Podcast Summary:
unscripted returns with Jeff and Sree in a fast, funny, and useful sprint through tech and daily life. Jeff opens with a hard-won shop lesson—don’t test a nail gun on your finger—then pivots to Apple’s event: Sree’s wow is AirPods for heart monitoring and live translation, while Jeff riffs on Apple’s new cross-body strap for safer phone carry. The duo’s biggest win is access: Sree explains AMC’s PCA program and demos the AMC app with VoiceOver gestures, from picking dates to snagging two QR-coded seats. They compare audio description at theaters (much improved) and even at a live concert (helpful, but mixed during songs). Quick hits follow: a slim MagSafe wallet-kickstand, Jeff’s beloved Caudabe case, the rock-solid Rain Design laptop stand, and Micro Center’s clutch battery repair. They close on health-app nudges, AirPods as quasi-hearing aids, and staying (happily) locked in Apple’s orchard—plus inspiration to make movie night a habit again.
Links from the show:
Rain Design 10032 mStand Laptop…
all aluminum stand
AMC app on iPhone on Android
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Full Transcript
{Music}
Jeff: Welcome to Blind Abilities Unscripted. Tech news and everyday life with blind and low vision. All in the moment. No script, just straight talk. Let’s get started. Welcome to unscripted. I’m Jeff Thompson and with me is Sri Roy. How are you doing Sri?
Sree: Pretty good, Jeff. How are you doing?
Jeff: I’m doing good. You know, a couple incidences with the hospital, but you know it’s all right. It’s my own fault. My own fault. Don’t ever try and pierce your finger with a nail gun. I’m just putting it out there. But if you want to, that’s your own business. I suggest not to. That’s for the record. I wanted that on record.
Sree: Yeah. I don’t think I’ve ever touched a nail gun in my life, so I don’t think I’ll play around with it.
Jeff: No, I had to go back out there and kind of figure out what happened, why it happened and all that, and now I changed the whole way. I use it and you have to you have to learn from your mistakes. So everything’s okay. No losses, no nothing. It’s just one of them things that I didn’t want to tell anybody. But now the world knows. And Tim Cook, you don’t have to call me. I’m okay. I’ll explain over lunch next week. And speaking of Tim Cook, how about that Apple event? I saw a few things in there, but were any shiny enough for you to pick?
Sree: You know, for me, I think if I had to pick between those three different devices, I think what I got the most wow factor was the AirPods.
Jeff: Wait a second. Did you forget about the cross body strap?
Sree: I was trying to picture what it actually looks like because they said something about as two magnets in the bottom, and I wasn’t sure what it actually kind of looks like.
Jeff: I heard it’ll wrap around your waist or your chest or wherever you want to wrap it, and the magnets hold it so you can break it away a little bit, and then you’re tethered to your phone in a sense. So if you drop it, it’ll sling down and kind of like a cord for a drape. If someone tries to grab it, it’ll give some resistance to that, I imagine, depending on how those magnets. I think you unhook the magnets and you can move it. They say it’s supposed to be fast enough because if you’re like going from walking to riding a bike, or you’re going into a store and you want to use it. So a lot of people say they worked it out and it’s $59. That’s Apple price. You know, I was wondering, would people like this type of thing? I like it because I don’t like having my phone out in public as much as some people will hold it there while they’re navigating and stuff. Um, kind of risky.
Sree: I know a lot of community calls that I’ve been on. We get the question of, you know, a lanyard or, you know, crossbody kind of a case. And I’m glad to see that Apple has come with a product now.
Jeff: Yeah, they said that some other countries like over in Europe these have been around. So they’re getting into the business now. So I like the idea of it. But like you were saying, there are three major devices that they announced.
Sree: Yeah, for me, I thought the most changes that would be very useful for me is the AirPods. I have the original AirPods Pro, so I’ll be really jumping to a newer model, and I still have an iPhone 15 Pro, so I’m not sure how leap of that would be to the newer iPhone 17. But I did get the green light for my wife. She said that if I did want to get one, uh, she was okay with me getting it, so we’ll see.
Jeff: Ooh, that’s tempting now.
Sree: Yes.
Jeff: I’m running a 14 pro max, and it’s like, that’s just borderline. You know, I don’t have the 15, so I don’t get the AI stuff. I don’t have the latest features. Over the last couple of years I watched them go by. Don’t have that action button. You know, it’s a nice price range that I was expecting a little more upward prices this year. I thought they all came in good, especially the AirPod pros three at 249. That’s what they were selling for the twos when they came out.
Sree: That’s one thing I would applaud Apple for this year. Some show is that they did not increase price even though the phones looked like they went up, but they kind of canceled out with the storage space. So I do applaud for Apple for keeping the cost the same as last year.
Jeff: Yeah, that’s my size. The 256. Usually you have to pay that extra 100 or 200, whatever it is to jump up to that level. I think it’s 100, isn’t it?
Sree: It’s $100. That’s what I paid. And I was actually checking my storage space. I’m like in the close to 210 on my phone right now, so I may have to go to a 500 next time.
Jeff: Oh, you see growth in your storage capacity usage, huh?
Sree: Yeah.
Jeff: All right. At least you’re starting at the same point. Everyone else. And then you’re going to add that 100 bucks or. No, that would probably be a 200 jump there.
Sree: Yeah. I’ve never gotten a phone at that storage space. But I have a feeling in the next couple of years I’m definitely going to probably cash out. At least go over 256.
Jeff: Yeah, good time to do it then. What are you sporting right now?
Sree: I’ve got a 15 pro max.
Jeff: Mhm. Yeah I was always doing the two year upgrading. And when I got the 14 I went from the 12 and I said to myself I’m waiting till the 18 comes out. And here I am at the 17 and I’m like, hmm, those apples look pretty ripe on that tree, don’t they?
Sree: I think for you, you may really see a difference. I know going from 15 to 16, I knew I wasn’t going to get much of a difference. That’s why I kind of held off. And it actually turned out well for me, because a lot of the features that was on the 16, I got it on the 15 with the action button, so I didn’t feel like I missed anything.
Jeff: Yeah, see, I don’t have that action button. I don’t have the AI stuff. Actually, a lot of people don’t have the Apple AI stuff.
Sree: Yeah, that’s exactly what I was gonna say. I don’t think no one is, uh, gotten the AI. A matter of fact, I tell people now that you’re probably going to get, you know, 10 or $20 in a couple of years for the current lawsuit that they’re go through.
Jeff: Yeah. They didn’t even spend a section on the AI. They had a couple dribbles of it here and there throughout, but not focused attention. They didn’t go to another city into an Apple Store and talk about the AI.
Sree: I’m not sure you know what their thought process with this whole AI, what they thought they could do with privacy and AI. I don’t know if it’s a good combination to go out to the internet to get all this information. It’s very hard to keep everything very private.
Jeff: Oh, didn’t open AI just pay a record amount of money to authors and books and publishing rights and all that stuff. Wow. I don’t know how many billions of dollars it was, but yeah, it’s scraping the internet is what they call it, right?
Sree: I have not heard that term. Can you explain it?
Jeff: Well, you just go wherever you go in the internet, just scrape it up and pile it into your databases, you know?
Sree: I see.
Jeff: I don’t know where it’s going to go with all this. And it seems like every place that wants to store all this stuff, all the cities are complaining about the water usage and it’s like, wow, this is huge. These databases. And Elon Musk was just surpassed by Larry Ellison, the founder of Oracle, the date of Magna juggernaut. And their stock just went up 40% off the news.
Sree: Well, I live very close to a large data center here, and we do get some complaints now that the residents are feeling the, uh, the disappointment of having a data center near their neighborhood.
Jeff: Really.
Sree: In Sterling. It’s a very, very large data center.
Jeff: I wonder what it is. Are their wells running dry? is their internet being sucked out of their routers?
Sree: I’ve heard some people complain about just noise.
Jeff: Really?
Sree: Like they’re just hearing a lot of noise. And obviously you got a large grid in that area too.
Jeff: So electrical hum.
Sree: And it’s crazy because there’s where I live in this area. Some residents are the local, um, energy company here are putting these big towers in people’s yard.
Jeff: Oh, really?
Sree: That’s getting some big news here. Now that, uh, having this big tower in the back of their yard.
Jeff: Because they get paid. But the neighbors didn’t get anything out of it.
Sree: Yeah.
Jeff: And they all got to see it.
Sree: Yeah.
Jeff: Mm. Pretty soon we’ll be hearing about the birds that are dying when they’re migrating and all sorts of stuff and…
Sree: Yeah.
Jeff: Yeah, but you brought up a great topic when we’re going to come on here last time. But we had some incidences. Come on. But ACB. No not ACB. I should check the notes before I talk. You had some news about AMC, and I got really interested in that because I used to be a member, and then I just let it go for a while until you brought it up. I started digging in again.
Sree: So I’ve been a fan of going to the movies since I was a kid. I’ve been going to the movies when I could see, and I’ve been going to the movies even when I lost my sight. You know, we usually go to either Regal or AMC, but a friend of mine recently told me that AMC has a PCA program, and I was not even aware of it. I’ve been going to AMC for years and never knew that they had a PCA program. But then I went to their website and sure enough, there’s a section where you can go in on AMC theaters and you can go to the assisted moviegoing section, and there is a form that I would fill out that basically just asks for my name and email and a brief description of my issue, and then submitted it, and then a day later, I got an email back requesting me to fill out three questions. Very simple questions as to why I need an assistant with me to the theatre, which I filled out and got another email back the next day saying, do I agree to these terms? And I said yes. And then, according to my app, I can now take a personal care assistant to the movie theatre with me.
Jeff: That’s cool. I remember you mentioned Regal might have this as well.
Sree: Yes, I was told that Regal also has the same type of program. I did ask someone at the Regal and they said yes, but since I’m not a Regal customer, I didn’t really go into finding it on the website, but I’ve been told they have the same type of program. I take advantage of it. You know, I have this monthly movie pass that I purchase. It’s about it’s a little on the expensive side. It’s like $26, but it allows me to see four movies in any format in the movie theater. Each week I try to get my Imax or Dolby Digital into the theater. I go to the theater with those type of movie formats, so I get my money’s worth, and I really enjoy going to the movies. There’s a big difference for me, going to the movies versus watching something at my house, even though I can’t see the screen.
Jeff: Yeah, it’s a focus. That’s what you’re doing at the house. You can be very distracted.
Sree: Yeah. It’s like for me, I like to sit in a chair, get some popcorn, not worry about getting up. Just enjoy the moment of seeing a good movie and a good theater.
Jeff: When I got the app, I was an AMC stubs premiere member. And now that cost 17.99 a year, which isn’t bad. And then you can go into the app and you can actually line up your popcorn, blah, blah, blah and everything. All that stuff that you do out in the lobby just boom, boom, boom, you know, all done. And then you get a free refill on a large popcorn if you, if you like, and a free birthday popcorn as well.
Sree: Yeah. I think it at AMC, at least on Tuesdays I think it’s $5 night. So yeah, it’s even a better time to go to the movies.
Jeff: An A-list member. That’s where. What? You have to pay more.
Sree: Yeah, I pay it’s. I think when I first signed up, it was like 24.95. I think they moved it up a couple dollars, but now I can see four movies a week in any format for free. So we typically try to go to 1 or 2 movies a week. So in that perspective, it’s definitely well worth it because I think a Imax or Dolby Digital is like 16 bucks a ticket.
Jeff: What’s really nice is I got my local theater, and then I can just check the movies real quick on my app. And here’s a quick little demo from Sri on the AMC theater app.
Sree: Before I do get started, I do want to mention about my gestures. If I say double tap, I’ll be using one finger to perform that action, and if I’m using more than one finger, I will state the number of fingers performing that gesture. Let’s take a look at the AMC theater app. I’ll either ask Siri or do a touch and explore until I hear AMC theaters.
VoiceOver: Amc theaters, three new items.
Sree: Double tap.
VoiceOver: Amc theaters.
Sree: Let’s take a look what’s inside the home screen. Continue to swipe right to Right.
VoiceOver: See a movie heading. Filter. Movies. Button. Search button. Message center three button. User account button.
Sree: Inside here there is a profile button, and inside there is where I can set up my default movie theater.
VoiceOver: Selected. Now playing tap one of three.
Sree: Now playing tab is currently selected.
VoiceOver: Coming soon. Tattoo of three. On demand. Tap three of three.
Sree: Below are a list of movies that are being played at my default movie theater, and the movie I’m looking for is Spinal Tap two.
VoiceOver: Demon Slayer Kimetsu no Yaiba, Infinity Castle image. The Conjuring Last Rites image Hamilton image. Spinal Tap two The End Continues image.
Sree: And here’s the movie double tap back button. Next, I’ll need to select the date. Swipe right until I hear it.
VoiceOver: Change selected day to day September 14th.
Sree: To bring up the other dates. Double tap and I’m going to go ahead and select Tomorrow date. Continue to swipe right until I hear it.
VoiceOver: Monday, September 15th. Double tap the back button.
Sree: Now I’m taking to a new screen where there’s some other information, along with all the different showtimes for Spinal Tap. To continue to swipe right til I hear it.
VoiceOver: Amc Tysons Corner 16 laser at AMC, 12:30 p.m. Showtime. Button button AMC Tysons Corner 16 laser at AMC 9:35 p.m. Showtime button, button.
Sree: I’m going to go ahead and select the 710 showing. Swipe left until I hear.
VoiceOver: Amc Tysons Corner 16 laser at AMC, 7:10 p.m. Showtime button button.
Sree: Double tap.
VoiceOver: Back button.
Sree: This takes me to a new screen where I can select my seats, and just as a reference point, the movie theater screen is towards the top of the iPhone.
VoiceOver: Spinal tap to the end continues AMC Tysons Corner 16 vertical line today, September 15th. Vertical line 7:10 p.m. vertical line laser at AMC. Heading close. Button. Screen. Zoom.
Sree: Now I’m in the area where I can select my seats. I can either swipe left or swipe right, or do a touch and explore until I find the right seat.
VoiceOver: Not available. A1. Regular seat available.
Sree: A1 is towards the front of theatre.
VoiceOver: A2. Regular seat available A3. Regular seat available.
Sree: Right now I’m just swiping right A4.
VoiceOver: Regular seat available A5. Regular seat.
Sree: I can also do a touch and explore A10.
VoiceOver: Regular seat available B10 regular seat available C10 regular seat available.
Sree: Now I need to find two seats, one for myself and one for my PCA. I’ll do a touch and explore until I find the seat.
VoiceOver: A21 regular seat selected.
Sree: Swipe left or swipe right to find the next available seat.
VoiceOver: K22 regular seat available. Double tap K22 regular seat selected.
Sree: Now that I have both seats selected, four finger single tap near the bottom of the screen. Lets on the continue button.
VoiceOver: Continue button.
Sree: Double tap.
VoiceOver: Back button.
Sree: Now I’m taken to the next screen where it’s asking me if I’m buying this ticket for another A-list member in my group. Touch and explore until I hit the no button.
VoiceOver: No button.
Sree: Double tap.
VoiceOver: Back button.
Sree: Now I’m taking. To the next screen where I have to choose what type of ticket I’m getting, whether this is for an adult child or a senior citizen. Continue to swipe right until I hear it.
VoiceOver: Add adult ticket button. Remove ticket button. Add child ticket button. Remove ticket button. Add senior ticket button.
Sree: Swipe left until I hear the adult ticket button.
VoiceOver: Add adult ticket button.
Sree: Double tap.
VoiceOver: Add adult ticket demand.
Sree: For finger single tap near the bottom of the screen that’s on the continue button.
VoiceOver: Continue button. Double tap continue back button.
Sree: If I do want to see a summary of my receipt, I can do a touch and explore towards the bottom left hand corner until I hear shopping cart image.
VoiceOver: Shopping cart image.
Sree: Double tap.
VoiceOver: Order details.
Sree: Let’s take a look at what’s on the screen. Two finger swipe down tickets.
VoiceOver: Adult ticket $233.98 AMC stubs A-list savings. And $0.99 personal care assistant.
Sree: Here’s the ticket for my PCA -$16.99.
VoiceOver: Fees. Waive convenience fee $4.38. Food and drinks. Add button taxes $0. Total $0. Fees cover the cost of processing your order.
Sree: To exit the screen to finger scrub.
VoiceOver: Shopping cart image.
Sree: And now I’m ready to purchase my tickets for Finger Single Tap near the bottom of the screen. Lance on. Continue to purchase button.
VoiceOver: Continue to purchase button.
Sree: Double tap. And then I’m presented with two QR codes which allows myself and my personal care assistant to be admitted into the movie. And that is how to use the AMC theater app. I think the A list you have a different line to so so-called a premiere line when you go in the theater to get your popcorn, it’s a separate line.
Jeff: Oh, really?
Sree: Yeah.
Jeff: Little VIP there.. Excuse me. The Roy’s have arrived.
Sree: And I do have to applaud AMC a little bit here, because they have definitely improved the device for audio description. The only bad thing is it’s still not accessible for someone who’s visually impaired because there is no text to speech on those devices. But I can definitely say they work 100% better than the ones that they used to have.
Jeff: Really?
Sree: I’ve never had a show where I didn’t run into any problems with the audio description device.
Jeff: Really? That’s some of the biggest complaints I’ve heard from people is, you know, well, it doesn’t work. And then you’re standing out there while the movie’s going. But I’m glad to hear that you got good stuff at AMC.
Sree: Yeah, I’ve definitely talked to them about trying to get this device to do more of. Text to speech, because it’s there and it’s the size of a like an iPhone device. It’s all touch screen. To me, it seems like they can definitely put that software in there so that we could ourselves program it.
Jeff: Does it come with Bluetooth or.
Sree: Jack it’s the 3.5mm jack. And what I’ve done now to make my experience really good is I take my noise cancellation headphones over the year Mhm. And when I go to like an Imax movie where the sound is just extremely loud, I just turn on my noise cancellation so I can still hear the movie as well as hear the audio description very clearly.
Speaker3: Oh yeah.
Jeff: Yeah. It’s nice to have options. And you’ve been to enough movies where you probably dialed it in pretty well.
Sree: Yeah, like I said, I really enjoy going to the movies.
Jeff: What’s your favorite seating spot in the theater?
Sree: Well, my wife always takes me to the disability section, so that’s easy to come in and leave.
Speaker3: Mhm.
Sree: And she doesn’t mind sitting closer to the front. But that’s our go to because we can always get our seats there.
Jeff: You’re talking about your new PCA.
Speaker3: Yeah.
Sree: Now my new PCA. Because right now my PCA is paying for her ticket. So now she’ll be able to go in for free, which is great.
Speaker3: Yeah.
Sree: Save some money.
Jeff: What’s the last movie you saw?
Sree: The last movie we saw was run.
Speaker3: Run?
Sree: Yeah, and I would say it’s a very okay movie.
Speaker3: Okay.
Sree: And that’s the great thing about having this pass. You know, I don’t feel so bad if I see a bad movie because, you know, I can go see three other movies if I wanted to for that week.
Jeff: Now, you also mentioned that you went to a concert and you had audio description.
Sree: Yeah. So I went to my local wolf trap. This is a indoor outdoor concert venue. A friend of mine who works there, Bobby, she told me that Wolf Trap offers audio description. And so I ended up talking to the director of sales, Bernie. And he told me that they do offer audio description and asked me if I was interested in having the Ub40 concert be described. And I said, sure.
Speaker3: Oh, wow.
Sree: I was at the concert, you know, we did have some technical issues with the frequency, and I was trying to sit with my friends and with my wife and my friends, but the frequency was way too noisy. There was, I guess I was too far from the where the equipment was, so I had to move back to where? Closer to the equipment. So I sat by myself so I could hear the audio describer. But I think what I my real experience of listening to audio description on a live concert, I’ve got mixed feelings because the audio describer was also talking when the songs were being played. So I think if I had that opportunity again, I probably may bypass it for a live concert at least.
Jeff: Yeah, it’s neat that a venue would have that option to give it a whirl, to give it a try.
Sree: Yes, and I applaud Wolftrap for doing that because they first of all, they were all the whole staff was very helpful in getting me seated and providing me everything I needed. I would also applaud the audio describer, Miss King. She really did a really good job. I appreciated her giving me a good description during the intermissions and certain times. I did appreciate it and certain times, you know, I probably enjoyed it more if I was actually listening to the song.
Speaker3: Well that’s neat.
Jeff: You know, I picked up a device, my daughter was up here and she was always leaning her phone up against something, and then I’d hear it fall. Not not once, twice, three times, but, you know, regularly over the long weekend. And so I went on to the Apple Store and I was looking and they have a MagSafe kickstand and it has a wallet in it too. So it does that. It sticks on there, and then you can kick out the back part and have it portrait or landscape. Plus there’s a place if you want to put some stuff in, like a little wallet part of it, a little slide in stuff, and it’s it doesn’t really pop off depending on what kind of case you have. Um, my case, which we’ll talk about in a little bit here, it works really good. Her case is more of a robust. She likes to I don’t think she likes to drop her phone, but she has in the past quite a few times. So I noticed it was a little bulkier on her case. But who knew when these two would meet what would happen? But it worked pretty good. And from the rest of that weekend I never heard it fall over, which was kind of nice. And she went to a concert with it and she had it attached. She put card in there and she said, it worked out great. I don’t know if I’m going to pronounce this name right, but it’s s a t e h I Satoshi Satoshi.
Sree: Yeah, I think that’s how you pronounce it.
Jeff: It’s kind of a teal color, but you can pick your colors. I picked purple for her, but there’s also a teal part, the kickstand part that kicks out. I really liked it. And you know from Apple they have good delivery service, comes in a little box with a handle on it. So it looks like I really tried to give her a neat gift. She was like, because she was up the weekend before and when she came and she opened it up, she goes, oh, she remembers me going, what was that? Oh, that was my phone. But yeah. So if you’re one of those people that like to tilt your phone up, like if you’re on video calls and just have it there facing you, or if you read, I know it doesn’t help me too much, but I know some people with low vision may like something like that. Or if they’re on a lot of video calls, zoom calls or something, it might be handy. It’s pretty slim. Not as slim as the iPhone air.
Speaker3: But.
Jeff: It’s pretty slim.
Sree: Does it have a credit card slide holder in there, too?
Jeff: Yeah, that’s the wallet part of it. That’s where she kept her cards. When she went to the concert. They went to the Lincoln Park concert that came here to Minneapolis, and it’s 39.95, which to me is comparable to what you’d find out there. I’m sure you can find some for 17 on Amazon, but I don’t know the brand. But if Apple’s doing it, you know it’s held to a high standard. And that’s what I wanted something quality.
Sree: My wife has somewhat similar to that, but it doesn’t work well with MagSafe like I. So I’m glad to see that you found one that actually works with MagSafe.
Jeff: Yeah, I was surprised because I was excited when she got it and hooked it up and I, you know, investigated and just it doesn’t flop right open. It stays shut until you purposely open it and it stands nice.
Speaker3: Yeah.
Sree: You put it in your pant pocket and it doesn’t slide off or anything. It stays put.
Jeff: Well she’s a girl and she was able to bring it in her jeans. And I believe the rumor is girls don’t have as big as pockets. And she. She said it was fine. She put it in her pocket. She says we’re going to the concert. And that’s how she did it. And I said, well, you don’t know if it’s going to fall off yet. Don’t put your cards in there and don’t. I was like being the dad guy, you know? And she successfully did it. She was fine.
Speaker3: Yeah, yeah. I’ll have to.
Sree: Mention this to my wife because right now hers doesn’t work with MagSafe.
Jeff: The case I was talking about from my phone, and soon she gave me this suggestion. I just threw it out there to him one day and I’ll spell it c a u d a b e. So it’s a case and it’s made in the USA. It’s ultra slim, shock resistant. I got it in my hand right now. And they say it’s drop resistant up to six feet. Lucky I’m not seven foot tall. Um, it’s got great MagSafe. As I explained with the stand, it works on mine really good. I mean really good, where I had to purposely pull that thing off. And mine’s the sheath is what they call this one. What I like about it is when I put mine face down. So like I don’t hear my messages when they go off, I get the tone. It’s got more grip. Because that piece that wraps around inside, you know, the inner case protrudes a little bit further and that has more grip, like on porcelain or on a table or something. So it just doesn’t slide where the other side, you know, you got the lenses and stuff and a couple points touching. It’s more slippery in a sense, but it doesn’t pull everything out of my pocket either. When I remove it from my pocket when I get a call. I mean, it could, I’m sure, depending on. But it’s not one of those gooey ones that your pocket turns inside out when you pull it out. It’s actually pretty good, and the buttons press pretty good. It’s not the cheapest one. I think it’s somewhere around that $50 mark. However, I’ve gone through cases and this one seems to be really good. It’s not giving me any trouble, so I highly recommend it to anybody.
Sree: And what color is it?
Jeff: I believe mine’s a black because I have a black phone, especially when it’s shut off. Yeah. It’s black. Uh, there were some choices of colors, so you can go to the website. I’ll put a link in the show notes for this. Check it out. Yeah. It’s nice to find a good phone case once in a while, but that’s why I don’t really worry about what color phone I get. But I like the case to be a good feel in the hand, and I like to be able to push the power button without having to over push it or under push it, you know what I mean? Yeah, there’s a certain sweet spot. I popped this off when I want to put the mv88 microphone on, and I put it back on, and I don’t find too much dust inside when I take it off, like sand or anything like that. If I want to have any downfall to this, it doesn’t have a plug in the bottom where you plug in your phone to keep the dust out of there. That’s the only downside, I guess, if I wanted to find one, but I haven’t had a problem with too much belly button lint getting in my phone either, so it’s working.
Sree: I’ve never seen a case that has a plug that blocks out the charging port when you’re not using it.
Jeff: Yeah, the last one I had had a little thing you pushed down in a little hinge, the vinyl or whatever. It’s made out of composite flaps down, so that protected that. But I think it’s pretty good. So I was digging for that, trying to figure out what, what’s bad about it. But I wanted to throw that out there. Some people may look for that and want that. Another thing that I have is a laptop stand, and it’s a rain designed 10,032 laptop stand. It’s all aluminum and it’s just like shaped like a Z, but it’s not a Z, and it has a nice hole in the back for your cords to go through. It’s just a nice stand, especially if you use an external keyboard, because you put the keyboard right in front of you and then stands back there and it kind of tilts your laptop towards you and your screen’s open there. If you have it open, depending on what use case you’re going to use it for. But it’s aluminum, so it’s stout. It’s not just a piece of plastic that oops is going to happen. And I paid 39.99 on Amazon. I bought two of them. I used to use one for my interface off to the side. So it’s like tilted towards me. But then I realized I didn’t need all that space taken up and I just removed it. And I think I’m going to give it to my daughter because all I need is one. And Lori uses two of them in her office, and she loves them, so they’re a good thing. I like.
Speaker3: That.
Sree: And if you type on it would. Can can withstand you typing on it also.
Speaker3: Oh yeah it’s let’s.
Jeff: See I got one right.
Speaker3: Here.
Jeff: It’s substantially.
Speaker3: Thick.
Jeff: I mean if I push with my hand I can make it move a little bit. But I’ve never noticed that it’s suspended like that. I’ve never noticed the give when I’m typing, but I use an external keyboard, so that doesn’t matter. And what’s nice about it is when you’re done, you can just slide it under, just like a mac. You can slide your keyboard underneath. It stores really well. So and I got the one of those cubby things here where I keep it and I store my laptop right up on top of it.
Sree: Yeah, I need to get one of those because I have a when my daughter went to school, like she got a MacBook M4 air and she gave me her old MacBook Pro, so I had that one. And right now I just I need to get a good stand for it. So thank you.
Speaker3: Yeah.
Jeff: And they say it’s designed so that the aluminum will sync Think with the laptop in a sense, and draw heat from it, because aluminum likes heat. These are their selling pitches, but it’s pretty solid. It finishes like a sandblast, then smooth. So it’s not just a slippery slippery. It’s got a little grip to it. So it’s just perfect. And then on the back they got a little circle there with a pad around it that your cables can go in and out of. Yeah. So they, they thought it through and it’s simple and it’s not that. Well it’s 39.99. You judge if it’s that expensive. But I seen what she was using and she had a plastic type of thing that I thought you should use for maybe a rain gauge or something. I don’t know what it was, but it was a laptop stand, and she says I just needed it, you know, something you’d get from the bookstore or something, you know? Anyways, so I have these and I’m going to give it to her next time she’s up.
Sree: Does it fit both the 13 and the 16 inch?
Jeff: It holds my 15 well and it holds my Lenovo 16. Well.
Speaker3: Yeah. Okay.
Jeff: And then it has on, uh, upper and bottom on the surface that the laptop sits. There’s circles that are about the size of a quarter, and they’re made out of some type of, uh, poly or something. So your laptop is not going to shift around. And then on the bottom lip, there’s two tabs on the left and the right to hold the base of it so it doesn’t slide down or all that. So it’s in there pretty good when it’s done. And that piece in the back where the hole is that’s molded right in there, that it’s not like just an added little piece that’ll fall off. So I’ve had no trouble with them. I’ve had four of them for 2 or 3 years now.
Sree: Yeah. Thank you. Good to.
Speaker3: Know.
Jeff: It’s compatible with the MacBook Pro air and depths less than 10.4in. So that’s from front to back. That’s pretty big really.
Speaker3: Yeah.
Jeff: Speaking of my Lenovo that I mentioned, I had a battery go bad on it. It’s only it’s running on its third year now and the battery went bad. So I brought it in and Microcenter has I would say it’s pretty good service. They charge almost 50 bucks to look it over to give it a full test. And they said, yeah, your battery’s bad. Oh yeah. Thanks. And then they ordered the part and put it in. They ordered it. It was 120 some bucks and about 60 bucks to put it in, so about $180. And I got it back within like 3 or 4 days, maybe five, when I could pick it up and it works fine. So, you know, if you got a bad battery and you got a micro center in your area, it’s not a bad service, I guess. I mean, there’s Best Buy’s and Geek Squad and other some guys down the street that say they can do it, I don’t know. I was happy, I was surprised, but I was happy.
Sree: Well, it’s funny you mentioned that I was driving around my area and there was a store called You Break It. We fix it.
Speaker3: Oh, really?
Sree: And it got my curiosity. So I called him up and I said, well, what do you actually fix? He goes, well, you name it, we fix it. And I go, you mean like phones and computers? And he goes, yeah, but I do love Micro Center. We have a micro center close to here and I love going in there.
Jeff: Yeah, I like it because they handle Macs and they handle refurbished Macs, too. My MacBook 15, 2015. That was a refurbished one and it worked great for years. I mean, but everyone knows it’s ten years old, so you know what state it’s in right now. But I would get another refurbished. They have a good system there and they have a good reputation. That’s where I buy my laptops from, just because I think I get good service there and the people know what they’re doing and.
Speaker3: Yeah.
Sree: Yeah, I want to keep them in business because it’s the only real computer store we have in our Northern Virginia area. So I appreciate that. We have a store here.
Speaker3: Yeah.
Jeff: Mostly I’ve dealt with Apple and then I deal with Apple Store, and that’s always been good service for me. But when I’m going into the Lenovo, the PC type of world, the Microsoft stuff, that’s where I go for Microcenter. I remember Microsoft started a store. It was right across from the Apple Store at the Mall of America, and they only needed one employee.
Speaker3: Yeah.
Sree: I also like about micro centers. You know, they’ll price match other stores. So.
Speaker3: Oh, really?
Sree: Yep. So I always go there and have them do a price match if I, you know like the Walmart the best buys and the always price match it.
Jeff: I volunteer for a company I think Minnesota it’s part of the I link foundation and we provide equipment sometimes. And sometimes we do provide a computer to people. And I like it because I can go in there. I don’t do it online because they have prices for online and then they have prices when you’re in the store, like in-store only prices. And when you go there, you never know what like open box or whatever it is and stuff like that. So you can get some good deals. You don’t always have to pay that top dollar for a company that if they have an open box and they tested it, it’s good. Plus you can always pick up extra Ram or stuff there too. And they have that type of stuff. So I like that store.
Sree: Mhm. I think now they also offer like a paid plan because I heard them when I called them, they said now you can get like tech support that you can pay for. I don’t know if you heard of that.
Jeff: I had a plan where they extended the warranty for two years, and it was two years and three months when my battery went out. Yeah, but are you going to pay that? If I would have paid anything. You never know. You know what I mean? So it’s just one of those things that if you do, it’s good. If you don’t, it’s good too. So it can go both ways.
Sree: I guess we should just be happy. There’s a micro center close by to this kind of work and get fixed.
Speaker3: Yeah.
Jeff: And Cheryl, who’s not with us today, she’s feeling ill. She teaches jazz and windows, so I need some brushing up because it was Windows 7 when I left. When Windows 8 came out, I left and went to the Mac and getting back into it. It’s just that muscle memory. Mhm. I don’t know how many times I hit the Vo keys on a PC.
Sree: Well I think at jaws you can use the um caps lock as your modifier key. Can’t you.
Speaker3: Yeah.
Jeff: I switched it over to a different keyboard because Laurie was using that. And now Cheryl has a favorite keyboard that she mentioned last time, so I’m just going to wait. I dug in a little bit and played a bit around with it and stuff like that. And you know, I can do I can do stuff, but I just want to take a couple lessons from Cheryl and just get my wheels underneath me and go.
Sree: I decommissioned my windows machine probably about two years ago. I just unplugged it and just put it away.
Speaker3: Mhm.
Jeff: I hear you. I debated if I wanted that battery, but I figured a good computer is better than no computer if I’m going to hang on to it. And I can always grandfather it down to the grandkids because it’s, it’s fairly good. I don’t like the fingerprint thing because sometimes it recognizes, sometimes it doesn’t. Maybe I shouldn’t be standing out in the shop too much on my with my fingers.
Sree: Or getting a nail gun.
Speaker3: Yeah. Yeah.
Jeff: Well, we don’t recognize that finger anymore. I’m still debating. Yeah. Some people are going to be start talking about their new gidgets and gadgets and all sorts of stuff, and I’m still holding off. I’m just waiting a little bit. We didn’t talk too much about the watches and they’re at about the same price. I was really surprised, especially the SE, that coming in at a fairly affordable 279.
Speaker3: Was it? Yeah.
Jeff: Yeah. And the other ones starting right around, you know, just under $400. Dollars, but that’s for the 42 if you want the 46. A little bit bigger. I think they add 30 bucks or so to it. So you’re at four and a quarter.
Sree: I have the original ultra and it works perfectly fine. I’m not using it for much of all the other stuff that’s available in there, except to do a little basic workout information. And, you know, I don’t see any reason why I need to upgrade. But I do like the AirPods because number one, they can do the hot monitoring now. And number two, they can do live. Translation. To me that was pretty impressive because, you know, I’d love to hear, especially when, you know, we have people doing landscape work or doing something. They’re talking to a different language. I would love to understand what they’re saying.
Speaker3: Oh yeah.
Jeff: And they don’t know that you can understand them. I was just thinking about that when you were mentioning that, that you could watch a movie in a different language and give it a test, see, see how it does. But the way they did it on the Apple event, it looked pretty seamless. It was just sitting across from each other. One talking, one language, one talking, the other language. And it was almost simultaneous. They were laughing and it just looked normal. I don’t know, it always looks better on video doesn’t it?
Speaker3: Yep.
Sree: I think number one, having that feature, getting to the level that it is, I think it speaks volume of what Apple is trying to do in a very small device built in.
Jeff: It’s all done in the AirPods.
Speaker3: Yeah.
Jeff: That’s remarkable.
Sree: It is. I applaud them for that. My only pet peeve, if I have to say mine always keeps falling. So I’m hoping like the newer ones, you know, now they got five fit options instead of four, so hopefully I’ll even get a better fit with the new ones.
Jeff: I wish they had colors that you could order rather than just white. I would like them to go towards skin colors because if I’m wearing them and they’re white, that means people are like, oh, he doesn’t want to talk to me. But you know, if you had them at skin color, it’d be more inconspicuous. You know, when I’m outside, I’ll have them on transparency mode. That works pretty good for me, because I can be aware of my environment and be listening to stuff.
Sree: Yeah, I’m contemplating getting one for my parents because my, you know, my mom has a little bit of hearing. Both my parents have hearing issues and they use hearing aids, but when they watch TV, they blast that television. I’m wondering if I can just get an Apple TV with some AirPods and they can just kind of listen to it, you know, somewhat quietly.
Speaker3: Yeah, my.
Jeff: Dad is the same way. He’s got hearing aids. He turns the TV up loud and he’s always, I don’t know, hearing aids to me are like not a scam, but it’s like they’re never working right for the people. It seems like they’re always like, I just got them tuned up. I went to Costco. They fixed them a couple days later. They’re talking about how their ear. Yeah, it’s just one of those things I don’t know.
Sree: Yeah. I hear the same thing from my dad.
Speaker3: Yeah.
Jeff: I wonder how many people are using the AirPod pros as hearing aids. I know you can set it up to uniquely fill in those gaps. In a sense, you can do that test and it’ll, like, tweak them a little bit. So I know some people have used them, but I don’t know a lot of people that have.
Sree: Yeah, I’ve talked to a couple people and they said they definitely use it for that purpose. They find it very helpful. So it tells me it’s working. You know, I always question, you know, does it work like the 2000 $4,000 that you get at Costco? Does it do the same thing.
Speaker3: Mhm.
Jeff: And you know the heart monitor if you don’t have a watch you know, you get that biofeedback from it in a sense. I mean between the watch the AirPods and your phone. Yeah it’s a good.
Speaker3: Thing.
Sree: They got us hooked.
Jeff: Yeah I take a prescription that gives me a reminder. At 7 a.m., I set that up in the health app. Not that I need it, but it sure is nice. At 7 a.m., I’m usually up and about already. I get that little reminder like, yes, I took it. What do you think? I’m stupid. But some days I am stupid and I don’t take it because I get up and do the dog first or something, or take the dog out and I get distracted or something, and then that little notification pops up. So you can use that health app for a lot of little things. And I don’t know how much information you really want to be feeding apple, but it’s interesting and it’s available, so it’s nice.
Sree: On a side note, I have a toothbrush. It’s a Bluetooth toothbrush and it connects to the health app. Really, it doesn’t do a lot of information. It just tells me, hey, you know, you brush too hard or you brush too soft, or you need to order your replacement soon, but it comes up in the health app.
Speaker3: Oh, wow.
Jeff: How often does it say to replace it?
Sree: Mine comes like every three months or so. I’ll get a notification.
Speaker3: Oh, wow.
Jeff: Kind of like my filter in my refrigerator. Yeah, it’s kind of neat to have these little alerts as we get older. That’s why people retire because they have so much to do. They have to do certain leg exercises. They have to do this. They have to check up on all this other stuff. So their time and taking care of themselves for the remainder of their years is they’re busy.
Sree: Sometimes we’re more busier when we’re retired than we’re working.
Jeff: I hope I’m busy. I hope I’m busy when I retire.
Sree: Yeah.
Jeff: It’s fun. It’s life is fun. I like the big show. And I hope we’re all around here for quite a while to enjoy it and see where this apple orchard grows to. For one thing. But the competition? I don’t know if the competition can keep up. I’m waiting. Have you ever thought of Android?
Sree: I used to be an Android user when I could see I was a Windows and Android user, and I don’t think I’ve ever now thought about switching back. I’m just way too much invested in everything here. It’d just be very expensive for me to just switch.
Jeff: Once you’re into that orchard, it’s hard to get out.
Sree: Yeah, my dad’s got an android, and like many of us were troubleshooting for for our parents. And I have such a difficult time trying to figure things out on that phone. It’s just to me, it’s just Apple just kind of made things simple. Now, that’s somewhat debatable on, you know, who’s talking about it, but I just find it very easy and simple on the iPhone. When I looked at my dad’s Android phone, there’s just a lot of things going on.
Jeff: It’s like switching from Mac to a PC. Again, it’s just foreign. Typically. I just like things to work the way they do and go, so it’s hard for me to dedicate the time to learn the jaws and the windows. Again, I can move around in it, but it’s not my workhorse anymore. By no means. But I was thinking, I want to go back to. I used to love it for word processing and all that, but I got word on the Mac, so I’m fine. It’s interesting.
Sree: Well, I applaud you for taking the leap towards learning the jaws again. I applaud you for that.
Jeff: I’m going to give it a shot. Actually. Find out how good Cheryl is as a teacher too.
Speaker3: Yeah.
Jeff: Maybe. Maybe I’m not a good student. But anyways.
Sree: I’m sure you’ll do fine.
Jeff: But thanks for inspiring me to look up my AMC app again. And I was thinking about it to take the time to actually go see movies, especially with your wife, is quality time. I like that, so we were thinking about it again. We did it before and we were thinking about getting back into it. Thank you on that. And uh, thanks for jumping on.
Sree: Good talking to you today, Jeff.
Speaker5: Unscripted tech news and everyday life with blindness and low vision. All in the moment. No script, just straight talk. Thanks for listening.
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Jeff: For more podcasts with the blindness perspective check us out on the web at www.blindabilities .com. On Twitter at Blind Abilities and download the free Blind Abilities app from the App Store. That’s two words, blind abilities.
And if you want to leave some feedback give us some suggestions give us a call at 612 367 6093.
We’d love to hear from you. I want to thank you for listening and until next time bye-bye.
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When we share-
What we see
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[Multiple voices overlapping, in unison, to form a single sentence]
…We can then begin to bridge the gap between the limited expectations, and the realities of Blind Abilities.