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Originally Posted by chamekke
Cons: You can't enlarge the text on the various menus, unfortunately. The homepage menu is fixed in size, and if your mom wants to change the sort order, she'll have to peer at the menu line at the top [Sort by... Most Recent First, etc.], which could be challenging. If the displays could be customized, and not just the e-texts, the Kindle would be vastly more accessible to people with vision problems.
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But you don't have to be able to see them if you turn on the audible menus.
Amazon added them specifically to meet accessibility standards for the blind.
It reads the book list and menu items to you, so all you have to do is hit enter when it's what you want.
(These audible menus are not the same as audible books or TTS - some might be confusing them...)
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Also, your mother's mileage may vary, but many elderly people have dexterity issues - difficulty with the fine motor skills required to make small, precise movements with the fingers - that could make entering text on that tiny keyboard a pretty big challenge. I know that my late dad could never have managed it :-(
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No doubt it's not a breeze, but for an ereader, the feedback and pressure the keys give helps immensely, especially compared to trying to use a touch screen.
I can just say that when I'm so shaky I can barely type on my laptop, or even think about dialing on my cell phone, I can still manage the buttons I need to on the kindle just fine.
Typing actual letters is rarely needed, but when you do want to (to create a collection, a note, or search for a word), even that isn't as hard as it would seem, because you can leave your fingers rested on the keys and just slide them over to the one you want. Not having to lift and aim again is very helpful in reducing the tremor.
The only thing I have trouble with sometimes is the DPad, but I have trouble with it even when I'm fine.. partly because of fingernails, but still.
I don't like it and hope they make it better in the Kindle 4.