Intel Reader and its synthesized read-back function rely on a built-in 5.0 mega pixel camera and 2GBs of storage space for around 500,000 scanned pages of text.
Interested consumers eager to sample the Intel Reader will be able to put it through its paces when it arrives via select resellers such as CTL, Don Johnston Inc., GTSI, Howard Technology Solutions and HumanWare.
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