Getting a Mac - a few questions

Great questions! First, we indeed use the same key commands on Mac. If you have Quicknav turned off, then you would use VO key plus Command then the letter. VO Command H, VO Command L for Link, etc. You can also activate quicknav and use those keys with a single letter. You can also do Vo U to bring up our equivalent of links list, and use right arrow to navigate via link button, etc. Applevis has some great getting started guides which will explain more. Second, I find the Mac is not that much harder than Windows. However, difficulty will depend largely on various things. For instance, I can do most of my tasks on the Mac now, but I find live broadcasting easier on Windows using SPL. I also find pages easier than word on both systems. Get used to interacting instead of tabbing and while it might seem daunting at first, you will find you get used to it. Also, I don't use some of the the advanced customizations with Jaws like using sounds for words and such, so that effects my prospective compared to someone else.

Hello. I agree with the other comment here. I've had absolutely no trouble using VoiceOver on my mid-2013 MacBook Air, although it seems that QuickNav has become a bit temperamental lately. In addition, I've had a problem with my external hard drive like forever and haven't been able to do much of anything with my music library for quite awhile. But iTunes/the music app is great. I think the name iTunes has been retired. I don't know how I feel about that but it might be better that Apple split their podcasting and TV into separate apps. Jmo and others might feel differently about that. But I love my Mac and blind-friendly Swiss army knife.

I didn't even know about the command Voice Over thing. I used Voice Over U and I can arrow to links, headings etc. You'll need to interact with tabled using the shift voice over and down arrow combination. It might take a bit longer todo a few things. When you're ready, you'll love turning off the hints. Like the "double tap to open" that the phone does. I still dislike actions available. I never did get the quick nav to work right. You'll also want more than one browser. I have firefox, and Microsoft edge which loads surprisingly fast on an old Macbook.

I have been using a mac primarily for about 5 years now. There is lots to like. Being able to type IMessages on the computer is pretty cool. As an iphone user, I appreciate the way safari syncs bookmarks and passwords between devices. The mail app takes some getting used to, but "i find "i am more productive in the mac app than in windows mail or thunderbird.

For me, the biggest drawback is web browsing. Safari does not handle selecting and copying text very well. A while back Apple added support for arrow key navigation, but in my experience it rarely works on web pages. So little things like trying to figure out how a name is spelled can be frustrating. I also end up spending more time than I would like doing things like uninteracting with frames and trying to get focus to the web page part of safari.

It could be that some of what I'm experiencing is a windows bias because that's how I learned to use computers. But whether I'm using JAWS, NVDA, or Narrator, something about the web browsing experience on windows feels snappier and more intuitive than browsing on a Mac. I don't regret purchasing my Mac, (lots to like), but if I were computer shopping today I'd buy a PC."

If jaws is freezing maybe your PC not jaws. Did you check to see what was it? I am also thinking getting a labtop beside my desktop. Sad the mac is to much and for a great labtop is close to $600 or $700.

Mac is certainly a good machine, but is also an expensive machine, at least in my country. So, before emptying your bank account, may be consider other options on Windows. There's that learning curve as well. From whatever experience I've had with Macs, the commands aren't that similar to windows. It involves lot of interacting with things throughout the interface, and honestly I prefer tabbing over that. It excels in doing certain tasks, like working with audio and video. But for web-browsing, writing assignments, I prefer a Windows machine. But guess what, at this point, you can run Windows on Macs, at least older Macs, and may be that can be also a good solution.
Where Mac absolutely wins is giving that kind of build quality and software updates in that price. How many on this forum are using Macbook air from 2013? Anyone with a Windows laptop from 2013? I mean you are paying that high price already, and majority of Windows laptops are plasticky flimsy things which don't have Apple's great software integration with IPhones. Sure, we have Microsoft's YourPhone app, but it is not equivalent to Apple's thing.
NVDA is a solid option, and from where I come from, it is certainly prefered screen reader among blind people. It is also very light on system resources.
Also, May I know what are these intensive tasks. Can it be that Jaws is not great with the software that you are using for these intensive tasks?

I think is the PC and not jaws. I do not have this issue. I was considering getting a mac but with the many bugs people here report and issues with VO, I probably not. The iPad maybe but will see.

As someone who has used both for work, my first question is what are your extensive tasks? This is important.

In my experience, others will differ, you’re going to be better off with a Mac for a few things, and better off with windows for many others. For example, if you’re writing a lot of Word documents or editing them, do yourself a favor and stick with a PC. If everything is printed out and the format doesn’t matter as much, then by all means get a Mac and use pages. Just understand that your productivity in Word and Excellent will most likely decrease on the Mac. On the other hand, if you’re doing music editing, then the Mac is probably a really good idea. I don’t edit music, but this is what I have read.

There are benefits and drawbacks to VoiceOver being the screen reader for a Mac. The big benefit is obvious. It’s built in and usually, hello Safari issues that have been happening on and off for the last few years, usually works with the native apps on a Mac. This is also a downside. Apple has no incentive to make it work with third-party products. When there is an issue, you usually end up waiting a long time, if ever, to see a change. Unfortunately, it’s usually the case that not enough blind people use a Mac to get the third-party to make their product accessible. Finally, VO is the only screen reader for the Mac. In my opinion this is a bad thing. If there were other screen readers it is obvious that it would push competition. The best thing for JFW over the last few years has been the improvements that have occurred with NVDA. It has made JAWS step and fight for what they have.

Another thing you could try is running multiple screen readers. Use JAWS when you need it and NVDA the rest of the time. It will keep you on a platform that you’re used to, help develop skills using another screen reader, and you’ll have more third-party software available to you.

IF you do a lot of web browsing and are mainly using your computer for that like I do; then a pc/windows laptop is the way to go, at least in my oppinion.

Try NVDA first, you can make it sound like JAWS with eloquence, if you'd like that; email me at bradleybrown2@live.co.uk and i'll help you.

Dear Sophie, I read a lot of articles before buying my macbook air 2019 almost 2 years ago.
The thought of having that beautiful devise on my belongings, was tempting enough, no matter how many posts told me not to buy it for a conventional office workplace performance.

Regarding your specific questions, navegating on safari is very smooth for me and many times better than in the PC with Chrome and JAWS, so you will not have any issues with headings, links, tables, etc. But my hardest time has been trying to be as half as productive in my job tasks with office for macOS.

As an attorney my main activities involve word in a 40%, outlook in a 30%, excel in a 20%, and PDF in a 10%, but the only activity I could perform in the Mac as good as I do it in my pc, is using outlook, which has been updated in the last year and now it goes very good with voiceover. And if you have issues with JAWS, wait until you see how voiceover performs when opening a word document of more than 5 pages, I hate that “voiceover in use” for like 10 minuts.

I ended using bootcamp in order to install windows in half of my harddrive, but even windows has some issues running in a macbook sometimes, and therefore I got sticked with my 2017 pc, which by the way, goes smoothly with JAWS 19 and not freezing almost never.

So, in conclusion, what Cowboy has told you, means a lot. You have to think what would be your mac for and get advice, not as me that now I have a beautiful macbook air, which is rarely used.

If you are getting one, AppleInsider and price. They check for the best price on Apple PC or other apple products.

+1 on everything Keith said, except perhaps the part about buying a PC on that basis--as others have said, it depends on what you need to do with it. If I only had one computer, I do think it'd have to be Windows. There are Web sites I simply can't complete tasks on using a Mac, such as buying train tickets on amtrak. Several other sites require unlinking the mouse and VO cursor before using them. And, as I write this, Safari is chopping off the last letters of lines as I read Web pages. On the other hand, what Windows screen readers call "combo edit boxes" and several other custom JavaScript-based controls are a wild west of unpredictability on Windows, leaving me having to spend an hour experimenting with different keystrokes to see which one will successfully pull down the menu and enter the data--which, as likely as not, will not be vocalized when I close the menu. On Mac, these controls are all a straight-forward pop-up menu with a checkmark by the selected item. I bought a Mac in 2013 and gave up, just basically ending up using it as a Bootcamp Windows machine (just about the best Windows laptop I ever had). Now I'm a few months into my M1 and am experiencing more bad things than good, particularly when Web browsing. I hate having to remember to turn quickNav on and off, and usually realize I need to turn it off because my computer is going haywire as I try to type in an edit field.
I like Ulysses, Drafts, Mail (mostly), and a little audio player called Colibri for pairing with my portable hard drive. I really like how Safari handles videos--much more consistent and usable than Windows. Zoom was better on Mac when I bought it, but the next Windows version surpassed it. I absolutely love my AirPods following me from my phone to the computer. That's no small thing when you sit outside near the street a lot.
I suggest scrolling through the Mac forums here pretty carefully to see what problems people are having. Safari, Microsoft Office, and PDFs are perennial favorites. Keyboard yoga is also an issue on the Mac, but generally more just an annoyance.

I am curious about your current computer. I have seen issues where jaws causes problems,, but it’s usually in combination with something else.

On my previous computer I would lose JAWS, but it was the fault of the computer. I would actually lose all sound. It was a Surface Book, and it would decide the soundcard connection to headphones no longer existed.

On my current computer it had to do with a combination of JAWS and a program Dell includes called MaxxAudio. After I removed the Realtek driver that includes the MaxxAudio software, jaws will run like a champ for days. Of course, having 32 GB of ram doesn’t hurt either. For what it’s worth, MaxxAudio would use all of the RAM with NVDA as well.

In conclusion, check to see how much ram you have and if there are other programs that are interfering with JAWS. It could be the amount of ram, to many programs running, or one small problematic program or driver.

I should have included all of this on my previous post.