Getting speakup talking on the Ssystem Rescue CD

[Andrew Hart]

Hi folks,

I have just discovered the System Rescue CD and thought it could be
significantly better than my current system backup solution, DOS with 
DOS screen reader, external synth and command-line Ghost.

I'm having some trouble getting speakup to start yabbering to me. 
Here's what I've done.

I downloaded an iso of the System Rescue CD Version 1.02 and burnt it to
a CD.
I've attached an Artic Transport to Com1 on my notebook.
The notebook BIOS is configured to boot from CD before hard disk and the
rescue CD does seem to be booting.
When the disk stops spinning, I type

rescuecd speakup_synth=txprt

and belt the enter key, at which point the CD spins up again and
continues loading.  It seems to stop at some point and pause, but
eventually spins up again and exhibits head movement.  At some point
during this process the Artic utters something that sounds like "at" but
that's the only thing I ever hear from it.  It does this every time for
both 9600,n,8,1 and 9600,n,7,1 serial port parameters.

I have looked through the Rescue CD manual and googled around the place
for info on getting speakup going with System Rescue CD, but there
appears to be no definitive step-by-step idiotproof guide for the first 
time blind user.  either that or I just didn't put the right magic 
string into google.  I did however find enough information which enabled 
me to construct the above option string to
give to the boot loader.

So, I figured I'd try my luck here and see if anyone can give me a bit 
of guidance or can tell me where
I'm going wrong.

It could be something as simple as me not actually entering the line at
the prompt.  I am only guessing that when the boot loader comes up that
I am being prompted for boot options and that I can type straight away.
  Perhaps I need to perform some other sequence of keystrokes first
before I can type at the prompt?  (I have read that this is the case 
with the Fidora
installer).  Or perhaps there's something else I'm not aware I need to
be including in the command line in order for Speakup to work correctly.

Btw, The Artic Transport is working properly as I can get JAWS to talk
to it under windows XP.  Also, although I have tried 7 data bits, I'm 
assuming that Speakup expects the
Artic to be using its default serial parameters of 9600,n,8,1 when you 
select txprt
as the Speakup synth.

Any help would be muchly appreciated.

Cheers,
Andrew.

P.S.  I'm aware that, depending on the answer to my problem, this thread 
could be OT for this list, but I'm hoping that since the real issue is 
getting Speakup to start giving speech feedback, my potential 
transgression will be looked upon with leaniency.