fiche readers

[Ronnie6492]

I have recently started visiting  my local library and have been using the readers there...But there are no instructions and although staff have been helpful, I dont like to keep bothering them with silly but (to me)important questions. Can anyone recommend where/how I could learn a bit more of the basics?
I'd be most grateful..I have tried googling but not much help.   Ronnie

[Ticker]

Hi Ronnie

This probably isn't the advice you're after  - but my suggestion is that you do bother the library staff!  In my experience they are always very helpful and willing to help people with even the most basic of things.  I am sure you will soon be up and running.  There may be guides on how to use them but I doubt if any will be as good as the hands on help you would get from library staff.

Good luck.

[trystan]

Ronnie,

Which bit of using the fiche readers were you wondering about? Are you asking about how to tmove the image about, or perhaps focus the image (or how to turn the fiche on?).
I was quite bewildered when I tried my "first" fiche session (at Shrewsbury!). I didn't really know WHERE to look for the fiches, and didn't get as much out of the session as I should have done.

Trystan

[Keith Bateman]

Hi Ronnie

As Ticker says - ask - but I found they vary greatly - the Shrewsbury ones which are quite new have a slider to enlarge and a button for focus - while my local Whitchurch library has only got one very old model with just a focus which the staff didn't know how to work !!

Press - push and slide everything !! 

Cheers
Keith

[Ticker]

Sound advice Keith!

[Kazza]

It is sound advice.   

The staff at my library are lovely,  they patiently answer all my questions,  and I think they are relieved to have a customer who is friendly and polite as so many aren't these days. 

However,  when they left me to it I pushed,  pulled,  slid and pressed everything and found they had not shown me how to get a good close-up.  And the reader has filters that make poorer pages easier to read,  so experiment,  they are sturdy machines,  meant for public use,  so it is unlikely you can break anything.

Kazza.

[Ronnie6492]

Thanks for that , I guess it's the obvious thing to do.I think there is only one of them that bites!

Ronnie

[Kazza]

Staff or machine?

Kazza. 

[trish251]

Hi Ronnie

What I do (especially with the film machines - so many different ones) is try and sit next to someone who is beavering away. They seem to realise - even before I ask - that I have a problem - and most are keen to show me all the right buttons, how to load the film etc. Like you, I find some staff much more helpful than others - I found one lady who told me she loved her job, except for dealing with the customers! I suggested this was rather like the teacher who thinks it is a great job except for the students.

Trish