Accessing bios with a screen reader

[techguy14]

Hi,

I would like to be able to change settings in my bios, for example, disable secure boot so that I can put Linux on another partission on my hard drive, and ajust other settings.

I am a blind user of this product, and I was wondering if there is any way to be able to enable screen reader support, or if there are any ways to force settings to be changed via an update or something?

I would like to be able to have full control over my computer just like a sighted person but can't access bios functions that I would like to access so that I can change surten things.

If my device supports it, I would also like to allow HP to manage my battery, because it is not lasting as long as it should.

Any advice would be great, as I have been trying to figure this out for days, and if you need any more information I am happy to provide it.

Thanks!

[WAWood]

@techguy14 

I apologize in advance for the non-politically-correct term, but some years ago, when I was a Technical Advisor to a very large Government program, I worked closely with several blind folks testing UI compliance (i.e. Section 508) and the viability of various screen readers.

And, as you probably know better than me, some of the readers worked OK, some were really awful.  

But from what I recall, NONE of them worked before the OS, its drivers, and its applications got loaded.  Maybe the market has improved since then, but my immediate guess would be that it has not.  And if that is the case, you would have to get a sighted person to assist you with the BIOS/UEFI functions.

I don't know of any special HP battery management functions.  There are things you can do to lessen battery use, one of them being turning down the brightness of the screen -- but this might compromise the screen reader.

As to putting Linux on the drive, sorry again, but HP does not provide Linux support.  So, the best bet in this case would be to contact a Linux support forum.

[techguy14]

Hi there,

Thanks for the response.

Is there any way to somehow be able to use 1 computer to control my bios and is it possible to find out if my Laptop supports the Intel Remote management AMT or something like that?

Sorry I am not for sure exactly what it is called.

About Linux, I know HP doesn't support it, I just needed to disable secure boot in order to do it, that's why I needed to access bios. I also wonder if it's possible to use an app like seing AI to point your phone at the screen and do it, but I don't know how to point my phone at the screen so that it reads everything.

There are ways to read other computer screens with opticle character recognition or known as OCR, but I need a way to remote into my computer, weather it is done via a wired connection, or something, so that I can in fact read my bios.

Just trying to come up with ideas how I can make it work.

Thanks!

[WAWood]

@techguy14 

Sorry, but you can't use remote support to access BIOS functions. So, that is not an option.

I think the only workable solution at this point is to get a sighted friend to assist you in doing this.

[techguy14]

Hi,
Thanks for your response. This is deffenetly disapointing because I live alone and need to be able to fully control my computer. Thanks for any assistance however.
If anyone would like to join me in providing feadback to HP, maybe they can create an accessible settings in the bios.
Also, if I knew exactly the order in which things were pplaced in the bios, I could for example, enable virtualization, if I knew, for example, how many times to press the erro keys and how to know which items are in what order. If I knew that, I think I may be able to try to enable Virtulization so that I can run Linux in a VM rather then trying to disable secure boot.
Thanks again for the help.

[WAWood]

@techguy14 

I really do understand the frustrations, but you need to understand that this is not the HP developers forum -- so nothing submitted here is going to reach any HP developers.  Plus, HP is not in the business of developing customized BIOS versions -- so any such request is going be ignored.

[techguy14]

Hi there,
Okay, thanks for the help. Take care and stay safe!