Amazon has developed a new solution for people that want to have text-to-speech on their Kindle ereader.
Amazon just introduced a new Kindle Paperwhite bundle that comes with a Kindle Audio Adapter that plugs into the Kindle’s USB port to listen to text-to-speech through a set of connected headphones or speakers.
It’s being marketed as a tool for the blind and visually impaired, but of course anyone who would like to bring text-to-speech support to their Kindle can enjoy it too.
The audio only works with TTS, not music or audiobooks.
It uses Amazon’s VoiceView feature, a screen reading tool designed to help visually impaired people navigate by touch and sound, which is getting added to Kindles via a software update.
There are eight speed levels to choose from, and it uses Amazon’s natural language text-to-speech voices (formerly known as IVONA). Battery life is rated at up to 6 hours of continuous use (using the Kindle’s battery).
Right now the Kindle Audio Adapter is only available with the Kindle Paperwhite 3 bundle, but hopefully it will be sold separately soon (Amazon hasn’t officially announced it yet).
The retail price is $19.99 for the Kindle Audio Adapter, according to the listing, so it adds $20 to the overall price of the Paperwhite 3 bundle, but Amazon is giving out a $20 credit with the bundle so it’s essentially free with the purchase of a Paperwhite 3.
It will be coming to other models as well so stay tuned for more updates (and a review eventually). More info can be found on this Kindle Accessibilities Page.
via: Slashgear
It has been reported elsewhere that this solution won’t work with other models such as earlier PaperWhites, Oasis or Voyage. That seems hard to believe since they all have the same firmware (more or less).
Initially it’s just for the Paperwhite 3 but it will be an option on other models too. See here for conformation via an Amazon blog. It remains unclear if they plan to sell them seperatley however. It would be silly not to, even if they are technically giving them away with the bundle credit deal.