Accessibility in Orange Dive 70

Tuesday, 29 March, 2016

By Amóvil

The Orange Dive 70

The Orange Dive 70 is a 4G mid-range smartphone that belongs to the white-label phone series sold by Orange. This device, which has been manufactured by the Chinese telecommunications company Huawei, is very affordable and suitable for users who are blind or deaf.

Features and specifications

The Dive 70 is powered by Android 5.1 Lollipop and runs on a quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 210 processor at 1.1 GHz.

Measuring 143.5 x 72.1 x 8.3 mm and weighing 155 grams, it sports an austere design with rounded corners. Its display is a 5-inches IPS panel with 1280 x 720 pixels resolution (294 ppi).

The handset includes an 8GB storage capacity expandable up to 128 GB with microSD card, and 1 GB of RAM. In addition, it comes with an 8 mpx rear-side camera with autofocus and LED flash, and a 2 mpx front-side camera for videocalls. The phone also has Bluetooth and GPS.

Accessibility review

Unlike other mid-range models in the market, there is no shortcut to accessibility settings available after the device is turned on for the first time. Instead, the Dive 70 offers users two configuration process options. One is for experienced users and guides them through the initial set up process (mobile data connection, Wi-Fi, and adding Google accounts, among others). The second option is for first-time users and offers simple explanations and exercises to help them learn basic touch screen gestures such as sliding, pinching, or tapping. It also includes a brief tutorial on how to use the virtual keyboard.

Vision

The handset is suitable for blind people. TalkBack, the screen reader for Android, reads most of the available visual content. However, a flaw observed that may pose discomfort to some users is that TalkBack does not convert abbreviations into complete sentences. Instead, it reads them as they appear on the screen.

The Dive 70 is not suitable for people with low vision. Although the handset allows increasing the size of the text, the largest font size available may be insufficient to these users. In addition, customizing screen colors is not possible which can hinder the experience to color blind users.

Hearing

We cannot recommend the Dive 70 to hearing aid or cochlear implant users because it is not compatible with these assistive devices. However, users with Bluetooth-enabled hearing prosthetics may be able to handle phone calls using this technology. Deaf users on the other hand may have a satisfactory experience with this Smartphone for it supports instant messaging and videocalls using apps such as WhatsApp, Google Hangouts and Skype, among others.

Dexterity

While the Dive 70 meets most of the accessibility requirements for people with dexterity disabilities, we cannot recommend it to these users. Pressing the device’s physical keys requires a level of strength these users may not have, so they may be unable to turn it on and off or to control the volume levels.

Another barrier hindering access to these users, particularly to those with very little or no dexterity skills, is that it lacks a software that would allow them to control it using writing sticks or simple gestures. Additionally, it does not include auto answering features.

However, to improve their experience people with dexterity disabilities can use Google Now to launch apps and initiate phone calls using their voices as well as to dictate emails and messages.

Comprehension

The Orange Dive is unsuitable to people with poor comprehension skills. Some of its icons have pictograms that are hard to identify. Additionally, the keys at the bottom of the display are geometric figures (a triangle, a square and a circle), and guessing their functions may be an impossible task to some users.

For more information about the accessibility features on this device, please consult the full Accessibility report available in Amóvil.

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