MacUser December 1995 - Vintage Apple...FreeMail 4.0 Create your own private e-mail system for next to nothing. / 93 APS HyperQIC Easy-to-use tape backup device holds 4 GB of compressed

It’s Still Not a Mac.PLUS

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Gift Guide: The Absolutely Coolest Stuff for the Mac Connoisseur…starts on page 131

What?Windows

Multimedia MonitorsWhich One’s Really Best?

PageMaker 6 Is ThisThe QuarkXPress Killer?

So 95

CONTENTSR E V I E WS & QUICK CLICKS

Apple Power Mac 7200/90 and8500/120 Second-generation PowerMacs support industry-standard PCIcards. / 55

Adobe PageMaker 6.0 Welcomeupgrade offers several nifty newfeatures but suffers somewhat in theownership transition. / 58

Claris Emailer E-mail program idealfor those with multiple mailservices. / 68

Apple GeoPort Telecom Adapter Kit This kit turns your Macintosh into abona fide telecom center, with speakerphone, digital answering machine, andfax-modem capabilities. / 70

HP DeskJet 1600CM and Lexmark Color Jetprinter 4079 plus Two inkjetprinters offer color capabilities at bargain prices. / 72

Panasonic PowerDrive2 LF-1000AB Switch-hitting storage device plays yourCD-ROMs and backs up your data. / 76

Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate DictionaryCutting-edge electronic dictionary goes beyonddefinition. / 77

WordPerfect 3.5 Top-of-the-line wordprocessor is quick and responsive — andHTML-savvy. / 78

Wacom ArtPad II, Wacom ArtZ II, andSummagraphics Summa Expression Whymouse around when you could be stylin’ withpen and tablet? / 82

A Passion for Art An inside look at a privatecollection of exceptional art. / 87

File Genie Pro Find and catalog all those files. / 89

FontChameleon Starter Kit Make your own TrueType and PostScript fonts./ 89

Snap Mail 2.0 Reasonably priced e-mail system isperfect for small to medium-sized businesses. / 90

PhotoMaker Poor person’s Photoshop does a good jobof image editing, at an unbelievable price. / 91

FreeMail 4.0 Create your own private e-mail system fornext to nothing. / 93

APS HyperQIC Easy-to-use tape backup device holds 4 GBof compressed data per cartridge. / 95

DECEMBER 1995 / VOLUME 11 NUMBER 12

NE W ON TH E MEN U

Web Tools Tortureless tagging. / CloneWatch New model zips. / PaperPortDocuments go digital. / Speed DoublerAptly named utility pumps up PowerMacs. / PCI Cards QuickDraw options. /ZMac Utility of the Month Quick LabRetriever. / Plus Macintosh price index./ 44

C OLUMNS

Letters Readers crack the code, pick onPageMaker, and live and die by the 2:1rule. / 13

Maggie Canon Sandra Bullock’s Mac./ 37

Andy Ihnatko Don’t tempt fate. / 39

John C. Dvorak Encyclopedic informationat your fingertips. / 236

How to Reach Us / 8

Product Index / 198

Advertiser Index / 202

Marketplace / 208

49 / An easy way toscan documents.

82 / Three new drawingtablets go pen to pen.

87 / Brushes withgreatness onCD-ROM.

It’s Still Not a Mac.PLUS

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Z I F F - D A V I S P U B L I S H I N G C O M P A N Y

Gift Guide: The Absolutely Coolest Stuff for the Mac Connoisseur…starts on page 131

What?

Windows

Multimedia MonitorsWhich One’s Really Best?

PageMaker 6 Is This The QuarkXPress Killer?

So 95

On the cover /Who needsWindows 95?

MacUser (ISSN 0884-0997) is published monthly by Ziff-Davis Publishing Company, L.P., One Park Avenue, New York, NY 10016. Editorial Offices: 950 Tower Lane, 18th Floor, Foster City, CA 94404. Telephone:415-378-5600. U.S. subscription rates are $27 for 12 issues, $45 for 24 issues, and $62 for 36 issues. Additional postage for Canada: Add $16 per year to the U.S. rates for surface mail. Single-copy price is $3.95. CanadianGST registration #R-140496720. Canada Post International Publications Mail Product (Canadian Distribution) Sales Agreement No. 278521. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to MacUser, P.O. Box 56986, Boulder,CO 80322-6986. Second-class postage paid at New York, NY 10016, and at other mailing offices. Printed in the USA.

FEATURE S

Breaking the Speed LimitDIVIDE AND CONQUER — that’sthe approach RAID drives take to

provide you with the speed you need forhandling large files. MacUser Labs tested17 RAID 0 systems with capacities of atleast 4 GB. BY KELLI WISETH / 104

Sight and SoundMULTIMEDIA MONITORS withbuilt-in speakers are all the rage

— and why not? The space-saving aspectalone was enough for us to take a gander. MacUser Labs put seven ofthese all-in-one monitors through sight and sound checks to find outwhether they make the grade. BY NIKKI ECHLER / 116

Quick LabsPROBLEM: WE JUST CAN’T KEEP UP with all the greatproducts introduced each month. Solution: Quick Labs, a

monthly bulletin of lab results on the latest printers, monitors, andstorage systems. / 126

COVER STORY DTP & GRAPHICS / 1 2 8

Favorite ThingsPamela presents

her publishing picks. / 131

Graphics How-ToTransparent overlaysthe easy way. / 134

Expert Tips A goodInternet authoringlanguage and other visions ofsugarplums. / 136

NETWORKING / 1 3 8

Net Tools Six tips for backing up a net./ 141

Mac to PC Can Apple’s NT-like strategygain cred with users? / 143

HANDS ON / 1 4 6

Defend Your Data Low-cost security./ 146

Mobile Mac Guide to pint-sizedPowerBook products. / 151

Net Traveler Finding the books. / 155

Help Folder Bob and Chris answer all yourquestions. / 156

PERSONAL MAC / 1 6 0

Don’t Let ThemEat FruitcakeAndy’s first-everMac-head guideto way-coolgifts. / 160

The Two Dads Two dads comeup with kid pleasers. / 164

The Game Room Match thegame to the loved one — and

you’re all set. / 168

GIFTguide

GIFTguide

GIFTguide

GIFTguideGIFTguide

THE NAKED TRUTHABOUT MICROSOFT’S NEW OSAND WHY YOU SHOULD CARE.

SEPARATE THE FACTS from theconsiderable hype, and you’ll find anoperating system current Windows userswill love. But is it really as good as theMac’s? We think not, and we’ll tell you why.By Rik Myslewski / 99

Windows

95

6 MacUser / DECEMBER 1995

Group Publisher

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Editor James S. BradburyManaging Editor Nancy GrothTechnical Director Henry BortmanExecutive Editors Cheryl England, Susan Janus,Rik Myslewski, Pamela PfiffnerSenior Editors Karen J. Ohlson, Jim Shatz-AkinSenior Associate Managing Editor Claire H. BreenChief Copy Editor Eva LangfeldtAssociate Technical Editor Rhoda SimmonsAssociate Editors Carolyn Bickford, Shelly Brisbin,Nancy Peterson, Sean J. Safreed, Jason SnellCopy Editor Jon ZobenicaAssistant Editors Nikki Echler, Roman LoyolaResearch Assistant Rebecca OlsonContributing Editors Sharon Zardetto Aker, David Biedny,Christopher Breen, Don Crabb, Bruce Fraser, Andy Ihnatko,Ted Landau, Bob LeVitus, John Rizzo, Stephan C. Somogyi,Michael Swaine, Gregory Wasson, Kelli WisethContributing Anti-Editor John C. DvorakExecutive Assistant to the Editor-in-Chief Teresa Campbell

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Entire contents © 1995 Ziff-Davis Publishing Company, L.P. Allrights reserved; reproduction in whole or in part without permis-sion is prohibited. MacUser is a registered trademark of Ziff-DavisPublishing Company, L.P. MacUser is an independent journal, notaffiliated in any way with Apple Computer, Inc.


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Words for Word

JUST WHEN IT SEEMED like most hadgiven up and conceded the battle on Word,Andy’s column (“Word’s Worth,” September’95, page 25) hit and hit hard. “Simpler andbetter” is a phrase too often lost on softwaremanufacturers today. Thanks for bringingthis ideal back into focus.Tom [email protected]

THANK YOU FOR exactly expressing myfeelings about Word 6.01. Your brutal,scathing honesty is refreshing in an indus-try where so many blindly accept and re-gurgitate corporate propaganda.Daniel [email protected]

THANKS FOR your support of Claris Mac-Write Pro. MacWrite Pro is as easy to use asyou described — it’s quick, takes minimalresources, and performs well for importinga variety of other formats.

For serious work, I drag out Frame-Maker, which dims the lights when I load itup. But for everyday quickies, MacWrite Prois the one I use.Walt [email protected]

ANDY IHNATKO must be using a differentMicrosoft Word 6.01 than I am. As a profes-sional writer, I use Word 6.01 all day long,and I love it! It does everything one couldever ask for in a word processor — andmore. Mr. Ihnatko ends his negativecolumn by implying that the ideal word

processor provides users with ablank, icon-free screen for uncom-plicated work. That’s exactly whatyou get with Word 6.01 — justchoose the Full Screen option fromthe View menu. Maybe Mr. Ihnatkoshould familiarize himself morewith Word 6.01 before criticizing itso strongly.Mike [email protected]

Home Video

THANKS FOR one of the best issues yet. Inparticular, your article on perfect videos(“Do-It-Yourself Video,” September ’95,page 68) was timely and instructive.Thanks.Libby [email protected]

YOUR ARTICLE was helpful and informa-tive, but you did underrate the Quadra 630’svideo capabilities. Using software otherthan Apple’s Video Player, you can generateframe rates comparable to those of the firstAV Macs. Just use Adobe Premiere and Fu-sion Recorder instead of Video Player.Eugene [email protected]

YOUR COVER STORY sounded great until Iread the details. Easy translates to a full dayof work for each minute of video. Perfectmeans a small picture at a slow rate. Andaffordable means buying a digitizing boardand a high-capacity hard drive, not to say afairly fast Mac.

My own choice has been to opt for linearediting, beginning with S-video and endingwith VHS. By the time I learn how to writescripts and shoot video, equipment for digi-tizing should be able to make truly perfectvideos at a more affordable price.Dennis [email protected]

Code Blue

GREAT ARTICLE on obscure Mac errorcodes (“Cracking the Error Code,” Septem-ber ’95, page 116)! Another good tool for

ET-Plug-and-play has always been one ofApple’s strengths, or so we thought. ButGlenn Cole warned us via e-mail aboutsomething he discovered recently: It seemsa formerly Mac-only catalog has begun sell-ing Intel-based PCs. “The catalog includes atable that shows the features of several sys-tems at a glance. One column is labeled ‘Plug& Play.’ You guessed it — the labels for all theMacs say ‘no.’” And that’s not all, Glenn: Macsdon’t come with a sound card, either. What’sApple trying to pull here?

The ferret-savvy among our readershipwrote in this month after intrepid columnistAndy Ihnatko tried to pull a fast one in hisSeptember column. As reader Geoff Wein-berg pointed out, Andy’s missing ferretcouldn’t possibly be of the black-footed vari-ety: “The black-footed ferret is endangered.You must have a sable domestic ferret,which has black feet.” Geoff also recom-mended we educate ourselves by visitingsome relevant Web sites. Ferret enough.

Black is in, whether it’s the color of yourferret’s feet or even your computer. Witnessincoming college freshman Michelle Savage,who wrote: “Does the Power Mac 7100/80come in black?” Sadly, Apple’s still commit-ted to the gray look. Maybe it’s time to revivethe custom-painted-computer business: anew designer Mac just for artistic types, out-fitted all in black and sporting a beret; acamouflage CPU for members of the MacMilitia; and of course, a trompe l’oeil Mac forMartha Stewart fans.

Witty banter like this is what makes us whatwe are today, and readers are noticing. “I canthink of no better place to put this than OpenFolder,” wrote Paul Sutton. “Have you noticedthat there are two Apple Newtons? There’sApple’s PDA and the snack from the makersof Fig Newtons. Next up: the new Apple Juice,a CD-ROM biography of O.J. Simpson.” Paul,because you’re a fan of Open Folder, we’regoing to say this nicely: Leave the joke tellingto the professionals, OK?

DECEMBER 1995 / MacUser 13

LETTERS

finding out what the errors mean is theshareware package MacErrors, by MartyWachter and Phil Kearney.

With this program, all you have to do istype in the error number, and it gives you adescription of the error. It’s available at ftp://mir rors.a ol.com/pub/info-mac/i nfo/mac-errors-121.hqx.Michael J. [email protected]

Having a Ball

I COULDN’T AGREE MORE with JohnDvorak (“Dropping the Ball, Again,” Sep-tember ’95, page 202) about how Apple hasfailed to market the Mac’s advantages. TheMac has sound capability, graphics capabil-ity, plug-and-play, networking, speech syn-thesis, speech recognition, QuickTime, andmore. The text editor works with fonts,sounds, pictures, and movies! PCs require aSound Blaster or other sound card (which isoften incompatible with, say, a modem).For that matter, a mouse is often incompat-ible with a modem.Andy Lyttlevia the Internet

ONCE IN A WHILE, after I’ve read throughMacUser three times, I flip to the last fewpages of the magazine hoping to find an en-lightening and interesting piece writtenby Mr. Dvorak. Unfortunately, he alwaysseems to write in circles. He is undoubtedlythe gloomiest columnist writing for yourpublication. I think he’s a spy or perhapssome kind of saboteur working for a PCcompetitor.

Dvorak is a cool name, though. It evensounds gloomy.Randy Yñ[email protected]

I JUST FINISHED reading John Dvorak’scolumn, and I’m incensed. Not because Ithink Mr. Dvorak is wrong, but because nomatter how hard I try, I can’t find a singleerror in his criticisms of Apple. He’s horri-bly right, and we’d better all hope Applewakes up and realizes it.Kurt [email protected]

ALTHOUGH JOHN DVORAK complainsabout Apple’s modems, I read elsewhere inyour issue about the Apple Color Laser-


Writer 12/600 PS (Reviews, September’95, page 39). I remember the originalLaserWriter, which popularized high-quality graphic output. Now, the ColorLaserWriter sounds like it will popularizecolor output.

Apple isn’t good at everything, but some-times it hits a home run. I can forgive theoverpriced hard drives, slow modems, andconfusing product families, because thecompany’s strokes of genius make up for theproblems.Scott [email protected]

Compact Discussion

I WAS DISAPPOINTED with two aspects of“Fast Drives, Loud Speakers” (September’95, page 86). First, you should have in-cluded the AppleCD 300e among the 2xdrives you reviewed, especially since yourecommended it back in December ’94(“Built for Speed,” page 76). It would havebeen helpful to know whether to buy acheap 2x drive or a 4x drive during thistransition period in the technology.

Second, you limited your discussion tothe drives and neglected to mention whatdiscs, if any, were bundled. The last time Ibought a CD-ROM drive, this was consid-ered a crucial part of the decision. Has thischanged?D. Mark [email protected]

/ The AppleCD 300e is no longer a shipping product,

so we couldn’t include it among the drives we tested.

In general, we don’t recommend purchasing a 2x

drive — they’re roughly the same price as 4x drives

and are quickly disappearing from the scene. And

the concept of bundling software with drives seems

to have fallen out of vogue — only a couple of the

drives we looked at included CD-ROMs, and those

were mostly demo discs. / CE

Eh, Sonny?

I WAS IMPRESSED that your article onspeakers (“Blasting on a Budget,” Septem-ber ’95, page 92) went beyond the glitz andstraight to sound-quality tests. However,it’s obvious by looking at the graphs thatthese speakers aren’t great high-fidelitycomponents. Multimedia speakers are rip-offs! The components included are low-quality, and the speakers are extremelyexpensive.

If you’re after a $40 pair of computer

speakers, go to a garage sale and get an oldeight-track stereo with inputs. It will have aheadphone jack and speakers that shouldeasily outperform the tiny multimediaspeakers available in that price range. True,there’s no magnetic shielding, but if you’relooking for a strong stereo effect, youshouldn’t have the speakers a foot awayfrom each other anyway.Trevor [email protected]

/ Not to mention that with your new stereo, you’ll

once again be able to play that Cat Stevens eight-

track you found in your garage. / JS

Collage Commendation

YOUR REVIEW of Fauve’s Xres (September’95, page 56) states, “Another incrediblyuseful feature is Xres’ ability to apply edit-ing operations to multiple objects simulta-neously, a capability you won’t find in Spec-ular Collage, Photoshop 3.0, Live Picture, orFractal Design Painter.”

Collage does allow you to affect multipleobjects for filtering and object manipula-tion, and it has done so since version 1.0.Andrei Herasimchuk, Specular [email protected]

/ An oversight on our part. We stand corrected. / SJ

Page-Layout Pig

IN YOUR ARTICLE announcing the releaseof PageMaker 6.0 (DTP & Graphics, Sep-tember ’95, page 98), you failed to mentionan important fact: the amount of RAM nec-essary to run this program: a whopping 10MB for Power Macs and 8 MB for 680x0Macs. Ouch!

I’ve been a loyal PageMaker user for yearsand years and always try to get the latest re-lease, but that’s an awful big chunk of myvaluable RAM!

I think I’ll stay with version 5.0.Carol [email protected]

The Resolution Revolution

BRIAN LAWLER incorrectly blames Prof. H.Nyquist for the “2:1 rule” for setting scannerresolution in relation to screen ruling, andhe errs in asserting that Nyquist said signalpower needs to exceed twice the noise levelto be effective (“The Resolution Solution,”September ’95, page 101).

Nyquist said the minimum bandwidthnecessary to avoid crosstalk in a telegraphic


LETTERS

signal is half the pulse rate. In the DTP in-dustry, this seems to get frequently con-fused with Shannon’s Sampling Theorem,published 20 years later. Shannon showedmathematically that a signal can be per-fectly re-created by sampling it at twice itshighest frequency.

What this means is that you should scanat two times the highest “frequency” inyour image — that is, at the highest num-ber of transitions in density per inch.Chris [email protected]

I WAS THRILLED to see your rule-breakingarticle. One of my greatest frustrations inworking with prepress and other imagingprofessionals is their marriage to the 2:1rule. And reminding readers not to use dpiand ppi interchangeably was icing on thecake. Thanks for making my job easier!Joel Wolfson, Digital Photographics & Imagingvia the Internet

TALK ABOUT MAKING a simple processcomplicated! Your advice was dangerousand overly convoluted.

I live and die by the 2:1 rule, not becauseI don’t know I can get away with less resolu-tion, but because I like the flexibility: I canresize the photo up or down as much as 20percent in my page-layout program with-out concern about quality. Also, it is mucheasier to calculate the resolution you need— most designers are not mathematicians,and giving us a formula such as Q x lpi x %is bound to confuse us and lead us intotrouble.Marc [email protected]

/ As we said in the article, resolution is a controver-

sial subject. Most images do not suffer by being

scanned at oversample ratios far less than 2:1, but

it’s up to you to test the process to determine the

ratio that works best for you. Our goal was to get

people to think about resolution as a function of

making halftones and to arm them with the math

— and the concepts — needed to avoid unneces-

sarily large files. A 250-MB image certainly isn’t

necessary for a postcard.

One of the biggest problems reported by service-

bureau operators is that customers bring in over-

sized files for output, slowing production, sending

costs skyrocketing, and resulting in significant out-

put problems. All of this can be avoided if one pays

attention to the correct scanning of images. / BPL


LETTERS

Cross-Platform Rage

I CAN’T TELL YOU how much I enjoyedJohn Rizzo’s “Cross-Platform Myths De-bunked” (September ’95, page 113). I’m anemployee of one such large company thathas recently undergone the same fate as thecompany Rizzo mentions in his article.Having been one of the first people at thatcompany to have a Mac, it really hurts to seeso arbitrary a move made by my company.

I sensed a certain rage in John’s tone inthis article, and I just wanted to tell you thatit put me more in touch with my own rageand disappointment with my company.Paul Bartellvia the Internet

YOUR ARTICLE PROVIDES some interest-ing and useful tips on adapting cross-platform networks for PCs and Macs, butyour advice is severely devalued by thewhiny attitude so many Mac users takewhen making comparisons with PCs.Please, discontinue the practice of whiningabout PCs. Just give us some legitimate, fac-tually presented solutions to these issues.Ken [email protected]

Modem Down

YOU GAVE the Global Village TelePort Plati-num only three and a half mice, but it’sworth at least four! Its fax software is supe-rior, supporting grayscale and groupfaxing, and is PowerPC-native.

The Supra SupraFAXModem 288 doeshave more indicators, but most home usersdon’t really care about or can’t comprehendmodem manuals or modem readouts! Theywant it to be easy to use and to work rightout of the box, and that’s what Global Villagedelivers.Orryan [email protected]

YOU SAY THAT “since over half of MacUserreaders use Macs and PCs, U.S. Robotics’snub of its Mac customers is less painfulthan it might otherwise be” (Letters, Sep-tember ’95, page 13). Condoning impropersupport for the Mac platform is unforgiv-able, especially from a Mac magazine. It isnot a major task to write a simple flash-memory upgrade program for a Mac.

Therefore, the lack of such a programby a vendor clearly indicates that it is not

interested in supporting the Mac platform,and we Mac users should steer clear of thisvendor and give our business to vendorswho do support the Mac market.

If we continue to condone shoddy sup-port for the Mac, we will continue to get it.Thomas [email protected]

/ We don’t believe that calling a support practice

“painful” is the same as condoning it. And, for our

money, the quality and performance of U.S. Robot-

ics modems are worth the hassle. You’re right about

one thing, though: Flash upgrade software is not

rocket science, and U.S. Robotics deserves spankies

for not making its software Mac-compatible. / RM

Sites & Sounds

I MUST APPLAUD YOU for your article onhow to find music on the Internet (“Inter-face the Music,” September ’95, page 125).However, you did make one large omissionin your list of sites: You neglected the Inter-net Underground Music Archive (http://www.southern.com/IUMA/index.html),possibly the largest collection of sound andmusic files on the planet.Ethan [email protected]

/ Of course, it’s next to impossible to list all the

great music sites. We also had to leave out the

Musi-Cal searchable concert calendar (http://

www.calendar.com/concerts/), a very cool place to

find out when your favorite band is coming to

town. / SB s

CORRECTIONSSome XChange product prices were listedincorrectly (September ’95, page 99). ThePhotoshop Import XTension is $99. Image-Editor and ImageEfxts are sold together for$129.

The correct toll-free number for DesktopGraphics Services (New on the Menu, Sep-tember ’95, page 36) is 800-391-0681.

The September ’95 Quick Labs (page 96)incorrectly listed the Nanao FlexScan FX2•21as the F2•21.

The correct scanning area of the Epson ES-1200C (“Low-Cost Color Scanners,” October’95, page 94) is 8.5 x 11.7 inches.

Brian Clark, Steve Falkenburg, and JohnWerner should also have been credited fortheir contributions to Value-Added News-Watcher (“The 1995 MacUser SharewareAwards,” October ’95, page 133).

The correct phone number for Wacom(DTP & Graphics, September ’95, page 99) is206-750-8882.

MAGGIE CANON

We Oughta Be in Pictures

These days, everybody who’s anybody inTinseltown is tapping into the Internet,

HOLLYWOOD JUST LOVES COMPUTERS.high tech. And yet, that works both ways.Just as waiters want to act and actors wantto direct, the grand pooh-bahs of the digi-

toting a PowerBook to power lunches, andbeing courted shamelessly by hordes ofproduct-placement elves from high-techcompanies (including Apple). And at theproduction end of the business, work thatonce required UNIX workstations has mi-grated down to the desktop. Products fromcompanies such as Avid, Radius, and Adobehave helped make Macs the system ofchoice for delivering ever more sophisti-cated digital-video capabilities to the stu-dios. More than ever, technology is playinga starring role, both on- and off-screen.

So how come computers always get sucha bum rap at the movies?

Hollywood hasn’t changed the way it por-trays computers since the HAL 9000 tried toterminate Dave’s life support in 2001: ASpace Odyssey. Instead, movies have contin-ued to reflect our collective anxiety aboutcomputers (see Tron, War Games, or evenThe Terminator). Even the megahit JurassicPark, which couldn’t have been createdwithout the magic of computers, featuredan evil hacker and a lot of lecturing aboutthe imperfectability of technology. In the’50s, it was the dawning nuclear age. In the’90s, it’s genetic testing and computer-controlled amusement parks. Either way,the end result is giant-lizard movies inwhich the hapless humans get eaten.

Last year, though, computer paranoiamust have bubbled especially near the sur-face of the tar pit of our national conscious-ness, because Hollywood delivered abumper crop of sinister-silicon scenarios.Let’s see, there was Virtuosity (basically, aTron update); Johnny Mnemonic (gee, ifonly my hard-disk drive looked like KeanuReeves); and my personal favorite, The Net.In The Net, typically gorgeous girl geek

Sandra Bullock hacks code and runs circles(and isn’t she in terrific shape for someonewho eats only M&M’s and pizza?) around adangerous gang that uses computers to dis-tort and erase personal financial and legalrecords in horrifically inconvenient ways.

The idea of having one’s entire life erasedby a DOS command istruly terrifying. But al-though The Net’s scenariois more than a little im-plausible, at least it’s a fairexpression of a legitimateconcern. Too many of usplace blind faith in the se-curity and privacy of thepersonal data that resideson our own computers and in commercialdatabases. When’s the last time somebodyasked for your Social Security number andyou unthinkingly provided it? And have youever considered that your personal diskdrive might be subpoenaed? Are you ready tohave everything on your disk discussed inopen court?

I didn’t think so.After watching all these movies, I had to

ask myself, are computers making progressin their cinematic portrayal? Well, at least theMac usually is the computer of choice of thegood guys (thanks, Sandra). But in the longrun, I’d have to say no. Movie computers stillsuffer from fairly ominous typecasting. IfAlfred Hitchcock were alive today, he’d prob-ably be planning Rear Windows 95. And yet,maybe a change is in the air . . . .

Image Makeover

As I said, during the past few years, Holly-wood has become more like Siliconwood, asexecs and talent alike have fallen hard for

If Alfred Hwere alivehe’d probabe planninRear Wind

tal world yearn to be media moguls or atleast to rub elbows with them. WitnessPaul Allen’s $500 million investment inDreamworks SKG, for example. Or BillGates’ $2 billion dabbling in TCI. Yes, in-deed, one might expect a few “computersare our friends” movies to spring full-blown from these foreheads.

Suppose that insteadof appearing in movieslike The Net, in whichthe computer plays theheavy, Sandra Bullockhad made While YourPowerBook Was Sleep-ing, a screwball comedyabout the mix-ups thatoccur when two attrac-

tive young Seattle-ites accidentally swap5300c’s at the local Starbucks? And I’m sureBill Gates could do worse than to bankroll aremake of that other Bill (Murray) opusWhat About Bob? (we’re dying to know theanswer to that one).

My favorite scenario, though, is whereApple and Walt Disney Studios collaborateon an animated feature in which the pluckyMac saves the universe from being forcedto use just one tyrannical operating sys-tem. Disney, after all, is a Mac company.The product tie-ins alone (imagine takingthe kids to Burger King and getting a pint-sized plastic peripheral with every Kid’sMeal) would make it worth it.

Meanwhile, if all this movie talk has youhankering for a big bag of popcorn (andwould you like that with virtual butter?),check out The Net. And keep an eye peeledfor some good-looking MacUser bags mak-ing a cameo in the next-to-last scene.

We’re ready for our close-up, Mr.Spielberg. s

itchcock today,blygows 95.


ANDY IHNATKO

Crash, Boom, BangMY FRIENDS, WITH YOUR INDULGENCE,

because you ultimately did somethingsimple and harmless. Karma got me forflipping a power switch. It got a good friendof mine for merely reaching for his mouse

I would like to broaden the scope of thiscolumn a tad; nudge its topical parameters
just enough to the left and right to answer,strictly as a public service, mind you, a fun-damental and troubling question regardingthe ineffable nature of the infinite and ex-panding Universe and Humanity’s rela-tionship within it.
The ineffable nature of the infinite andexpanding Universe is to be a profoundlyrotten bastard to the innocent simps strug-gling for survival inside it. The Universe isabout as calm and mature as a nine-year-old boy who has just been told thatMcDonald’s is all out of the Action X-MenHappy Meal toys and that all it has left areLegends of the PGA Senior Tour sweat-bands — and, brothers and sisters, we’rethe ones who promised the infinite and in-effable Universe a Wolverine Sup-R-SlashCycle if he finished his homework early.

Right about now, the more astute of youare probably toying with the theory that atthe moment, I might be crawling out fromthe wreckage of a startling and unpleasantexperience with my Mac. Run with thatthought, because, yes, on the day this col-umn was due — during the very monthwhen due to a family emergency, I had to begiven a long extension on my deadline —my trusty Apple 13-inch RGB decided thatfour years of displaying my self-indulgentpop-culture references was enough. Thecolumn, which was one simple edit awayfrom completion, was on that Mac. It wasthe only Mac monitor in the house at thetime, none of my so-called friends wouldloan me theirs, the Mac-to-VGA adapter Idrove to New Hampshire for didn’t work,and I couldn’t start File Sharing by blindlytyping and clicking (although I tried).

This has had not a small effect upon myoutlook on life, as you have guessed. Let me

Karma has althe world, anwhat you feaunderestimat

now share with you my thoughts on hard-ware failures. First and foremost, forheaven’s sake, don’t make the same mistake Imade yesterday. My entire system was upand running just fine, and I even had abunch of documents open and waiting forme. So what did I do? I shut the machinedown for the night —it’s a classic case of notleaving well enoughalone. Why did I shutit down? To save elec-tricity, of all things,when everyone knowsthat by keeping doz-ens of high-load ap-pliances on around the clock, we help pumpbucketloads of valuable ozone back into ouratmosphere, where it belongs.

The second-biggest mistake you can makeis to actually turn the thing on; it’s the lead-ing cause of system failure. Because Karma,as I’ve noted before, is a bewildering andsavage thing. Oh, it’s real all right. It watchessilently as you perform memory upgradeswithout properly grounding yourself before-hand. Every time I did something inadvis-able to the motherboard with a solderingiron; every time I unplugged an AppleTalk,ADB, or — yes — even SCSI cable withoutfirst powering down the entire system; everytime I cleaned a dirty NuBus card by tossingit into the dishwasher, Karma was there, tak-ing photos and silently biding its time.

See, metaphysically slapping your hand asthe immediate punishment for having donesomething foolish is beneath Karma. “Afterall, you do already have a mother,” Karmalaughs, taking another drag from its ciga-rillo. No, Karma’s style is to cause the entireworld to come crashing down upon you

l the time ind it knowsr. Nevere Karma.

on a dry winter’s day. Karma has all thetime in the world, and it knows what youfear. Never underestimate Karma. As luckwould have it, I’ve anonymously receivedvia the Internet a list of Karma’s favoritecharities, and you can bet I’ll be givinggenerously from now on.

Well, that prettymuch covers the “Pre-vention” section ofthis special columnon hardware malfunc-tions. Now let’s talkabout what to do afterdisaster strikes. Whatworked well for me

was having had the forethought to invest inseveral good, cheap keyboards instead ofone expensive, high-quality one. The mal-function had nothing to do with the key-board, of course, but when I finally realizedthat I was well and truly hosed and thatwhat with the sheer amount of frequent-flier miles my editor’s accumulated and theease with which one can purchase a hand-gun in a major city such as Boston, thesemight indeed be my final hours on God’sgreen earth, I could act upon that impulseto slam my fist into the keyboard. Cheapkeyboards are kind to the hands and shat-ter into a satisfying spray of key caps im-mediately upon impact, and after you’vebrushed all the springs and shards of plas-tic off the desk, you can simply walk intoyour closet and pull out another one. I’drecommend my own keyboard to you, butunfortunately, I can’t find the corner of thething that has the product logo. I think it’sunder the radiator.

Now, I don’t want you people worryingyourselves about needless acts of mindless


ANDY IHNATKO

aggression. Just pull the keyboard out infront of you; take a deep cleansing breath;and when you start to feel that soothingwave of serenity wash over you, beat thepudding out of that thing quick, before theserenity overtakes you completely andtalks you out of doing it. If computer com-panies didn’t want you to do this, theywouldn’t have sold the keyboard to you socheaply. One area in which manufacturersexcel is in preventing their users from in-juring themselves so severely that theircustomer base begins to erode. That’s why,for instance, every single piece of softwareyou buy is accompanied by an inch-thicksoftbound manual. That way, when the im-pulse to pound your head against the tableagain and again inevitably overtakes you,the wide layer of manuals will be there tocushion the blow. The original IBM PCshipped with three hardbound three-ringbinders, and as a recent article in a leadingmagazine has theorized, it was a suddenand shocking drop in customer base thatgave Microsoft its first major toehold inmarket share.


So concerned is the Industry aboutstress-induced injuries taking potentialcustomers out of the lineup that the IEEEactually developed mandatory guidelinesfor makers of portable computers, settingstrict limits on the ratio of user-interfaceimpenetrability to physical mass. Take thevery first portable computer, the Osborne1. Considering the CP/M operating system(in which the command for copying a file isPIP), the Industry imagined the untoldhorrors of hundreds of machines beingheaved out of windows and raining downupon the terrorized populace, so Osbornewas forced to make the machine the sizeand weight of a medium-sized desk, onlywithout so many convenient handles. Atthe other end of the spectrum, we haveApple’s Newton MessagePad. Its trivial sizeand weight are not a testament so muchto its advanced engineering as to itsfriendly operating system. Although New-tons are smaller and lighter than a paper-back Tom Clancy novel, the IEEE’s stan-dards board ultimately decided that theelegance of the Newton OS made the PDA’s

high throwability a trivial source of con-cern. During the summer of 1993, however,the IEEE did lobby heavily for sidewalks tobe kept clear, as a nation of users struggledto teach their new Newtons to recognizetheir handwriting.

So here I am, finishing up this column onmy faithful PowerBook, Lilith, with thephone off the hook. The massive, headline-grabbing political exposé I had planned forthis issue will have to wait until I manage tobring in a new monitor or get the old oneworking again. Of course, I could have sim-ply cracked open my Writing Mac, torn outthe hard drive holding that nearly com-pleted column, and grabbed the file withLilith and a temporary drive enclosure.That, unfortunately, is the sort of solutionyou come up with only after having written1,000 words of a substitute column. Now ifyou’ll excuse me, there’s an open gravesomewhere I have to leap into. sAssuming that Andy’s friends and family stop him intime, Andy may be reached at [email protected] that they don’t, well, you’ll always have theURL for Andy Ihnatko’s Colossal Waste of Bandwidth:http://www.zdnet.com/~macuser/.

NEW ON THE MENUPRINTERS /

HP’s Ultimate SOHO Machine?New color inkjet printer doubles as an economical copier.
IS THIS THE ULTIMATE machine forsmall offices, home offices, and cor-porate workgroups? By combining aninkjet printer with color-copier tech-nology, Hewlett-Packard may hit themark with its new CopyJet M. With anestimated price of $3,199, the HPCopyJet M satisfies the needs of thosewhose output requirements includeshort-run color copying as well aseconomical color printing.
Looking like a bulky HP DeskJet1200C/PS (in fact it’s based on thesame engine and uses the same inkcartridges), the CopyJet M is first andforemost an inkjet printer. Equipped with PostScript Level 2 andPCL 5c, it prints at 300 x 300 dpi in color and 600 x 300 dpi in mono-chrome. Like other HP color printers, the CopyJet M includes HP’sColorSmart technology, which improves the look of variousgraphic types, and its Resolution Enhancement technology (REt),which sharpens the edges of black text.

Print speeds are standard for an inkjet printer: In Econofastmode, color letter-sized pages print at 1.5 ppm and monochromepages at 7 ppm. Speeds for high-quality printing slip to 4 ppm formonochrome and 2 minutes per color page. Expect print times ofabout 3 ppm for pages containing text and graphics. The printeraccepts 180 sheets of plain bond, special inkjet, or glossy paper aslarge as 8.5 x 14 inches or 50 sheets of transparent media. The unit


ELECTRONIC PUBLISHING /

Webtop Publishing Here at Las

automatically detects when the papertray contains transparencies andmakes the appropriate engine adjust-ments for printing on that medium.

Sound good so far? Here’s the bestpart.

On top of the printer rests a flatbedscanning station for copying pages aslarge as legal size and — thanks to itshinged, removable lid — thickerdocuments such as books. A frontpanel gives you access to such copierfunctions as adjusting lightness/darkness; choosing the number ofcopies, up to 99 per job; reducing and

scaling originals down to 50 percent and up to 400 percent, witheight presets or in 1-percent increments; and selecting copy modesthat match the source material, such as photographic images.

Copies are made at 300 dpi, and on copies that contain both textand graphics, HP’s new text-recognition technology enhances blacktext without altering color images. In copy mode, the CopyJet Mproduces four monochrome copies per minute and one color copyper minute. Thanks to inkjet technology, its per-copy costs are low:only 7 cents per plain-paper copy, with costs rising for other media.

Because it’s designed for small workgroups, the CopyJet M comeswith HP’s JetDirect printer-server card, for connecting to LocalTalkor Ethernet networks. It ships with 7 MB of RAM, expandable to 39MB. 800-752-0900. / Pamela Pfiffner

t
A DECADE AGO, PageMaker sparked a revolu-tion by bringing paper-publishing tools to themasses. Now Adobe and Netscape Communi-cations are following in Aldus’ footsteps, withproducts that may make creating sites on theWorld Wide Web as easy as editing a word-processing document.
Until now, putting material on the Web hasmeant dealing with the codes and tags ofHTML (HyperText Markup Language). True,there have been utilities to make creating Webpages easier — but all of them still requiredknowledge of HTML. Now, Netscape Navigator

Gold ($79) and Adobe’s PageMill ($195) giveusers WYSIWYG Web tools that let them type orpaste text into a window and apply styles to itwithout seeing one <b> or <h1> tag.Netscape Navigator Gold. Incorporating allthe new features of Netscape Navigator 2.0(see related story), Netscape Navigator Goldallows you to edit HTML documents in thesame window you use in order to surf the Web.You can drag and drop images, QuickTimemovies, and other items into the NavigatorGold window. Essentially, if you can viewsomething in Netscape Navigator 2.0, you can

create it by using Netscape Navigator Gold.PageMill. Acquired by Adobe from CenecaCommunications, PageMill doesn’t support allthe HTML bells and whistles that are supportedby Netscape Navigator 2.0, but it makes creat-ing pages easy: You can drag and drop imagesinto a PageMill window, and they’re automati-cally converted into Web-standard GIF files.Clicking on buttons in PageMill’s tool bar letsyou create interactive forms in seconds.Double-clicking on an image lets you set itstransparency color and even create a clickableimage map.SiteMill. Navigator Gold and PageMill allowyou to edit only one Web page at a time.Adobe’s SiteMill ($795) lets you administer allthe text and image files that make up a Web

CLONE WATCH /

New from Power:Speed and a TowerFaster processor sparks new design.

Power’s tower makes possible greater driveexpansion than the company’s desktopmodel.

Netscape Goes Live with Navigator 2.0

site. In addition to incorporating all the page-editing functionality of PageMill, SiteMill letsyou view which files a given page links to andwhich pages link to that page and highlightsincorrect links in red. And if you move or re-name a file or discover that one of your externallinks has changed, SiteMill will automaticallyupdate every link in your site so it points to thecorrect URL.

Netscape plans to offer a similar tool, calledSite Manager, that will be available only as apart of its LiveWire server package ($500) forWindows and UNIX, ceding the Mac site-administration game to Adobe — at leastfor the time being. Adobe, 415-842-6810.Netscape, 415-528-2555; [email protected]./ Jason Snell

PageMill lets you edit Web pages as theyappear, with no arcane HTML codes.

ALWAYS ON THE LOOKOUT for a newfeature or two to entice customers, PowerComputing is adding the Power 120 to itslineup. The 120’s claim to fame is a 120-MHz PowerPC 601 processor, which offers aslight speed boost over the Power 100,which is equipped with a 100-MHzPowerPC. Not to be outdone, Radius is alsoreadying a clone that uses a 120-MHzPowerPC.Power Computing. The extra speed offeredby the 120-MHz 601 in the Power 120 comesat a price premium of $300 compared to thePower 100. For example, a Power 120 with16 MB of RAM, an 850-MB hard drive, and a2-MB VRAM card (but no CD-ROM drive)will run $2,819. A comparably configuredPower 100 can be had for $2,519.

With the new processor comes a new

case: a minitower. Power now offers boththe Power 100 and the Power 120 inminitower models in addition to Power’straditional desktop form factor. The advan-tage of the minitower design is an addi-tional front-accessible drive bay suitable forremovable-media drives. The extra roomadds about $100 to the price of a similarlyconfigured desktop model.

Still missing from the Power Computingprice list are PCI-based models. The Power120, like the Power 100, is a NuBus-basedsystem. As we reported earlier (New on theMenu, August ’95, page 27), Power will mar-ket systems containing PCI as well as NuBusslots — the only company to do so — butpricing and availability information onthese forthcoming models wasn’t availableat press time. Our sources indicate, though,

that they’re just around the corner.Radius. Speaking of rumors, sources closeto Radius claim that that clone vendor isnearly ready to unveil a new desktop model.Apparently, Radius also thinks 120 MHz is agood speed for a 601 processor. And, per-haps taking a cue from Power, the new Ra-dius design reportedly will provide its I/Ofunctions (serial ports, Ethernet, and thelike) on a daughtercard rather than on themotherboard. / Henry Bortman

NETSCAPE NAVIGATOR HAS snared an esti-mated 70 percent of the Web-client market inthe past year, but Netscape Communicationsisn’t resting on its laurels. Netscape Navigator2.0 ($49, free to users in education) adds a hostof new features certain to please Web surfers.Live Objects. Navigator 2.0’s most exciting

feature is its support for Live Objects — theplaying or displaying of multimedia items di-rectly within Navigator. As we’ve already re-ported, Navigator 2.0 will be able to displayAdobe Acrobat documents (New on the Menu,July ’95, page 24), Macromedia Director files,and applications written in Sun Microsystems’

Java language (New on the Menu, September’95, page 31). Just about any other media typeimaginable can be supported from withinNetscape via a plug-in; plug-ins for QuickTimeand QuickTime VR, Novell’s Envoy, ProgressiveNetworks’ RealAudio, SGML, VRML, and manyothers are expected to be available when Navi-gator 2.0 ships in early December.Mail Reader. Navigator 1.0 worked as a Usenetnews client, but version 2.0 goes it one better byworking as a POP/SMTP e-mail client too.Although its initial feature set doesn’t measureup to Qualcomm’s Eudora or Claris Emailer, itdoes help Navigator seem like the ClarisWorksof the Internet.Frame-Up. Other new features include Frames,which lets Navigator display multiple docu-ments — whether they’re HTML, PDF, or someother format — in one window; SmartMarks,bookmarks that alert you when the Web sitethey point to has been updated; hierarchic,threaded news reading; and improved securityoptions, including support for digital signa-tures, which may eliminate the need for Webusers to enter passwords to authenticate theiridentities. 415-528-2555. / JS


NEW ON THE MENU

ORGANIZERS /

By-the-Book PIMs

Color Lasers Gear UpPrinters from newcomer Lexmark, veteran QMS.
THE FIRST, FAST FLURRY of color laserprinters has passed, and now a second waveis gathering momentum. A player new tothis market, Lexmark, introduces the OptraC, and color-laser veteran QMS fills out themidrange of its product line, with themagicolor cx.Lexmark Optra C. Based on the same Canonengine as the Apple ColorLaserWriter 12/600PS — which means the same bulky
dimensions as that printer — the Optra Cprints color pages at 600 x 600 dpi, with set-tings for three types of output on plainpaper: continuous tone, for photographicimages; stochastic, for smooth colorblends; and ColorGrade, Lexmark’s half-tone technique. The special Contone Glosssetting enhances output on coated stock.The printer also supports color matchingfor Pantone inks and color-management


Quick Lab Retriever

MACUSER/ZMAC UTI

software such as Apple’s ColorSync 2.0 andAgfa’s FotoTune.

But despite its graphics capabilities, the$7,500 Optra C is designed to be a fast,network-ready printer. It’s rated to printcolor pages at 3 ppm and monochromepages at 12 ppm. It comes with LocalTalk,parallel, and serial connections (Ethernetand token ring are options) as well as Lex-mark’s MarkVision network-managementsoftware. The PostScript Level 2 printerships with 8 MB of RAM, upgradable to 64MB. An internal hard drive and flash-memory SIMMs are optional.

Lexmark has also introduced fourPostScript monochrome laser printers. TheOptra R+ ($1,749), Optra Rt+ ($1,999),Optra Lx+ ($2,699), and Optra Lxi+($3,549) all offer up to 16 ppm and up to1,200 x 1,200 dpi. The models are distin-guished by paper capacity, processorspeeds, and networking options. 800-891-0331 or 606-232-3000.QMS magicolor cx. Oriented to the graphic-arts market, the magicolor cx offers 600-x-600-dpi color printing, enhanced by QMS’ColorSmooth technology, which modulatesdot placement for smooth color transitions.The printer’s QuickDraw GX driver pro-vides access to QMS’ new Qcolor software,which automatically optimizes output fortext or different types of images. The Qcolortechnology also supports the ICC standard,used in Apple’s ColorSync technology. Print

LITY OF THE MONTH

speeds are rated at 12 ppm in monochromemode and 3 to 6 ppm in color mode, de-pending on ink coverage

Priced at $7,999 — about $3,000 morethan the rock-bottom magicolor LX — themagicolor cx ships with 32 MB of RAM(upgradable to 64 MB), an internal harddrive, a 40-MHz RISC controller, and anEthernet or token-ring interface. QMS’CrownCopy attachment ($1,499) allows theprinter to function as a color copier. 800-523-2696 or 334-633-4300. / Pamela Pfiffner

1994 WAS THE YEAR of the PIM, but 1995 hasbeen comparatively quiet on the personal-information-manager front. However, break-ing the silence are two new PIMs, one based ona tried-and-true paper organizer, the othercreated just for the digital world.Day-Timer Organizer. Based on the popularDay-Timer organizers, this PIM tries to retainthe look and feel of its paper predecessors. Pre-viously available only for Windows, Day-TimerOrganizer 2.0 ($60) offers cross-platform com-patibility plus network communication onAppleTalk or Novell networks. It offers exten-sive drag-and-drop support and can print to pa-per formats used by Day-Timer paper organiz-ers (as well as competing products). And Day-Timer Organizer organizes money as well astime — its Expense Tracker is meant to reducethe time you spend filling out expense reports.Day-Timer Technologies, 415-572-6260.Consultant. This new PIM sports a sleek designand is smart enough to understand Englishcommands — typing “Meet Bob Jones tomor-row from 10 to 11” will automatically be trans-lated into an appointment entry, with contactinformation for Bob Jones attached. Consultant($99) also offers Gantt charts for use in manag-ing projects, and an optional hardware add-onuses Caller ID to automatically bring up infor-mation about an incoming call. Chronos. 801-375-4602. / Jason Snell

MONTHLY ROUNDUPS of the latest monochrome printers, hard drives, and colormonitors — called Quick Labs — have been appearing in MacUser since the July ’95 issue. Nosooner are these products released than MacUser Labs tests and evaluates them to keep you up-to-date on the newest hardware. But keeping up with the dozens of Quick Labs reviews each andevery month is itself a challenge. The solution is this month’s ZMac Utility, Quick Lab Retriever,a FileMaker Pro database containing the complete lineup of past and present Quick Labs re-views. Instead of pawing through a stack of MacUser back issues, just fire up Quick Lab Retriever.

Quick Lab Retriever will be updated with new reviews every month. Updates will also beavailable as compact, convenient text files you can download and import into your copy of thedatabase. And if you don’t have FileMaker Pro 2.0 or later, worry not; a special run-time versionof Quick Lab Retriever will be available, bundled with Claris’ FileMaker Pro User software.

Quick Lab Retriever will be available on October 30 from ZD Net/Mac, on CompuServe (GOZMC:MACUTIL) and eWorld (shortcut:MacUser). / Scott Love

VIDEO CARDS /

New PCI Cards On TapINPUT DEVICE /

Visioneer Goes GrayPaperPort Vx scans grayscale, business cards.
PAPER CLUTTER per-sists as a problem in thelives of most office work-ers. Visioneer hopes tomake organizing yourdocuments faster andeasier with the PaperPortVx, an update to thepopular original thatnow offers enhanced 8-bit gray-scale scanning,new software for busi-ness-card scanning andcopying, and a host ofminor enhancements.
The PaperPort Vx is slimmer than its pre-decessor. Capturing images at 400 dpi, thescanner is both faster and sharper than theprevious model. Also, the gray-scale capa-bility enables the software to improve thecontrast of a captured document. Thismeans better readability on-screen and indocuments destined for fax machines.

Visioneer has included extra options inversion 3.5 of the PaperPort software. Inaddition to a faster OCR engine, it hasadded Corex’s CardScan SE, for capturing

Speed Doubler Lives

business-card information, and Picture-Work’s Copier application, for automatingthe copying of scanned documents. Thebundled document-management softwaresports new tools for sharpening lines to im-prove readability and a manual straighten-ing tool to help you set your digital docu-ments straight.

Current users can upgrade to version 3.5of the PaperPort Vx software (nowPowerPC-native) for $70. The PaperPort Vxhas an estimated street price of $369. 415-812-6400. / Sean J. Safreed

Up to Its Name

LIMITED QUANTITIES and limited optionshave plagued users wanting to upgrade tofaster PCI display cards. Now, PC-display-card maker Matrox offers the MGA Millen-nium with QuickDraw 3D acceleration andNumber Nine Visual Technology brings the128-bit Imagine128 display card to PCI-based Power Macs.MGA Millennium. With a name like that ofa ship from a sci-fi flick, this new video cardfrom Matrox offers both QuickDraw andQuickDraw 3D acceleration as well as sup-port for high resolutions. The $589 cardcomes with 4 MB of a new type of video RAMcalled WindowRAM (WRAM). Matrox claimsthat WRAM is faster and cheaper than theVRAM used on most display cards.

For working with 2-D graphics, the MGAMillennium supports 16-bit color at resolu-tions of up to 1,600 x 1,200 pixels or 24-bitcolor at resolutions of up to 1,152 x 870 pix-els. QuickDraw 3D users will have to settlefor lower resolutions if they want 24-bitcolor, however. QuickDraw 3D renderingrequires twice the memory to smooth theanimation of 3-D objects. In this mode, thecard supports 24-bit color only at a resolu-tion of 640 x 480 pixels. But with a $4994-MB memory upgrade installed, the Mil-lennium can support 24-bit color at resolu-tions of up to 1,024 x 768 pixels. ForQuickDraw 3D users willing to settle for 16-bit color, the card can display resolutions ofup to 1,280 x 1,024 pixels and still accelerateQuickDraw 3D rendering. 514-685-2630.Imagine128 for Power Mac. Highlypraised by the PC press, the Imagine128 is a128-bit PCI-based display card with Quick-Draw acceleration and 4 or 8 MB of VRAM.The accelerator moves data in 128-bitchunks, so four 32-bit pixels move at onetime from the graphics chip to VRAM, whichNumber Nine claims provides faster redraw,even with millions of colors.

With 4 MB of VRAM, the card supports 16-bit color on displays that have resolutions ofup to 1,600 x 1,200 pixels; the 8-MB versioncan do 24-bit color at the same resolution.Both versions support all the Mac-standardresolutions, from 640 x 480 to 1,152 x 870pixels, by use of on-the-fly resolution-switching software. The bundled control-panel software can also power down themonitor when it’s not in use and calibratethe display for better color matching. 4-MBversion, $899; 8-MB version, $1,599. 617-674-0009. / SJS

DELAYED AND OVERPROMISED, Speed Doubler seemed destined not to live up to the claims itsdeveloper, Connectix, has made. Our skepticism is turning toward fanaticism, because our prelimi-nary tests reveal that Speed Doubler really boosts the speed of all Power Macs.

For the uninitiated, Speed Doubler is a set of extensions that speeds up Finder operations andreplaces the 680x0 emulator and the disk-caching software. Speed Doubler translates the 680x0code found in some applications and in current system software with an emulator that’s even fasterthan the improved emulator that shipped with the new PCI-based Power Macs. Speed Doubler’sdisk cache is smarter than Apple’s too, thus speeding up disk operations.

We ran several tests in Word 5.1a — our favorite non-PowerPC-native application — on a PowerMac 7500/100 to find out what Speed Doubler could do. Scrolling through a 50-page document was38 percent faster with Speed Doubler installed, not much of a gain. However, opening a MacWritedocument showed a 150-percent improvement and finding and replacing a text item showed a120-percent improvement. / SJS

PRODUCTS TESTED SCROLL 50 PAGES OF TEXT CONVERT MACWRITE FIND AND REPLACE TEXTDOCUMENT TO WORD

TRULY A SPEED DOUBLER / Connectix’s software fills the bill

SLOWERTIME IN SECONDS

29 40


6 15


5 11

Power Mac 7500/100 with SpeedDoubler Power Mac 7500/100


NEW ON THE MENU

INPUT DEVICES /

Mouse TrapsCD-ROMS /

Up Your Science Savvy

IF YOU HATE MEECES to pieces, it’s time totry the latest in Mac input devices — thetrackpad, a smooth, flat surface you dragyour finger across to move your cursor. Andif that sounds too kinky, Kensington’s latesttrackball may fill the bill.

Trackpads aren’t just for PowerBook us-ers. Alps Electric has several freestandingdesktop models, but its latest integrates thetrackpad into a keyboard that takes up littlemore space on your desk than any otherkeyboard does. The GlidePoint Keyboard($160) also has a built-in wrist rest and aDelete key near the space bar so you don’thave to reach so far to erase your mistakes.


New Games Go High-

The trackpad-only model, theDesktop Glide-Point ($100), nowcomes with an adjustable stand so you canchange the angle of the pad to suit you. Likethe keyboard model, this trackpad comeswith three programmable buttons. Fordesktop-computer as well as PowerBookusers, Alps additionally makes a combina-tion keypad/trackpad, the GlidePoint Key-pad ($150). 408-432-6000.

Kensington, long a leader in alternativemice, unveils the Turbo Mouse 5.0 (about$110), a trackball that sports four (up fromtwo) programmable buttons. The TurboMouse’s new ergonomic design works forboth right- and left-handed users and in-cludes easy-to-click buttons. New softwarelets you control the trackball’s on-screenacceleration and movement. And in caseyou’re still stuck on mice, Kensington re-cently introduced an affordable two-buttonmouse, the Kensington Mouse ($60). 800-535-4242 or 415-572-2700. / Nancy Peterson

Tech

IF YOU SAT SLACK-JAWED through your sci-ence classes, there’s no need to do a 24-hourNova marathon to get up to speed — justcram with the following CD-ROMs:Life’s Greatest Mysteries. Want to knowthe origin of your headache? Wonder whyyou dreamed about multicolored reptileslast night? Answers to these and more than50 other questions about the mind andbody are found in A.D.A.M. Software’s new-est CD-ROM. Hosted by A.D.A.M.’s newestanimated character, Bob Winkle, you’ll ex-plore the four different sections of the disk— the Mind, the Body, Illness, and Curiosi-ties — to find out why our stomachs growl,how we catch colds, and why we have twoeyes. Beats old wives’ tales by a mile. $40.800-955-9920 or 619-693-1200.The Eyewitness Encyclopedia of Nature.Want to commune with nature withoutleaving the house? It’s easy with DKMultimedia’s new CD-ROM, Eyewitness

Encyclopedia of Nature. Using its unique in-terface, you can open “drawers” and learn allabout more than 250 plants and animals orfind their habitat on an interactive globe.Traverse the North American desert to seewhat species are indigenous to the area, orjump to the animal of your choice to get acloser look. $80. 212-213-4800.Earthscapes in Time: The See-ThroughAtlas. The latest CD-ROM in Now What?Software’s popular Small Blue Planet series,Earthscapes in Time takes the interactiveatlas one step further. Using images fromNASA, the CIA, and Landsat, you can viewboth the natural and human-induced globaltransformations that have occurred over thelast 30 years. Observe images of Mt. St.Helen’s volcanic eruption and read about itsimpact on global weather, or view the effectof increased irrigation on the quickly shrink-ing Aral Sea. $50. 800-322-1954 or 415-885-1689. / Kristin Balleisen

WHIZ-BANG TECHNOLOGIES such as QuickDraw3D and QuickTime VR are great, but when willyou be able to use them in applications thatmatter? Where are the games? They’ll be avail-able just in time to make your holiday wishlist.

Havoc, from Reality Bytes, is one of the firstgames that can use a QuickDraw 3D acceleratorcard. The game lets you control a BattleCycle,HoverCraft, or HyperTank while trekkingthrough futuristic worlds. Network play is avail-able through LocalTalk, modem, or TCP/IP. $69.617-621-2500.

Descent, a popular PC game that’s finallycoming to theMac, also usesQuickDraw 3D. Inthis game, youmust fly throughan alien base andrescue a bunchof hostages. De-scent, distributedby MacPlay, sup-ports up to eight

players over a network. $50. 714-553-3521.Both Havoc and Descent use their own ren-

dering engine if you don’t have QuickDraw 3D.The first action-adventure game that uses

QuickTime VR comes from Morpheus Inter-active. Secrets of the Luxor Pyramid is anadventure game that was created in conjunc-tion with the Luxor Hotel in Las Vegas. $60.801-652-5300.

But the most ambitious project is Anark’sGalapagos; you control Mendel, a syntheticorganism that uses an algorithm that enables itto learn what you teach it. As you journeythrough Galapagos, Mendel develops an “intel-

ligence,” andsince there is noright or wrongway to teach it,two players canhave Mendelswith differ-ent behaviorpatterns. $60.303-545-2592./ Roman Loyola

MACINTOSH PRICE INDEX

NEW ON THE MENU

NEW & NOTABLEHARDWARE /
d Sony PC Cam. Sporting a pipe-cleaner-styleneck, Sony’s PC Cam is a full-color NTSC camera
that requires a Mac with AV capa-bilities (it also works with a TV or aVCR). Expected to be especiallyuseful for businesses doing

videoconferencing, the PC Cam offers amanual focus and a manual iris. $499.800-352-7669.NEC MultiSpin 4Xc. This quad-speed CD-ROM drive is based on the Eddy Award-

winning Nakamichi CD changer tech-nology. You can load as many asseven CD-ROMs at once into the

MultiSpin 4Xc and mount them all —the drive automatically shuffles the discs asyour Mac accesses them. $349. 708-860-9500.MicroNet Advantage 1.3GB Optical Drive.Rotating at a fast 3,600 rpm, this 5.25-inch opti-cal drive’s mechanism can read and write 650-MB and 1.3-GB optical cartridges. The drivecomes standard with a 4-MB cache. $2,155; ad-ditional 1.3-GB cartridges, $108. 714-453-6000.Mega Drive Systems Enterprise E-8 and E-2.Targeted at digital-video and prepress profes-sionals, these two removable-storage systemssupport Fast and Wide SCSI-2 drives. The Enter-prise E-8 ($1,999) is an eight-slot storage hub;the Enterprise E-2 ($449) is a two-slot storagehub. 310-247-0006.Consumer Technology Northwest TView.This computer-to-TV video adapter is compat-ible with Macs and PCs, automatically sensingwhich platform it’s connected to. $449. 800-356-3983 or 503-643-1662.

SOFTWARE /MailKeeper. r Serving asan intelligent text data-base, MailKeeper automati-cally categorizes and storese-mail and other importanttext. Text can be stored inMailKeeper via drag-and-drop or a key combination.$40. Nisus Software. 619-481-1477.StatView 4.5. The latestversion of this data-analysis program adds 20new analysis and graphing templates, survivalanalysis, quality control, the ability to importand export Microsoft Excel documents, and acomplete set of Apple Guide-based help. $595;upgrade from previous versions, $149. 510-540-1949.Mac Manager. Formerly called Menu MasterMac, this security utility controls access to Macs


by making users log in and by restricting themto certain areas of Mac Manager’s Finder-likeinterface. Mac Manager can control the amountof time a user can stay logged in, track the num-ber of pages a user prints, and watch what CD-ROMs and floppies are inserted. Price varies,depending on number of users. ElectronicLearning Systems. 800-443-7971 or 904-375-0558.First Person: Mumia Abu-Jamal. This CD-ROM focuses on Mumia Abu-Jamal, the contro-versial death-row inmate. It includes the text ofhis book Live from Death Row, essays, and 50 ofhis radio commentaries. $30. 212-431-5199.Captivate 4.5. Tanned, rested, and ready foraction is the latest version of the venerablescreen-capture utility Capture. The newlynamed Captivate 4.5 includes the usual assort-ment of screen-capture abilities, a viewer ca-pable of displaying images in a variety of fileformats, and an image-cataloging utility thatlets you organize and preview your screen cap-tures. $90. Mainstay. 805-484-9400.StuffIt InstallerMaker 3.0. This utility thatlets developers create one-click software in-stallers adds a slew of new features. Now install-ers can move files from place to place, envelopdozens of different packages within a single file,update files all by themselves, and even per-form deinstalls. Prices vary. Aladdin Systems.408-761-6200; [email protected] CD-ROM. Just in time for Monop-oly’s 60th anniversary comes Parker Brothers’Monopoly CD-ROM, which lets you become avirtual dog, shoe, car, or other token as youbounce along a virtual Monopoly board, com-plete with 3-D rendered scenes ranging fromthe run-down squalor of Baltic Ave. to the opu-lence of Park Place. $40. 800-874-4607 or 714-

833-8710.Dust. Whoa,pardner — Cyber-flix, the maker ofsci-fi CD-ROMsJump Raven andLunicus, is goingback in time withthis Wild Westadventure, set in1882. As a man onthe run, you enter

the dying town of Diamondback and interactwith 40 unique characters. $50. 800-483-8632or 615-546-1157.A Zillion Kajillion Clichés. We’ll be a monkey’suncle: This program, from the makers of AZillion Kajillion Rhymes, might be a sure-fire hitfor those troubled souls needing just the rightcliché, if you get our drift. $40. Eccentric Soft-ware. 206-628-2687.

THE UNITED COMPUTER EXCHANGE index re-flects average sales prices of new and used Macsas of September 7, 1995. Prices (except those forcompact models, Performas, and LCs) do not in-clude a monitor or a keyboard. The United Com-puter Exchange is a national clearinghouse ofused microcomputer equipment.

Mac Model New Used

SE/30 (5/40) • $450

Classic II (4/40) • $375

Color Classic (4/80) • $650

LC III (4/80) • $375

Performa 475 (4/160) • $800

Performa 550 CD (5/160) • $700

Performa 575 CD (5/250) • $975

IIsi (5/40) • $300

IIci (5/80) • $475

IIfx (8/160) • $575

Quadra 605 (4/80) • $500

Quadra 610 (8/160) • $600

Quadra 630 (4/250) • $750

Quadra 650 (8/230) • $1,100

Quadra 660AV CD (8/230) • $950

Quadra 700 (8/230) • $875

Quadra 800 (8/230) • $1,400

Quadra 840AV CD (8/230) • $1,750

Quadra 900 (8/230) • $1,300

Quadra 950 (8/230) • $1,650

Power Mac 6100/60 (8/250) • $1,000

Power Mac 6100/66 CD (8/350)$1,499 $1,250

Power Mac 7100/66 (8/250) • $1,350

Power Mac 7100/80 CD (8/700) • $1,700

Power Mac 8100/80 (8/250) • $1,800

Power Mac 8100/100 CD (16/1GB) • $2,250

Power Mac 8100/110 CD (16/2GB) $3,799 $3,000

PowerBook 145B (4/80) • $700

PowerBook 150 (4/120) $999 $700

PowerBook 165 (4/80) • $900

PowerBook 165c (4/80) • $1,100

PowerBook 170 (4/40) • $875

PowerBook 180 (4/80) • $1,300

PowerBook 180c (4/80) • $1,500

PowerBook 520 (4/160) $1,399 $1,200

PowerBook 520c (4/160) $1,899 $1,500

PowerBook 540 (4/240) • $1,550

PowerBook 540c (4/320) $2,699 $2,200

Duo 250 (4/200) • $1,075

Duo 270c (4/240) • $1,700

Duo 280 (12/240) • $1,600

Duo 280c (4/320) $3,379 $1,850• = discontinued model

For more pricing information on these and othermodels, call 800-755-3033 or 770-955-0569, or visithttp://www.uce.com. And find it on ZD Net/Mac, inLibrary 1 (Special Reports) of the MacUser Forum (GOZMC:MACUSER). On eWorld, go to shortcut MACUSER, inMacUser Software Library:MacUser Special Files.

REVIEWS & Quick Clicks

Apple Power Mac 7200/90 and 8500/120Apple’s new PCI Power Macs standand deliver.

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HEARD THE HYPE and seen the specs ofApple’s second-generation Power Macs? Bynow you probably have. But what’s it likegetting down to work with the new ma-chines day to day? How fast are they really?What can you do to get the most out ofthem? And if you’re considering trading inan older Mac or a PC for one of the newmachines, which model should you choose?

To help you answer these questions andmore, we spent several weeks working in-tensively with production units of two of thenew PCI models — the Power Mac 7200/90and the Power Mac 8500/120. We foundthat, by and large, the newmachines lived up quite wellto our expectations. How-ever, there are several issuesthat potential buyers shouldbe aware of, particularlythose who are consideringthe purchase of a Power Mac7200.

RATING KEY

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Apple Power Mac 7200/90

To be honest, we found Apple’s entry-levelPCI Power Mac to be a bit underwhelming— at first. Sure, it has some great features.You get a quad-speed CD-ROM drive anddual Ethernet ports, including a 10BASE-Tconnector that requires no extra-cost trans-ceiver. And the system is far more expand-able than previous low-cost Macs — itcomes with an empty drive bay, three slotsfor PCI expansion cards, and four DIMM(dual in-line memory module) slots thatcan accommodate as much as 256 MB ofRAM. And don’t forget the machine’s

hassle-free enclosure,which allows you to plughardware and memoryinto the slots in — quiteliterally — less than aminute.

That’s a gigantic im-provement over lastyear’s entry-level Power

Mac, the single-slot 6100 model, especiallywhen you consider that the 7200 costs onlyslightly more than its predecessor. With 8MB of RAM, a 500-MB hard drive, and aquad-speed CD-ROM drive, the 7200/90sells for about $1,900. Of course, you’ll needadditional RAM if you intend to run any-thing more substantial than, say, Claris-Works. But even when you figure in an addi-tional $350 to $400 for more RAM, the priceis still attractive.

What first gave us pause about the 7200/90, however, was its speed. Even though itsPowerPC 601 processor has a 90-MHz clockchip and the machine ships with a new ver-sion of the Mac OS (System 7.5.2) that’s sup-posed to contain more native PowerPC codethan previous releases, the 7200/90 simplyisn’t as fast out of the box in benchmarktests or real-life usage as a two-year-old 80-MHz Power Mac 8100.

Fortunately, the problem is easy to fix ifyou’re able and willing to spend a few hun-dred dollars more. For about $250, you canadd a 256K cache DIMM, which boosts the7200’s processor and display speed by 30percent or more. It then equals and sur-passes the speed of the 8100/80.

For about $55, you can get an additionalspeed boost by loading Connectix’s SpeedDoubler software, which accelerates appli-cations and Mac OS routines that aren’tPowerPC-native. In our speed tests, SpeedDoubler slashed the amount of time re-quired to sort a 12,596-record FileMakerPro database from more than a minute to 38seconds. We also added another megabyteof video RAM, at a cost of about $100, to the1 MB that comes with the 7200. Not onlydoes the additional VRAM get you more col-ors at higher resolutions but it also pro-duces a noticeable speedup for some graph-ics functions, including scrolling in manyapplications.

Altogether, these enhancements — in-cluding the cost of the 8 MB of RAM — addabout $750 to the price of the system. Butwhat you get for your investment is a genu-ine speedster. And the 7200’s three PCI slotsprovide still more flexibility. The first third-party cards announced for the new PCI bus


REVIEWS COMPUTERS

Apple Power Mac 7200/90 mmmmPrice: $1,900 (estimated street).

Pros: Aggressive price. Excellent case design.Built-in 10BASE-T connector. Quad-speedCD-ROM drive. Three PCI slots. Modest extrainvestment provides significant speed boost.

Cons: Disappointing speed with base model,due to lack of cache. No built-in digital-videosupport.

Company: Apple Computer, Cupertino, CA;800-538-9696 or 408-996-1010.

Reader S ervice: Circle #401.

Apple Power Mac 8500/120 mmmmPrice: $4,000 for 16/1GB/CD model (estimatedstreet).

Pros: Blazing speed. RAM expandable to 512MB. Three PCI slots. Fast-SCSI support. Built-inhigh-quality digital video. Upgradableprocessor.

Cons: Case design makes RAM expansiondifficult.


SPEED-TESTING THE NEW POWER MACS

MACBENCH 2.0 PROCESSOR FLOATING POINT DISK MIX VIDEO MIX

BETTERSCORE BETTERSCORE BETTERSCORE BETTERSCORE

32 41

41

5

14 55

166 181

182

3

5 186

7.4 8.9

17.0

7.7

14.8 14.1

15 22

22 14

14 29

Power Mac 7200/90 Power Mac 7200/90 with 256K L2 cache Power Mac 7200/90 with 256K L2 cache and Speed Doubler Power Mac 7200/90 in emulation mode Power Mac 7200/90 in emulation mode with Speed Doubler Power Mac 8500/120

Apple’s new low-cost PCI Mac by adding a 256KL2 cache. The Power Mac 8500/120 is a screamerright out of the box — it will have special appealto graphics and digital-video professionals.

A stock Power Mac 7200/90 comes with severalattractive features, including a quad-speed CD-ROM drive, but its speed is nothing to writehome about. Fortunately, you can supercharge

mostly offer faster Ethernet, SCSI, or graph-ics, so we expect most 7200 buyers will becontent with a stock machine. However, it’snice to know that if your needs change orthat if one of the other new PCI cards now inthe pipeline — MPEG video-playback cardsor DOS/Windows coprocessor cards, for ex-ample — catches your fancy, you can easilyslap in a card.

All in all, the scalability, expandability,and attractive base price of the 7200/90make it a great system for corporate orsmall-business users who want to run basicoffice applications or even some graphicsand publishing programs.

Home and education buyers will also findthat the 7200 offers plenty of bang for thebuck, including 16-bit audio, an unusuallystrong built-in speaker, and a first-rate CD-ROM drive. Novices, though, will generallybe better off with a Performa, which comescomplete with a monitor, a keyboard, and aslew of software. Digital-video pros shouldknow that the 7200 has no built-in video-inor -out capabilities. Although PCI cards willsomeday fill this void, for now, video-capable Macs — such as the Performa 5200or 6200 or the Power Mac 7500 or 8500 —make more sense.

Apple Power Mac 8500/120

Out of the box, the Power Mac 8500/120 isclearly the Mac of choice for graphics pro-fessionals and anyone else who wants andcan afford maximum speed but who doesn’tneed the extra slots, bulk, and expense ofthe Power Mac 9500. And it’s a great choicefor almost anyone doing serious work withdigital video.


With a 120-MHz PowerPC 604 processorand an internal SCSI bus that can handle asmuch as 10 MB of data per second, this sys-tem flies. You feel its snappiness even whenyou’re doing mundane chores — openingand closing windows, compressing files,and searching with Find File. The 8500 re-ally shines, however, when you challenge itwith demanding work, such as manipulat-ing large images with Adobe Photoshop. Inour tests using Photoshop 3.0.4 (newly opti-mized for the PowerPC 604), the programtypically runs 50 to 200 percent faster on the8500/120 than on an 8100/110.

On the digital-video front, the 8500 —with its enhanced display, capture, and out-put capabilities — leaves last year’s AVmodels in the dust. Although the machineisn’t quite capable of producing broadcast-quality video — capture rates to a ConnerCFP1080S drive from our 24/1GB/CD testmodel fell well short of 30 frames per sec-ond — video quality is more than adequatefor corporate training tapes or for Quick-Time clips destined for CD-ROM.

Obviously, all this horsepower comes at a

price: The 8500 starts at about $4,000 for a16/1GB/CD configuration. Fortunately, thismachine comes with a 256K cache. Like the7200, the system also has the three PCI slotsand dual Ethernet connectors, but you gettwice as many RAM DIMM slots — eightaltogether, for a maximum of 512 MB ofRAM.

However, expansion is infinitely moredifficult with the 8500 than with the 7200.Instead of using an easy-open case like the7200’s, Apple chose to package its beefiermodel in the company’s standard mini-tower enclosure, which is notoriously diffi-cult to work with. Just to add RAM, for ex-ample, you have to unplug every last cableand card in the system, right down to theprocessor daughterboard.

One other caveat that applies to both the7200 and the 8500: If you’re moving to one ofthese machines from a 680x0-based Mac,you may have to upgrade much of your soft-ware to ensure compatibility and to takeadvantage of the PowerPC chip. Even ifyou’re already using a Power Mac, be pre-pared for some compatibility problemswith the new class of machines. Severalpopular programs, including Now Utilitiesand most of Symantec’s utilities, need up-dates to work with System 7.5.2. And mostseriously, early users of all the new PowerMacs have experienced frustration trying todial into the Internet under Apple’s newOpen Transport networking scheme.

The Bottom Line

Apple deserves kudos for the Power Mac7200/90 and 8500/120 PCI systems. Butbuyers of the bargain-priced 7200 will wantto consider investing an additional $750 inthe machine — the speed gains they’llachieve will be well worth the extra money./ Henry Norr

REVIEWS PAGE LAYOUT

Adobe PageMaker 6.0 / Powerful featuresaside, venerable page-layout programstrained in move from Aldus to Adobe.

THE SCUTTLEBUTT on PageMaker 6.0 isthat it’s no QuarkXPress killer. True, thefirst upgrade released under the Adobe la-bel isn’t exactly flashy, but version 6.0 doesboast several key features that addresscolor publishing and printing and that im-prove on the program’s layout flexibility.However, we were surprised to find thatseveral features were poorly executed, giv-ing PageMaker 6.0 the feel of a product stillin the midst of a transition from one com-pany to another.

The New Order

Anyone who appreciates PageMaker’s free-form approach to layout will relish the newArrange menu’s features. New commandslet you navigate stacked objects one layer at


a time, and you can lock pivotal objects onthe page. Version 6.0 also includes two fea-tures — the Align Objects command andthe Group command — previously avail-able separately as plug-ins. The Align Ob-jects command gives you control over theuniform placement and distribution ofmultiple objects; the Group command pro-vides an easier way to group multiple ob-jects into one element than its plug-in pre-decessor did.

As much as we liked PageMaker’s newobject-grouping command, it performedsomewhat inconsistently. For example, weconfused the program by applying a textwrap to four objects grouped as one andthen ungrouping the objects — the textboundary remained with one of the objects.

Powerful andflexible, PageMaker6.0’s implementationof multiple masterpages lets you assignmasters to left- andright-facing pagesindependently.

PageMaker 6.0’sColors palette nowincludes a pull-downmenu for quicklyapplying tints ofexisting colors. Andyou can use the newpolygon tool tocreate star bursts,such as the oneshown here on thisExplorers cover.

PageMaker 6.0 also gives you more con-trol over imported images. You can maskimported TIFF files, using the rectangle, theellipse, or the new polygon tool. The re-vamped Keyline plug-in automatically addsborders to images — a great time-saver.And finally, you can specify text and graphicobjects as nonprinting.

The ability to apply Photoshop filters toimages within PageMaker 6.0 is an interest-ing idea — too bad this feature doesn’t workas well as it should. Adobe ships 12 of itsGallery Effects (GE) filters with the pro-gram, but the filters are memory hogs thatcrashed our Power Mac 7100/80 equippedwith 32 MB of RAM. And support for third-party filters is spotty at best — for example,Kai’s Power Tools 2.1 works fine, but KPTConvolver doesn’t. Also, you can apply na-tive Photoshop 3.0.4 (only!) effects to im-ages, but truly useful filters such as Sharpenand Unsharp Mask, which are now built intoPhotoshop, aren’t available to PageMaker.The Acquire, Import, and Export filtersaren’t supported either, so you have to useTWAIN — an inelegant solution at best —to scan images directly into your layout.

Yes, Master

One very welcome addition to version 6.0 issupport for multiple master pages, so youcan define unlimited master designs for thepages within a single publication. Using apalette, you create and edit master pagesand then apply them either to publicationspreads or to right- and left-facing pages in-dependently. Icons indicate which masterapplies to which page. When the palette isclosed, PageMaker’s traditional master-page icon provides a pop-up menu that tellsyou which page is in use. You can also designa regular page and then elect to save it as amaster page — a boon for design-as-you-go types.

PageMaker’s color handling has been im-proved in version 6.0. The Colors palettenow includes a pull-down tint menu thatlets you quickly apply percentages of de-fined colors to lines and fills. The colorNone has been added, so you can createtransparent lines and fills, and you can nowdefine colors based on new color libraries,such as the Pantone Hexachrome six-process-color standard. Best of all, with theclick of a button, you can eliminate unusedcolors from a document’s palette. Not only

Adobe PageMaker 6.0 mmmmPrice: $895 (list).

Pros: Flexible object layering and grouping.Good implementation of multiple masterpages. Automatic import of Photo CD files.Advanced color-management features.

Cons: Poorly executed Photoshop-filtersupport. Incomplete Acrobat and HTMLfeatures.

Company: Adobe Systems, Seattle, WA;800-422-3623 or 206-622-5500.


REVIEWS PAGE LAYOUT

aker’s new Arrange menu let you navigates one layer at a time.

does this cut down on clutter but it alsohelps prevent the inadvertent generation ofunnecessary spot-color plates when print-ing. Finally, the much lauded TrapMakerplug-in is now built into the program.

Kodak Connection

For publishing pros, PageMaker’s whizziestnew features are support for EastmanKodak’s Precision Color Management Sys-tem (CMS) and Photo CD image format.Precision CMS ensures that color informa-tion stays consistent throughout the pub-lishing process, from input device to displayto composite printer to proofing device tofinal output. You select the proper deviceprofiles, and CMS takes over from there.PageMaker 6.0 ships with Kodak profiles fora variety of input, output, and display de-vices. Support for Apple’s ColorSync 2.0 andICC-compliant profiles is expected by theend of the year.

To take full advantage of Precision CMS,you should define colors and import imagesby using the appropriate CMS settings. Ad-ditionally, for those who plan to create colorseparations, PageMaker can preseparate

bitmapped images. During this process, theprogram creates a new CMYK file from theoriginal bitmapped image. The new file istargeted to the separation device you’vespecified in the CMS setup process. The ad-vantages of preseparating are twofold: Itsaves you processing time, because thecolor-space conversion is accomplished be-fore printing, and it simulates final outputon the printer you’re using for design com-posites. This is a powerful addition, but itbegs for batch-processing capabilities.

Precision CMS really shines when em-ployed in conjunction with PageMaker’sPhoto CD support. You can now open,

A welcome feature in the new version of PageMis the ability to import, scale, sharpen, and color-images in Kodak Photo CD format. However, prevmechanism for feedback on images are sorely mi


rotate, scale, sharp-en, color-convert,and place a PhotoCD image in one fellswoop. Here is theway it works: Usingthe Place command,you open a PhotoCD file, crop it, setits final size andresolution, choosea sharpening level,and opt for auto-matic color balanc-ing and grayscaleconversion. The Ko-dak import mecha-nism also automati-cally color-manages the file via PrecisionCMS when you select the film type used forthe original image.

Our only complaint is with the interfaceto PageMaker’s Photo CD features. For start-ers, there’s no image preview when you se-lect a Photo CD file. Given Kodak’s absurdPhoto CD filenaming convention (for ex-ample, IMG0001.PCD;1 doesn’t really tell

you a whole lot about the im-age), it seems pretty obviousthat users desperately need away to view the files on aPhoto CD without openingthem first. And while we’re onthe subject, we’d also likePageMaker to provide a pre-view of the images that we’reimporting.

Online Publishing

These days, no major up-grade to a page-layout pro-

gram would be complete without the addi-tion of online-publishing features. However,PageMaker’s HTML support serves more asa trendy checklist item than as a practicaltool. You can’t apply the program’s HTMLAuthor plug-in to any PageMaker documentand produce files instantly formatted for theWorld Wide Web. But you can use Page-Maker as a from-scratch HTML authoringtool. The plug-in lets you map PageMakerstyle sheets to HTML styles, create hyper-links between pages, and export an entiredocument or specific pages or stories from asimply designed existing PageMaker file inHTML.

akermanageiews and assed.

Commands on PageMthrough stacked object

More practical for online publishingis using PageMaker in conjunction withAdobe Acrobat. Version 6.0 lets you savePageMaker files in PDF format, which re-tains the look of the original document. Butwe got erratic results when we used this fea-ture, particularly with graphics-rich files— sometimes the PDF command worked,sometimes it didn’t. The three-step processis also time-consuming. We agree that itmakes sense for PageMaker to work hand inglove with Acrobat, but version 6.0’s unpre-dictable performance suggests that this fea-ture was a hasty addition to the program.

The Bottom Line

Although several of PageMaker 6.0’s newfeatures suggest that they were hasty addi-tions by Adobe, the new release givesPageMaker loyalists quite a bit to cheerabout. Page-design enhancements, flexiblelayout tools, and the one-two punch ofKodak’s Precision CMS and Photo CD sup-port make for one powerful publishingtool. / Pamela Pfiffner

REVIEWS ELECTRONIC MAIL

Claris Emailer / Claris’ electronic postmanperforms automatic pickup and delivery.

Claris Emailer mmm

Price: $89 (list).

Pros: Automated access to e-mail from severalservices in one easy-to-configure interface.Excellent drag-and-drop support. SupportsMIME as well as file-enclosure formats forcommercial services.

Cons: Inconsistent interface. Slower thanEudora Pro. Inefficient method of storinge-mail. Does not support AppleScript.

Company: Claris, Santa Clara, CA;800-544-8554 or 408-987-7000.


o

ALMOST EVERYONE these days has at leastone electronic-mail address, and manypeople have several. To avoid the time andtedium of signing onto multiple online ser-vices daily, you can use Claris Emailer.Emailer automatically picks up and deliversall your electronic mail directly to yourdesktop, whether you’re using CompuServe,America Online, eWorld, Radiomail, the

Internet, or all of the above. Emailer is trulya time-saver, but interface and engineeringproblems make it not as fast or as elegant asit should be.

Your Mail Is Served

The first time you launch Emailer, it inter-views you about which online services youbelong to and how often and when you wantit to check your files. Emailer can checkyour services for mail at given intervals, atcertain times of the day or week, or when-ever you use its Connect Now command.

When you respond to a message you’vereceived, Emailer avoids Internet gateways,if possible. For instance, if you receive amessage on your CompuServe account fromsomeone on eWorld, Emailer will send thereply from your eWorld address, if you haveone, by default. If you prefer to send all yourmail from one account, you can set it as yourpreference. Emailer knows the native fileformats for each of the services, so you can,for instance, enclose compressed StuffIt

All your e-mail will arrive in one central in box if you let Claris Emailer become your virtual elec


files to colleagues on America Online anddecode binary files received from Compu-Serve. Emailer supports the MultipurposeInternet Mail Enclosures (MIME) protocol,used to transmit files over the Internet, soyou can send a file from any online serviceto another.

Emailer’s interface has tabs labeled InBox, Out Box, Filing Cabinet, and Address

Book. The address booklets you catalog several e-mail addresses for each ofyour contacts. Compre-hensive support for drag-and-drop means that youcan drag an address fromthe address book and dropit into the address field of amessage or drag a receivedmessage out of the in boxand drop it into the filingcabinet. You can also dragtext out of a word-process-ing document and drop itinto your message andvice versa.

Qualcomm’s Eudora Promay have set the standard

for filtering Internet mail, but Emailer out-shines it. Based on text in messages, EudoraPro can file and label them; Emailer can dothat as well as forward the messages andautoreply to them.

For all that’s great and innovative aboutEmailer, there’s also a lot that’s frustrating.Since all the messages are stored on yourhard disk, the filing cabinet gives you a wayto organize your mail in a place separatefrom the in and out boxes. But although youcan attach one of eight user-definable labelsto messages in your in box, the labels disap-pear when you move the messages to the fil-ing cabinet.

If you’re reading through a long list ofmessages and delete one of them, Emailerwill return you to the first message you readin the list, so you have to search for your stillunread messages. Emailer does keep trackin the in box of which messages you’ve readand which ones you haven’t, but not if you’veused a mail filter to let Emailer move somemessages into the filing cabinet. You also

n your hard disktronic postman.

have to open messages in the filing cabinetif you want see the date and time they weresent instead of the date and time Emailerdownloaded them.

Emailer saves each message as an indi-vidual file, as America Online, Compu-Serve, and eWorld do, rather than in onelarge mailbox, as Eudora does. Each file hasto take up at least one block on your harddisk, which means the higher-capacity yourhard drive, the more space each messagewill take. For example, electronic text thatwould take up only 850K in Eudora or asASCII text took up 1.8 MB of space on a 160-MB hard disk. This method of handlingmessages also slows down Emailer, becauseit has to scan through a hard-disk folder tofind stored messages; Eudora searchesquickly through an index of its files, whichis cached in RAM.

Emailer doesn’t support styled text. Italso can’t print more than one message at atime. It doesn’t let you selectively downloadand delete mail on POP Internet mail serv-ers, as Eudora Pro lets you do. And if you’rethinking of automating Emailer to, for in-stance, make it work with your scriptableapplications, you’re out of luck, because itdoesn’t support AppleScript.

The Bottom Line

Emailer has a lot of great features for peoplewho use commercial online services or whowould like a cheap and easy way to automatetheir e-mail. But although many of its fea-tures demonstrate that Eudora Pro, whichdoesn’t work with commercial services, isfar from the ultimate e-mail reader,Emailer’s interface and file-system prob-lems leave Eudora as a better choice forthose who receive most of their mail overthe Internet. / Jason Snell

REVIEWS TELEPHONY

Apple GeoPort Telecom Adapter KitTransform your Mac into a speakerphoneand digital answering machine.

Apple GeoPort TelecomAdapter Kit mmmm

Price: $129; extended features, $49.95 extra(list).

Pros: Inexpensive, sophisticated digitalspeakerphone and answering machine.Includes modem, fax, and OCR.

Cons: Express Modem limited to 14.4 kbps.

Company: Apple Computer, Cupertino, CA;800-776-2333 or 408-996-1010.


FOR LESS THAN $100, the Apple GeoPortTelecom Adapter Kit can turn your PowerMac or AV Mac into a complete telecommu-nications center. Consisting of several use-ful, complementary telecommunications-software applications bundled with a singlepiece of hardware, this kit lets your Mac takethe place of your speakerphone, digital an-swering machine, and fax modem.

Digital Conversion

The DSP (digital signal processor) in AVMacs and the PowerPC processor in PowerMacs process modem signals, sound, andspeech. However, you can’t simply connectyour phone line to the processors’ externalinterface, the GeoPort, on the back of yourMac. For this you need the hardware part ofthis kit, the GeoPort Telecom Adapter, a lineadapter that converts the phone line’s in-coming and outgoing signals into a digitaldata stream the processor can handle.

The Telecom 2.0 coordinating softwaredeciphers the signals processed by the DSPor PowerPC as fax, modem, or voice com-munications and routes them to the appro-priate program. Without the GeoPortadapter and the Telecom program, you’dhave to buy hardware to do what the soft-ware in this kit does. Apple’s Express Mo-dem and Express Fax also provide all the ca-pabilities of a fax modem in software. TheExpress Fax even has built-in OCR (opticalcharacter recognition) to turn receivedfaxes into editable text. For connecting toyour favorite BBS or Internet provider, thepackage includes Aladdin Systems’ SIT-comm Special Edition, a scriptable commu-nications program.

MegaPhone

But by far the prize in the kit’s crackerjackbox of telecommunications programs is Cy-press Research’s MegaPhone, a softwaretelephone and answering machine based onCypress Research’s PhonePro (see review,June ’95, page 43). The bundled version ofMegaPhone includes a 30-day demo of theextended version, which is well worth theextra $49.


Unlike most computer-based speaker-phones, MegaPhone operates in full-duplexmode. This means that you can speak andlisten at the same time, using your Mac’sspeakers, as you would if you were using aregular phone line; you don’t have to pause

for a moment before and after speaking.As a digital answering machine, Mega-

Phone can play outgoing messages andrecord incoming messages as audio on yourhard disk. You can use Call Screening, soyou can decide whether or not to answer acall when it comes in, or turn on Do NotDisturb to send messages directly to yourdigital voice-mail without the phone’s ring-ing. The received messages appear as a listin a window, showing you the date and timeof the call, and to play a message, you clickon it. As with a real answering machine, youcan fast-forward or rewind the messageswhen they’re playing, and you can call inand listen to them from an outside phone.

MegaPhone has its own telephone book,and once you’ve set up a list of contacts in it,you can dial a number simply by clicking onit. Otherwise, you type in the number fromyour keyboard. MegaPhone automaticallyconverts alphabet letters to numbers, so youdon’t have to figure out which numbers cor-respond to, say, 800-55-JOKES. You can alsoset up AppleScript scripts to automaticallydial numbers at appropriate times, soMegaPhone might call your broker whenyour stock program informs you that Coca-Cola stock has dropped to $30 a share, for

A telephone and answering machine in softwaMegaPhone is the prize component of the Apple Telecom Adapter Kit. MegaPhone even provides atelephone book for storing contacts and phone n

instance. MegaPhone’s PowerDial takescare of dialing special prefixes for accesscodes, area codes, and international codesas well as suffixes for calling-card andcredit-card calls.

The only major qualm we had about theGeoPort Telecom Adapter Kit is that theApple Express Modem’s maximum data-transfer speed is only 14.4 kbps, when 28.8-kbps modems are already becoming com-mon. The 14.4-kbps speed seems evenodder when you consider that the DSP or

PowerPC could let you connectat high speeds over digital tele-phone PBXs and ISDN lines,which are off-limits to most or-dinary modems. And you can’tsubstitute an ordinary hard-ware modem for the ExpressModem, because MegaPhoneworks only with the Apple Ex-press Modem and the GlobalVillage TelePort Gold IIv mo-dem, a hardware 14.4-kbpsvoice/fax modem. But since theExpress Modem is software,upgrading to a version that sup-

ports V.34 or ISDN speeds — when it be-comes available — should be less expensivethan paying for a hardware upgrade.

The Bottom Line

You can buy voice-mail systems and faxsoftware and patch together a telecommu-nications center with your Mac, but it’s un-likely you’ll be able to get everything theApple GeoPort Telecom Adapter Kit deliversfor its price. This bundle lets you use theDSP in your AV Mac or the PowerPC in yourPower Mac to its fullest — almost — deliv-ering an impressive, full-featured telecom-munications system at an even more im-pressive price. / John Rizzo

re,GeoPort

umbers.

REVIEWS PRINTERS

HP DeskJet 1600CM and Lexmark ColorJetprinter 4079 plus / Inkjet printers forbusiness and graphics pros.

THE MOST-AFFORDABLE color printersfor business and graphics users are inkjetprinters. Two recently introduced modelsoffer major improvements over their prede-cessors. Street-priced at less than $2,000,the Hewlett-Packard DeskJet 1600CM is thequickest and most capable inkjet printerwe’ve seen. Although HP has targeted busi-ness users, even discriminating graphicspros will be pleased with the quality of thenew DeskJet’s output. The more expensiveLexmark Color Jetprinter 4079 plus is aimedat users of graphics applications, but theprinter’s less than stellar output and incon-venient media-selection process detractfrom its appeal.

HP DeskJet 1600CM

Ideal for small to midsized workgroups, theDeskJet 1600CM produces better-lookingoutput at a faster pace than its predecessor,the DeskJet 1200C/PS. The new PostScriptLevel 2 printer clearly means business —out of the box, it comes equipped with anHP JetDirect card, which lets you connect itto either an EtherTalk or a LocalTalk net-work, as well as with a Centronics parallelinterface. The printer also comes with 4 MBof memory and an Intel RISC processor.


The HP DeskJet 1600CM (left) is the most versathe office or design shop. The Lexmark Color Jetpoverall quality of its output isn’t on a par with th

For mixed-platform workgroups, theDeskJet 1600CM can automatically switchbetween network and parallel interfaces aswell as between the PCL 5C and PostScriptprinter languages. A simple context-sensi-tive one-button control panel on the front ofthe printer makes operation easy.

The DeskJet 1600CM prints impressivelygood-looking color documents at 300 x 300dpi. There are four ink cartridges, each ofwhich is rated for about 900 prints at 5-percent coverage. Each cartridge has agauge, so you can easily see how much ink itcontains. When a cartridge runs out of inkduring a print job, two things happen: Theprinter completes the current page andstops, and the driver software notifies youthat a cartridge is out of ink. However,there’s no warning that tells you when a car-tridge is running low before you start toprint — to stay on top of ink levels, you haveto remember to lift the front cover andcheck the gauges.

We achieved the highest-quality colorprints with special glossy paper, but the realbeauty of the DeskJet 1600CM is that it pro-duces very good-looking output on plainpaper. A built-in heater dries the ink, sothere’s very little paper wrinkling.

tile and affordable inkjet printer you can buy forrinter 4079 plus prints vibrant color, but the

e HP printer’s.

HP’s proprietary ColorSmart Technologylets the printer make smart decisions aboutcolor and dithering, based on each elementon a page — text, graphics, and photo-graphic images. But there’s a hitch: To takeadvantage of ColorSmart, you must haveApple’s QuickDraw GX extension installed.For black text and line art, the DeskJet1600CM prints at a 600-x-600-dpi resolu-tion, using HP’s REt (Resolution Enhance-ment technology), so you get nice crispedges and smooth curves.

The paper-handling features can meetthe needs of busy workgroups. The printercomes with an adjustable 180-sheet tray forletter-, legal-, or A4-sized pages. If you needmore capacity, you can opt for a $379 500-sheet tray.

Color Jetprinter 4079 plus

Lexmark’s new inkjet printer improves onthe print quality and speed of its IBM-madepredecessor, with a revamped Canon en-gine, a PostScript Level 2-compatible RIP,an AMD 29030 RISC processor, and 360-x-360-dpi resolution. Considering theprinter’s target audience — graphics usersand publishing pros — Lexmark offers anoptional internal hard drive for font storage.Graphics users will also like the ColorJetprinter’s ability to handle 11-x-17-inchtabloid-sized pages, but the printer doesn’tsupport tabloid bleeds.

Installation of the printer’s four ink car-tridges is simple and straightforward, andLexmark rates each cartridge for 205 pagesat 5-percent coverage. For networking, theColor Jetprinter comes with LocalTalk built-in — an external EtherTalk adapter is op-tional and costs $499. Included with theprinter is the MarkVision software utility,which handles basic tasks such as changingthe printer’s name and downloading fontsand PostScript files.

At print time, you can choose from fiveoutput-quality settings — we got the best-looking results in Pause mode, but ofcourse, printing with it takes the longest.One real drawback is that color pages arestill visibly wet, and smearable, when theycome out of the printer. And when weprinted on plain paper, the ink was so satu-rated that the paper wrinkled. If you plan toprint lots of documents that use generousamounts of color, we recommend that youuse coated paper. It ensures that colors stay


REVIEWS PRINTERS

vibrant and minimizes the amount of inkthat seeps into the paper.

One other problem with the Color Jet-printer has to do with media handling. Theprinter comes with an adjustable built-inflip-down paper tray that holds 100 sheetsof letter- or tabloid-sized media. We printedletter-sized documents without a hitch, butwhen we switched to tabloid-sized docu-ments, using our application’s Page Setupcommand, our documents passed throughthe printer and came out with letter-sizedoutput. That’s because Lexmark requiresyou to manually change the media size byusing the printer’s LCD front panel. A muchmore convenient approach would allow us-ers to control the media size from theirMacs.

Battle of the Inkjets

To gauge how the Color Jetprinter and theDeskJet 1600CM compare in output qualityand speed, we used a test suite that mirrorsthe kinds of documents typically printed bybusiness users and graphics pros. For ourspeed tests, we chose settings that producedacceptable, although not superior, outputfrom each printer. When we compared out-put quality from the two printers, weprinted on coated media at the highest-quality setting for each printer. The Lex-mark printer was equipped with 12 MB ofmemory and the HP printer with 8.5 MB.Our test platform was a Power Mac 6100/60with 40 MB of RAM running System 7.5.1over LocalTalk.

In terms of output quality, the HP printerclearly has the edge over Lexmark’s offer-ing, for both graphics and text. Althoughthe Lexmark printer’s color output is vi-brant, it’s compromised by striping. Print-ing in Pause mode minimizes the effect, but

Hewlett-Packard DeskJet1600CM mmmm

Price: $2,479 (list).

Pros: Built-in LocalTalk and EtherTalk. Excellentoutput quality, even on plain paper. Goodspeed.

Cons: ColorSmart requires the QuickDraw GXextension. No indicators to tell you when inklevels are low.

Company: Hewlett-Packard, Santa Clara, CA;800-752-0900 or 800-387-3867 (Canada).


it’s still visible, especially in solid areas ofcolor.

In our speed tests, the Lexmark printerwas considerably faster than HP’s at print-ing a QuarkXPress document comprisingseveral TIFF images, colored text, down-loadable fonts, and clip art (8 minutes forthe Lexmark and 11 for the HP printer). TheHP printer’s drying process contributed toits slower print speed, but because theheater lets you print very successfully onplain paper, it’s well worth the speed hit.

When we printed our five-page colorMicrosoft PowerPoint document, the HPprinter finished in 10 minutes, compared tonearly 14 for the Lexmark printer. Neck andneck at printing a complex color Adobe Il-lustrator document, the two printers fin-ished in about 2 minutes.

Because the HP printer is aimed at thebusiness market, we also speed-tested it byusing a ten-page text-only Microsoft Worddocument — a good indicator of enginespeed. Although HP claims that the printer’sengine speed is 8 ppm in normal mode,those results are based on printing a PCLfile from a PC running under DOS. Forprinting on the Mac, our results showed theprinter’s engine speed to be closer to 4 ppm.

The Bottom Line

We were impressed with the HP DeskJet1600CM — it represents a new class ofinkjet printer that offers unprecedentedversatility, as well as excellent output qual-ity, for the price. Whether you’re searchingfor an affordable color printer for the designshop or for the office, the new DeskJet is agood buy. The Lexmark Color Jetprinter4079 plus, on the other hand, boasts vibrantcolors, but striping mars the overall qualityof the printer’s output. / Tony A. Bojorquez

Lexmark Color Jetprinter4079 plus mmm

Price: $3,199 (list).

Pros: Simple installation. Good speed.

Cons: Striping in color output. Pr ints are wetand smearable. Confusing media-selectionprocess.

Company: Lexmark, Greenwich, CT;800-891-0331 or 606-232-2000.


REVIEWS STORAGE AND CD-ROM DRIVES / RESOURCES

Panasonic PowerDrive2 LF-1000AB / Newdrive doubles as a CD-ROM player and aremovable-storage device.

Panasonic PowerDrive2

LF-1000AB mmmh

Price: $995; 650-MB PD cartridge, $59 (list).

Pros: Removable-storage and CD-ROM drivetake up a single SCSI ID.

Cons: Slow. Proprietary cartridges.

Company: Panasonic Communications &Systems, Secaucus, NJ; 800-742-8086 or201-348-7000.


UNLIKELY TO WIN the heavy-weight title as either the fastestCD-ROM drive or the highest-

capacity removable drive, Panasonic’s newPowerDrive2 LF-1000AB nevertheless packsa few good punches as a hybrid device. Theswitch-hitting PowerDrive2 works both as aquad-speed CD-ROM drive and as a phase-change optical drive, and with two drives inone, it’s more compact than twoseparate drives would be anduses only one SCSI ID.

What It Doesn’t Do

It’s probably just as important tomention what the PowerDrive2

does not do as to say what it does.It uses its own proprietary opti-cal media, 650-MB PD car-tridges, which cost $59.95 each.It doesn’t work with other opticalmedia. It’s neither as fast as a Sy-Quest drive nor as inexpensive asan Iomega Zip drive, and youcan’t use it instead of a CD-Rdrive, because only the Power-Drive2 can read the PD cartridges. But it’seasier to set up and use than a CD-R drive,and you can write to and overwrite the PDcartridges several times.

When you insert a CD-ROM into thePowerDrive2 tray, the drive works just likeany regular CD-ROM drive. The CD-ROMsoftware that ships with the drive is mini-mal, consisting simply of a driver and theCorelSCSI Audio utility, which lets you usethe drive for listening to audio CDs. ThePowerDrive2’s speed is squarely in themiddle of the range for 4x CD-ROM drives.You might want to consider adding a third-party CD-ROM program such as FWB’s CD-ROM ToolKit or CharisMac Engineering’sCD AutoCache to improve its speed.

To use the PowerDrive2 as a removable-storage device, you load a PD cartridge(about the size of a CD caddy) into the CD-ROM tray. The cartridge appears as an iconon the desktop. Once you’ve initialized andconfigured the cartridge with the bundledCorelSCSI Tools, you can use drag-and-

InnovativLF-1000ABchange opsingle SCS


drop to move files to it, as you would to anymounted volume.

The PowerDrive2’s driver software has anannoying quirk: CorelSCSI Tools must beopen whenever you mount a cartridge. If it’snot, you get a message asking you to initial-ize the cartridge, as if you’d inserted anuninitialized floppy. But if you try to use theMac Finder to initialize the cartridge, you’ll

get a dialog box telling you that the car-tridge is locked — whether it is or not. Ifyou want to use the cartridges for auto-mated backup, you will also have to buy abackup application, such as Dantz Develop-ment’s Retrospect.

Slow but Stable

Writing to a PD cartridge demonstratesboth the pluses and the minuses of opticalmedia. Like those of most optical-mediadrives, the PowerDrive2 mechanism does asecond pass after it’s written data to the car-tridge to verify that the data was writtencorrectly. You can turn off the verification,although we recommend leaving it on, be-cause we’d rather have an undamagedbackup than a small improvement in speed.In our tests, the PowerDrive2 was about asfast as current optical drives; about half asfast as SyQuest, Bernoulli, and Zip drives;and one-third as fast as a Quantum 1-GBhard drive.

Depending on your removable-backup

e and convenient, the Panasonic PowerDrive2

works as both a CD-ROM drive and a phase-tical drive, so you get dual functionality at aI address.

needs, the PowerDrive2 is either a bargain ora luxury at today’s prices. For the same $995that buys you the PowerDrive2, you couldbuy a low-end 230-MB optical-media driveand a 4x CD-ROM drive separately. But forthose who need 650 MB of removable stor-age, the PowerDrive2 costs less than a high-end 650-MB optical drive alone. And othervendors that will be selling the PowerDrive2

under their labels are expected to price iteven more competitively.

Panasonic has a strong commitment tothe PowerDrive2 and has solid plans for itsfuture. The company has an internal modelof the PowerDrive2 and at press time was fi-nalizing agreements with vendors of Mac-compatible products to offer the Power-Drive2 as an option. Panasonic also plans tocreate a PowerDrive2 with a Super Densitydrive that can read the Super Density CD-ROMs, expected in the near future. Theywill hold 5, 9, 10, and even 18 GB of data ona single disc. There are also plans for aPowerDrive2 jukebox, a CD changer, and aWORM (write-once, read-many) version ofthe PD cartridge. And in about a year, thePanasonic drive will be competing against asimilar CD-ROM/optical-media drive fromSony and Philips, which might spur com-petitive pricing.

The Bottom Line

As convenient as it is to have both a CD-ROM drive and an optical drive occupyingonly a single SCSI address, the PowerDrive2

is unlikely to usurp the position of SyQuestor Zip drives as an industry standard forremovable media because of its cost. Butas production ramps up in the comingmonths, prices for the drive, as well as for itscartridges, will probably drop to more-competitive levels — at the same time asPanasonic keeps it on the cutting edge ofnew technology. / Kristina De Nike

Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate DictionaryThe last word on words.

Merriam-Webster’s CollegiateDictionary, Deluxe ElectronicEdition 1.0 mmmh

Price: $49.95 (list).

Pros: Links to included thesaurus. Fastsearch engine. Unique types of searches.Comprehensive entries.

Cons: Cannot define words from within a wordprocessor. Indistinct illustrations.

Company: Merriam-Webster, Springfield, MA;800-828-1880 or 413-734-3134.


IF YOU LOVE WORDS — their etymology,their antonyms, and their modern usage —you’ll love the CD-ROM-based Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, DeluxeElectronic Edition. The 160,000-word dic-tionary falls short of the 200,000-wordAmerican Heritage and 315,000-word Ran-dom House electronic dictio-naries, but Merriam-Webstermore than makes up for itwith its informative entries,powerful search routines,and clever word games.

Merriam-Webster’s elec-tronic dictionary includesbiographical and geographi-cal names, foreign words,and abbreviations. When youlook up a word, you get muchmore than its definition.Separate fields for pronun-ciation, function, usage, ety-mology, and date of earliestrecorded use bring out thestories behind each word.Synonym and usage para-graphs show you the differences betweensimilar words, and sample phrases andquotations illustrate each word’s currentuse. The dictionary is linked to a 130,000-entry thesaurus. Clicking on the Thesaurusbutton takes you from a word’s definition toits synonyms and antonyms. However, youcan’t look up a word by double-clicking onit in a document in a word-processor — afeature in other electronic dictionaries andin this dictionary’s Windows version.Merriam-Webster says the Mac version willhave this feature in a future release.

If you have 28 MB of free disk space, youcan install the dictionary and the thesauruson your hard disk, for fast searches. As withother electronic dictionaries, you candouble-click on a word in any field to see itsdefinition and use wildcard characters tofind words you’re not sure how to spell. Butthis dictionary’s real strength is its uniquesearch capabilities. For instance, you cantype 1958 into the Date field to find all thewords that were coined that year. You can domultiple-field searches by using AND andOR operators — for instance, you can find

In addition tCollegiate Dicwhen a wordcrossword pu

all the slang words of Spanish origin. If youenjoy word puzzles, you can use the special-ized searches to help you cheat, er, find theword or words you need. You can also dowildcard searches in the pronunciation fieldto find a list of rhyming words.

The dictionary has a few quirks. You have

to click on a camera icon, which sometimesobscures the definition, in order to see an il-lustration. And the illustrations are indis-tinct. The online help has useful pronuncia-tion and style guides, but the guides sufferfrom grammatical mistakes.

The Bottom Line

Despite a few annoyances, the Merriam-Webster dictionary is a fun and invaluableresource for anyone who works or playswith words. / Aileen Abernathy

o providing definitions, Merriam-Webster’stionary, Deluxe Electronic Edition, can tell youwas first used, find synonyms, and even solvezzles.


REVIEWS WORD PROCESSING

WordPerfect 3.5 / Novell’s stellar wordprocessor gains easy-to-use Internetpublishing tools.

TEAMING A HEAVYWEIGHT feature setwith an elegant and unobtrusive interface,Novell’s WordPerfect is giving MicrosoftWord a real run for its money. Ironically, asWord for the Mac has grown more Win-dows-like in version 6, WordPerfect for theMac — which began life as a rather poorlydisguised DOS program — has become aparadigm for well-designed Mac applica-tions. The latest version of WordPerfectgains an even wider lead over its archrival,with more nimble performance than be-

fore, plus the addition of several key fea-tures, including new easy-to-use Internetpublishing tools.

Just Browsing

The big news with WordPerfect 3.5 is its in-corporation of HTML (HyperText MarkupLanguage), which means you can importHTML documents from the Internet intoWordPerfect and edit them or create yourown World Wide Web pages for the Net fromdirectly within WordPerfect. You also getfree with the package the latest version ofthe Netscape Navigator Web browser, whichlets you preview the HTML pages you createwithin WordPerfect as well as browse theNet if you’re already connected.

WordPerfect makes many aspects ofHTML coding, such as background colorand pattern selection, a snap — for ex-ample, there’s no need to calculate funky


hexadecimal color codes — simply pick abackground color or pattern from a palette.The new HTML bar provides easy access tomenus that let you format selected text asheadings or as body text, and there’s a vari-ety of standard character-level formats youcan use, including Emphasis, Strikeout,Strong, and the infamous Blink. Addition-ally, WordPerfect provides buttons for hori-zontal lines, quotation formatting, and add-ing images. To see what your page will looklike in a Web browser, you simply click on

the Preview button to launch NetscapeNavigator (or the browser of your choice)and then load your page. When you’re happywith your coding, you save your pages asHTML, and then they’re ready for your Website.

Several other HTML features are pro-vided separately from the HTML bar. If youwant to create bulleted or numbered lists,you use WordPerfect’s bulleted-list and out-line-formatting commands. To link text in adocument to other text, either in the samedocument or in other documents, you em-ploy WordPerfect’s new BookMarks andHyperLinks. You can even create links toInternet addresses. When you click on a linkto an Internet URL (Uniform Resource Lo-cator), WordPerfect launches NetscapeNavigator and passes it the address — veryslick.

Creating BookMarks and HyperLinks is a

Create your ownWorld Wide Webpages from withinWordPerfect, usingversion 3.5’s easy-to-use HTML tools. Freewith the package isthe NetscapeNavigator Webbrowser, which letsyou preview yourWeb pages.

simple point-and-click process. You beginby highlighting the text you want to link toand labeling it as a BookMark. Next, youhighlight the text that will take users to theBookMark and define it as a HyperLink. Apop-up menu lets you define your Book-Mark as the HyperLink’s target. When you’redone, clicking on the HyperLink text(HyperLinks appear underscored and in atext color of your choosing) takes you di-rectly to the linked BookMark.

I’ll Take You There

All the BookMarks you create appear in ahandy pop-up menu — select a BookMark,and WordPerfect takes you to the selectedtext. The pop-up menu even maintains ahistorical record of all the BookMarksyou’ve visited, including those located onWeb pages. When you save a document con-taining HyperLinks in HTML format, thelinks become properly formatted HTML an-chor tags.

In addition to HTML features and Book-Marks, WordPerfect 3.5 includes severalother noteworthy additions. Text-to-speechcapabilities let you hear either an entiredocument or a specific selection spoken byone of several Apple system voices. ThePrint Envelope command provides a nicelydesigned dialog box that lets you enter ad-dresses or retrieve stored ones into a stan-dard or custom-sized envelope. In additionto typical font and size options, WordPerfectprovides a wealth of Postal Service-approved bar-code formats.

The unique Make It Fit command lets youspecify how many pages long you want yourdocument to be, and WordPerfect willmodify line height and spacing, type size,and margins to make it so. You even havecontrol over what gets modified.

WordPerfect 3.5 ships with two mini-applications, called QuickTasks, that you areable to call up from within the word proces-sor. One QuickTask allows you to importdata from Excel spreadsheets, the otherfrom FileMaker databases. The noteworthything about this feature is that the datacomes nicely formatted in a WordPerfecttable.

Smart Templates

The new WordPerfect package is chock-fullof template documents — there are morethan 80 new ones that range from fax cover

Addressing envelopes is a snap withWordPerfect 3.5’s well-designed dialog box.

REVIEWS WORD PROCESSING

sheets to business cards to letters. AndWordPerfect’s templates are more thansimple predefined files — they containbuilt-in macros that prompt you for the in-formation (name, address, and phonenumber, for example) required to fill in thedocument. After you have entered the in-formation, the program automaticallychannels it to the correct location in thedocument.

WordPerfect also makes it easy to createyour own templates, complete with the spe-cial macros needed for prompting users forthe required information and for placing itin the proper location. To make frequentlyused templates easy to access, you canplace them on the Templates menu underthe File menu.

New features aside, WordPerfect’s well-designed interface continues to be its mostappealing characteristic. It’s clean and un-cluttered, yet it provides easy access to richformatting options via various icon bars.You can hide any bars you don’t need. Ver-sion 3.5 highlights each button or pop-upmenu on a bar as you move your pointerover it, which means you don’t have to beprecise when you click on an item to selectit. The one feature we’d like to see that’smissing is the ability to collapse a docu-ment to an outline and then reorganize it by

WordPerfect 3.5 mmmmh

Price: $189 (list).

Pros: Well-designed interface. Robust featureset. Nimble performance. Easy-to-use HTMLand HyperLink tools.

Cons: Can’t collapse documents to outlines toreorganize them.

Company: Novell, Orem, UT; 800-451-5151 or801-225-5000.


moving headings as well as subheadings.Last, but far from least, Novell has

slashed the list price of WordPerfect from$395 to $189!

The Bottom Line

With version 3.5 of WordPerfect, a great toolbecomes even better. Novell’s word proces-sor is quick and responsive, even when it’s

being run on a lowly PowerBook Duo 230,and the program is no slouch when it comesto features — there’s everything from abuilt-in draw program to automated tablesof contents to on-the-fly spelling correc-tion. And the slick new HTML featuresin the latest release put WordPerfect usersdirectly on the crest of the Internet wave./ Eric Taub


REVIEWS DRAWING TABLETS

Wacom ArtPad II, Wacom ArtZ II, andSummagraphics Summa ExpressionStop mousing around.

IF YOU’RE STILL using a mouse withyour graphics program, your system’s duefor an overhaul. Smaller graphics tabletsthat cost less than their full-sized siblingshave been available for a while, and nowthere’s even more incentive to purchase one.Wacom has improved its ArtPad and ArtZtablets and lowered their prices. Anothernew contender is the SummagraphicsSumma Expression, but it offers too little,too late.

Each of the tablets comes with a stylus,which gives you precise control over thecursor, making the tablets well suited forgraphics work. You can also use the stylusand the tablet to do anything you’d do with amouse, such as navigate Mac menus, selectspreadsheet cells, and highlight text. Eachstylus is also pressure-sensitive.

Wacom ArtPad II

The mouse-pad-sized ArtPad is the small-est and least expensive pressure-sensitivegraphics tablet you can buy. The latest in-carnation has an innovative twist on its sty-lus: an eraser. The eraser is plastic, and iterases digitally. It’s shaped like a pencil-toperaser and houses a spring, so wheneveryou rub with it, it feels as if you’re using areal eraser.

In the graphics applications that supportthe new digital eraser, whenever you flipthe stylus over, the application automati-cally selects its own eraser tool. When yourub on the tablet with the eraser, the pro-gram erases the corresponding parts ofyour illustration. When you flip the stylusback to its tip, the application returns youto the tool you were using before. Like thetip, the eraser is pressure-sensitive, so theharder you press, the greater the effect you’llget.

Graphics applications that supportedthe eraser at press time include AdobePhotoshop 3.0.4, Fractal Design Dabbler1.0a, FutureWave’s SmartSketch 1.0, StrataMediaPaint, and the PowerPC-native ver-sion of Fractal Design Painter 3.1.

The eraser also works like the Clear com-mand to delete text in applications such as


word processors, PIMs, databases, andspreadsheets. You simply highlight with theeraser the characters you want deleted, andwhen you lift the eraser from the tablet, theydisappear.

The ArtPad II’s erasing stylus does notemploy batteries, so it is light, trim, and

maintenance-free. But its lightness alsomeans that you can’t trace through a stackof documents more than an eighth of aninch thick. (The battery-powered Summa-graphics stylus, in comparison, is able totrace through a stack that’s up to three-quarters of an inch thick.) The productwould also benefit from two customizablebuttons on the side of the stylus instead ofone.

With a 4-x-5-inch drawing area, the Art-Pad II is unsuitable for tracing anythingbigger than a postcard or a snapshot. And itdoesn’t have any macro buttons on the tab-let or as many features as its larger sibling,the ArtZ II. But with a street price that’s hov-ering around $150, it’s a terrific deal forchildren and people who simply want todoodle.

Wacom ArtZ II

If you want an erasing stylus and a slightlybigger, but still inexpensive, tablet that hasmore features, check out the ArtZ II. Forabout $330, you get the stylus as well as a

6-x-8-inch drawing area, a clear-plasticoverlay to hold drawings in place for trac-ing, and a menu bar accessible right on thetablet. It has a large border that is wideenough for your hand to rest on it whenyou’re drawing.

The on-tablet menu bar is a new featurein the ArtZ II. The menu bar has 2 buttonsthat let you adjust pressure sensitivity aswell as 16 customizable buttons, to whichyou can assign keystroke combinations ormacros that you write with a macro pro-gram. Nine of the buttons are already preset

to do common operations such as cut, copy,and paste, but their labels are small anddifficult to read.

The ArtZ II also has advanced custom-ization options, which you access on its con-trol panel. You can set a preferred pressurerange, so, for instance, the stylus can pro-duce proportionally thicker lines when youpress harder than it would with its normalsensitivity. You can set different ranges ofpressure sensitivity for different applica-tions too.

The ArtZ II stylus can sense the angle atwhich you’re tilting the stylus tip or eraserso that applications can translate that infor-mation into appropriately broader or thin-ner strokes.

Summa Expression

The Summa Expression stands out for hav-ing controls directly on the tablet, insteadof having them hidden in a control panel,for setting up a zip area. A zip area allowsyou to map the entire screen to a smallerportion of the tablet, so you’ll be able to

The best inexpensivedrawing tablet is theWacom ArtPad II(bottom). The WacomArtZ II (top) costsmore, but it gives youa larger pad andmore features. TheSummagraphicsSumma Expression(left) gives you adrawing area thesame size as the ArtZII’s, but it falls short ofthe Wacom tablet infeatures.

REVIEWS DRAWING TABLETS

navigate quickly when you need to.But at roughly the same size and the same

price as the ArtZ II, the Summa Expressiongives you fewer features. The tablet has onlysix customizable buttons, preset to matchyour first six function keys; if you want tocustomize them, you have to make use of amacro utility. The drawing area’s border,which is decorated with an offbeat design, isuncomfortably small. You can adjust pres-sure sensitivity, but you can’t create differ-ent settings for different applications and

SummagraphicsSumma Expression mmm

Price: $389 (list).

Pros: Heavier pen can trace through thickdocuments. Pressure scaling and zip featuresadjustable with on-tablet buttons.

Cons: Awkward tablet design. Only sixcustomizable buttons on tablet, which requirewriting macros.

Company: Summagraphics, Austin, TX;800-337-8662 or 512-835-0900.


the stylus doesn’t have tilt sensitivity.The heavier, wider stylus requires a bat-

tery, which can be problematic if the batterydies late at night in the middle of a project. Ifthe Summa Expression stylus’s two custom-izable side buttons or the ability to drawthrough thicker layers than with the Wacomstyli have you considering the Summa Ex-pression over the ArtZ II, you might want tolook at the full-featured, similarly sized Cal-Comp DrawingSlate II (see review, July ’95,page 44).

Wacom ArtPad II mmmmh

Price: $174.99; bundled with Fractal DesignDabbler, $189.99 (list).

Pros: Inexpensive. Small. Erasing stylus.

Cons: Too small for tracing. Only one buttonon stylus.

Company: Wacom Technology, Vancouver, WA;206-750-8882.


The Bottom Line

The Wacom ArtPad II is a terrific mouse al-ternative, with basic features for controland accuracy in draw and paint packages.For more money, you can buy a bigger tabletwith more features — the most intuitiveproduct we’ve seen is the 6-x-8-inch WacomArtZ II. Summagraphics’ Summa Expres-sion, on the other hand, doesn’t offer asmuch as the ArtZ II or CalComp Drawing-Slate II, reviewed in our last drawing-tabletroundup. / Shelley Cryan s


Wacom ArtZ II mmmmh

Price: $389.99 (list).

Pros: Highly customizable. Erasing stylus.Large handrest. Tilt-sensitive.

Cons: Some menu labels difficult to read. Onlyone stylus button.

Company: Wacom Technology, Vancouver, WA;206-750-8882.


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A Passion for Art / Magnificent museum
A SPECTACULAR CD-ROM, A Passion for Art gives you a look insidethe private collection of Dr. Albert Barnes, which includes work bythe likes of Renoir, Cézanne, Matisse, and Picasso.
To explore the gallery, simply click on one of seven buttons to vir-tually walk through the gallery and look at the paintings one by one,examine documents and audio archives, create your own slide showof your favorite works, or go on one of four guided tours.Art History. If you decide that you want to explore the gallery on yourown, you can focus on any work that catches your eye and fromthere access text that gives you more information about the paint-ing, the artist, and other artworks in that person’s portfolio. You caneven examine the art more closely by using the zoom and super-zoom tools, to see, for instance, the painstaking pointillist tech-nique Seurat employed in Sunday Afternoon on the Island of LaGrande Jatte.

The guided tours are flawlessly presented in a documentary man-ner, with narration from art-world notables on prominent themesthroughout the collection. There’seven a tour about Dr. Barnes that de-scribes his rise from poverty to hisamassment of what is widely regardedto be one of the world’s greatest artcollections.

A Passion for Art is a fantastic ac-complishment that imparts the mag-nificence of the works that adorn itswalls along with the spirit of Dr.Barnes. / Kristin M. Balleisen

A Passion for Art mmmmm / Price: $45 (es-timated street). Company: Corbis Publishing,Bellevue, WA; 206-526-6000 (distributed byMaxis, 800-526-2947). Reader Service: Circle#415.


File Genie Pro / Conjuring up a search

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NEED TO QUICKLY FIND and retrieve files stored on your manyoptical discs, floppy disks, CD-ROMs, and other removable media?Duet Development’s File Genie Pro is a swift and easy-to-use file-search and automatic-disk-cataloging utility that lets you find filesstored on any of your local or removable media.Your File Is Served. Graphic artists who work withvarious removable media will find File Genie Proa real time-saver — it searches and catalogs amedium in as little as three seconds. Once you’vefound your file, the software prompts you to load the medium it’son, open the file, print it, and even move it to the Trash. Launchedvia the Finder’s File menu, it also lets you initiate as many searchesas you want without losing the results of your previous searches. Butit unfortunately doesn’t allow you to save frequently used searches.

It has other limitations: For instance, search results are limited tothe first 500 files File Genie Pro encounters and it can’t use morethan one criterion in a search. Those who like what File Genie Prodoes can instead buy a comparably priced cataloging utility such asContinuum Software’s Virtual Disk and use it in conjunction withSystem 7.5’s more versatile Find File utility. / Steve Rubel

File Genie Pro 1.1 mmm / Pr ice: $89 (list). Company: Duet Development,Campbell, CA; 408-559-3838. Reader Service: Circle #416.

FontChameleon Starter KitFabulous fonts fast
AN ATTRACTIVE alternative to Adobe’s multiple-master technology, FontChameleon gives you the
freedom to create unlimited PostScript or TrueType fonts by ma-nipulating aspects of a core set of master font descriptors.Bargain Typefaces. The new Starter Kit edition contains seven fontfamilies (Berkeley Oldstyle, Century Schoolbook, Frutiger, Gal-liard, Helvetica, Helvetica Neue, and Kabel), with 47 typefacesamong them. Each font is in the form of a master font descriptor youmanipulate with sliders to change aspects such as x-height, de-scender depth, and weight. FontChameleon then generates Post-Script or TrueType fonts based on your settings. Each descriptortakes only about 4K of space, so you can create thousands of fontswithout needing the disk space thousands of conventional fontswould take up. After you’ve created a font, you can save it in its en-tirety or throw it away and save only its descriptor settings so thatyou can re-create it. FontChameleon can also create fonts by usingcommercially available AFM (Adobe Font Metrics) files.

The new version can create true italic fonts, the lack of which wasa major shortcoming of the first release (see review, October ’94,page 55). Furthermore, the redesigned interface in this versionsparkles, with easier-to-use sliders and resizable windows.

You can enhance the FontChameleon Starter Kit with any of fourFontChameleon add-on type collections, which cost between $25and $40 per collection. If you want a more thorough set of font de-scriptors and typefaces, you can opt for the $295 full edition, whichcomes with 51 font families, including 220 typefaces in all, and is ul-timately a better value for those who can afford it. / Gregory Wasson

FontChameleon Starter Kit 1.5 mmmm / P rice: $55 (list). Company: A resSoftware, Foster City, CA; 415-578-9090. Reader Service: Circle #417.



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Snap Mail 2.0 / And e-mail for all
IF YOU NEED an electronic-mail system for your small or medium-sized business, you’ll find that the inexpensive and easy-to-useSnap Mail 2.0.2 may have all the features you need — including theoption of adding an Internet gateway. Snap Mail is also one of thefew PowerPC-native e-mail packages available.Simple Efficiency. First-time Snap Mail users will be pleasantly sur-prised by its simple, uncluttered interface. The top part of the mainwindow has the InBox, which lists mail you’ve received and a direc-tory of users. You select a message and click on the Open button toread it. The bottom part of the window has the OutBox, in which youcompose and send messages. You have to be careful how you startthe message, however, since Snap Mail doesn’t have a subject fieldand automatically uses the first few words to label your message.
This version of Snap Mail is packed with new features. You cannow enclose folders and files up to 15 MB in size by dragging themfrom the Finder and dropping them into the Snap Mail main win-dow. The new Find function can search through the text of all yourmessages, and you can store received mail in folders. There is also aTalk button, which lets you confer in real time over your network.The only major feature Snap Mail still lacks is an unsend feature.

Snap Mail can work in peer-to-peer mode, which stores messageson your hard disk that can’t be delivered immediately (such as ifyour recipient is off the network temporarily). However, for thismode, you have to leave your computer on if you don’t want to loseundelivered messages.

Alternatively, you can use Snap Mail’s distributed server mode,which delivers undelivered mail addressed to unconnected users toa server when you turn off your Mac. You can use a single, dedicatedserver or distribute server work over several users’ machines(which have to be left on). You can also set your computer to alwayssend mail to a server and deliver it from there, which is useful forcomputers that are often disconnected from the network, such asPowerBooks and computers connecting through ARA.Get Connected. Snap Mail is a Mac-only product, but the Internetgateway you can buy with it, Information Access Technologies’Hologate, lets you exchange mail with a variety of PC and Mac e-mail systems that also have Internet gateways.

For small groups with networked Macs, Snap Mail 2.0.2 is a greatalternative to expensive corporate systems. / John Rizzo

Snap Mail 2.0.2 mmmm / Price: 5 users, $250; 10 users, $420; 50 users, $1,940(list). Company: Casady & Greene, Salinas, CA; 800-359-4920 or 408-484-9228.Reader Service: Circle #418.

PhotoMaker / Edit images for less
IF YOU LIKED Micro Frontier’s Color It! 2.2,which — for a fraction of the price — gaveyou much of Adobe Photoshop’s image-editing/painting prowess, you’ll love Mac-Soft’s PhotoMaker. PhotoMaker is Color It!,licensed from Micro Frontier and offered ata bargain-basement price of $29.95. Forthat modest investment, you get a CD-ROMwith PhotoMaker and 100 royalty-free pho-tographic images to play with.Full of Features. PhotoMaker 1.0 is a slicklittle program brimming with nifty, user-friendly features. It has a good selection oftools in a customizable tool box (frombrushes and airbrushes to smudgers andsharpeners), multiple undo levels, simpleand intuitive masking, and support formost Photoshop plug-ins. PhotoMaker’sown built-in filters are few but surprisinglyuseful — especially the Convolution filter,which has most of the power of Photoshop’sdaunting Custom filter but in a more easilycomprehensible package. PhotoMaker doesa dandy job of anti-aliasing text against anybackground, and it has nice select-by-color
features that Adobe got around tofully implementing only in Photo-shop 3.0.Quick and Dirty. PhotoMaker is a use-ful program to have when you needto modify or create an image in ahurry, even if you do have Photoshop.In the time it takes for Photoshop toload, you can be busily painting awayin PhotoMaker.

Although PhotoMaker does manythings nicely, it’s not a prepress or de-sign powerhouse. It doesn’t supportCMYK or pressure-sensitive styli,and its color-correction tools arelimited. Moreover, the overly chattyuser guide has some embarrassinglybad screen shots. But it’s hard to faultPhotoMaker, given its user-friendlypricing. For those who want to have funwith painting and image editing — butaren’t ready for the big-bucks investmentrequired by Photoshop, Painter, and LivePicture — PhotoMaker is a great way tostart off. Owners of the aforementioned

painting/image-editing heavyweights willalso find PhotoMaker a useful arrow to havein their quivers. / Eric Taub

PhotoMaker 1.0 mmmm / Pr ice: $29.95 (list).Company: MacSoft, M inneapolis, MN; 612-559-5140. Reader Service: Circle #419.


FreeMail 4.0 / Private roads off the information superhighway

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WHEN GETTING friends, family,and clients to communicate withyou over the information super-highway is too expensive or diffi-cult, you can create your own pri-

vate e-mail system, using the innovativeFreeMail. Unfortunately, the Mac version isriddled with serious user-interface anddocumentation defects.Friends Ride Free. With a single copy ofFreeMail, you can create an unlimited num-ber of child copies. These copies, whichcan’t create child copies of their own, re-quire almost no setup, since they comeprewired with all the information othersneed in order to communicate with you.

The standard version lets users with childcopies send short messages, up to 400 char-acters long, directly to you — if you’re theperson running the original, parent copy ofFreeMail — as well as messages to eachother, in which case you have to forwardthem. The more expensive Extended Familyversion lets users with child copies sendlonger messages and enclosed files both to

you and to each other, without your inter-vention. The Extended Family version alsolimits the number of child copies to 200,presumably to limit the volume of mail yourcomputer has to handle. You have to leaveyour computer on so that it can receive andforward messages.Misfit Windows. FreeMail was originallywritten for the Windows platform, and theMac version seems to have been ported withlittle revision. Some of the resulting inter-face problems, such as a button that doesn’tline up with other buttons, are minor, butmost of them are rather serious. For in-stance, in both the parent and child ver-sions, some interface elements are com-pletely unreadable on a monochromescreen, which is bad news unless you knowfor sure that everyone with a child copy hasa color screen.

The printed documentation is a Windowsmanual with haphazard additions for Macusers. You’ll need to know Mac equivalentsof Windows features to understand instruc-tions that tell you, for instance, to maximize

your windows or to press the Alt key. You’llalso need to know Windows conventions inorder to use the program, such as when adialog box pops up and asks you whetheryour floppy disk is in drive A or B.

Oddly, you can’t make child disks forWindows, even though your FreeMail net-work can have both Mac and Windows us-ers. If you have Windows correspondents,you’ll have to buy Windows child disks fromFreeMail for $5 each.

If you can work around the program’sWindows idiosyncrasies on your Mac, you’llfind that FreeMail works well: Sending andreceiving e-mail is remarkably easy. Whenthe company cleans up FreeMail’s interfaceand documentation for the Mac, as it prom-ises to do in an upcoming version, FreeMailmay just be the ticket for creating your ownprivate e-mail system easily and withoutfuss. / Michael Swaine

FreeMail 4.0 mm / Price: $74.95; Extended Familyversion, $595.95 (list). Company: FreeMail,Bozeman, MT; 406-586-4200. Reader S ervice: Circle#420.


APS HyperQIC / Quick and cheap individual backup

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IF YOU’VE FINALLY RESOLVED to back up your data every night,check out APS’ HyperQIC — a straightforward, rugged quarter-inch-cartridge (QIC) tape drive that can store as much as 4 GB ofcompressed data on each cartridge. The HyperQIC has decentspeeds for individual backup, and at $499.95, it costs considerablyless than the average DAT drive, which sells for about $800. The in-dividual HyperQIC cartridges, however, may be too expensive.

Like most other tape drives, the HyperQIC is easy to set up andsimple to use. The APS case has switchable DaTerm (digital activetermination), which can prevent termination problems on longSCSI chains. The drive comes with Dantz’s Retrospect 2.1, the lead-ing archive application for the Mac. APS does not include a tape withthe HyperQIC, but they are available through APS and other ven-dors for $32 to $35 each. The tape, which can hold 2 GB of uncom-pressed data, comes preformatted and ready to use.Like It Like DAT. Although the HyperQIC is as fast as the speedy, 28-MB-per-minute Digital Data Storage-2 DAT drive when it comes tothroughput with uncompressed data, it does not have hardwarecompression. If you want to store a full 4 GB of data on a HyperQICcartridge, you have to use Retrospect’s software compression op-tion. With the compression algorithm running on the Mac, the datastream to the tape drive is slower, especially with slower CPUs: Witha Power Mac 6100/60, we saw a 20-percent decrease in HyperQICspeed when we turned on software compression.

Because DAT drives use hardware compression, which doesn’t

affect the drive’s speed,and since a DAT cartridgeis cheaper than a Hyper-QIC cartridge (an average90-meter DAT cartridgecosts $8), a DAT drive is abetter choice for networkbackup and for use withgigabytes of data. DATdrives are also much quieter than the HyperQIC.Built to Last. Although the HyperQIC media and drive are sturdilybuilt, potential users should be aware that the HyperQIC’s cartridgesticks out of the drive during operation. A light on the front of thecase shows when the tape is in use, but the cartridge is not locked inplace and you can therefore pull the cartridge out during a write. Ifthis happens, the tape will still be usable but you will have to startthe copy process over again.

The HyperQIC is a small initial investment, it’s easy to use, andit’s plenty fast for single-workstation backup. If you’re careful, youshouldn’t have any problems with data security. However, the car-tridge prices are too high to make the HyperQIC an economicalchoice for every office. / Kristina De Nike

APS HyperQIC mmmh / Price: $499.95; cartridge, $34.95 — $31.95 in quantity(direct). Company: APS Technologies, Kansas City, MO; 800-235-2753 or 816-483-6100. Reader Service: Circle #421. s


What They’re S “Windows 95’

TEN FACTS EVERY MAC USERNEEDS TO KNOW ABOUT THE MAC OS’STOP RIVAL. By Rik Myslewski

Windows 95
The smoke from the fireworks has cleared, the stampeders’ dust
has settled, and the brass band has packed up and moved on. The Windows 95 coming-out party is over, and — like anyone left off a guest list — we Mac devotees may feel acurious mixture of regret and relief: Did we miss something important? Is someone,somewhere, having more fun than we are? Or were we simply lucky enough to havedodged an overpromoted bore?

The answers: yes, no, and maybe. Although it’s not the Mac killer that Microsoftwould like us to think it is, Windows 95 is a landmark product that affects all personal-computer users — including us Mac folks. And although we’re lucky enough to avoidinstalling it on our desktops, we would be naive to remain willfully ignorant of itsimportance.

Windows 95 threatens to fool neophytes into believing that a Wintel computer (Win-dows operating system, Intel microprocessor) is “as good as a Mac.” It also strengthensthe hand of IS managers who are looking for an excuse to ban Macs from the workplace.

But the Windows 95 user experience (Applespeak for user interface) isn’t “as good asa Mac” — not by a long shot. And don’t take just our word for it: Read what the PC presshas to say (see “What They’re Saying . . .” ). And as a Mac user, even if you’ll never haveto worry about your WINSOCK.DLL file being renamed (see Fact 6), you still need toknow some basic facts about Windows 95 — if only so you can respond to “It’s as goodas a Mac” with more than a “Sez who?”


aying . . .s look and feel mimics [the] Mac OS . . . but the overhaul is still skin-deep.“

— H erb Bethoney and Peter C offee, PC WEEK

WINDOWS 95

Complex and confusing, Windows 95’s Windows Explorernavigation system has garnered complaints from veteran Win-dows users who long for the simpler — though less powerful —File Manager of Windows 3.1 and Windows for Workgroups 3.11.

The much ballyhooedStart button and itscustomizable hierarchicalmenus allow Windows 95users easy access toapplications, utilities, andrecently used documents. Toour testers, however, theMac’s Apple and Applicationmenus were easier to usethan the Start button and itsassociated Task Bar.

Fact 1. Windows 95 will be a success.Don’t doubt it for an instant. Forget all the hemming and hawing inthe popular press. Ignore reports of untold complaints to Microsofttech support. Disregard the online rantings of disaffected nerds andthe cautious pessimism of many corporate IS managers: Windows95 will sell like hotcakes and will become the dominant operatingsystem for PC-compatible desktop computers.

In Windows 95’s first four days of availability, sales topped 1 mil-lion copies — astonishing even amid the frenzied hype of August’sWindows Week. Projections are that 30 million desktops will wel-come Windows 95 by the end of the year. We’re talking huge success— and for one very simple reason: need. Windows 95 has the dis-tinct marketing advantage of being a knight-in-shining-armorproduct — the OS it replaces is a dog.

Fact 2. Windows 95 is an improvement overprevious versions of Windows.Windows 3.1 and its more robust successor, Windows forWorkgroups 3.11, stink. They’re hard to install. They’re hard to use.They crash a lot. They make it a colossal pain to add hardware.


“. . . if Microsoft had been the innovative compan

Windows 95, despite its flaws, is a blessing to Wintel folks. AsApple’s advertisements have justly indicated, however, Win 95’s big-gest innovations are old news to Mac users: long filenames, a trashcan (called the Recycle Bin — appropriate for a P.C. universe),aliases (called shortcuts), a real honest-to-goodness desktop, easyswitching among applications, and the promise of plug-and-playsimplicity (once the peripherals industry implements Microsoft’sstandards).

Fact 3. Windows 95 is more difficult to use than theMac OS.You may be thinking, “It’s a Mac magazine. They have to say that.”Well, we never doubted it, but one of our sister magazines measuredit: When PC/Computing tested Windows 95 in its Usability Lab, nov-ice users rated it poor for managing files and unacceptable for work-ing with applications (they actually preferred Windows for Work-groups 3.11). “Testers were frustrated with even the simplest tasksin Windows 95,” was one comment. Furthermore, PC/Computingsaid, “The carefully controlled Macintosh environment is still theusability standard.” Thanks, guys.

y that it calls itself, it would have taken the opportunity to

take

A full-featured file finder that lets users search by multiple criteria and savecomplex searches is one of the best-executed aspects of the Windows 95 interface.Mac and Mac-compatible users won’t get a utility this powerful until the next versionof the Mac OS ships next year — or the year after that.

For many and varied reasons, users find the Mac easier to navi-gate than Windows 95. For example, take Windows 95’s muchvaunted Start button and Task Bar. Sorry, but we’re underwhelmed:Apple’s menu bar, application menu, and Apple menu do the samejobs far more elegantly.

A more specific (and quite typical) example is the Windows 95“shortcut” for adding an item to the Start menu: Move the pointer tothe Task Bar, and click the right mouse button. When the pop-upmenu appears, type R (no, it’s not listed on the menu, but don’t letthat distract you — this is a shortcut, remember?). Now type Con-trol-Tab and then A. You’ll be presented with a series of dialog boxesthat ask you first to enter the name of the item you want added to theStart menu, then to choose where you want to put it, then to type inwhat you want to call it, and finally to choose what icon you want torepresent it. By contrast, if you want to add an item to the Applemenu in the Mac OS, you select it and then choose “Add Alias toApple Menu” from Automated Tasks on the Apple menu. Done.

Another area where Windows 95 lags well behind the Mac OS isremovable-media management. Floppy-drive and CD-ROM-driveicons are always on the desktop — even when no media are in-serted. Click on the floppy-drive icon, and you get an alarming dia-log box that proclaims, “A:\ is not accessible. The device is notready.” Sure, it’s ready, guys. It’s just empty. But if you insert a floppyor a CD, the icons don’t tell you the name of the inserted disk — theydon’t even change to let you know that they’re now “ready.”

a radical leap beyond the Mac, instead of producing a f

Finally, there are the frequent reminders that just below Windows95’s slick surface lurks a soul of pure DOS. For example, each timewe restart one of our test PCs in MacUser Labs, we get this warm andfriendly DOS-font message: “Invalid VxD dynamic link call fromATR(Ø1) + ØØØØØAA3 to device "3155", service E.” Microsoft techsupport was baffled, and so are we.

Fact 4. Windows 95 has some advantagesover the Mac OS.But enough Windows-bashing. If you’re going to argue convincinglythat the Mac remains superior, you’ll have to give some ground andconcede that there are some ways in which Windows 95 beats theMac OS.

System administration, for example, is more advanced. Networkhonchos are positively drooling over two new Windows 95 tools: theRegistry and the System Policy Editor. The Registry enables admin-istrators to peek at and tweak individual users’ system-configura-tion information, and the System Policy Editor lets administratorsimpose standard settings on every PC across the network (or por-tions of it) — for parameters ranging from available printers andservers to desktop “wallpaper” patterns. These features may soundOrwellian, but they’re a godsend to corporate IS managers — andplenty of Mac administrators would love them.

On paper, Windows 95’s networking capabilities look awesome.They include support for the industry-standard NetWare and


eeble, me-to o implementation.”— Douglas Adams, author of The H it chhiker ’s Guide to the G alaxy

WINDOWS 95

Microsoft network operating systems and for enough network pro-tocols to satisfy any net administrator’s wildest dreams. The visionjust gets better when you fold in seamless remote-dial-in supportand simultaneous support for multiple networks using multipleprotocols — the same multihoming feature that Apple recentlyadded through its Open Transport system extension.

However, as might be expected, the Utopian vision is clashingwith reality. Early reports from the field indicate that Windows 95’snetworking goodies are plagued with incompatibilities that maytake quite a while to resolve.

Fact 5. Windows 95 has a more advancedarchitecture than the Mac OS.The most powerful advantage Windows 95 has over the Mac liesdeep inside. That unmistakable edge is its preemptive multitaskingcapability. This isn’t hype — it’s a real boon. In a preemptivelymultitasking system, the OS takes over the parceling out of CPUtime: Background processes can peacefully — and efficiently —


“Macintosh System 7.5.2 is by far the easiest, sm

coexist, file transfers and disk formatting can take place withouttying up the computer, and user interaction can remain smooth andseamless despite multiple background activities. In Windows 95,however, these benefits will appear only when users are runningnew 32-bit applications written to take advantage of preemptivemultitasking; current 16-bit applications cannot run preemptively.

The Mac OS doesn’t support preemptive multitasking. What’sworse, the next version of the Mac OS, code-named Copland, willsupport only a limited version, available only to processes that don’trequire a user interface (file transfers and image rendering, for ex-ample). Thus, Mac users will remain behind the preemptive eightball for the foreseeable future.

Architecturally, the Mac OS has one major advantage over Win-dows 95: multiprocessing. Specifications developed by engineers atDayStar Digital, and now widely available from Apple, enable devel-opers to write Mac applications that take advantage of multiple pro-cessors working on the same task. Windows 95-based PCs can’t sup-port multiprocessing.

WHO’S GOT THE EDGE? / dispatches from the operating-system battles

Windows 95 has taken a lot of heat for its (ahem) appropriation of Macintosh interface features, but many of its components put new spins onfamiliar Mac functions — or introduce altogether new tricks of their own. Conversely, the Mac OS still offers many features that Windows 95does not (cannot?) approximate. So which OS has the edge — and in what task areas? Here’s our breakdown of features —and of which OS hasthe advantage.

FEATURE MAC (SYSTEM 7.5.2) ADVANTAGE WINDOWS 95Overall ease Its consistent and intuitive A huge advance over Windows 3.1of use interface remains unequaled. l but still labyrinthine.

Customizability Versatile, but wait for Copland l r Basic viewing options arefor the big improvements. well handled.

File The Finder is showing its age, but l r The Windows Explorer intimidatesmanagement it’s still powerful and intuitive. even veteran users.

Peripherals The justly acknowledged leader of l r Plug and Play is a promisingsupport no-hassle computing. beginning— if the industry

plays along.

File searching Find File will be greatly enhanced l r A powerful Find command is a must inin Copland. this Byzantine system.

File deletion The venerable Trash still does l r The Recycle Bin: Trash with a trendyits duty. name.

Networking Open Transport is an improvement, r A rich — if finicky — set of networkbut administrative support remains connections with excellent administrativerudimentary. support.

Online help Nothing beats Apple Guide’s l r Text-based help is thorough thoughcoach marks. simple.

Remote dial-in Apple Remote Access costs extra, l r A clean interface to abut it’s worth it. powerful feature.

oothest, most usable operating system out there.“— Paul S omerson, PC/Computing

Fact 6. Windows 95 is not fully compatiblewith existing software.Compare, if you will, Apple’s transition to the Power Macintosh withthe Wintel world’s transition to Windows 95: Apple offered a rock-solid emulator that enabled Mac users to migrate their existing soft-ware with only minor problems. Microsoft created an incompatibil-ity inventory that lists hundreds of applications, utilities, and toolsthat have some problem with Windows 95. So much for seamlesssupport of legacy applications.

And then there’s the case of the missing WINSOCK: Internet us-ers who upgrade from previous versions of Windows and thenboard the Internet through Microsoft Network or use Windows 95’sremote-access features discover that Windows 95 has deftly elimi-nated their ability to access the Internet through their previous pro-vider. Technically, Windows simply monkeys with the essentialWINSOCK.DLL file that instructs the PC where to look for Internetaccess. Innocent technical glitch — or nefarious roadblock to allInternet on-ramps but Microsoft’s? You decide.

Fact 7. Windows 95 will require multiplesoftware upgrades.If we weren’t so darned concerned about conflict of interest (and thewatchful people at the SEC), we’d invest heavily in software compa-nies specializing in Windows 95 applications. Like Power Mac usersbefore them, Windows 95 users will have to upgrade their softwareto take full advantage of their new systems. Windows 95’s speediermemory management and greater crash resistance and the mul-tiple benefits of preemptive multitasking benefit only Windows 95-specific 32-bit applications. Hmmm . . . . Thirty million users, acouple of applications per user — looks like a good year for diskettemanufacturers, at least.

Fact 8. Windows 95 may require significanthardware upgrades .Microsoft claims that the minimum hardware platform for runningWindows 95 is a 386DX PC with 4 MB of RAM. Sure — and System7.5 runs fine on a 4-MB Classic. More realistically, PC WEEK Labs’testing proved that no rational human would call the performanceof Windows 95 “good” unless it were running on at least a 33-MHz486DX4 with 8 MB of RAM.

And that’s the ground floor: According to testing done by PCMagazine Labs, to make Windows 95’s performance really speedy,you would want 16 MB of RAM and a Pentium processor, whichtakes far better advantage of the additional memory than a mere486 does. You can almost hear those checkbooks fluttering, can’tyou?

Most corporate IS managers estimate that Windows 95-fueledupgrade costs for hardware and software will range from $500 to$1,000 per PC. Add to that the cost of training — which, accordingto usability tests, should remain significantly higher than for theMac OS. All things considered, you don’t have to be a hard-nosedbean counter to question the wisdom of an immediate changeoverto Windows 95.

“. . . [Windows 95] is relatively easy to crash [and

Fact 9. Windows 95 doesn’t improve performance.Windows 95 is a features upgrade, not a performance upgrade. Test-ing has shown that the performance of 16-bit applications runningon Pentium-based PCs remains essentially the same when the oper-ating system is upgraded from Windows for Workgroups 3.11 toWindows 95.

But what about the future? What about when Intel’s newest mi-croprocessor, code-named P6, becomes widely available? The newsis not promising for Windows 95 users. Although P6 promises blaz-ing speed for fully-32-bit operating systems, such as Windows NTand OS/2 Warp, Windows 95, which contains lots of leftover 16-bitcode, won’t fare as well. PC Magazine testing suggests that current-generation 16-bit applications running on a P6-based, Windows95-equipped PC will see practically no speed advantage and mayactually run slower than on a Pentium-based PC. And Windows 95-specific 32-bit applications will run about 20 percent faster on P6-based PCs than they do on Pentium-based PCs. Are you unim-pressed yet?

On the other hand, expect Mac OS performance to improve sig-nificantly when Copland is released. Unlike the current Mac OS,which contains significant chunks of code that must be run in emu-lation mode on PowerPC-based Macs and Mac-compatibles,Copland will be 95 percent native. Native code plus PowerPC equalsa speedy OS.

Fact 10. The Mac is here to stay.Windows 95 is a much needed improvement over its predecessors.However, it faces significant compatibility challenges, it offers noimprovement in speed or responsiveness, it requires a substantialinvestment in new hardware and software, and — bottom line —it’s just plain difficult to use. To paraphrase Senator Lloyd Bentsen,confronting a different well-financed rookie, “I know the Mac-intosh. I work with the Macintosh. And you, Windows 95, are noMacintosh.”

But quality alone is not a guarantee of success. (If it were, we’d allbe dubbing quadraphonic sound tracks onto Betamax cassettes of“My So-Called Life.”) No, numbers are what count in business, andthe PC industry is no exception.

But even if numbers alone are the barometer of success, the Macis doing quite well, thank you: More than 20 million Macs have beensold. One out of every ten desktop PCs is a Mac. The U.S. Mac marketis expected to total well over $10 billion this year — a jump of morethan 30 percent from last year.

Then there’s one less reported — but possibly even more impor-tant — number: This year’s Apple Worldwide Developers Confer-ence was by far the most well attended in history, with more than4,100 in attendance — a 30-percent increase in developer partici-pation over last year. Cutting-edge software will continue to beavailable for the Mac and Mac OS-compatibles.

The Mac is alive and well. s

Rik Myslewski, a veteran MacUser executive editor, says his favorite operatingsystem is still MP/M.


it] retains significant chunks of old DOS co de . . . .“— L inley Gwennap, M icropr oc essor Repor t


RAID 0 SYSTEMS

BREAKINGSPEED LIMIT

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RAID LEVEL 0PROVIDES THESPEED YOUNEED FORHANDLINGLARGEGRAPHICSAND VIDEOFILES.

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RAID — the word may conjure up images of late-night gangster moviesand Eliot Ness storming into secret hideaways. But although this storagetechnology doesn’t involve moonshine, it may quench your thirst for speedin graphics, video, and prepress environments. RAID systems provide fasteraccess to data than do regular, stand-alone hard drives — you’ll especiallyappreciate the increased speed if you work with large files.

A RAID (redundant array of inexpensive disks) system combines multiplehard drives so that they behave as a single unit. On your Mac’s desktop, yousee a single volume, but behind the scenes may be anywhere from two toseven hard drives working in unison. It’s the old divide-and-conquer ap-proach: Files are split among the drives, as is the workload — the reads andwrites occur on multiple physical drives simultaneously, resulting in fasterspeed than when you use a single hard drive.

There are six levels of RAID — 0 through 5 — for dealing with multipledrives. Five of these levels provide various degrees of reliability, or fault tol-erance (see the “Explaining RAID” sidebar). RAID 0 has no built-in reliabil-ity features, but it’s the fastest level — and it’s the focus of our testing, sincespeed is of the essence for publishing, prepress, and video applications.

For this report, we tested 17 RAID 0 systems — combinations of harddrives, RAID software, and interface cards — in capacities of at least 4 GB.Fourteen vendors are represented, including such newcomers to the Macmarket as DPT and xiStor. A veteran of the PC marketplace, DPT is offeringits complete line of storage products in Mac versions; xiStor is a recentstartup that sells only Mac products. Eight of the systems we tested are forthe ultrafast PCI bus, which was recently introduced to Macs in the newPower Mac line; eight are for NuBus Macs; and one, the La Cie Joule RAID,connects to the Mac’s built-in SCSI bus.

Among the vendors that are noticeably absent are APS, MegaDrive,Micropolis, and Storage Dimensions. They were in the process of upgrading


RAID 0 SYSTEMS

their RAID systems at the time we did our testing. Some vendorsthat use products from Adaptec (a leading vendor of SCSI control-lers for PCs) did not have systems available at test time, becauseAdaptec was acquiring Trillium Research, maker of the RemusRAID software (included with many of the products we tested). Tril-lium Research will become a wholly owned subsidiary of Adaptec


and will continue to sell its Remus software to other vendors.Although we tested only complete systems, do-it-yourselfers can

buy drives, SCSI-2 interface cards, and software and build RAIDarrays from scratch. RAID software packages such as CharisMac’sProfessional Storage Suite ($199 list for RAID 0 and 1), Trillium’sRemus ($590 list for RAID 0, 1, 4, and 5), and FWB’s RAID ToolKit($399 list for RAID 0 and 1) are the brains behind the software-based RAID implementations we tested.

Only one system — the DPT SmartRAID — is a hardware-basedRAID implementation. The other systems include Mac-based RAIDsoftware (such as the programs just mentioned), but theSmartRAID includes a PCI SCSI-2 interface card that contains aRAID controller and a 32-bit 40-MHz processor. You’d think thatwith all the heavy-duty hardware, the SmartRAID would blaze pastthe software-based RAID systems. But we were disappointed by theSmartRAID’s speed — the software-based RAID 0 products beatthe SmartRAID hands down in our tests.

THE CASE OF THE NON-RAID RAIDSo just what is a redundant array? In the late ’80s, researchers at UCBerkeley were looking for ways around the high cost of the high-capacity hard drives used for minicomputers. The scheme theyoriginally proposed (and documented in a paper with a title remi-niscent of a Nancy Drew mystery: “A Case for Redundant Arrays ofInexpensive Disks”) consisted of five ways — RAID 1 through 5 —of combining what were at the time relatively low-cost drives (whichhad lower reliability ratings as well). Since these drives weren’t builtto the rock-solid specifications of the high-priced storage used inlarge-systems environments, a key component of the RAID schemewas built-in fault tolerance — data redundancy — which enabledrebuilding of the information on any of the drives in the array if adrive failed.

Until recently, RAID has typically been cost-justifiable for per-sonal computers only in the LAN market, for providing fault toler-ance for servers. Interest in RAID for nonserver Macs is beingstimulated by such factors as promises of overall speed improve-ments, particularly for high-end graphics. Due to falling hard-driveprices, new PCI hardware development, and the influx of PCI-cardvendors to the Mac market, RAID is fast becoming more viable —read cost-effective — for Macs. The RAID systems we tested start atless than $3,000 — as low as $2,799 for the MacProducts Magic 4 GBRAID.

Although RAID 0 wasn’t part of the original Berkeley scheme, it islike the other RAID levels in that it “stripes” data across multiplehard drives. The particulars of striping vary among the RAID levels,and in all cases but RAID 0, either a duplicate of your data or infor-mation about that data is also saved to disk — this is the redundantaspect of RAID. Stripes contain the number of blocks of data thatcan be written (or read) across the entire array; the default stripesize for the products in this review is 64K.

You can see how the speed improvement occurs with RAID if youthink about the notion of striping. For example, whereas a single 4-GB drive writes a 64K block of data on a single disk, a 4-GB arraycomposed of four 1-GB drives can simultaneously write four 16Kchunks. (The more drives in a RAID array, the faster it is.) Whenreading files back, splitting the reads among the four physical drives

THE BOTTOM LINETIME IS MONEY — and the fastest RAID 0 array to the finish line cansave you a bundle. When rating RAID 0 arrays, speed weighedheavily but we also considered other factors such as price, features,and support. We’ve separated the PCI products from the NuBus onesto compare the products fairly. Here’s how the field panned out.

3/ OUTSTANDING 2/ ACCEPTABLE 1/ POORRATING PRODUCT PRICE SUPPORT FEATURES SPEED

PCI SYSTEMS

mmmmhMicroNet DataDock WideStorage System 2 3 3 3This array ($5,860 list, $5,275 estimated street price) is the fastestsystem, thanks in part to its dual-channel design. Not only doesthe system provide top speed but it also comes in a well-designedenclosure, and MicroNet provides customer support 24 hours aday, seven days a week.

mmmm DGR Ultrastar 4.0 3 3 2 2

mmmm MacProducts Magic4 GB RAID 3 3 2 2

mmmm Microtech BLUEStreak 3400 2 2 3 3

mmmh Conley Cobra 2 2 2 2

mmmh FWB SledgeHammer4100 FMF-W 2 2 2 3

mmm CharisMac Anubis4 GB RAID 2 2 2 2

mmh DPT SmartRAID 1 2 2 1

NUBUS AND BUILT-IN-SCSI SYSTEMS

mmmm Optima DisKovery4200W 2 2 2 3The Optima DisKovery 4200W ($4,155 list, $3,950 estimated streetprice) uses dual ATTO SiliconExpress IV cards to provide high speed.This overall-best NuBus performer comes with easy-to-use soft-ware that also supports RAID 5.

mmmh Conley Cobra 2 2 2 2

mmmh FWB SledgeHammer4100 FMF-W 2 2 2 2

mmmh MaxConcept MaxRAIDSW4100e 3 2 2 2

mmmh MicroNet Raven ProNuBus Wide 2 3 2 2

mmmh Mirror RAID 2 2 2 2

mmmh Spin Whirlwind 2 2 2 2

mmm La Cie Joule RAID 2 3 3 1

mmh xiStor xi.RAID 2 2 2 1LISTING IS ALPHABETICAL WITHIN GROUPS OF EQUAL MOUSE RATINGS.

also results in overall faster delivery. RAID 0 doesn’t have the over-head of calculating redundant data, so it’s the fastest of all RAIDlevels. Since RAID 0’s raison d’être is providing fast data through-put, speed is the most important criterion. We tested each system,focusing mostly on how it performed with high-end graphics appli-cations such as Photoshop and QuarkXPress. We also ran keyMacBench 2.0 test suites and a Finder copy (see the “Need forSpeed” charts).

NUMBERS RACKETIn addition to revealing the fastest systems, our tests shed light onseveral factors you should take into account before buying. Withouta doubt, PCI provides faster throughput than NuBus, as you can seefrom our results. For example, we tested both a PCI and a NuBusversion of the FWB SledgeHammer 4100 FMF-W (according toFWB, the only difference between the two systems is the interface).Opening a 32-MB Photoshop file took about 38 percent longer onthe NuBus system — 72 seconds compared to the PCI version’s 52seconds. You can expect faster results with Photoshop 3.0.4, whichwasn’t available during testing but is now shipping.

In a production environment, where you may be saving a fileevery 15 minutes, you’d save about 10 minutes over the course of an

8-hour day, which adds up to a full 40-hour week a year. Althoughthat may not seem like much, consider all the other tasks you maydo in Photoshop or any other disk-intensive application — rotat-ing, applying filters, resizing — and your time savings can easilyamount to weeks.

Regardless of whether your Mac is NuBus- or PCI-based, makesure the mix of components makes sense: There’s little reason toinvest in a RAID 0 system if you don’t have a SCSI-2 Fast and Wideinterface and Fast and Wide drives. This isn’t rocket science — it’sbasic math: A Power Mac’s SCSI bus can handle only up to 5 mega-bytes per second, so attaching a Fast and Wide drive capable of 20-megabyte-per-second throughput is a waste — like slamming yourfoot on the brakes just as you merge onto the autobahn.

A case in point: Compare the results for the La Cie Joule RAIDwith those for our baseline storage system, a non-RAID Apple 1080external drive. Because the Joule RAID also connects to an externalSCSI bus and is thus limited to 5 megabytes per second, the SCSI busbecomes the bottleneck, making the Joule RAID fare little betterthan our baseline drive. At $3,999 for 8 GB of storage, the Joule RAIDmay sound like a bargain, but you’ll be disappointed with its speed.

Hard-drive mechanisms should also support some type of SCSI-2 bus implementation — Fast, Wide, or Fast and Wide. Each of

BEST PERFORMER IN EACH TEST

MACUSER BEST BUY


44 50 50 51 52 54 63 97

52 53 53 61 62 65 72 77 80

88


48 51 55 56 58 58 67

106

55 59 60 67 67 69 80 84 87

91


19 21 22 23 24 23 24 42

42 41 44 42 45 47 57 55 59

48

FASTERMEGABYTES PER SECOND

16.8 16.1 12.7 12.8 13.4 13.3 11.8

4.0

15.3 11.8 11.2

8.7 8.7

10.3 6.4 6.1 5.8

4.4

c

PCI SYSTEMS cMicroNet DataDock Wide Storage System Microtech BLUE Streak 3400 MacProducts Magic 4 GB RAID DGR Ultrastar 4.0 FWB SledgeHammer 4100 FMF-W Conley Cobra CharisMac Anubis 4 GB RAID DPT SmartRAID NUBUS & BUILT-IN-SCSI SYSTEMS cOptima DisKovery 4200W Mirror RAID MaxConcept MaxRAID SW4100e Conley Cobra MicroNet Raven Pro NuBus Wide Spin Whirlwind FWB SledgeHammer 4100 FMF-W xiStor xi.RAID La Cie Joule RAID REFERENCE PRODUCT Apple 1080

Desktop publishers,graphic artists, and video produc-ers can never have too much speedwhen they’re working with largefiles. Fortunately, a RAID 0 arraycan cut down on a lot of the thumbtwiddling that normally happenswhile, say, you’re opening largefiles. To compare their speed, weran the arrays through a series of

real-life tests. First, we timed howlong it took to open a file in AdobePhotoshop 3.0.1 (Photoshop 3.0.4was not available at testing time)in order to find out how well eacharray handled a large data flow.Next, we rotated an image inPhotoshop — a time-consuming,common, and disk-intensive task.Our third test, a Finder copy, also

tested throughput and let us com-pare the different Power Mac busarchitectures as well as the differ-ence between the Finder thatships with the older Power Macsand the revised one that shipswith the Power Mac 9500/132.

We also ran the MacBench 2.01,024K-sequential-write test. Ahigh rate signifies an array that

offers fast, continuous through-put, such as that needed for pro-cessing digital video.

All PCI RAID systems weretested with a Power Mac 9500/132, and all NuBus systems andthe La Cie Joule RAID were testedwith a Power Mac 8100/80. Thearrays are listed here in order ofoverall speed.

THE NEED FOR SPEED / the top finishers and the also-rans

PRODUCTS TESTED PHOTOSHOP OPEN PHOTOSHOP ROTATE FINDER COPY 1,024K SEQUENTIAL WRITEFor this test, we timed how long ittook to open a 32-MB file. SincePhotoshop is less dependent oncaching, this test indicates eacharray’s raw throughput.

We wrote continuous streams ofdata to the arrays. A high scoreindicates fast sustained throughputof large files, such as that neededfor digital video.

We performed a copy of a 32-MBfile in the Finder. PCI Macs not onlybenefit from the hardware but alsothe new Finder is more efficientfor transferring files.

We rotated a 32-MB file 90 degreescounterclockwise. This commontask is highly disk-intensive. On PCIMacs, Photoshop 3.0.4 shouldprovide even faster results.


RAID 0 SYSTEMS

these has a different bus width and speed. So although the spec forSCSI-2 is 5 megabytes per second, a Fast implementation supportsup to 10 megabytes per second; add Wide to this (for 16-bit widthinstead of 8-bit), and you should see speed increases. With the ex-ception of three systems — the DPT SmartRAID, the La Cie JouleRAID, and the xiStor xi.RAID — the hard-drive mechanisms in thearrays we tested support SCSI-2 Fast and Wide. DPT’s mechanismssupport Fast but not Wide SCSI-2, La Cie’s are narrow Quantummechanisms, and xiStor’s are narrow Seagates.

Also be sure the tasks you perform and the applications you useare disk-intensive. In our QuarkXPress test — saving a documentas an EPS file — speeds of the RAID systems were either the sameas or only 1 percent better than those for our baseline Apple 1080drive. Since this task involves converting data into PostScript code,it is dependent on the speed of your CPU rather than that of thedrives. In cases such as this, where the Mac’s processor does most ofthe work, the money you’d spend for a RAID system would do moregood if you upgraded your Mac.

TWO-TIMING BUSESTwo-timers in old gangster movies usually ended up wearingcement shoes, but two-timing (as in doubling up) on the SCSI canreally help your system get the lead out. When it comes to SCSI busesand RAID, more is better. Vendors such as ATTO and MicroNet sell(independently as well as part of their systems) dual-channel SCSI-2 interface cards in NuBus as well as PCI configurations. A dual-channel SCSI interface card contains two SCSI controller chips andports, thus providing for up to 15 devices on each of two separatebuses. The advantage of using a single dual-channel card is that youlose only one NuBus or PCI slot in your Mac. Conley ships theMicroNet Raven Pro (a dual-channel card) with its NuBus RAIDsystem, but the system uses only a single channel because of theNuBus bottleneck.

Another approach some vendors take is to bundle two separateSCSI-2 interface cards in the package. The Optima DisKovery4200W and the Microtech BLUE Streak 3400 each come with twoSCSI-2 Fast and Wide interface cards. In terms of pricing, you may


EXPLAINING RAID / what you need to know about the technology

Software Software

RAID 1

Also known as mirroring, RAID 1 is the most fault-tolerant of the RAID levels, since asecond drive contains a complete duplicate of the first. RAID 1 lets you get back to workinstantaneously should a drive fail, since you don’t have to restore anything. RAID 1 isexpensive, because half of your storage is devoted to providing the mirror. Read timesare shorter, because more than one drive reads the same file simultaneously, but writetimes are longer than with RAID 0, because all drives must be written to.

RAID 0

RAID 0 provides the fastest throughput, because it allows afile to be striped — that is, written across two drives. RAID0 provides the lowest cost per megabyte, because it offersno fault-tolerant features; all the tracks of the hard diskscan be used for storing data. Be sure to implement somebackup system — if any drive in a RAID 0 array fails, all islost.

pay a slight premium for the slot-saving convenience of a singledual-channel card. For example, the ATTO ExpressPCI comes inboth single- and dual-channel versions; the single-channel ATTOExpressPCI costs $395, and the dual-channel version is $895. Interms of speed, either a dual-channel card or two single-channelcards will give you better speed than one single-channel card.

In a single-channel RAID 0 system, the physical hard drives aredaisy-chained to each other and in turn to the SCSI bus. The dual-channel approach connects one half of the array — which may becomposed of multiple physical drives — to one channel and theother half of the array to the other channel, whether the channelsare on the same card or on two separate ones.

A dual-channel RAID 0 system is faster, because data is passingthrough two channels instead of one. In our tests, the NuBusOptima DisKovery 4200W, with its two ATTO SiliconExpress IVcards, was faster on average for the suite of Photoshop, Quark-XPress, and Finder-copy tests than the CharisMac Anubis 4 GBRAID, a PCI single-channel system. If you look at just the results of

the Photoshop tests (the most important ones, given the focus ofRAID 0), you see that the top five performers overall — theMicroNet DataDock Wide Storage System, Microtech BLUE Streak3400, MacProducts Magic 4 GB RAID, DGR Ultrastar 4.0, and Op-tima DisKovery 4200W — were dual-channel systems. Of these, theNuBus Optima system was even slightly faster than the FWBSledgeHammer 4100 FMF-W with a single-channel JackHammerPCI card.

The power of dual-channel systems is exemplified in our 1,024K-sequential-write test. The top three performers — the MicroNetDataDock Wide Storage System, the Microtech BLUE Streak 3400,and the Optima DisKovery 4200W, which are dual-channel systems— were about four times as fast as our baseline Apple 1080 drive.On the other hand, the single-channel NuBus FWB SledgeHammer4100 FMF-W and xiStor xi.RAID were only one and a half times asfast.

Overall speed is influenced a great deal by the type of files younormally work with. For example, the DPT SmartRAID has been


COST AND NOMENCLATUREaside, RAID providesadvantages in two key —and completely different —areas: for networks, wherefile servers must constantlybe up and running, andfor graphics and video,which require ever greaterspeed for accessing andprocessing large files. RAID0 through 5 are all abouttrade-offs: Each levelprovides a different balanceof speed, reliability, andtotal cost per megabyte.Only RAID levels 0, 1, and 5are prevalent on the Mac.

RAID 5

Best for networks, RAID 5 stripes data across multiple drives, a block at a time; parity information iscalculated on a series of blocks and then written to a different drive. If one drive fails, then the filecan be reconstructed from any other drive. With parity information as well as data striped across alldrives, overall throughput is faster than with RAID 1 (but still slower than with RAID 0).

[P 1,2] 01101 011011010110

[P 3,4] 01101 011011010110

[P 5,6] 01101 011011010110

1.

3. 4.

6.5.

2.

Software

RAID 0 SYSTEMS

optimized to work with small files, and as a result, it fared dismallyin our tests involving a 32-MB Photoshop file. The SmartRAID didexceptionally well, however, in the MacBench 2.0 Disk Mix test, atest of key business-productivity applications that is optimized forsmall, “bursty” reads and writes. Although the Disk Mix test is nota network test per se, the type of read and write activity it models iscomparable to that of a file server — bursty reads and writes, typi-cally with small file sizes. We’d be curious to see how the DPTSmartRAID performs in a network environment, but we don’t rec-ommend it for desktop publishing or prepress work — connectedto a Power Mac 9500/132, it fared worse than the baseline Apple1080 drive on the Power Mac 8100/80 in all tests except the DiskMix test.

IT’S A SETUPInstalling and configuring any RAID system takes some time. Inaddition to the physical installation of the hard drives, the interfacecards, and the connections between them, several layers of software


are involved, including drivers for the SCSI interface card, driversfor the hard drives, RAID software for striping and configuring thedrives, and sometimes management software. Despite this, we hadlittle difficulty installing and configuring most of the systems —although the process was sometimes time-consuming.

The software bundled with all these systems (except the xiStorxi.RAID, for which RAID 1 software costs extra) lets you configurethem for at least RAID 0 and 1. Most of the products ship with Tril-lium Research’s easy-to-use Remus Lite, which lets you configure anarray for RAID 0 or 1. With the Remus Monitor control panel (andthe Remus Responder installed on networked Macs), administra-tors are able to keep a watchful eye on the status of all the Remus-configured RAID systems.

In addition to striping and mirroring for RAID 0 and 1, Remuslets you configure an array to span multiple disks, which consoli-dates multiple volumes into a single volume, for easier manage-ment. Spanning can be a real boon in a graphics environment or forany desktop littered with numerous, variously sized hard drives.

REMOVABLE BEASTS / the importance of design

IT’S NOT A ONE-SIZE-FITS-ALL WORLD. The systems we tested run thegamut from small, sleek desktop units to tall stacks of drives. Which oneyou choose depends on your long-term storage strategy. For example,if you think you may eventually implement RAID 1 or 5, hot-swappability — the ability to remove drives without powering down

your system — is a feature you’ll need. Having removable drives is aprerequisite for hot-swappability, although not all arrays with remov-able drives support it (see the “Array of Features” table for informationon which systems are hot-swappable). Here are your choices when itcomes to case design.

REMOVABLE DRIVES

Some arrays consist of a stack of removabledrives. You can slip hard-drive modules intoand out of docks that contain the SCSIcircuitry and connectors. Unlike withstandard removable hard drives, however,you can’t easily access the data stored onthis type of array from another Mac. Thesecond Mac must not only have the correctdock for holding the drives but it must alsohave the RAID software installed and, for allsystems except the La Cie Joule RAID, itmust have the proper controller cardinstalled. Some arrays with removabledrives do, however, let you hot-swap drives.

ALL-IN-ONE UNITS

These no-nonsense small-to-medium-sizeddesktop boxes contain the drives thatcomprise the array in a single enclosure. Ifyou don’t plan to make any changes to yourRAID configuration, these systems will workquite well. Note, however, that with theseall-in-one units, you’ll never be able toupgrade to RAID 1 or 5 with hot-swappability. Another drawback is that onedrive may fail, but the other may still begood. Replacing the failed drive can becumbersome. To add more capacity, youcan daisy-chain additional drives throughSCSI.

EXPANDABLE BUT NOT REMOVABLE

With some arrays, you can expand yourstorage space by stacking drives in verticalor horizontal configurations. The drives areheld together by interlocking clips on theenclosures. These systems do not haveremovable or hot-swappable drives, butthey do let you expand the number ofdrives in your array without taking upadditional desk space. Microtech offers aremovable version of the BLUE Streak 3400for a few extra dollars (we tested thenonremovable version).

RAID 0 SYSTEMS

Note that you won’t see the kind of speed improvement you get whenyou stripe an array, since with a spanning configuration, writing tothe disks that make up the volume happens sequentially rather thansimultaneously.

The DGR Ultrastar 4.0, MacProducts Magic 4 GB RAID, Max-Concept MaxRAID SW4100e, Mirror RAID, and Spin Whirlwind arebundled with Remus Lite. The La Cie array also uses Remus Lite,but the software is bundled under the name La Cie Joule RAID. For$295, you can upgrade to the full version of Remus, which gives youRAID 4 and 5 support in addition to support for RAID 0 and 1.Remus’ documentation is well thought out and includes tutorials onbuilding various RAID configurations.

CharisMac’s Anubis RAID software has the most user-friendlyinterface — it’s simple enough that you don’t need to look at themanual. Anubis RAID, which supports RAID 0 and 1, comes withthe CharisMac Anubis 4GB RAID and the Microtech BLUE Streak3400. The Conley systems ship with Conley’s SoftRAID — the sameRAID software that MicroNet bundles with its RAID systems andthat Apple bundles with its Workgroup Servers under their own re-spective names. It’s also easy to use, and the documentation is ex-cellent. SoftRAID supports RAID 0 and 1.

At the other end of the spectrum is the DPT Storage Managersoftware, which proved to be a disappointment. We were teased by


references in several places in the manual to some great features —remote management over both a network and a dial-in connection,for example — only to find that these features were yet to be imple-mented in the Mac version. The PC version provides numerous low-level configuration settings that can be adjusted to improvethroughput, but regrettably, these settings are also not imple-mented in the Mac version. And although DPT Storage Managersupports RAID 0, 1, and 5 for the Mac, you have to go elsewhere fordriver software — it’s not included with the DPT system. At DPT’ssuggestion, we used La Cie’s Silverlining, but La Cie confirmed thatit does not have a bundling agreement with DPT.

INSURANCE GAMEOnce you’ve configured your system, you shouldn’t have to use theRAID software again, unless you need to add to the existing array orchange the configuration. And pray that you don’t decide to do thatwith a RAID 0 array, because if you do, you’ll have to back up all yourdata to tape or some other medium and then reconfigure the wholesystem. You should back up a RAID 0 system regularly anyway —remember that unlike other RAID levels, which are fault-tolerantand enable you to reconstruct your data in the event of a disk failure,RAID 0 does not include built-in recovery features.

You should back up even fault-tolerant RAID systems as well.

There’s more than just speed to consider when you’re buying a RAID 0array. The arrays we tested vary not only in speed but also in the fea-tures they offer. Some vendors, for example, use removable drives,whereas others use drives that were meant to find a permanent homeon your desktop. There’s also the issue of cards and channels — do you

want a single card, dual cards, or a single card with dual channels? Howmuch capacity do you need, 4 or 8 GB? And the software packagebundled with the array is important too — some vendors license pack-ages from third-party vendors, whereas others bundle proprietarysoftware. Vendors also vary in the type of support they offer — for

AN ARRAY OF FEATURES / sorting out the specifications

LIST PRICE ESTIMATED CAPACIT Y RAID SOFTWARE SCSI-2 INTERFACE RAID SINGLE DUALSTREET PRICE TESTED CARD LEVEL 5 CARD CARDS

PCI SYSTEMS

CharisMac Anubis 4 GB RAID $5,195 $3,995 4 GB CharisMac Anubis RAID QLogic Fast SCSI 2

Conley Cobra $6,999 (direct) NA 8 GB Conley SoftRAID QLogic Fast SCSI 2

DGR Ultrastar 4.0 $2,899 (direct) NA 4 GB Trillium Research Remus ATTO ExpressPCI 2

DPT SmartRAID $7,115 $5,000 4 GB DPT Storage Manager DPT PM 3224-MAC 2 2with SM4000

FWB SledgeHammer 4100 FMF-W $4,899 $3,700 4 GB FWB RAID ToolKit FWB JackHammer 2

MacProduc ts Magic 4 GB RAID $2,799 (direct) NA 4 GB Trillium Research Remus ATTO ExpressPCI 2

c MicroNet DataDock Wide $5,860§ $5,275 4 GB MicroNet Power Raven MicroNet PCI 2◊

Storage System

Microtech BLUE Streak 3400 $4,875 $3,645 4 GB CharisMac Anubis RAID BLUE Lightning 2

NUBUS AND BUILT-IN-SCSI SYSTEMS

Conley Cobra $7,499 (direct) NA 8 GB Conley SoftRAID MicroNet Raven Pro 2◊

FWB SledgeHammer 4100 FMF-W $5,099 $4,000 4 GB FWB RAID ToolKit FWB JackHammer 2

La Cie Joule RAID $3,999 (direct) NA 8 GB La Cie Joule RAID NA (uses Mac’s NA NAbuilt-in SCSI)

MaxConcept MaxRAID SW4100e $3,800 $3,540 4 GB Trillium Research Remus ATTO SiliconExpress IV 2

MicroNet Raven Pro NuBus Wide $5,370 $4,655 4 GB MicroNet Raven Pro Manager MicroNet Raven Pro 2◊

Mirror RAID $3,999 $2,700 4 GB Trillium Research Remus ATTO SiliconExpress IV 2

c Optima DisKovery 4200W $4,155 $3,950 4 GB Optima DiskArray RAID ATTO SilconExpress IV 2 2

Spin Whirlwind $3,599 (direct) NA 4 GB Trillium Research Remus ATTO SiliconExpress IV 2

xiStor xi.RAID $5,560 (direct) NA 8 GB ATTO ExpressStripe ATTO SiliconExpress IV 2

c MacUser BEST BUY*32-bit bus per channel per card. †8-bit bus per channel. §$5,335 without the hot-swap feature. ◊Dual channels on a single card. **Optional.

Kelli Wiseth is a MacUser contributing editor. Senior project leader KristinaDe Nike managed the testing for this report.

Perform the same tests as MacUser Labs by using your own copy ofMacBench 2.0, available online from ZD Net/Mac. See How to Reach Usfor instructions on accessing ZD Net/Mac.

Although it might seem “redundantly redundant” to back up aRAID 1 mirrored system or a RAID 5 array, it isn’t. Fault tolerancemeans that the array can recover from damage to one of the physicaldisks in the array by reconstructing files from the redundant datastored across the remaining disks. If two (or more) disks fail, you’reout of luck. Fires, floods, or other acts of nature — a RAID systemwon’t help you overcome these.

CASE CLOSEDThe need for speed for DTP, prepress, and video production neverdiminishes, and using RAID 0 is being touted as one way to increaseit. But our tests demonstrated that getting a RAID system is worththe cost only in certain situations. If you’ve got a PCI-based PowerMac, you’ll see a great speed boost when you work with Photoshopfiles, for example. Any RAID system you get should have hard drivesthat support Fast and Wide SCSI-2, or you’ll be sorely disappointed.Also, RAID systems built around a dual-channel SCSI-2 Fast andWide card, or two single-channel cards, have an edge over those thatuse a single channel.

The MicroNet DataDock Wide Storage System is our PCI pick. Itscompact enclosure can hold two hot-swappable drives, so you canmove the drives to other DataDocks at other workstations. In addi-tion, if you configure the DataDock for RAID 1, the hot-swappablefeature will be helpful if one of the drives fails. Better yet, MicroNetoffers tech support 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Although not the fastest in our tests, the DGR Ultrastar 4.0 andMacProducts Magic 4 GB RAID are good buys too. Each took about40 percent less time than the baseline Apple drive to perform ourPhotoshop tests. In addition, each company provides a toll-freetech-support number and a five-year warranty.

Among the NuBus systems, the Optima DisKovery 4200W getsthe nod. Its two ATTO SiliconExpress IV Fast and Wide interfacecards push it a nose ahead of the rest of the pack. Although Optima’sstandard warranty is only one year, you can extend this to two orthree years at an additional cost. And Optima provides cross-shipreplacement, meaning that it will send you a replacement unit whileyou are returning a bum drive. In addition, in case you decide in thefuture that you need fault tolerance, Optima’s software supportsRAID 5 (if you have the drives for it). Still, considering how muchfaster PCI systems are than NuBus ones, graphics and video profes-sionals still working with NuBus Macs might be better off upgrad-ing to a PCI Mac and taking a RAIDcheck. s

16-BIT BUS REMOVABLE HOT-SWAPPABLE TOLL-FREE WARRANT YPER CHANNEL DRIVES DRIVES TECH SUPPORT

2 2 † 2 years

2 2 5 years

* 2 5 years

† 2 2 2 3 years

2 5 years

* 2 5 years

2 2 2 3 years

2 2** 2 5 years

2 2 5 years

2 6 years

† 2 2 5 years

2 2 years

2 2 2 3 years

2 2 2 years

2 1 year

2 2 5 years

2 2 2 † 5 years

example, toll-free tech support and/or five-year warranties.Without a doubt, sorting out the prices, channels, software bundles,

and other features can be harrowing. Our table can help you figure outexactly what each product offers. Check out “The Bottom Line” for ourrecommendations and ratings.

DIRECTORY / vendors of products tested

CharisMac EngineeringNewcastle, CA800-487-4420916-885-4420916-885-1410 (fax)

ConleyNew York, NY212-682-0162212-682-0071 (fax)

DGRAustin, TX800-622-3475512-892-4070512-892-4455 (fax)

DPTMaitland, FL407-830-5522407-260-5366 (fax)

FWBMenlo Park, CA415-325-4392415-833-4653 (fax)

La CieBeaverton, OR800-999-0143503-520-9000503-520-9100 (fax)

MacProducts USAAustin, TX800-622-3475512-892-4070512-892-4455 (fax)

MaxConceptSan Diego, CA800-622-3475619-530-9062619-530-9032 (fax)

MicroNet TechnologyIrvine, CA800-800-3475714-453-6100714-453-6101 (fax)

Spin PeripheralsMarlborough, MA800-466-2900508-787-1200508-787-1201 (fax)

xiStorReno, NV800-947-8671702-824-7777702-825-3016 (fax)

MicrotechEast Haven, CT800-220-9488203-468-6223203-468-6466 (fax)

Mirror TechnologyEdina, MN800-654-5294612-830-1549612-832-5709 (fax)

Optima TechnologyIrvine, CA714-476-0515714-476-0613 (fax)



MULTIMEDIA MONITORS

SIGHT

Soundand

MONITORS WITH BUILT-INSPEAKERS ARE THE LATESTFAD. SHOULD YOU INVEST?

By Nikki Echler

PHO

TO IL

LUST

RAT

ION

/G

IAM

PIER

O B

ENV

ENU

TI

Image is everything. That used to be the philosophy when you wantedto buy a monitor. But that was when monitors were supposed to be seenand not heard. Sure, image quality still counts, but with the advent of

multimedia monitors (monitors that have built-in speakers), you’ve now gotto worry about whether a monitor sounds as good as it looks.

Multimedia monitors have started to show up just in time for the Christ-mas buying season. Vendors claim that built-in speakers will one day bemandatory for monitors, that the Mac’s tiny speakers will not be sufficientwhen audio applications such as videoconferencing and telephony becomecommonplace. Right now, however, multimedia monitors are more of anoddity than a must-have.

As of early September, only seven Mac-compatible multimedia monitorswere shipping. Of those, only the AppleVision 1710AV represents a secondattempt by a company to produce a mainstream product. (Apple’s first mul-timedia monitor, the AudioVision 14 Display, which shipped in mid-1993,lacks the extensive sound and color-calibration capabilities of the newermodel.) The other monitors are first-generation products, from companiesjust starting to tap into multimedia technology.

To get a better idea of whether multimedia monitors are a good idea or justa passing fad, we tested the units that were available in late summer. We werecurious about all sorts of things. How does the image quality compare to thatof speakerless monitors? How good is the audio? Do vendors charge a pre-mium for the sound capabilities? Do these monitors offer the features we’vecome to expect from top-notch products?

To answer these questions, we spent considerable time with each monitor.We performed lab tests on image quality and sound quality; we stared at textdocuments, line art, and scanned images; we played our favorite audio CDs atoffice-hours levels and at after-hours levels; we fiddled with knobs and on-screen controls; we checked street prices and warranties. You get the picture.Here’s what we learned.


1

MULTIMEDIA MONITORS

THE BOTTOM LINESILENT NO LONGER: These monitors have a voice, but at what cost?Before buying a monitor with built-in sound capabilities, be sure tocompare prices with its speakerless counterparts. After you’vechecked out the price tag, turn up the volume, take a long look at thescreen, and play with the buttons. After all, a good multimedia moni-tor is more than just a pretty picture.

3/ OUTSTANDING 2/ ACCEPTABLE 1/ POORRATING PRODUCT PRICE SUPPORT IMAGE SOUND

QUALITY QUALITY

mmmm ViewSonic 17GA 2 2 3 2A real multimedia bargain, the ViewSonic 17GA (estimated streetprice, $850) offers solid image quality, warm colors, fine-sound-ing audio, and a slew of easy-to-use on-screen controls — all at acompetitive price. The stylish case will also make you the envy ofyour office mates.

mmmm Apple AppleVision1710AV 1 2 3 3

mmmh IBM 17S/S 1 2 2 3

mmmh Nokia 447W 2 2 3 1

mmmh PanasonicPanaMedia 17 2 3 2 2

mmm Philips 17B 2 2 2 1

mmh Philips Brilliance 15A 2 2 2 1

LISTING IS ALPHABETICAL WITHIN GROUPS OF EQUAL MOUSE RATINGS.

THE PROS: WHY YOU’LL LIKE THEMIt didn’t take long to find a couple of good reasons to at least con-sider purchasing a multimedia monitor. First, these monitors gen-erally cost only a tad more than their speakerless counterparts, andsecond, even the worst-sounding units had better speakers thanthose built into the Mac. Beyond that, we found several distinct ad-vantages that multimedia monitors offer.

Built-in speakers take up less desk space than stand-alones — avaluable trait in a world where desktop real estate is at a premium.Even better, built-in speakers won’t get knocked over nor will theyjust “walk away.” Expensive stand-alone speakers may offer jazzylooks, top-notch sound quality, and easy portability, but these veryattributes can work against them, making them prime targets fortheft. On the other hand, swiping a multimedia monitor to get at thespeakers would be like stealing a house to get at the safe — it justdoesn’t make sense.

Some users will be charmed by a multimedia monitor’s no-assembly-required approach. Unlike many personal stereo sys-tems, an all-in-one system doesn’t leave you with a mass of flimsyspeaker wires tangled up around your desk nor does it give you anysetup headaches. For example, with a multimedia monitor, youdon’t have to worry about matching the speakers’ RCA plugs with acomputer’s standard stereo miniplug. Instead, you simply attach ashort cable that comes with the monitor directly between the Mac’saudio-output port and the multimedia monitor’s speakers. This no-fuss approach is sufficient for those who want a quick-and-easy wayto get better sound than what comes out of the tiny speakers in theirMac. True audiophiles, however, might be left wanting more.


THE CONS: WHY YOU WON’T LIKE THEMEven the vendors of multimedia monitors will tell you that built-inspeakers will probably never match the sound quality of a homestereo system. Cost issues aside, physics works against includinghigh-quality sound in a monitor. First, the speakers that fit in amonitor are not big enough to produce the full range of sound youcan find in a home system. Large speaker cones and enclosures pro-duce deeper, richer bass response than their smaller counterparts,because they can move more air and create deeper reverberations.

Second, it’s difficult to acquire surround-sound from stationaryspeakers. Home-stereo enthusiasts plan speaker placement care-fully so that the sound waves bounce and reflect for optimal audio.Monitor speakers, however, don’t allow you this luxury.

Finally, large speaker magnets create loud, rich sounds but theirmagnetic forces can also cause color distortion in your monitor.Manufacturers use special shielding on all computer-compatiblespeakers to keep them from interfering with the monitor’s screenimage, but this shielding is not strong enough to protect a monitorfrom the pull of large speaker magnets.

Because of these technical issues, audio enthusiasts may be dis-appointed by a multimedia monitor’s limited sound capabili-ties. You won’t get booming bass lines, surround-sound, or home-stereo-level loudness from any of today’s multimedia monitors.Serious music fans will have to shell out extra cash for stand-alonespeakers in order to experience audio authenticity.

Graphics professionals may also hesitate before jumping onto themultimedia-monitor bandwagon. None of the monitors we testedhad a screen size larger than 17 inches, and only the AppleVision1710AV and the Nokia 447W offered any color-calibration abilities.The AppleVision 1710AV’S software can create a ColorSync profile,which you can refine by adjusting the screen’s white point, ambientlight, and gamma point so that the display matches real-life colors.New color-management technology also allows the AppleVision1710AV to constantly monitor and correct for the effects of ambientlighting, phosphor aging, and glass browning, so that on-screencolor remains accurate over time. Nokia supplies its monitor withColorific, color-calibration software that works in conjunction withColorSync 2.0 to enable you to match on-screen colors with theirprinted counterparts. Nonetheless, with so few color-calibrationchoices available, professional designers might be wise to wait untilmore products reach the market.

HEARING IS BELIEVINGIf you’re ready to take the plunge and buy a monitor with built-insound capabilities, you should listen before you leap. We performedobjective lab tests to find out how well each monitor reproducedsound. Then we tested the monitors the old-fashioned way, simplylistening to a wide variety of sounds. Audio quality ranged frompoor AM-radio-style crackle to sound reproduction that held itsown against inexpensive stand-alone speakers.

Speaker location has a strong influence on audio quality. Moni-tors that have speakers hidden underneath the bezel or relegated tothe sides of the case, such as the Nokia 447W and both of the Philipsmodels, sacrifice volume and clarity as the sound waves are ab-sorbed by the desktop or dispersed to the side. To achieve superioraudio, the speakers should be mounted on the front of the monitor,

We’re a tough crowd toplease here at MacUser, but wedidn’t find much to complainabout when it comes to imagequality. Overall, all the monitorsgave us clean, colorful images. In

fact, we noted failings only in thebrightness tests (the PanasonicPanaMedia 17 and the Philips 17Bwere noticeably dim) and in theconvergence tests (the IBM 17S/Sshowed visible halos).

In order to test image quality,we ran the monitors through agamut of lab tests, using sophisti-cated measuring devices. A spotmeter gave us data on eachmonitor’s brightness, sharpness,

convergence, and geometry. Acolor analyzer revealed how welleach monitor fared when repro-ducing color: It measured colortracking, color range, color unifor-mity, and color purity.

BEST PERFORMER(S) IN EACH TEST

MACUSER BEST BUY

BETTERSCORE

Apple AppleVision 1710AV Nokia 447W c ViewSonic 17GA Panasonic PanaMedia 17 Philips 17B IBM 17S/S Philips Brilliance 15A

1.3 1.3 1.3 1.2 1.2 1.1 1.1

BETTERFOOTLAMBERTS

35 31 30 26 25 31 32

BETTERSCORE

49 60 56 59 53 57 42

BETTERSCORE

1.1 1.1 1.1 1.0 2.0

.5

.9BETTERSCORE

1.4 1.2 1.3 1.2 1.2 1.1 1.0

c

LOOKIN’ GOOD / multimedia monitors provide solid image quality

PRODUCTS TESTED OVERALL QUALITY BRIGHTNESS SHARPNESS CONVERGENCE COLOR QUALITYWe combined the results We measured the highest To find each monitor’s For this test, we measured Our three color-quality testsfrom a variety of tests, such level of brightness each sharpness, we measured how accurately a monitor’s measured each monitor’sas brightness, sharpness, monitor could achieve how well it was able to electron beams hit the red, color tracking, color range,convergence, and color without losing focus. A display single-pixel-wide green, and blue phosphors. and color uniformity. Aquality. A score of 1.0 is result of 20 footlamberts is lines. A score of 50 is A score of 1.0 is considered score of 1.0 is consideredconsidered acceptable. considered acceptable. considered acceptable. acceptable. acceptable.

so that the sound waves travel in a direct path to your ears.In fact, the AppleVision 1710AV, IBM 17S/S, Panasonic Pana-

Media 17, and ViewSonic 17GA each have the speakers on the frontof the bezel — and these monitors scored above average in our sub-jective listening tests. Of these, the AppleVision 1710AV, with itsrelatively high-powered speakers bulging up and out from the bot-tom front of the bezel, blasted past the competition in terms of purepower and accurate sound reproduction. No other multimediamonitor came close to matching its extensive bass and treble re-sponse; the resulting sound was clean and sharp enough to rivalthat of the stand-alone Altec Lansing ACS52 speakers we used forcomparison.

One explanation for the AppleVision 1710AV’s superior soundlies in its design. Like the Altec Lansing ACS52 speakers, theAppleVision 1710AVs gain greater bass-tone reproduction throughporting, a technique that allows air to pass through the enclosureand causes the speaker cones to reverberate. The rest of the speak-ers, which lack this feature, offered only minimal bass response (seethe “Sounding Off ” charts).

The IBM 17S/S performed slightly better than the PanasonicPanaMedia 17 and the ViewSonic 17GA, although all three provedcapable of pumping out adequate sound at above-average volume.Each of these units suffered from minimal bass response, but theiroverall sound quality was far superior to the tinny, scratchy soundsof both the Philips models. We were disappointed with the Nokia447W’s poor sound quality. We also noticed a disturbing trend withthe Philips monitors and the Nokia 447W: When we boosted thespeakers in these monitors to high volumes, we saw an irritatingshimmer on the monitor screen. Speaker vibrations at these vol-umes were causing the monitors’ shadow masks to vibrate.

PICTURE PERFECTImage quality may no longer be a monitor’s sole selling point, butdon’t be deceived by relatively slick-sounding speakers into think-ing that it’s not important. Listening to your favorite audio CD may

get you through the day, but chances are you’ll spend more of yourtime staring at a spreadsheet than jamming to the beat. To help youdetermine which monitor offers the best image quality, we ran eachthrough a battery of lab tests and then stared them down ourselvesto make sure the numbers didn’t lie (see the “Lookin’ Good” charts).

Overall, each monitor offered acceptable image quality, but indi-vidual strengths and weaknesses may dictate which monitor youprefer. If you work with numbers, for example, you may want thesharpest monitor; if you work with scanned photos, you may needthe monitor with the best color quality. Here’s what we found.Brightness. Looking at a dim screen over long periods can placeundue stress on your eyes. Thus, it’s wise to choose a monitor that’ssufficiently bright. You should also make sure the monitor is evenbrighter than you need — dimness creeps up on monitors as CRTsage over the years, like a receding hairline.

All the monitors we tested offered adequate brightness for mostoffice environments. The AppleVision 1710AV and the Philips Bril-liance 15A scored the highest, providing enough brightness to lastwell into their golden years. Our testers and editors also noted thatdespite other image flaws, these monitors stood out from their com-petitors; in general, people have a natural preference for brightscreen displays. In comparison, the Philips 17B, which offered theleast brightness, proved disappointing and dim.Sharpness. People who spend most of their day slaving over spread-sheets or staring at word-processing documents will want a moni-tor that offers crisp text and clean lines. To evaluate screen sharp-ness, we measured the contrast between adjacent single-pixel-wideblack and white lines. The Nokia 447W scored the highest, by anose, in terms of crisp screen images.

Only the sweet-sounding AppleVision 1710AV and the PhilipsBrilliance 15A produced unacceptable scores in this test. In eachcase, text and lines appeared noticeably more blurry than they didon the other monitors. Blurriness has plagued many of Apple’smonitors — and the problem is still evident on the AppleVision1710AV.


MULTIMEDIA MONITORS

THE PERFECT ALTERNATIVE / the third option

THE IDEA OF AN ALL-IN-ONE, space-saving multimedia monitor isappealing, but you love the monitor you have. What do you do? Oneoption is to check out the Sony CSS-B100 speaker system ($99.95list), which is designed to fit underneath your monitor.

The lightweight set of full-range audio speakers fits below any17-inch or smaller monitor. Sliding-bar tuners located between thetwo front-mounted speakers let you adjust the volume or pump upthe bass. In order to obtain a full, rich sound, however, you’ll want tokeep the bass boosted at all times. (Lowering the bass results in aflat, weak sound that’s hardly better than what comes out of yourMac.)

With the volume turned up and the bass maxed out, the Sonyspeakers prove comparable in sound quality to most of the low-costpersonal speakers currently being manufactured for use with com-puters. The Sony CSS-B100s also compete with personal speakers forfeatures. They ship with all the necessary cables, and the front-panelinput ports make hooking up headphones, a microphone, or anadditional CD player a breeze. You can reach Sony at 800-352-7669

or 408-432-0190.Other vendors, such as

NEC, have also realized thevalue of space-saving soundsystems and will offer sim-ilar below-the-base speakersthis fall. As sound quality im-proves and desk space less-ens, these stackable speak-ers may become the perfectaudiovisual alternative fortight spaces.

Convergence. The sharp, colorful images that pop up on your moni-tor are the result of electron beams accurately lighting up the red,green, and blue phosphors on the inside of the screen. If these elec-tron beams do not nail the phosphors squarely on the head, you’llsee fuzzy, off-color text and color halos rainbowing around theedges of images. Our tests measured the alignment (known as con-vergence) of these electron beams. Although both the IBM 17S/Sand the Philips Brilliance 15A had subpar convergence levels, wenoticed only the slightest differences between these monitors andthe top-scoring Philips 17B. Most monitors, unfortunately, do nothave convergence-correction capabilities.Color Quality. You don’t have to be a graphics guru to appreciate high-quality color. Even inexpensive CD-ROM titles such as Passage toVietnam or games such as DOOM and Buried in Time sport stellargraphics and vivid, photo-realistic images. If you want the mostfrom your multimedia monitor, don’t settle for washed-out colors.

We tested each monitor for color purity, range, and uniformity ofbrightness across the screen. Imperfections in any of these qualitiescan result in weak colors, limited hues, or a dirty-looking screen.The AppleVision 1710AV and the ViewSonic 17GA scored slightlyhigher than the rest of the group in these tests, but the color qualityof all the monitors was acceptable. Even when we viewed color qual-ity subjectively, it was difficult to pick out any favorites from themix, although the AppleVision 1710AV garnered praise for its vividcolors and the ViewSonic 17GA earned points for its realistic hues.


EXTRAS AND ERGONOMICSYou might not buy a car solely because it has dual air bags, but theextras that come with a product can, and should, influence your fi-nal purchasing decision. Computer monitors are no different. Weput together a wish list of features we look for in a top-notch multi-media monitor and then checked to see how each monitor matchedup. Here’s the scoop:Resolution. All the monitors support resolutions of 640 x 480 pix-els, 832 x 624 pixels, and 1,024 x 768 pixels. Also, the AppleVision1710AV, IBM 17S/S, and Nokia 447W offer a maximum resolution of1,280 x 1,024 pixels, which is handy when you need to view largechunks of data. (You need a third-party video card to drive themonitors at this resolution, however.)Image Controls. All the monitors except for the Philips models offerdigital on-screen controls that you manipulate via a set of four ormore buttons on the front of the monitor. The Philips monitors takethe minimalist approach, by offering analog brightness and con-trast knobs in addition to several basic on-screen controls. Someusers may prefer analog controls, because accessing them is quickand adjustments are intuitive, but digital on-screen controls offermore fine-tuning options and give you better visual feedback onyour adjustments. Many digital controls additionally allow you torevert to the factory settings with a mouse click, making experi-mentation less risky for users unfamiliar with the more obscuremanipulations.

All the monitors have brightness and contrast controls (digital oranalog) as well as degaussing and pincushioning adjustments.Pincushioning can occur after you switch resolutions, making con-trols a necessity. Most monitors include an additional 10 to 15 on-screen digital controls that, for example, let you center an imagevertically or horizontally or rotate it. Most also allow you to set thecolor temperature. You may not need all these fine-tuning features,but they can prove useful, especially as your monitor ages or if it isjostled in a move.

The AppleVision 1710AV’s controls were our favorites. Easy-to-understand icons and arrows point you in the right direction as youadjust contrast and brightness, basic geometry, and color tempera-ture. Although the IBM 17S/S, Nokia 447W, Panasonic PanaMedia17, and ViewSonic 17GA also offer an impressive array of digital on-screen controls, none quite equal the sophistication and simplicityof the Apple monitor’s.Audio Controls. Once again, both Philips models scraped by with thebasics, offering only analog volume controls. The IBM 17S/S, thePanasonic PanaMedia 17, and the ViewSonic 17GA earn kudos forseparating the mute and volume adjustments from the main on-screen control menu, making them quickly accessible. But it wasagain the AppleVision 1710AV that earned the highest praises, forits on-screen bass and treble tuners (speaker controls not found onthe other monitors). The Apple monitor also lets you set the volumelevel for your headphones separately from the speaker volume.Adapters. Most of the monitors can be used with either a Mac or aPC, and most require an adapter to hook up to the Mac. All exceptfor the IBM 17S/S, the Panasonic PanaMedia 17, and the ViewSonic17GA come with the proper adapters. ViewSonic and Panasonic willinclude an adapter free of charge, but only if you request it. To hookup an IBM 17S/S to your Macintosh, you must purchase a multiple-

1

MULTIMEDIA MONITORS

It’s all in the expecta-tions. True audiophiles may notlike the sounds they hear blastingfrom even the best multimediamonitors. But for users who arecontent with sound quality thatfalls between that produced bythe Mac’s built-in speakers and ahome stereo system, several of the

multimedia monitors will do quitenicely.

We tested the seven units tofind out how consistently theycould reproduce sound over thevarying frequencies that fallwithin the human hearing range(20 to 20,000 hertz). When wecompared our subjective ratings

with the objective results, we no-ticed a pattern. Subjectively, wepreferred those speakers that didtwo things well — covered a highpercentage of the human hearingrange (how close the start of theline in a chart is to 20 hertz andhow close its end is to 20,000hertz) and produced consistent

volume (how close the line is tothe 0 level in a chart).

We’ve grouped the results sub-jectively. The volume of eachspeaker at 1,000 hertz, where hu-man hearing is most sensitive, isgiven the value 0. The volume atall other frequencies is shownrelative to that value.

SOUNDING OFF / sound quality from best to worst

OUTSTANDING

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FREQUENCY IN HERTZ20 20,000

-12

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AppleVision 1710AV

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ACCEPTABLE

c ViewSonic 17GAPanasonic PanaMedia 17

Philips 17BPhilips Brilliance 15ANokia 447W

IBM 17S/S

c MacUser BEST BUY

resolution adapter such as the Liberty Adapter ($39.95 list), fromEnhance Cable Technology (800-717-8757 or 408-232-0200).Built-in Extras. As multimedia continues to evolve, the definition ofmultimedia monitors will expand to include more than just built-in speakers. The AppleVision 1710AV, IBM 17S/S, Nokia 447W,Panasonic PanaMedia 17, and ViewSonic 17GA come with built-inmicrophones that enable you to record sounds and that facilitateteleconferencing. The IBM 17S/S even includes a video-cameracompartment on the top front that allows you to hook up a camerafor videoconferencing.Warranties and Guarantees. You may be tempted to toss warrantiesthat come with less expensive appliances, but when you’re shellingout $1,000 or more, you can’t afford to be left in the lurch if the itembreaks down. The IBM 17S/S, the Panasonic PanaMedia 17, and thePhilips Brilliance 15A each come with an impressive, three-yearwarranty on parts and labor. The AppleVision 1710AV has the worstprotection against product failure, with a meager, one-year parts-and-labor warranty.

As for money-back guarantees, only the IBM 17S/S has a 30-daymoney-back offer direct from the manufacturer. Nokia and View-Sonic leave the option of providing money-back guarantees up todealers. You should check a store’s policy before purchasing one ofthese vendor’s monitors.Manuals and Support. Detailed manuals and toll-free support linesare useful for making sense of the myriad of on-screen controls andfor troubleshooting minor glitches. The AppleVision 1710AV’s 158-page manual covers everything from installation to color calibra-tion, using detailed illustrations and step-by-step instructions. Anindex quickly guides you to where you need to go.

The manual packaged with the Panasonic PanaMedia 17 also


supplies comprehensive instructions and clearly displays the toll-free help number for anyone with questions. On the other hand,IBM does not list a help number anywhere in its manual. The guide’ssmall type, sterile graphics, and stilted instructions make referringto the guide unpleasant and confusing.

Each company offers toll-free tech support, although operatinghours vary. Panasonic deserves recognition for its high level of cus-tomer support — it’s the only company to offer around-the-clocksupport, seven days a week. The other companies’ support lines areopen only between about 7 A.M. and 8 P.M. EST — and don’t eventhink about getting help from any company besides Panasonic ifyour monitor breaks down on the weekends or major holidays.

THE PRICE IS RIGHTOnce you’ve stared at the screens, jacked up the speakers, and in-spected the extras, you may still be confused about which monitorto buy. You may even still be wondering whether you wouldn’t bebetter off buying a plain-old monitor and a pair of stand-alonespeakers. Frankly, we still have qualms too.

After looking at all the variables, we’ve found that you get morefor your money with an all-in-one audiovisual package. Yet com-petitive shoppers may be turned off by the current limited supply. Atthe time of our testing, the small crop of seven multimedia monitorswas small potatoes compared to the abundance of soundless moni-tors that appear on the scene every month. And the audiophilesamong us woefully noted that if you’re willing to spend upwards of$150, you can get superb stand-alone speakers.

That said, we did find two multimedia monitors that we would beperfectly happy to have on our desks — the AppleVision 1710AVand the ViewSonic 17GA. The AppleVision 1710AV garnered high

MULTIMEDIA MONITORS

honors, for its full range of sound; extensive controls; and bright,vivid images. But at an estimated street price of $1,159, it may betoo expensive for some budgets.

The ViewSonic 17GA, however, receives our BEST BUY rating.This monitor performed solidly in all of our testing categories,and its screen images displayed warm, realistic color. And with an


estimated street price of $850, it’s definitely priced right. After all,these multimedia monitors are still best suited for users who don’twant to pay the high price associated with high end. s

Nikki Echler is a MacUser assistant editor. Associate lab director NathanGarcia managed the testing for this report.

LIST ESTIMATED VITAL STATISTICS HITS MISSES WARRANTY COMPANYPRICE STREET PRICE INFORMATION

Apple AppleVision 1710AV NA $1,159 17-inch Trinitron tube with Deep bass response and a Fuzzy text and slightly 1 year parts Cupertino, CAa maximum resolution of bright, colorful screen. blurry lines. Full-figured and labor 800-538-96961,280 x 1,024 pixels at a 75-Hz Variety of simple-to-use price tag hurts the wallet. 408-996-1010refresh rate controls make using this

monitor easy to master.

IBM 17S/S $1,400 $1,300 17-inch shadow-mask tube with Easy-to-use digital Poor convergence and a 3 years parts Research Triangle Park, NCa maximum resolution of on-screen controls; superior downright hefty price. and labor 800-772-22271,280 x 1,024 pixels at a 75-Hz sound reproduction; and a 914-765-1900refresh rate bright, crisp display. 800-426-3395 (fax)

Nokia 447W $850 NA 17-inch shadow-mask tube with Razor-sharp lines and Sound quality reminiscent 3 years parts Sausalito, CA(direct) a maximum resolution of on-screen controls available of poor AM-radio reception. and labor, 800-296-6542

1,280 x 1,024 pixels at a 80-Hz in six languages. 2 years on CRT 415-331-6622refresh rate 415-331-6211 (fax)

Panasonic PanaMedia 17 $999 $830 17-inch shadow-mask tube with Crisp text and sharp lines. Dark display creates low 3 years parts Secaucus, NJa maximum resolution of Around-the-clock, toll-free contrast. and labor 800-742-80861,024 x 768 pixels at a 75-Hz support never leaves you 201-348-7000refresh rate in the lurch. 201-392-4760 (fax)

Philips Brilliance 15A $599 $500 15-inch shadow-mask tube with Small screen equals small Scratchy, muffled audio 3 years parts Knoxville, TNa maximum resolution of price. makes silence sound good. and labor 800-822-12191,024 x 768 pixels at a 75-Hz 615-521-4316refresh rate 615-521-3210 (fax)

Philips 17B $899 $800 17-inch shadow-mask tube with Best convergence creates So-so sound quality due to 2 years parts Knoxville, TNa maximum resolution of pure colors. side-mounted speakers. and labor 800-822-12191,024 x 768 pixels at a 75-Hz Dark screen makes word 615-521-4316refresh rate processing tedious. 615-521-3210 (fax)

c ViewSonic 17GA $995 $850 17-inch shadow-mask tube with Offers the most-consistent Speakers provide only 3 years parts, Walnut, CAa maximum resolution of audio and image quality. minimal bass response. 1 year labor 800-888-85831,152 x 870 pixels at a 75-Hz Warm, realistic screen colors. 909-869-7976refresh rate 909-869-7958 (fax)

c MacUser BEST BUY

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY / the best and worst featuresWhat’s hot and what’s not — here’s the place to find out where each of themonitors shines and where it doesn’t. We’ve also included the key specifica-tions for each monitor, statistics such as the maximum resolution and the

length of the warranty. We didn’t, however, list all the standard features themonitors have in common — things such as contrast and brightness con-trols, antiglare treatment, and Energy Star compliance.

126 M

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, which is the most expensive item to replace.To clear up some of this confusion, from now on, Quick Labs’ warranty listing

ngth of time covered by any component of the war-ny may cover parts and labor for three years, if the only for one year, we will list the warranty as beingwarranty to its lowest common denominator, we’re exactly how much “free time” you have with your

ick Labs goes online. Check out “MacUser/ZMacmonth’s New on the Menu for more details.

3/ OUTSTANDING 2/ ACCEPTABLE 1/ POOR HICS PAP PAGES PER MINUTEITY HAN

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months. The 1660E is also flexible enough formost work settings — its RJ-45 connectorplugs into any Ethernet network easily; it shipswith drivers and software for Windows, OS/2,and UNIX as well as for the Mac OS; and itsupports all standard network protocols.

The 1660E comes standard with a letter-sized paper tray that holds 250 sheets and asecond 11-x-17-inch tray that can hold paper,transparencies, or envelopes. QMS sells extratrays that hold 250 sheets or 500 sheets, inboth 11-x-17-inch and 8.5-x-11-inch sizes.REVIEWER / JIM SHATZ-AKIN TESTING / JIM GALBRAITH

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ESTIMATED RESOLUTION WARRANTY TEXT GRAPSTREET PRICE QUALITY QUAL

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month, for two reasons. One is pravendors didn’t ship any brand-newchrome printers this month. The opractical: QMS just began shippingin a new configuration, with 48 MBinstead of the original 16 MB. The memory boosts the printer’s price$2,000, to roughly $6,000, but unlilower-RAM configuration, which toa resolution of 600 x 600 dpi, 48 Menough imaging power for a work

QUICKolest-Lookin

rkgroup Printhe Maytag repairman sat forlornly by ll has product support — or the lack tespite improved product quality, moret someone will be there to answer ques goes awry. Vendors, however, aren’t ale of need or even what parts they’ll repl

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ACIOUS HARD DRIVES

3 / ESTIMATED SCREEN MAXIMUM OMMENTS IMAGE-QUALITY SCORESTREET PRICE SIZE RESOLUTION

mmm 00 $995 17 in. 1,280 x 1,02 pace-age case holds ace performer.mmm $999 17 in. 1,600 x 1,20 traight-A screen quality but awkward controls.mmm $999 17 in. 1,600 x 1,28 harp, bright screen images make up for low-end controls.mmm $995 17 in. 1,600 x 1,28 arge cast of on-screen controls and a decent display.mmm $1,599 20 in. 1,600 x 1,28 verage attributes at a high price.LIST S OF EQUAL MOUSE RATINGS.

GE 1600 ArtMedia 408-980-8988 Cutting Edg -2000 Mirror Technologies 612-830-1549 PLI 612-830-1549 Portrait Display Labs 510-227-2700Po 00 ViewSonic 909-869-7976

ptions for formatting, trouble-d tuning their drive.

MS 1 GB sports a Micropolis housed in a compact case. Thee Diplomat Q850 has a supersmall, case. Its power supply is external you need to replace it. Unfortu-ound Cutting Edge’s tech supportve.

3/ R ESTIMATED FORMATTED PRICE PE MENTSSTREET PRICE CAPACITY MEGABYT

mm $649 999.5 MB $.65 t case, great warranty. An all-around good bargain.mm $642 1,039.8 MB $.62 pact case. Excellent software for tweaking settings.mm $439 517.8 MB $.85 like it, but 500-MB drives are no longer value leaders.mmm $1,299 4,103.0 MB $.32 traditional, full-sized case. Fast, but a tad noisy.mmm $299 808.5 MB $.37 , tiny case — cute even. But we’re still waiting for tech support.mmm $1,499 4,103.1 MB $.37 g remarkable, but it works just fine — and fast.LIST S OF EQUAL MOUSE RATINGS.

FINE MONITORS

A clean, sharp screeof controls make Pmonitor, the Pivot just a marketing giturning this sturdyimages in either poAfter you flip the mmouse, and the scrand open windowsThe monitor can dopiece, thanks to itsand its curves.

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s control an on-screen menu thatse among 19 image adjustments.onics Goldstar 2010 offers similar,-screen options through flimsyontrols.Max PM17TE+ and the ArtMediahave the same box design andscreen-geometry and imageo use the controls, however, youontortionist — for example, tofault settings, you must fiddle

with a combination of buttons while pushingin the reset button with a ballpoint pen. Ifyou’re willing to sacrifice user-friendly controls,you’ll find that either model is a fine choice.

The image-quality scores reflect the resultsof our tests for image sharpness, focus,brightness, uniformity, pincushioning, colorrange, color accuracy, and vibrancy. Maintain-ing focus and sharpness is more difficult onlarger monitors, so 20-inch monitors tend toscore lower than smaller models. A score of 1.0is considered acceptable.

Big drives, small drthis month. The comand Hammer PE 10for desks that are ta Quantum Firebalcomes with FWB’s combination that mfor their respectiveToolKit sports a rich

MacBench 2.0 Disk Mix Score

REVIEWER / R OMAN LOYOLA TESTING / KRISTINA DE NIKE

0 5 10

BETTER

REVIEWER / NIKKI ECHLER TESTING / MARTIN WONG

0 1.0 1.6

BETTER

If you need a high-capacity drive, check outthe Mirror 4.0 GB or the PLI Infinity 4.0 GB.Each has a more traditional, full-sized case, andeach is speedy — in all, a competent duo.

We tested drive speed by using MacBench2.0’s Disk Mix test. The results are relative tothat of a 250-MB Quantum IDE drive in aQuadra 630, which has a score of 10.

OUTSTANDING 2 / ACCEPTABLE 1/ POOR

m Portrait Display Labs Pivot 17h ArtMedia TG1882h PowerMax PM17TE+h ViewSonic 17PS

LG Electronics Goldstar 2010ING IS ALPHABETICAL WITHIN GROUP

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mm APS MS 1 GBmm FWB Hammer PE 1000FMFmh FWB Hammer PE 520

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DTP & GRAPHICSPAINT PROGRAMS /

Reach Out and Retouch SomeoneTelepaint with Painter 4, animate with Dabbler 2.
MIMICKING A MASTER MOSAICIST and imitating a Disney ani-mator are now possible with Fractal Design’s Painter 4 and Dabbler2. The latest version of Painter also adds the ability to collaboratewith other artists over the Internet. Dabbler 2 gives novice artistsnew animated tutors and tools for creating QuickTime animations.Painter 4. The natural-media paint program has long offeredbrushes that imitate pencils or oils, but now it creates mosaic tilework too. Instead of being a simple filter that breaks up an imageinto little boxes, Painter’s new Mosaic brush lets you paint with col-ored squares, controlling the tile size and grout width as you go. Fora more realistic look, the mosaic’s shapes respond to adjacent tilesby automatically adjusting their position within the image.
Speaking of shapes, Fractal expands Painter’s Bézier capabilitieswith tools for drawing basic shapes and editing Bézier lines.

Painter even anti-aliases the shapes sothey’re easier on the eyes.

Telecommuting frees usersfrom the office shackles, andnow Fractal gives us “tele-

painting,” which lets users col-laborate on a piece of art, evenover the Internet. This means

that a Painter user on a Mac canhost other artists using any ver-sion of Painter on any platform

with AppleTalk, IPX, or TCP/IP


ELECTRONIC PUBLISHING /

Adobe Acrobat Strikes Back

network protocols. Think locally, paint globally. $499.Dabbler 2. Novice artists not ready for telepainting or Mosaicbrushes can learn more about animation by using Dabbler 2. Thisentry-level paint program gives you nearly two hours of newQuickTime-based tutorials on an included CD-ROM.

Dabbler’s Tutors reveal the basics of drawing cartoon-style pic-tures and animations. Because a Tutor plays in a floating windownext to the Dabblercanvas, you can stop itat any time to practicewhat you’ve learned.The animation Tutorincludes rich materialfrom former Disneyanimator Preston Blair.

Animation is inte-gral to Dabbler’s new“flipbook” feature. LikePainter 3, Dabbler 2 lets users paint frame-by-frame animationswith controls for onion-skinning — drawing on successive trans-parent layers — and fast-forwarding and rewinding flipbooks. Youcan print the animations as a series of images to cut and staple intoan actual flipbook. To help you get started, Dabbler 2 also includesmore than 100 paper textures, hundreds of stencil shapes such asmap outlines, and character fonts from Image Club. $69. Upgradefrom 1.0, $29. 408-688-5300. / Sean J. Safreed

ScanVec’s Paper Tracing

IT’S NOT A MAJOR UPGRADE, but users of PowerPC-based computerswill find Adobe Acrobat 2.1 to be an incredible improvement on ver-sion 2.0, for one simple reason: The free Acrobat Reader and the $195Acrobat Exchange are finally PowerPC-native. Also new to version 1.2of Reader (available online from Adobe) is Acrobat WebLink, whichextends Acrobat’s hyperlinks to the Internet — click on an Internetlink, and Acrobat will automatically launch a Web browser or FTP cli-ent to take you to the appropriate corner of the Net.

With version 2.1, Adobe is also finally offering a Mac version ofAcrobat Catalog ($500; included with the $1,595 Acrobat forWorkgroups), a utility that was previously available only for Windowsand that is used for creating full-text-search indexes. And althoughusers previously had to buy a copy of Acrobat Exchange in order toperform full-text searches, Adobe is now offering a tool kit for CD-ROM developers that will enable searching in Acrobat Reader. Up-grade from Exchange 2.1, $29; upgrade from Acrobat for Workgroups2.1, $199. 800-833-6687 or 415-961-4400. / Jason Snell

A PLETHORA OF illustration pack-ages doesn’t stop artists fromdrawing on paper and then scan-ning sketches to get a digital du-plicate. But converting the bit-mapped image into PostScript lineart doesn’t always go smoothly.ScanVec’s Tracer makes conversionmore accurate, with unique edit-ing tools.

Like other tracing packagessuch as Adobe Streamline, Tracerlets you specify whether to followa bitmapped image’s outline, traceits centerline, or use a combina-tion of the two methods. Tracerconverts only black-and-whitePICT or TIFF images into EPS for-mat for importing into illustrationor page-layout applications. Otherexport formats are HP-GL and DXF.

Unique to Tracer are custom

conversion tools that eliminatethe tedious editing of Bézier con-trol points. To create smoothcurves, you can set two points andTracer automatically fits a Bézierline between them, according tothe bitmap. The corner toolsquares off rounded joins, and anyirregular blob can instantly be-come a perfect circle. $795. 508-694-9488. / SJS

FINE PRINTMitsubishi Dye-SubsLet It Bleed
IF YOU’RE GOING TO PAY for an expensive dye-subprinter, why not buy one that can print page spreadsat full size with color bleeds? Mitsubishi’s newDiamondScript I (a.k.a. the S6600-40U) allows you toprint images of up to 11.92 x 17.17 inches at resolutionsas high as 300 x 600 dpi.
Unlike Mitsubishi’s previous tabloid-capable dye-sub,the DiamondScript I includes an Adobe PostScript Level 2

controller and supports Apple’s ColorSync color-matching standard. Pricedat $14,995, this new model ships with 24 MB of RAM, so you can start printing right out of

the box. A 260-MB internal hard drive serves as a print spooler and stores frequently downloadedfonts. Parallel, serial, and LocalTalk connections are included, and EtherTalk is a $990 option.

It accepts four paper sizes — letter, legal, tabloid, and wide tabloid — and uses monochrome,three-color, or four-color ribbons. 800-843-2515 or 714-220-2500. / Pamela Pfiffner

Plug-ins Meld Illustrator, Photoshop

Photoshop by the BookSOME SAY you can never be too rich or toothin or have too many books on AdobePhotoshop. And judging by the Photoshoptomes flooding our office, we’d tend to dis-agree. Separating the wheat from the chaffcan be tricky. Here are a few titles on whichwe’ve come to rely. ✲ If you spend lots oftime in Photoshop color-correcting imagesand preparing them for print, then youwant Real World Photoshop 3: Industrial-Strength Production Techniques. Justpublished by Peachpit Pressand written by DavidBlatner and MacUser con-tributing editor BruceFraser, this exhaustivelook at how Photoshopreally works fearlesslydelves into gamma,white point, blackpoint, tonal curves, and soon. It also covers such mainstream areasas how to get great scans with Photoshopand your desktop scanner. $35. 800-283-9444 or 510-548-4393. ✲ Photoshop is fa-mous for its fancy filters and special effects.For those who want to see Photoshop art-ists in action, there’s The Photoshop 3Wow! Book, newly revised by Linnea Day-ton and Jack Davis (Peachpit Press). Richlyillustrated with step-by-step techniques, itwill inspire and amaze you — who knewthere were such, um, diverse talents outthere? $40. And if you want to try your handat special-effects wizardry, take a look atPhotoshop Filter Finesse, which lets youfollow along with accomplished digital art-ist Bill Niffenegger as he plays with scores ofinteresting techniques. Random House.$45. 800-733-3000 or 212-751-2600. ✲ Twobookshelf mainstays are Photoshop 3 forMacintosh: Visual Quickstart Guide, byElaine Weinmann and Peter Lourekas(Peachpit again), a kind of Cliff ’s Notes forPhotoshop ($20) and Advanced AdobePhotoshop: Classroom in a Book, the offi-cial training book from Adobe Systems,with a CD-ROM of sample images. Abeginner’s edition is also available. $50.Distributed by Macmillan. 800-428-5331 or317-581-3535. ✲ We’ve only skimmedPhotoshop Artistry: A Master Class forPhotographers and Artists, by BarryHaynes and Wendy Crumpler (Sybex), butthis book of hands-on exercises looks prom-ising. $50. 800-227-2346 or 510-523-8233.And the list goes on . . . . / PP

CROSSING THE BOUNDARIES betweenbitmapped and vector graphics, Extensis’DrawTools and Human Software’s Medleybring creative tools found in image-editingpackages to Adobe Illustrator and Macro-media FreeHand. Or if trying to correct thecolors in a bitmapped image has youstumped, try Intellihance 2.0, also fromExtensis.DrawTools. Formerly from ScarlettGraphixx, this set of integrated plug-inssports a new interface and includes mod-ules that can reshape, color-correct, andprecisely move objects in Adobe Illustratoror Macromedia FreeHand. The Shape mod-ule can wrap vector artwork around a vari-ety of user-definable 3-D shapes à la AdobeDimensions. In FreeHand, the shape toolswork interactively, so you can position 3-Dshapes within the work space rather thanusing a clumsy modal dialog box.

The DrawTools Color module providesvector artists with a number of the color-correction options available in AdobePhotoshop, including gamma-curve edit-ing, color-to-grayscale conver-sion, and duotone generation.$149. 503-274-2020.Intellihance 2.0. New to the

Extensis lineup is Intellihance 2.0, formerlyfrom DPA Software. The original filter dis-tilled the arcane control dialog boxes inPhotoshop into simple menu choices. Ver-sion 2.0 of this Photoshop plug-in offers arevamped interface; before-and-after im-age previews; and easier-to-use slider con-trols for tweaking the tone, saturation, andsharpness of images. $149.Medley. Human Software takes the powerfulmasking and layering functions available inits AutoMask Photoshop plug-in and putsthem into Medley, a plug-in that works withIllustrator and FreeHand. Like AutoMask,Medley can quickly composite up to 64 RGBor CMYK images, using a variety of blend-ing modes. Medley also has interactivemasking brushes for creating soft featheredareas and simple drop shadows. The plug-inrequires just 8 MB of RAM, and its imagescan be more than 100 MB in size, thanks tothe proxy-based preview. The final resultis an EPS file placed in Illustrator orFreeHand. $199. After January 1, $295. 408-399-0057. / SJS


DTP & GRAPHICS

GIFT GUIDE / BY PAMELA PFIFFNER

Favorite ThingsBrown-paper packages tied up with string may satisfy some people, but what delightsdesktop publishers and graphic artists? Here’s our guide to DTP holiday giving.

HO HO HO HUM. The holiday season is here, filling uswith the anxiety of finding The Perfect Gift. Never fear:We’ve put together a shopping list to please the graphicartists and desktop publishers on your holiday gift list.
Start your shopping with a trip to the mall— the font mall, that is. Open up the beau-tifully designed Precision Type Font ReferenceGuide ($40), and pick a handful of fontsfrom mainstream stores such as Adobe Sys-tems, Monotype Typography, and ITC orfrom designer boutiques such as The FontBureau, T-26, Carter & Cone. Better yet, Pre-cision Type offers font gift certificates rang-ing in value from $25 to $250, so your DTPpals can choose their own. 800-248-3668 or516-543-3636. Another source of innovativetype is FontShop International, which spe-cializes in cutting-edge design with a Euro-pean flair. Its sleek catalog, FontBook ($39),is a gift in itself. 800-897-3872 or 312-360-1990. The new AgfaType Creative Allianceoffers exclusive fonts (not sold in stores!)designed by a who’s who of contemporarytype designers. Call for its free Ag faTypeCatalog. 800-424-8963 or 508-658-5600.
If selecting fonts for a finicky friend is toodaunting, slip the Bitstream MasterWorksfont collection under the tree. This CD-ROM contains 200 of Bitstream’s best-sell-ing fonts in PostScript as well as TrueType

format. $399. 800-522-3668 or 617-497-6222. For fun display type, there’s

Image Club Graphics’LetterPress Special Edi-tion CD-ROM of 160

PostScript fonts, including 20 picture fonts.$449. 800-661-9410 or 403-262-8008.

Compact discs are a holiday classic, butinstead of getting the new Oasis CD, opt fora CD-ROM of photographic images or clipart that has a bit more snap and crackle thanutilitarian images of busy executives or bril-liant sunsets. For example, we like the play-ful black-and-white Retro Americana($299) collection of stock photos, fromPhotoDisc. For unique objects that can beplopped into any image, try PhotoDisc’sRetro Relics ($149), Architectural Elements($149), or any volume from PhotoDisc’seight-disc CMCD object library of visualsymbols. $159 each. 800-528-3472 or 206-441-9355. The Classic Photographic ImageObjects library — photos of movie propsfrom Hollywood — is a riot, especially thenew Classic Nostalgic Memorabilia collec-tion. $70. 800-370-2746 or 818-564-8106.

A pioneer of the retro revival, CSA Designsells a whopping two-pound hardcovercatalog ($50) of its distinctive line-art im-ages. Each of the 7,777 images is copy-righted, so you have to pay a fee to use them,but it’s a great source of inspiration. Betteryet, order the CSA Archive CD-ROM of 100copyright-free images ($95). Even betterstill, dress your desk with neato retro acces-sories — such as face-changing magnets

($20), canned 3-D “clipart,” cheeky wristwatches($69), Slacks cologne thatlets you “smell like yourDad” ($35), and even ac-tual coffee tables ($185)bearing CSA’s ’50s styleline art — from the CSAArchive Collection. 612-339-1263.

For the gift that keeps on giving, signyour friends up for a subscription to ArtParts, an eclectic collection of EPS line artwith the look of hand-drawn sketches. Eachsubscription ($40 per month) comes withthe official Art Parts beanie and with Regu-lar Joe the Font. Two “CD-RONs” are alsoavailable for $400 each. 714-771-6754. Forthe complete Art Parts experience, throw inthe delightfully illustrated A Day with Biff, abook created entirely of Art Parts and de-signed by Ron and Joe, the noggins behindArt Parts. The book comes with a samplerdisc. $25. Peachpit Press, 510-548-4393.

Ah, yes, books. Like Tinker Toys or Erec-tor Sets, how-to books make great gifts —we highly recommend How Desktop Publish-ing Works ($25), by yours truly. ZD Press,800-688-0448 or 510-601-2000. But theimage-conscious may prefer trendy design


DTP & GRAPHICS

books such as A Blip in the Continuum, DTPmaven Robin Williams’ book on grunge ty-pography, from Peachpit Press. A disc with22 cutting-edge fonts is included. $23.Another possibility is Emigre (The Book):Graphic Design into the Digital Realm. Formore than ten years, Zuzanna Licko, RudyVanderLans, and the rest of the gang at Emi-gre have pushed the envelope in terms ofMac-generated graphic design, with theireponymous quarterly magazine, which in-corporates Licko’s original fonts (for salefrom Emigre) and provocative essays ongraphic design. This deluxe, signed, slip-cased retrospective of their work comeswith a music CD. $50. 800-944-9021 or 916-451-4344.

The Hard Stuff

Remember the thrill of receiving a PolaroidSwinger or, for you younger types, your firstSony WatchMan? This year’s equivalent isthe Casio QV-10 LCD Digital Camera. We’veraved about this sexy little toy before (see“Photo Opportunities,” November ’95, page82); it’s just the thing for the guy or gal whohas to have the latest cool gadget. $999. 800-962-2746 or 201-361-5400.

Most people think that a color printer isout of reach, but now there are optionsavailable for most budgets. For less than$400, you can give the print publisher inyour life a personal photo studio, with theFargo FotoFun! dye-sublimation printer.This little number produces photo-realisticprints the size of 4-x-6-inch snapshots fromthe local Fotomat. An optional $30 kit en-ables you to make four photo mugs — per-fect for next year’s gift giving. 800-327-4622or 612-941-9470.

For printing layouts, flyers, invitations,and so on, you’ll want to give a more versa-tile printer. The $400 Apple Color StyleWriter2400 (800-538-9696 or 408-996-1010) andthe $500 Hewlett-Packard DeskWriter 660C(800-752-0900) offer high-quality inkjet


printing at rock-bottom prices. Throw inGDT Softworks’ StyleScript 2.0, software thattransforms the 2400 into a PostScriptprinter, for just $149. 604-291-9121.

Wrapping up a pen as a gift sounds likesomething Great-Uncle Ernie might do, butnot when it’s a Wacom Erasing UltraPen forthe Wacom ArtPad II and ArtZ II graphictablets. Sold separately for $90 or bundledwith a tablet (prices start at $175), the penacts as if it had a real eraser when usedwith software that supports it. 206-750-8882. If you’re new to the world of pressure-sensitive pens and natural-media software,Fractal Design Dabbler ($69) is a great prod-uct to start with. Dabbler provides many ofthe natural-media brushes and paper tex-tures of its big brother, Painter, includingsupport for the Erasing UltraPen, butDabbler’s interface is easier to use. For atruly great deal, you can buy the Dabbler/ArtPad II bundle, which includes software,tablet, and erasing pen for just $190. 800-297-2665 or 408-688-5300.

The desktop publishers on your list al-ready have QuarkXPress; Macromedia Free-Hand; and Adobe Page-Maker, Photoshop, andIllustrator — if theydon’t, remedy that,pronto — but the holi-days are an opportunityto give them softwarethey wouldn’t ordinarilybuy themselves. KPTBryce, from HSC Soft-ware, is a fascinatingprogram that allows youto render incrediblybeautiful photo-realisticlandscapes for use inpage-layout and multi-media projects. $199.805-566-6200. You canround out thepackage with Su-san Kitchens’ TheKPT Bryce Book,from Addison-Wesley. $40. 617-944-3700. And fordevotees of thecult of Photoshopguru Kai Krause,there is alwaysNick Clarke’s Kai’s

Power Tools: The Illustrated Guide ($40), alsofrom Addison-Wesley.

Two fail-safe gifts: a higher-capacity harddrive and a handful of RAM. OK, so they’rethe digital equivalent of getting underwearand socks from Aunt Edna, but every desk-top publisher needs them. Gigabyte harddrives cost less than $500 — check out ourmonthly Quick Labs feature for our picks ofthe latest models. However, even an extra365 MB of storage (about $200 mail-order)will be greatly appreciated. To top it off, tossa fistful of SIMMs (or DIMMs, for the newPCI-based Power Macs) into the toe of aChristmas stocking, and watch any Photo-shop user grin.

Bits and Pieces

Pamper them with paper — laser stock thatmakes even bad news look good. IdeaArtfeatures only recycled papers with soy-inkimprints. The company’s sampler pack in-cludes a selection of paper, envelopes, la-bels, postcards, and so on for $20. You canorder a catalog by calling 800-433-2278 or615-889-4989.

When price is no object, seek outthe Arts and Crafts-style furniturefrom Green Design Furniture. Made ofNorth American cherry wood, a com-puter desk with a keyboard tray($2,140), a printer stand ($695), and abookcase ($1,190) assemble in min-utes, without requiring tools. “Sets upfaster than your computer,” accordingto the company. 800-853-4234 or 207-

775-4234.Computers don’t replace

everything in the publishingprocess. Put together a grab

bag of publishing essentials, allavailable at local art stores: a

loupe for examining images close-up, a pica ruler, and a proportion

wheel. Toss in new Pantone swatchbooks. $32 to $195 each. 201-935-5500.

Finally, give your high-tech friends somehistorical perspective. The renownedMcKenzie & Harris type foundry sells realmetal type in a variety of designs — suchas Centaur, Futura, Stymie, and Century— and in sizes ranging from 6-point to 72-point. Prices are $15 per pound. The mini-mum order is $25. 415-777-0716. s

Executive Editor Pamela Pfiffner can do without TheSound of Music, but she does like whiskers on kittens.

GRAPHICS HOW-TO / BY JANET ASHFORD

Screening BackMaking transparent overlays is easy in Illustratorand FreeHand; just copy and desaturate.

DTP & GRAPHICS

ab

CREATING CONTRAST between graphic elements sets items apartand increases the impact of your message, and this is especially important fortype. Outlining text with a contrasting color or placing black text over a light-ened area (called a screened background) increases readability.

Screening a background is easy to do in Adobe Photoshop, but now you canachieve the same effect by using the Desaturate command in PostScript illustra-tion programs such as Adobe Illustrator 5.5 and Macromedia FreeHand 5.0.Using Illustrator 5.5, I employed this technique to create a panel that sets off thetype for a wine label.


Janet Ashford is the coauthor, with Linnea Dayton, of Adobe Illustrator: A Visual Guide for theMac (Graphic-sha/Addison-Wesley, 1995).

4. Applying the type. Afterusing the Desaturate filter, Iadjusted the white shapes in theoval area (Filter: Select: Same FillColor) by adding a pale-green fill(10% cyan and yellow) to theshapes. I then added black typeover the panel and a black borderwith pale-green type at the top(see the finished piece).

3. Making the screen. To createthe screened background, I firstcopied the art (Edit: Copy) andpasted it in front of the original(Edit: Paste In Front) so that thetwo were exactly aligned. I thenmoved the copy to a new layer(Layers Palette: New Layer). Withthe objects still selected, Iapplied the Desaturate filter(Filter: Colors: Desaturate) severaltimes to lighten the image. Tocreate the panel, I positioned anoval over the lightened copy andmasked the copy into the ovalshape (Objects: Masks: Make).The oval shape falls over theoriginal art, lightening the areaand providing plenty of contrast.

1. Preparing the image. Thebackground image is an originalphotograph of the Mendocino,California, coast (a). I scanned theimage into Photoshop; convertedit to grayscale (Mode: Grayscale);and posterized it (Image: Map:Posterize), with a Levels setting of4, so that it contained only fourgray tones (b).

2. Converting to PostScript.Opening the file in AdobeStreamline, I autotraced the scanby using the Outline mode (File:Convert) and saved the resultingfile in Illustrator EPS format. InIllustrator, I filled each regionwith a custom color by selectingall the gray regions (Filter: Select:Same Fill Color) and changing thecolor in the Paint Styles palette.Streamline can convert colorbitmapped images into color EPSfiles by selecting the mostprevalent colors in the image, butI preferred to create a customcolor palette.

EXPERT TIPS / BY BOB SCHAFFEL AND CHUCK WEGER

All We Want for Business . . .is our two font geeks. What we want for the holidays can’t be wrappedup with a bow. Here’s our wish list.

.

DTP & GRAPHICS

IN THIS SEASON OF GIVING, we want to proposea few things (in no particular order) that might betterthe desktop-publishing industry and thereby makeour holidays — and our jobs — merry and bright.
A font-management system that works. Afterten years of desktop publishing, we’re stillstruggling with issues of displaying andprinting documents properly. Adobe TypeManager takes care of simulating type on-screen when fonts required by the docu-ment are missing (as long as they’re notsymbol or pi fonts). But when printing, wedon’t want fonts that approximate the realthing — we want the actual real thing. Wewould like a utility (or system software)that’s not only capable of interrogating thedocument for font requirements but alsosmart enough to find and install the missingfonts automatically.Simple systems. Although we think there arenumerous useful extensions, we want a sys-tem that doesn’t require a lot of third-partystuff to achieve basic functionality. Come tothink of it, maybe that’s what everyone atApple is calling Copland.Better testing. Here’s a revolutionary idea!How about more interoperability testing byvendors before they drop their products intothe marketplace? It’s really difficult for pub-lishers to make any money when they’re en-gaged in a never ending industrywide beta-test program.Database management. As more and moredata is converted from traditional materialsinto digital form and as original digital workmushrooms, we need databases that fit ourwork flow. The trouble is that most peoplethink of a database as a warehouse for files.That seems a bit shortsighted to us. We needto rethink how data is broken down before

it is “checked in” to the database. Insteadof organizing databases around primitivefield types, why not use databases to storedecision sequencesthat drive the workflow? The resultwould be more pro-duction flexibilityand greater data lon-gevity, allowing forreal “repurposing”of content.Anything other thanHTML. Because weare now repurposingour data for elec-tronic content deliv-ery, we’d like to see an authoring languagefor the Internet that doesn’t look likewarmed-over typewriting. In its currentversion, HTML has about as much pizzazzas dot-matrix printing. Of course there aresome very clever HTML programmers cre-ating exciting visual art with the tools, butmost are content to produce information inHTML’s usual boring format. The recentAdobe/Netscape announcements aboutsupporting online use of Adobe Acrobat maychange this dramatically. Stay tuned.Reasonable RAM prices. Anyone want to starta philanthropic fund to rebuild the apocry-phal Japanese manufacturing plant whosedestruction by fire is being blamed for sky-rocketing RAM prices? The cost of mostchips — except RAM — is falling. Whilewe’re at it, how about designing computers

that don’t have different pin configurationsin each model release. In some cases, weinvest more in SIMMs and DIMMs than wedo in computers. It’d be nice to get long-term use out of them.Cheap ISDN. Because robust telecommuni-cations is becoming a must for professionalpublishing, it would be a nice present if thephone companies would offer ISDN for thesame price as a regular phone line. In New

York City, ISDN isan operational andeconomic reality. Inmany other placesaround the country,though, it’s not onlyunaffordable — it’salso unattainable.On-time deli very.Someone needs togive Apple a manu-facturing schedulethat allows it to ac-tually deliver new

computers when they are announced.Building up our expectations about won-derful new machines and then making uswait 30 to 60 days until the product gets intothe pipeline seems Scrooge-like.Affordable digital cameras. How aboutsomeone taking the risk to produce a qual-ity digital camera the rest of us can afford?We always hear that the price is high be-cause the market for digital cameras issmall. Which came first — the chicken orthe egg?

Whatever you have on your shopping list,we hope that you have a healthy and happyholiday season. May the god of installationssmile on your technological innovation. s

Bob Schaffel is emerging-technologies consultant forR. R. Donnelley & Sons. Chuck Weger is a consultantand publisher of the Photoshop Monitor newsletter.

NETWORKINGHIGH-SPEED LANS /

Whitetree Branches fromEthernet to ATM25
THE BETTER-KNOWN ATM (Asynchronous TransferMode) standard, ATM155, remains a backbone tech-nology limited by high cost and marketplace uncer-tainty, but another ATM standard — ATM25 — is show-ing promise for workgroup networking. Embraced byApple when it joined the ATM Forum, the 25-megabit-per-second ATM25 standard is now supported in a work-group-oriented hub from Whitetree (415-855-0855) thatswitches among ATM25 and 10BASE-T network media.
The WS3000 ($7,795) has 12 ports, each of which canfunction as an ATM25 or a 10BASE-T Ethernet port, de-pending on the NIC (network-interface card) installed in theconnected end-station — that is, the computer or networkdevice at the other end of the wire. The hub detects and ac-commodates the appropriate media type for each port auto-matically and independently of the other ports.

Two network-option slots provide connectivity to other networksand switches. With Whitetree’s ATM155 Network Option Module($1,395), the WS3000 can connect workgroups to ATM backbones.The company’s Stacking Bus Module ($1,195) lets you connect aWS3000 to other WS3000s (up to 12 can be stacked), for networkexpansion. The latter module will ship by year’s end.

Whitetree’s support of these two networking standards in oneproduct is unique. Organizations currently using Ethernet but in-terested in moving to ATM25 or an ATM155 backbone can use the


CROSS-PLATFORM APPLICATIONS /

AppWare Cozies Up to Visual Ba

Whitetree hub to split the differencewhile allowing both network types to coexist.

For those who plan to move up to a high-speed LAN, ATM25 canprovide an attractive way to accommodate high-bandwidth appli-cations. Because ATM25 operates in full-duplex mode (data cantravel two ways simultaneously), it’s faster than would appear fromits rated speed — possibly even faster in practice than the 100-megabit-per-second Fast Ethernet, which operates in half-duplexmode. ATM25 can also use Category 3 wiring (the dominant wiringstandard until a year or two ago), whereas Fast Ethernet requiresnewer, Category 5 wiring. However, the high prices of ATM cardsand hubs compared to those of Fast Ethernet ones will continue toinhibit ATM’s growth in the marketplace. / Shelly Brisbin

sic, OpenDoc
THE DREAM OF EASILY CONSTRUCTING cross-platform applications is coming closer to frui-tion, as Novell (800-453-1267 or 801-429-5588) readies new versions of its AppWaredevelopment system — and as Novell andthird parties issue new modules for AppWare.
AppWare lets developers choose from li-braries of modules in order to build customapplications for Windows and the Mac OS.The modules — called AppWare LoadableModules, or ALMs — can perform single func-tions or complex tasks, such as providing con-nectivity to an Oracle database or to Word-Perfect for Macintosh. Users need not havetraditional programming skills, according toNovell, so the system is well suited to VARs,MIS people, and consultants charged withdeveloping custom applications.

One of the most important AppWare

advances recently is the ALM for Visual BasicControls (VBXes), which was included withthe August release of AppWare 1.2. The freeVBX ALM makes AppWare and Microsoft’sVisual Basic programming language inter-operable, so developers can use VBXes withinAppWare without rewriting any code. Once aVBX has been dropped into the AppWare en-vironment, it can be employed in new appli-cations, just like the visual components in anyother AppWare library.

Other recently released AppWare tool setsprovide new imaging and Newton connectiv-ity capabilities. Alta Impower Tools for Imag-ing ($7,500) is a set of ALMs from Alta Tech-nology (800-214-9100 or 801-562-1010) thatdevelopers can use to integrate scanningand image-viewing capabilities into theirsoftware. Revelar Connection Utility ($49.95),

from Revelar (800-669-5191 or 801-485-3291),is able to give AppWare-developed Newton ap-plications instant access to suchfunctions as Newton Names, Notes, To Doitems, and Dates.

Novell’s current plans for AppWare includedeveloping new AppWare-based applica-tions as well as new versions of AppWare. Theapplications will bring directory access andsome NetWare-management functions to theMac. A PowerPC-native release of AppWare,scheduled for late 1995, will include full sup-port for building and using OpenDoc parts; aWindows 95 version will also be released latethis year. In addition, Novell has announcedthat AppWare VBX Release 2.0 will be avail-able early next year. / Mitzi Waltz

NET BYTESTELECOMMUNIC ATIONS /

Dayna Spin-off Brings Cellular to PBs

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Shall We Dance?
A NEW PRODUCT AND A SALE of subsidiaries arethe latest aftershocks following the restructur-ing of Dayna Communications. The company’swide-area-wireless subsidiary, newly dubbedAirGo (reachable through Dayna, at 800-531-0600 or 801-269-7200), has announced its firstproduct, the AirGo PhoneCard System. Daynahas also sold its remote-access business.
The AirGo PhoneCard is a Type III PC Card thatcontains both a modem (14.4 kbps, V.32bis)and a cellular phone. Users can make voice, fax,or data calls with the integrated card, which iscompatible with PowerBooks and PC laptops.Connectors on the PhoneCard support the useof a handset, a DAA (data-accessarrangement, for connecting themodem to an RJ-11 phone jack), oran external antenna (for widerreach than the integrated antennacan provide).

The AirGo PhoneCard Systemalso includes a telephone handsetof AirGo’s design and AirGo Phone-Book software. The software storescontact information and can dialeither the fax modem or the cellularphone.

Final pricing for the PhoneCardSystem was not available at presstime. AirGo estimated the cost ofthe full package (including the PCCard, the handset, and software) at

HIGH-SPEED DIAL-UP /

3Com Delivers ISDN M

under $1,000, and the cost of a package con-taining the PhoneCard, software, and a JabraEarphone Connector (for supporting voicecalls) at under $800.

AirGo is partially funded by Dayna and usestechnology developed there before the com-pany reorganized earlier this year. In additionto splitting off the wireless subsidiary that be-came AirGo, the reorganization created an-other subsidiary that manufactured and mar-keted DaynaLINK remote-access servers. Daynarecently sold the remote-access subsidiaryto Ascend Communications (510-769-6001),known for its WAN connectivity products. / SB

odems

NO LONGER A WALLFLOWER, the Mac is ex-panding Wall Data’s RUMBA line, with therelease of Mac RUMBA. The Mac RUMBAgraphical terminal-emulation packages arebased on Apple’s SNA•ps products; WallData acquired SNA•ps last year. Mac RUMBAfor AS/400 and Mac RUMBA for Mainframeare each priced at $345 per user. 800-487-8622 or 408-369-6900. ✫ A new versionof MachTen, from Tenon (800-662-2410or 805-963-6983; [email protected]), en-hances the only UNIX operating systemavailable for the Power Mac. PowerMachTen 4.0 ($695) features a redesignedarchitecture, including such UNIX nicetiesas dynamically linked shared libraries andmemory-mapped file access. ✫ The devel-oper of MacWeb has turned its attention toInternet security. TradeWave (512-433-5300; [email protected]), formerly EI-Net, will soon ship TradeSecret (price notset at press time), a system that securescommercial transactions over the Internetby creating virtual private networks be-tween parties. Businesses can grant sets ofaccess privileges to customers. TradeWavealso plans to release a new version ofMacWeb, which will include support fortables, mail-to URLs, and other featuresnow available exclusively in Netscape Navi-gator. MacWeb will continue to be free. ✫GenesisRegistration ($795), a new offer-ing from WebGenesis (607-255-5565;http://www.webgenesis.com), brings ac-cess privileges and passwords to Web sites.The Common Gateway Interface (CGI)works with StarNine’s WebStar, a Mac Webserver. The GenesisRegistration productallows site managers to register usersand give them access to specific areasand services on the site.WebGenesis is also ship-ping GenesisSurveys($495), a Web sta-tistics package,and GenesisJive($895), which al-lows Web-basedconferencing. ✫ Version 2.5 of ISDNManager ($2,795; upgrade, $149), from4-Sight (515-221-3000), adds a design-collaboration tool called QuickProof. Usersof ISDN Manager can share a screen and“mark up” graphics or page layouts over alive ISDN connection. The originator of theimages can make requested changes andupdate the image in real time. / SB

TELECOMMUTERS, NET SURFERS, andsmall offices are the intended customersfor the Impact ISDN modems, from 3Com(800-638-3266 or 408-764-5000). The ex-ternal, all-in-one devices include a BRI(basic-rate interface) and an NT-1 (networkterminator), the two hardware componentsnecessary for making an ISDN connection.

Both Impact modems — the 3Com Im-pact with Multilink PPP ($649) and the3Com Impact with V.32bis ($749) — sup-port Multilink PPP (MPPP), an ISDN proto-col expected to be adopted as an industrystandard in 1996. With MPPP, it’s possibleto bind the two 64-kbps ISDN channels to-gether, for a total theoretical throughput of

128-kbps on a sin-gle call.

Without MPPP, each channel functionsseparately, allowing two simultaneous, butslower, connections. The higher-priced Im-pact model also contains a built-in 14.4-kbps modem, for analog data calls.

In addition, both Impact products in-clude an integrated analog voice port, whichlets users connect telephone handsets or faxmachines to an ISDN line. Users can makephone calls or send faxes on one channelwhile using the other to connect to the officeor the Internet via ISDN.

3Com renamed and upgraded the Impactproducts after acquiring them from Access-Works Communications, which sold themunder the QuickAccess brand name. Havingadded MPPP support with the upgrade,3Com says it plans to expand the productline.

Current owners of Impact modems canpurchase a Multilink PPP upgrade for $129through the end of the year. / MW


NETWORKING

NET TOOLS / BY SHELLY BRISBIN

6 Net-Backup SecretsIf your neck’s on the line when important data gets lost in a disk crash, don’t take anychances — use these tips to make your network backup system a true safety net.

BUYING A TAPE DRIVE and network backup soft-ware is a big step beyond just handing your users a stackof floppies. But you also need to set up a smart backupsystem. Here are six tips for making sure your backup

figure 1

If speed is more important than the convenience of backing up from an administrator’sMac, think about using an existing file server as the backup server. With that approach,data on the file server doesn’t need to travel across the network to be backed up; instead, itzips across the SCSI bus to the connected backup device.

The Best Backup Server / file server versus administrator’s Mac

system won’t fail you if — or rather, when— disaster strikes.1. Ensure sufficient storage. Make sure yourstorage media are sufficient to back up allthe Macs on your network. Start by addingup the capacities of all the hard drives usedin your office, including those attached toservers and PowerBooks. Then estimate theamount of space needed by redundant data(applications and other files that are thesame on all of your Macs), and subtract thisamount from the sum of the hard-drive ca-pacities. If your backup hardware or soft-ware supports data compression, reduce thetotal by 30 to 50 percent, depending on thecompressibility of the files you’re backingup (text files, for instance, can shrink by asmuch as two-thirds). The result is the mini-mum storage capacity you’ll need — moreis better.2. Choose a good backup server. You don’tneed to dedicate a Mac solely to backuptasks. Many system administrators connectbackup devices to their own Macs for conve-nience; others connect them to a Mac that’salready being used as a file server. The latteroption can provide faster backup (see figure1) — plus added security, if the server is ina locked closet. However, be sure not to usea mail or calendar server as your backupserver; programs such as QuickMail andMeeting Maker continuously update infor-mation across the network and can conflictwith the backup process. Whichever setupyou choose, make sure your backup serveris a fast Mac (especially when you’re using

software-based data compression) withplenty of RAM.3. Stick to a schedule. Back up all of yourMacs every day — preferably at night, whenthe network is unused. The first backup al-ways takes the longest, so schedule it over aweekend. Thereafter, set your backup soft-ware to perform incremental backups,which include only the files that havechanged since the last time.4. Make multiple backups. Use two or moresets of backup media. Rotate them so thateach set is used on alternate days and the setnot being used is off-site, in case of a fire orother disaster.5. Don’t forget PowerBook users. Schedule a

regular PowerBook backup time when usersare in the office or in their hotel rooms, andask them to connect then for backup. Duousers are more often on the network, butthey’re usually using the computer whenthey’re connected; try scheduling Duo back-ups for lunchtime. If your network has manyPowerBook users, consider using DantzDevelopment’s Retrospect 3.0 as your back-up software. It can search the network forrecently connected PowerBooks and backthem up at a time each user can specify.6. Make an “Up and Running” tape. Finally,make a plan for restoring data when users’systems crash. Create a tape that includesyour company’s standard applications, sys-tem software, and network-access pro-grams. If a user’s system goes down, restorethe “Up and Running” system to an externalhard drive or a spare Mac. That way the usercan keep working while you deal with thecrashed system and restore the data you soprudently backed up. s


MAC TO PC / BY JOHN RIZZO

NETWORKING

Apple Serves Up NetWareBy porting NetWare to its PowerPC servers, Apple hopes to finally gaincredibility in the world of corporate IS.

NEIL YOUNG HAS IT. Pearl Jam has it. Michael Jack-son used to have it. Madonna never did have it. I’m talk-ing about what the music industry is calling credibility,or more simply, cred. In the lingo, cred is a reputation
for producing quality work without exces-sive ego. Among corporate information-services (IS) departments, Apple does nothave cred, a fact reflected in the diminish-ing Mac market share.
Hype doesn’t buy cred in the IS world anymore than it does in the music industry.That’s why Windows 95 doesn’t yet havecred with corporate IS. Cred has to beearned, the way Windows NT earned it. NTgot its foot in the corporate door as a serverplatform. Now, NT client workstations areeverywhere while many IS departments areforbidding Mac servers on their corporatenetworks — even in all-Mac workgroups.

Can Apple pull off an NT-like strategy forgaining cred for the Mac? Until now, Applehas focused on the client front and left theserver battles largely to PC and UNIX plat-forms. However, Apple will enter the cross-platform-server arena around the end ofthis year, when it starts selling NetWare forPowerPC, a port of the venerable networkoperating system to Mac server hardware.

NetWare for PowerPC is clearly aimed atgaining cred among IS types, not Macohol-ics. The new product completely dumps theMac OS — which is not multiuser, notcrash-proof, and not designed to run as aserver OS — in favor of an OS based on Net-Ware 4.1, which has lots of cred in IS circles.

But Apple will still need to demonstratesome clear advantages of PowerPC hard-ware over Intel hardware in a server envi-ronment. It will also have to calm IS fearsabout supporting nonstandard hardware.

These are daunting tasks, but they’re neces-sary for the long-term success of thePowerPC-based servers.

Real NetWare

NetWare for PowerPCwill greatly resemble theNetWare 4.1 running onIntel servers today, rightdown to the source codeon which it’s based. It will provide the samebasic services as NetWare 4.1: file, print,and directory services; integrated messag-ing; network management; protocol rout-ing; and security. There will be out-of-boxsupport for Mac, DOS, Windows, OS/2, andWindows NT clients, and the pricing is ex-pected to be the same as for NetWare 4.1.(Apple will distribute NetWare for PowerPCboth as a stand-alone package to run oncurrent Apple Workgroup Servers and as abundle with one or more as-yet-unannounced PowerPC-based servers.)

However, the most crucial factor influ-encing the success of NetWare for PowerPCwill be the number of NetWare LoadableModules (NLMs) ported to the PowerPCserver. The NetWare operating system is avery small, very efficient piece of code sur-rounded by hundreds of NLMs. NLMs aresimilar to applications but often performvery low-level tasks.

NetWare 4.1 comes with about a thou-sand NLMs. An Apple spokesperson told methat Novell is porting most of these NLMs tothe PowerPC, including NFS (Network File

System, a UNIX standard) and NetWare forMacintosh. However, NetWare for PowerPCmay not include all the NLMs that users ofIntel systems get, which could hinder theproduct’s acceptance.

Even more important are the NLMs fromNovell and third parties that don’t comewith NetWare but that add important abili-ties such as e-mail and automated backup.

At press time, Applecouldn’t tell us whetherNovell’s add-on NLMs, suchas the GroupWise group-ware package, would beported in time for the firstNetWare for PowerPC re-lease. Even though a list of

PowerPC NLMs wasn’t available at presstime, Apple claims to have worked withNovell to convince top NLM vendors to porttheir products. Third parties are willing toport, according to Apple, because the pro-cess is not difficult. NLMs written accord-ing to Novell specs need only a recompile (asopposed to a rewrite) to run on PowerPC-based machines, and this process generallytakes less than a day per NLM.

Improved NetWare?

But even if NetWare for PowerPC does ev-erything NetWare 4.1 does, why would cor-porate IS departments want NetWare run-ning on anything other than Intel boxes?The most obvious benefit would be rawspeed. Apple claims that a Power Mac 9500with a 120-MHz 604 chip runs 51 percentfaster than a 120-MHz Pentium-based PC.With NetWare and its NLMs completelyPowerPC-native, the Apple servers shoulddo well in CPU-intensive tasks such as data-base access and graphics and video serving.

Apple also expects the PowerPC’s supe-rior speed to result in a lower CPU-


NET WORKING

utililization rate, allowing the server to runmore reliably and accommodate more ap-plications and users. IS groups are likely toappreciate these benefits even more thanthey will the speed itself.

NetWare for PowerPC won’t provide anystriking ease-of-use advantages over Net-Ware on Intel. It will have the same com-mand-line interface as NetWare 4.1 and will


be administered through Novell’s Win-dows-based NetWare Admin tool. AlthoughApple says you’ll be able to run the Windowsadministration tools on a Mac with a DOSCompatibility Card or SoftWindows, theWindows requirement will be disappoint-ing for AppleShare fans who want to up-grade their servers. But NetWare for Power-PC isn’t aimed at AppleShare owners; it’s for

NetWare partisans. Changing the interfacenow would only confuse the people Apple istrying to woo.

Still, NetWare for PowerPC may beslightly easier to set up and administer thanNetWare on Intel, because of what Appleclaims is better integration with the hard-ware. Just as drivers aren’t much of an issueon Macs under the Mac OS, drivers underNetWare for PowerPC should be less of ahassle than they are on Intel servers.

Credibility Through Standards

A major hurdle NetWare for PowerPC willhave to overcome is the reluctance of IS de-partments to support nonstandard hard-ware. The PCI bus in the newer Power Macswill help, since it allows the Macs to run thesame networking interface cards as PCs.

However, Apple’s main weapon here is theApple/IBM/Motorola common hardwarereference platform (CHRP), a standardizedPowerPC machine that will be able to runmultiple operating systems. No one getsfired for buying an IBM server, and you maybe able to buy a CHRP machine from BigBlue as soon as next year. Of course, Applewill have to compete with IBM and the otherCHRP clone makers, but it will be compet-ing with a compatible platform.

When CHRP platforms begin shipping,Novell will become the primary distributorof NetWare for PowerPC. For its part, Novellcould gain even more credibility than it al-ready has by giving NetWare hardware inde-pendence. With the PowerPC added to itsplatform list and other platforms soon tofollow, NetWare takes a big step toward theportability of its competitor Windows NT.On the other hand, it’s expected that NT it-self will be ported to CHRP by either Appleor Motorola in the near future.

Ironically, the one monkey wrench in thesuccess of the CHRP as a server platformmay be Copland, Apple’s next-generationclient operating system. Apple is rumoredto be behind its planned schedule of ship-ping Copland by mid-1996, and the com-pany may want to delay the CHRP untilCopland is ready. Without Copland, Applewon’t have a Mac OS to run on CHRP. And aMac without a Mac OS would definitely nothave a lot of cred with Mac users. s

Contributing editor John Rizzo is a San Franciscowriter and consultant on cross-platform issues andthe author of How Macs Work.

HANDS ON

If casual snoopers are a bigger threat toyour Mac’s data than corporate spies, trythese common-sense techniques beforeinvesting in expensive security software. / BY GREGORY WASSON

Defend Your

DATA

Remove or hidecontrol panels

whose settings youdon’t want others to

change.

Create personalfolders or programlaunchers for each

person who usesyour Mac, to limit

access.

Inexpensive antivirusprograms are essential ifyou exchange files withanyone — friend or foe.

Back up your backup. Backing up is like flossing your teeth. It mayseem like a nuisance at the time, but it will eventually pay off — forinstance, the next time someone accidentally trashes one of your im-portant files. Make doing frequent backups an ingrained habit. Takeadvantage of the automatic-backup features found in some pro-grams, such as FrameMaker and WordPerfect. To be on the ultrasafeside, make backups of your backups.Inoculate your Mac. If you don’t have complete control over the flop-pies people insert into your Mac or the files that come across the

OTS TAPPING AND coworkers snooping canalter your Mac faster than Godzilla can wreckdowntown Tokyo, leaving trashed documents,

a discombobulated desktop, and orphaned files in theirwake. The knee-jerk reaction is to call out an army ofsecurity software, but before you do, consider thealternatives: some simple techniques that can helpkeep those desktop- and data-destroying disasters to aminimum. These techniques will help you guard againstpilfering intruders and your own mistakes as well.

T


Internet, your Mac may be in danger of a viral attack. Install andkeep updated a dependable antivirus utility, such as Virex, fromDatawatch, or Symantec AntiVirus for the Macintosh (S.A.M.). Dis-infectant is an excellent freeware alternative that is available fromonline services (see end of article for online-access information).Divide and conquer. By creating custom folders for the people whouse your Mac, you can discourage them from rummaging throughall your folders. Place aliases to the programs a person uses in afolder, and teach the user how to save documents to only that folder.

An obvious but underused technique:Lock files in their Get Info boxes so no onecan accidentally change or trash them.

Backing up remainsone of the best waysto prevent loss of data.

Exploit the passwordprotection built intoprograms such asExcel.

Make files unenticing —view them by namerather than by icon.

Place an openfolder over theTrash to preventaccidentaldeletions.

A higher-tech way to achieve the same goal is to use an applicationlauncher such as Square One, from Binary Software (800-824-6279or 310-449-1481), or DragStrip, from Natural Intelligence (800-999-4649 or 617-876-7680). Launchers let you create customized pal-ettes for giving friends, family members, or coworkers easy access toa selection of specific programs.Control your panels. A few careless clicks in your control panels cansend your Mac time-traveling, reset mouse behavior, or change yourdesktop appearance so that it no longer feels like your own. You can

easily prevent such sabotage by removing relevant control panelsfrom the System Folder. You can place them in another folder hiddena few levels down or put them on a floppy disk and completely re-move them from your hard disk. Likely candidates for removal arethe Date & Time, Mouse, Color, General Controls, and Desktop Pat-terns control panels.

Another way to make control panels inaccessible is to disablethem. You can do this with Apple’s Extension Manager or any otherstartup manager.


HANDS ON

HARDWARE SECURITY / foiling thieves and power problems
Use the system’s padlock. Don’t overlook theobvious. The Mac operating system pro-vides an easy way to lock files so they can’tbe altered or trashed — just click on theLocked check box in the Get Info window ofany file you want to protect. It’s a little in-convenient, since you have to unlock it tomake changes yourself, but it could be a reallifesaver, er, file-saver.Make a decoy. Accidentally deleting a file isa common mishap. It happens often be-cause trashing a file is so easy on the Mac —especially if you’ve turned off the alert op-tion in the Trash’s Get Info window. To makeaccidental deletions less likely, leave thealert on or try this: Create a new folder, andcall it something descriptive such as Pre-Trash. Drag it to the desktop near the Trash,and open the folder. Make it as small aspossible and drag the open folder windowover the Trash. Now when you drag a file tothe Trash, it remains in the Pre-Trash folderuntil you drag the folder’s contents to thereal Trash. Moving the folder off the Trashwhen you need to throw something awaymay be a little inconvenient, but you’ll havefewer Trash blunders.Employ a disguise. Icons are eye candy foradults and kids alike. There’s nothing assatisfying to a fun-loving youngster or anew user as double-clicking on colorfulicons — unless it’s seeing Daddy orMommy in tears because that importantbudget spreadsheet has been reduced tomeaningless ciphers. You can make thecontents of any folder less tempting to ca-sual users of your Mac simply by changingthe folder’s view option to By Name on theView menu.
If you must keep files, folders, and appli-cations on the desktop, where you don’thave the option of viewing by name, usealiases rather than the actual icons of files.Also, keep important stuff in folders a levelor two down on your hard disk so they’reharder to reach.Protect with passwords. To keep othersfrom deliberately reading those incrimi-nating love letters or confidential financialworksheets, you may want to use programsthat have simple password protection. Sev-eral popular programs, such as Excel andWordPerfect, keep Nosey Parkers out. Mosthard-disk-partitioning software lets youpassword-protect any volume and any filein it in one easy step. Screen savers such as


After Dark generally include at least onemodule that requires a password before itreturns you to the desktop. If you opt forpassword protection, regardless of the prod-uct, make the password random, ideally acombination of words and numbers. Usingyour own name, that of a pet or a child, or ablank password isn’t a good idea. Also, longpasswords are better than short ones.Last-resort security. Still feeling ill at ease?Then you may be a candidate for securitysoftware. Before you buy, keep in mind onewarning: Most security software is to somedegree incompatible with data-compres-sion software, such as Symantec’s NortonDiskDoubler, or disk-optimization utilities,such as Speed Disk (part of Symantec’sNorton Utilities). You often have to disablethe security software when you install newsystem and application software or whenyou use hard-disk utilities. Forget and youcan kiss your data goodbye.

With that warning in mind, if you useyour Mac in a home office, stick with some-thing simple such as Apple’s At Ease. It pre-vents access to the Finder (no more trashed

files) and can be used to limit access to con-trol panels and applications.

Users of stand-alone Macs in an officeenvironment will be better served by usingmore-traditional volume-access and en-cryption software, such as Symantec’s Nor-ton DiskLock.Don’t go overboard. For most individualsecurity needs, the maximum protectionnecessary is a low-end security-softwareprogram. Few people really need the mostpick-proof, high-end security software.

Even low-end security software may beoverkill. The do-it-yourself techniques de-scribed here won’t deter determined hack-ers, but they can be an inexpensive andeffective shield against your residentGodzillas. s

Contributing Editor Gregory Wasson is continuouslyen garde, protecting his data against four mean-looking cats, an adventuresome spouse, and sinisterelectrical surges.

You can find the shareware and freewareprograms referenced in this article in theMacUser and ZD Net/Mac areas on

CompuServe and eWorld. See How to Reach Us forinstructions on accessing ZD Net/Mac.

THEFT AND POWER ANOMOLIES can do as much damage to your data as any family memberor hacker. To fight these attackers, you sometimes need special hardware. Here are someproducts we recommend:

The Comp U Lock One Plus No Drill, from Versa Lock (800-248-5625 or 818-886-8962), for about $55, is a clever device designed toprevent theft of your computer (and attached hardware peripher-als, if you like). It’s a set of plates — you attach one to your computerand the other to a surface such as a desk and then lock the two platestogether. You can remove them from your equipment and furniture

by applying heat. In earthquake-prone areas, it can help prevent damage to your devices bykeeping them from dancing across the desk or crashing to the floor.

The Disk Drive Lock, from Secure-It (800-451-7592 or 413-525-7039),for about $25, secures your floppy-disk drive with a locked insert. Itthwarts those who might put a floppy disk into your Mac to copyand carry away your private files.

An uninterruptible power supply (UPS),such as the Back-UPS Pro (starting at around $200), from AmericanPower Conversion (800-800-4272 or 401-789-5735), is a must in areaswhere the electricity is spotty. These wonderful devices give you 10to 15 minutes of dependable power when the lights go out —

enough time to safely close documents and shut down your Mac properly.

If your problem is too much power rather than too little, what you need is a good surge pro-tector. The surge protectors from Panamax (800-472-5555 or 415-499-3900) are note-worthy, because they carry a lifetime warranty that covers repair or replacement of anyequipment that’s damaged by a power surge when connectedto one of the company’s protectors. The protectors range inprice from around $60 to $130.

HANDS ON

MOBILE MAC / BY SHARON ZARDETTO AKER

The PowerBook Gift GuideThe holidays are upon us once more. Treat that special someone to a littlePowerBook present — even if that someone is yourself.

MAGAZINE WRITERS LIVE IN a time warp: It’sabout three months from the time we write somethingto the time it’s printed in a periodical such as MacUser.Once a year, I actually enjoy that delay, because of its
perfect timing: I get to gather ideas for theDecember gift guide during the August Bos-ton Macworld Expo, where everyone isshowing off new products. Although I didn’tget a chance to give all of these recom-mended products a thorough MacUserworkout, I was able to make sure they allpassed some vital points of inspection:namely, each is well made, useful, nifty, notover $100, and — most importantly —something I personally would be willing topay for based on the information at hand.
Let There Be Light

The backlight on a PowerBook eats up lotsof power — especially on a color screen,which takes more light to keep those pretty

colors visible.You can trysaving bat-tery powerby turningyour back-

light all theway down and

holding a penlightbetween your teeth

to shine at the screen.Or you can use the

NoteLight ($9), fromInterex. This clever little de-

vice plugs into the ADB port andsnakes its way around the case to shine ontothe screen, the way a personal book light di-rects its rays to the page. Since the powercomes from the PowerBook, the light itself

needs no batteries. The power draw fromthe ADB port is less than what the backlightitself uses, so you can save power and lookclever at the same time.

You can also get the NoteLightas part of the PowerBookCompatible Accessory Kit($25). Besides the NoteLight,the kit includes a portablesurge protector and a Copy Clip— a clip you attach to the top of thePowerBook to hold as many as fivesheets of paper. You can slide an armon the clip in and out, so it’s unobtrusivewhen you’re not using it. Still, I’m not con-vinced I want to mar the lid of myPowerBook with a Copy Clip.

Energize While You Drive

Cigarette smoking may not be as popular asit used to be, but now there’s another use forthe lighter in your car: recharging a Power-Book battery. Just plug in a PowerBook DCconverter (you’ll probably have to unplugthe radar detector), and charge as youdrive. Or pull over when inspiration strikes

and use your hooked-up PowerBook tocompose journal entries without drainingany battery power.

Several companies make these convert-ers, including Battery Technology andLind, but up to now, I’ve seen only the onesfrom Battery Network and VST Power Sys-tems. For a 100-series PowerBook (otherthan the 190) or a Duo, you can get a LaptopNotebook Auto Adapter ($70), from BatteryNetwork. For a 500- or 5200-series Power-

Book or for the 190,VST offers the VST

Auto Adapter (about $100).VST’s models include input

transient protection, so you don’t have tounplug the adapter when you’re starting thecar. All models from both manufacturersinclude an LED to let you know when juiceis flowing (most late-model cars don’t sup-ply power to the cigarette lighter when theengine’s off unless you turn the key to theaccessory position).

Have a Ball

A few years ago, I recommendedAPS Technologies’ PowerBalls

as a perfect gift for thePowerBook owner. Theseare fun, colorful track-ball alternatives that

come in an array of col-ors, including neon green,

bright yellow, mellow or-ange, or luscious pink. They are

DECEMBER 1995 / MacUser 151DECEMBER 1995 / MacUser 151

HANDS ON

DirectoryApple ComputerCupertino, CA800-538-9696408-996-1010

InterexWichita, KS316-524-4747

Meridrew

available in all three trackball sizes. APShas recently come out with PowerBalls II,for Duos and models 140 through 180. Thenew trackballs come in China blue, fire-en-gine red, moby grape, and a jet black eight-ball design (plain black for Duos). Theprices of the original PowerBalls are $5each or $7 for the variety pack of four col-ors. PowerBalls II come in variety-packs only, for $13.

Keep It Klean

Don’t you just hate it whenkompanies spell things wrongon purpose? The namesmake me wince, but I’vebeen very impressedwith Meridrew Enter-prises’ Klear Screen prod-ucts: Klear Screen Singles (actu-ally two wipes — one wet, one dry),Klear Screen cleaner (spray-on screencleaner), and Klear Kloths (lint-free polish-ing cloths). The cleaning solvents are non-abrasive, nontoxic, and antistatic: just whata PowerBook owner needs. You kan kounton it!

Your Number, Please?

A few months ago, I devoted a column to theproblems of dialing up telecom serviceswhile you’re on the road (“TravelingTelecom Tips,” September ’95, page 121);what with changes in local access numbers,needing to dial out of hotel phone setups,and trying to use a calling-card number, it’snot always easy. I presented all sorts ofmanual solutions, but now I find there’s anautomatic one: MegaDial (estimated streetprice, $80; free 30-day demo version avail-able on various online services), fromCypress Research. MegaDial takes care of


APS TechnologiesKansas City, MO800-235-2753816-483-6100

Battery NetworkSomerville, NJ800-653-8294908-534-4630

Cypress ResearchSunnyvale, CA800-274-6361408-752-2700

EnterprisesDanville, CA800-505-5327510-838-8774

TargusBuena Park, CA714-523-5429

VST PowerSystemsConcord, MA508-287-4600


everything. Sure, you have to use the controlpanel to tell it your phone-card number,where you are, and what number gets youan outside line, but that’s all you need to do.

No matter what software you’re usingor where you’re logging on,

MegaDial intercepts any callyou initiate from your

PowerBook anduses the informa-

tion you gave it to dialcorrectly. It looks up

the local accessnumber from

its database;turns off thecall-waiting

feature, if any;and waits for a dial

tone so your call-ing-card number can

be dialed. Anything youneed to set up in your communications pro-gram (and a few things that you might notknow how to set up) is taken care of.

Get a Grip

I ran into ZD Net/Mac’s chief sysop, JoeHolmes, at the Macworld Expo (well, OK, atone of the after-hours parties), and he tookout his PowerBook to show off his wonder-ful new home page on the Web. The pagewas impressive, but it was his cleverPowerBook accessory that caught every-body’s eye. APS Technologies’ Grip-It Stripsare skinny, textured adhesive strips you canput on the outside of a PowerBook so thatwhen you’re carrying it closed, it won’t slipout of your hands. Joe says he’s not surewhether they’ve actually made a difference,but he certainly feels a lot safer. You might beable to find them in a local computer store,but they’re also available in the APS catalog.A set of granite-colored or teal strips costs$9, and a three-pack of purple, teal, and

black strips costs $20.

For the Happy Wanderer

Lots of PowerBook owners sub-scribe to the backpack philoso-phy of life, but a briefcase-stylePowerBook case looks pretty sillyslung on a back. Fortunately,Targus makes a backpack carrierfor PowerBooks. The standard$70 version comes in your basic

luggage colors (black, burgundy, huntergreen, and navy), and for $99, there’s also aclassy black-leather version. When youwant to blend in with the briefcase folks, thebackpack straps tuck away, leaving an easy-to-carry handle.

Happy New Year, 500s!

The which-came-first, chicken-or-eggproblem of PC Cards (the lack of products isblamed on a lack of customers, which is it-self blamed on a lack of products) is finallyover, what with the PC Card slots in thenewest PowerBooks. So, once the holidaysare over and you’re ready to get down toserious work, start the year out with a seri-ous purchase for your 500-series Power-Book: a PCMCIA Expansion Module($219), commonly known as a card cage.

This handy item from Apple Computerwill let you use any of the new PC Cards thatare poised to flood the Macmarket — that is,as su m i n gthat thevend orsaren’t aslate with thecards as somepeople are withholiday cards! s

Sharon Aker plans to celebrate the new year byupgrading both her mobile and her desktop computerequipment — even though she may not pay it offbefore next holiday season.

NET TRAVELER / BY MICHAEL SWAINE

HANDS ON

Shhh! Online LibrariesBrowse the card catalog without leaving your computer — or catch up ongreat literature online.

YOU’RE LOOKING FOR a book: Vladimir Nabokov’sPale Fire, a relatively obscure novel that appears to beout of print and that no used book store in your area hasin stock. Looks like it’s time for a visit to the library. Well,
the Internet is a library, right? But if theInternet is a library, you say, where’s thecard catalog? Among the many differencesbetween the Internet and a traditional li-brary (libraries usually aren’t open all night,they smell musty, you’re supposed to bequiet), one stands out: A library usually hasone card catalog, but the Internet has thou-sands. Some of these catalogs are collec-tions of other sites: one self-appointed Netlibrarian, John Makulowich, maintains anawesome list of libraries and other suchreference-oriented Web sites at http://w w w. c l a r k . n e t / p u b / j o u r n a l i s m /awesome.html. Or try the excellent WWWVirtual Library, at http://www.w3.org/hy p e r te x t / Dat a S o u rc e s / by S u bj e c t /Overview.html.Libraries on the Web. Eventually you dis-cover Libweb, a directory of libraries andlibrary-related information, at http://www.lib.washingto n.edu/~tdowling/libweb.html, where you learn just how manylibraries have ventured into the electronicrealm. An excellent university-library Website can be found at Indiana University( ht tp : / / w w w. in di a na . e du / ~ li bwe b /index.html). Borrowers can renew booksover the Net and submit interlibrary-loanrequests. From this site you can also searchother library catalogs throughout the world.You also find that lots of public libraries areonline. The size of a site’s hometown doesn’tseem to have much to do with the quality ofits online libraries. The excellent SantaCruz, California, Public Library page at
http://www.cruzio.com/~sclibs/ includesinformation about local events and govern-ment, as well as search-able stacks. At the city library ofProvo, Utah (http://www.provo.lib.ut.us/),it’s easy to get confusedabout what’s actually inthe library and what’selsewhere on the Net.Distinctions such asthis, you realize, are be-coming less and lessimportant.Finding the Books. Aftera while you find outthat there really are books on the Net. Whilebrowsing the stacks at http://english-server.hss.cmu.edu/, also known as the En-glish Server at Carnegie-Mellon University,you pick up The Raven and dive into Poe’slush verse. And here are Goethe’s Faust,Fielding’s Tom Jones, and more.

You finally find Pale Fire at the public li-brary of Charlotte & Mecklenburg Countyin Charlotte, North Carolina, at http://www.plcmc.lib.nc.us/. This is one of thebest library Web sites around. True, theclear and attractive Web interface degener-ates into clunky Telnet when you access thecard catalog, but you’re getting used to thatby now. (Some institutions, such as the Li-brary of Congress at http://lcweb.loc.gov/z3950/gateway.html, are experimentingwith web-based card catalogs.) You learn, to

your delight, that there are four copies ofPale Fire currently on the shelves. You canreserve a copy now, although you do need alibrary card — a trifling detail. Then youjust drop by the library and . . . . What? Youhave to, like, go to North Carolina? What astartling intrusion of reality into your vir-tual search this is! Better ask about inter-library loans.

Tip of theMonth

If you return to aparticular Web pagefrequently — sayJohn Makulowich’sAwesome List —try saving it toyour hard disk. InNetscape Navigator(other browsers canalso save pages lo-cally), select SaveAs, choose Source

as the format, and name the file you’re creat-ing. The next time you want to visit thispage, choose Open File from the File menuand view the page locally. Graphics won’t bedisplayed; links won’t work unless you’reonline; and of course, you won’t see anychanges John has made to the page sinceyou downloaded it. But you will have a refer-ence point, and you’ll have saved some timeon your Web walk.

Don’t Know ftp from ftd?

MacUser maintains a list of frequentlyasked questions (FAQs) about the Internet,MacUser itself, and this column specifically.Send mail to [email protected]. MacUser’saddress on the World Wide Web is http://www.macuser.ziff.com/~macuser/. You canreach me at [email protected]. s


BY CHRISTOPHER BREEN AND BOB LEVITUS

Help FolderA mysterious morning-only backup problem, an unusual ergonomicdevice, and the pros and cons of clock-chip accelerators.

HANDS ON

WRITE TO HELP FOLDER/TIPS

c/o MacUser950 Tower Lane18th FloorFoster City, CA 94404

Don’t want to wait for an answer? Postyour question on ZD Net/Mac, MacUser’sonline service, or send e-mail [email protected] [email protected]. We pay $25 to $100for any undocumented tips we publish.

Backup Blues

Q. My backup system (an APS DAT driveand Retrospect software) seems to workonly first thing in the morning. After I’vedone a full day’s work, the backup softwarefreezes when I try to run it.

I’ve tried everything to fix it — restartingmy Mac before backing up; leaving the tapedrive on; leaving the tape drive off; movingthe tape drive to a different location, in caseit’s getting too hot. Nothing seems to workexcept the morning backup.Wendy KuhnFort Worth, TX

BOB: Because the problem occurs only latein the day — which, not coincidentally, iswhen your Mac and its peripherals and con-nectors are literally “warmed up” — I thinkyou have a hardware problem.CHRIS: Nailed it, Bob. The fact that Wendyhas restarted prior to the failed afternoonbackup attempt clinches it.BOB: The reason you see the problem onlylate in the day is because, when your com-ponents warm up, they expand ever soslightly. This can cause a failure in the SCSIchain, at any connector or in any cable.

All you probably need do is replace theSCSI cable that’s causing the trouble. If youhave multiple SCSI devices, temporarilydisconnect all but the DAT drive, to maketroubleshooting easier.


If installing a new cable doesn’t help, youprobably have a bad connector on the DATdrive. Contact APS’ tech-support depart-ment for further instructions.CHRIS: For others who are experiencingcrashes and freeze-ups regularly after a fullday’s work, the cause may not be hardware-related. Rather, the problems can be causedby running a passel of programs that setyour Mac up for an eventual fall. If youhaven’t already done it (as Wendy has), tryrestarting your Mac to fix the problem.

The Pain of Wrist Strain

Q. If I have to use a program that’s mouse-intensive for more than a few minutes, I geta serious pain in my hand and wrist thatlasts for days.

System 7’s Easy Access control panelhelps, but it’s really tedious pressing the ar-row keys over and over to move the cursorjust a little. Besides, it disables my numberpad and must be reenabled each time I startmy Mac. Do you have any other suggestionsfor RSI (repetitive-stress injury) sufferers?L. Brockmannvia America Online

CHRIS: Well, L., it all depends on the severityof your injury. If you want to stay completelyaway from clicking and tapping devices,look in the January ’95 issue for an articleentitled “The Easy-Access Mac” (page 119).The article offers plenty of solutions forthose with physical limitations.

If your condition is less severe — andconsidering you’re able to use Easy Access, Iassume that it is — I can recommend some-thing that may not only help your pain butalso cheer you up in the meantime. I’mspeaking, of course, of Kernel Productions’ChoiceStick (about $70).BOB: Wait a minute, I could swear that’s agaming device I was considering reviewingfor The Game Room.

figure 1 / Designed for game playing, theChoiceStick can also give relief to RSIsufferers. Its control panel lets you programgame devices to move the cursor and performa variety of functions, such as emptying theTrash, with just the click of a button.

CHRIS: Right you are, Bob. The ChoiceStickis an adapter for Sega and Atari game con-trollers and joysticks. Although these gamedevices are normally used for blasting elec-tronic enemies, they can also help cut backon the kind of repetitive mousing that in-flames injured appendages.

You can, of course, hook up a Mac gamecontroller, but the ChoiceStick adapter givesyou access to game controllers that typicallyhave more buttons than the Nintendo-stylegame pads used by most dedicated Macgame controllers. For RSI sufferers, themore programmable buttons, the better,because they don’t have to use their injuredhands as much.

Not only do you get more buttons out ofthe deal (see figure 1) but the ChoiceStick’scontrol panel also triples the number offunctions of a game controller by letting youassign three separate functions to each but-ton — for instance, one press can bring upan Open dialog box, two presses can click onOpen, and three presses can click on Cancel.

Oh, and it’s fun to use with games too.BOB: I had some wrist pain last year, so Ibought a pair of articulated arm holdersthat clamp onto my desk and support myforearms as I type. They helped, but they

TIPS / Power Mac
weren’t cheap — they ran about $200.Another thing I’ve had success with is a
pair of Handeze Energizing and Therapeu-tic Support Gloves. (I get mine from APSTechnologies, for about $20.) They workbetter than I ever expected.

Last but not least, instead of a mouse, Iuse a trackball, because it seems to relievestrain.

A Chip off the Old Clock

Q. Ads say “clock chippers” accelerate yourMac, but I’m wary. Do you think installingone is a good idea?Tracy Luphervia the Internet

CHRIS: Let’s start with the basics: Thesechippers are doodads that clip onto theclock chip of your Mac, pumping up theclock rate. For instance, a 66-MHz PowerMac 6100 could conceivably operate at 90MHz. For the speed boost you get, they’recheap, starting at around $75 from vendorssuch as Newer Technology.BOB: Sure they’re cheap and they do speedthings up, but your wariness is warranted,Tracy. Boosting the clock speed puts addi-tional strain on your computer’s main pro-cessor, which translates into excess heat.

TIPS / Microsoft Word

CHRIS: This heat can prove deleterious toyour Mac’s finer feelings, and Apple wouldjust as soon not replace processors thathave been reduced to a pile of molten goo.I’ve never heard of that happening, though.In fact, to prevent processor damage, mostchipper vendors include small fans thatdraw heat away from the main processor.

Besides, if the processor gets sizzled, youcan always feign ignorance with the “How’dthat happen?” look. Raise your eyebrows,bug your eyes out a bit, and let your mouthflop open like that of a spotted grouper. Thislook is handy not only for computer-relatedproblems but also for automobile mishapsand misunderstandings in relationships.

Unfortunately, there’s no predictingwhether a chipper will work at all in yourMac. As much as we would like to assure youthat all Macs are created equal, it’s just notso. You can take two identical Power Macsoff the shelf and crank both up to the sameblazing speed with identical chippers, andone will work flawlessly while the othercrashes before the first extension loads.

Last, a warning for Power Mac 6100/66users: Your Mac has a Level 2 cache card notfound on the 6100/60. This cache card canbe mighty finicky about having the clockrate excessively messed with — it was de-signed to work at 66 MHz, and once you gobeyond that, the results are unpredictable.In a real-world test, I had the best successwhen I replaced the original cache card witha third-party Level 2 cache card designed towork beyond the 66-MHz limit.BOB: I wouldn’t dream of putting a chipperin my Mac. Sure they’re cheap, but a logic-board replacement isn’t.

CHRIS: I know of more than a couple of savvyMac users who swear by them. On the otherhand, chippers are so new that we have noidea what long-term damage your proces-sor may or may not suffer.

Drubbing Pub-and-Sub

Q. I use System 7’s publish-and-subscribefeature to create a spreadsheet of summarydata from data in several other spread-sheets. It works fine on my PowerBook, butwhen I transfer the files to my IIci, the mainspreadsheet can no longer find the pub-lished data from the other spreadsheets.How can I make it work on both machines?Gregory Welchvia the Internet

CHRIS: I have two ideas: one obvious andtiresome and the other sneaky and compli-cated. Before I reveal them, a little back-ground is in order.

Publish-and-subscribe, for the 98 per-cent of you out there who have never usedthis System 7 innovation, lets you link twoor more documents. Every time you make achange to the document designated as thepublisher, linked documents, or subscrib-ers, automatically update to include thosechanges.

The tricky part is that pub-and-sub lo-cates files based on the original pathname— it knows that publisher document Gorgoand subscriber document Son of Gorgo arein the Rubber Monster folder on the Worth-less Data disk, for example. Once you moveGorgo and Son of Gorgo to another volume,the pathname is no longer the same and thedocuments are essentially lost.

Solutions? We got ’em! The really obvious

POWER INDEXINGHere’s a way to include every occurrence ofa particular word in an index in just a fewsteps in Microsoft Word 5.1 (you can do itautomatically in Word 6, with the Mark Allfeature):

Select Replace, on the Edit menu, andenter the word you’d like to index — LAN, forexample — in the Find What field. Now en-ter that word twice with the characters .i. inthe middle and a semicolon at the end(LAN.i.LAN;) in the Replace With field. Clickon the Replace All button.

Use the Find and Replace commandagain, this time finding .i.LAN; and replac-ing it with the same characters (.i.LAN;) inhidden-text format (from within the Re-place dialog box, select Character from theFormat pop-up menu; then check the Hid-den check box). Again select Replace All.

Your key index words are now properlyformatted and ready for Word to start build-ing the index.Kirk MauleLondon, England

CRAMPED UPGRADE C ARDI’ve discovered that the case of an LC is intended to support amaximum of 35 pounds. Anything heavier causes the top of thecase to bow slightly inward. Normally this isn’t a problem, butwhen I installed a DayStar Power Mac upgrade card — thePowerCard 601 — in my LC 475, put my monitor on top, and letmy cat Shadow jump up on the case, my machine froze. When Itried to restart, my Mac played the chimes of doom.

A bowing case puts pressure on the upgrade card, which nearly touches the top of the LCcase, and can cause the Mac to lock up.

All I had to do to fix it was open the case and jiggle the card. My tip? Avoid the trouble I hadby making a monitor stand out of a couple of two-by-fours and a hunk of plywood, and placeit over your Mac.Bart FarkasAlberta, Canada


1

HANDS ON

TIPS / Power Mac
IDENTIFY NATIVE APPS, IHere’s a way to tell whether or not an appli-cation is PowerPC-native:
Highlight the application’s icon, andchoose Get Info (Command-I). If you see anote at the bottom of the Get Info windowregarding virtual memory (or RAM Doubler,if it’s installed), the application is native. Ifit’s non-native, you’ll see just the standardGet Info box.Alex Rampellvia America Online

IDENTIFY NATIVE APPS, IITo find out if an application is native, high-light the application’s icon and press Com-mand-Option-Shift-I. If the dialog box thatpops up lists programmers who helped withthe 680x0-to-PowerPC transition, then youhave a native app. Non-native apps displayonly the standard Get Info box.Junius GunaratneMoorhead, MN

and tiresome way around this is to link thedocuments again by republishing andresubscribing. Just follow the usual pub-and-sub procedures on your desktop Mac,and you’re done. Ho hum.

The sneaky and complicated solution —and the one that will save you time only afteryou’ve performed the task hundreds oftimes — is to make the pathname on yourdesktop Mac the same as that on yourPowerBook. Assuming that you have a com-mon file and folder hierarchy on the twomachines, rename the disk on your desktopMac to match that of your PowerBook disk.BOB: So it’s sneaky — but complicated?CHRIS: No, wait — here’s where the beauti-ful part comes in. You can create a macrothat renames your desktop disk as wellas opens your pubbed-and-subbed docu-ments. When you’ve finished your work, fireoff another macro that closes the programand then switches the disk’s name backagain. Tweaking the macro to make it workproperly can take hours!

Virtual-Memory Debate

Q. I have a Power Mac with 8 MB of RAM.Is there any advantage to installing Con-nectix’s RAM Doubler as opposed to turn-ing on the Mac’s virtual memory?Marty KlatzkoSt. Paul, MN


BOB: I recommend RAM Doubler for tworeasons. First, based solely on personal ex-perience, I’d be willing to bet RAM Doubleris faster than the Mac’s virtual memory.

Second, RAM Doubler doesn’t claim anyspace on your hard disk until it needs it.When it does need space, it grabs only asmuch as it needs and grabs it only tempo-rarily. The Mac’s virtual memory, on theother hand, creates a swap file on your harddisk equal to the size of your installed RAMplus your virtual-memory allocation. Thatspace is unavailable for anything else when-ever virtual memory is turned on.

Best of all, RAM Doubler doesn’t seemto affect the performance of any of myprograms, even the notoriously virtual-memory-averse Photoshop.CHRIS: Power Mac owners win no matterwhich of the two virtual-memory optionsthey choose — the one that comes withMacintosh system software or RAM Dou-bler. That’s because native applications re-quire less memory when you’re using eitherof these types of memory than when you’renot.

If I had to make a choice, I’d go with RAMDoubler for the last reason Bob mentioned:There are certain applications that, whilesneering viciously in the presence of Apple’svirtual memory, purr like fuzzy pussycatswith RAM Doubler installed.

Best View on the Desktop

Q. When I set folders to View by Namemode — who can stand anything else? —in the Finder, all my icons turn generic. I’vetried reinstalling system software, rebuild-ing the desktop, and zapping the PRAMabout a gazillion times. And I’ve tried to fixit with TechTool, Save A BNDL, and BNDLBasher — all to no avail. Is there any kind ofcure?Anne HillSebastopol, CA

BOB: The cure is simple . . .CHRIS: . . . if, perhaps, elusive.BOB: Even the power users I quizzedcouldn’t figure it out right off the bat.

You’ve probably chosen the smallest iconsize in the Views control panel. To makeyour icons show their true colors once more,choose the middle or large icon size.CHRIS: There is a good use for that smallest-size icon setting — I often run my colorPowerBook in black-and-white mode, and

two-toned icons are just this side of useless.Also, the smaller icons eat up less of thePowerBook’s precious desktop space.

The Fury of Sound

Q. I was told by Apple that I could not hookup an ordinary microphone to my PowerMac, since the microphone jack is powered.What good is 16-bit stereo input if I can’t getat it?Aaron Greenbergvia the Internet

CHRIS: It’s true; you cannot use a standardmicrophone with the sound-input jack onthe Power Mac, as well as on several otherMacs, such as the PowerBook 500 series andthe Quadra 660AV and 840AV. They have aPlainTalk input, and it works only with aline-level signal (the kind found on cassettedecks and VCRs) or with a PlainTalk micro-phone. Plugging a regular mic into that jackwon’t hurt anything; it just won’t work.

The PlainTalk mic has a plug that’s aquarter of an inch longer than a standardminiplug. When you insert the PlainTalkmic’s plug into that jack, it makes contactwith a powered connector. Contact with thepowered connector gives the PlainTalk micthe juice it needs to operate correctly. Stan-dard-length miniplugs can’t reach the con-nector, and for good reason. If they used theextra boost of juice, it would be too much.

The only way to use a regular mic with thePlainTalk input jack is to run the micthrough a preamp (a device that adjusts themic’s signal). You can do this by pluggingthe mic into a sound-mixing board, since itcomes with a preamp, and then pluggingthe mixing board into the Mac’s sound-input port. You can get mixing boards atelectronics stores, such as Radio Shack. Thecheapest one costs around $35, but to get agood one, expect to spend around $300.BOB: The cheapest way to go is to use aPlainTalk mic for voice input. If you don’talready have one, you can pick one up fromApple for under $40. s

Bob LeVitus is the director of evangelism for PowerComputing. Christopher Breen is a San Francisco BayArea musician who suffers from LWAS (Lloyd WebberAversion Syndrome).

You can find the shareware and freeware pro-grams referenced in this article in the Mac-User and ZD Net/Mac areas on CompuServe

and eWorld. See How to Reach Us for instructions onaccessing ZD Net/Mac.

PERSONAL MAC

Don’t Let ThemEat Fruitcake

Sick of fruitcakes, Chia pets, and neckties? Andy’s giftguide is guaranteed to satisfy the Mac user in your life —

even if you have to treat yourself.BY ANDY IHNATKO

IT’S A COZY, winter-wonderlandish holiday evening. Mom’s in thekitchen, doing what she does best: scrutinizing acres of data on herPowerBook, calculating long-range projections of the spot metalsmarket for her investment firm. Dad’s in the den, trying to get theholiday lights to work. After two hours of frustration, he will finallydetermine that it’s his scanner refusing to relinquish the serial port,and after a restart and a brief prayer, he will be rewarded by seeinghis modem’s “OH” and “CD” lights finally come to life. He will in-deed be able to log onto America Online and have a basket of exotic

cheeses sent to his mother overnight. And Junior’s in his bedroom,snuggling up close to his Performa, looking for saucy images on theWeb, sugarplums of a decidedly different sort dancing in his head.

Well, Norman Rockwell it ain’t, but these are the ’90s, after all,and the members of this family should be thankful that on Christ-mas Eve they’re even in the same house together. And the followingitems aren’t exactly a Red Ryder Pump-Action BB Rifle with a com-pass in the stock either, but they’re nonetheless likely to float theboats of the Mac-heads on your gift list.

PHO

TOG

RAP

HY

/M

ICH

AEL

FA

LCO

NER
FOR FUN WITH FIGURES, try Fractal
Design’s Poser r ($199), which does for thehuman figure what KPT Bryce did for planetsand terrain. Giving you a variety of basichuman models you can customize and thenpose in lifelike (or unlifelike) positions, it’snot only a useful thing to have in yourgraphic-design tool chest but also loads offun to play with. Noodling around withPoser will bring you right back to those daysof your youth when you spent hours on theliving-room floor with your Barbies. GI Joes. Imeant to say GI Joes. 408-688-8800.

YOU’LL NEVER throw awayanother file again once youhave an Iomega Zip uremovable-cartridge driveconnected to your Mac. Whenyou can buy a 100-MBcartridge for $19, I mean,why bother throwing out allof those Word Settings (x)files? Sure, its technologymay be less durable than thatof other cartridges, but with adrive that’s priced to move at$199, most people won’t careone bit. 801-778-1000.

WHAT DO NEWTON MessagePad 100 own-ers envy most of all about the more sophisti-cated 110 and 120 models? Not the addi-tional memory or the longer battery life butthat snazzy built-in lid that protects thescreen. Envy no more, with a snappy Flip-LidClassic r, from The MODELSHOP. Made of

sturdy black aluminum, it in-stalls (and removes) in secondswith the use of miracle Velcrotechnology, and its double hingesallow it to serve as a convenientangled stand. Available from PDADirect,800-279-4732 or 219-882-5228, for $39.95.

CHEER UP. Just because you’re acomputer geek doesn’t meanyou can’t appreciate the finerarts. But when dressing up adreaded office or apartment,shun those gaudy andoverpriced Renoirs, Chagalls,and Lichtensteins in favor of anactual memory or logic boardfrom a Cray 1 supercomputer,lovingly mounted in space-ageacrylic for a lifetime of viewingpleasure. They’re $199 and$249, respectively, and areavailable from Tony Cole,at MemoryBilia Computers.510-881-1772.

Part

s for

Art

’s Sa

ke
LET’S BE FRANK: The WorldWide Web caught everyone bysurprise. There we were, securein the knowledge that ourV.32bis modems were plentyfast for anything an onlineservice wanted to throw at us,not knowing there werenefarious plans afoot to createan infrastructure for livemultimedia via the Internet.Unless you want to wait all dayfor that live image of a coffeepotin Stuttgart, a 28.8-kbps modemsuch as the Global VillageTeleport Platinum u ($279)is in your future. 408-523-1000.
KWIK KWIZ TIME, KIDS!What’s exactly 3.5 incheshigh? That’s right: theArmy’s S9JNA field-rocketammunition! Those littlebabies helped keep thepeace during the ColdWar . . . now the sturdy(and I’m talking sturdy)rope-handled crates theywere shipped in can keepan eye on more than 600of your floppies. Angrymilitary stenciling andsuperdense wood say“No” to would-be master-disk pilferers, with acapital “Nyet!” Just $10from American Science &Surplus, whose catalog isa pretty good gift initself. 708-982-0870.

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UNTIL THE EVIL SCIENTISTSof the world perfect cold-fusionpower supplies for notebookcomputers, there will always bethose awkward moments whenyou’ll have to shut down yourPowerBook and pick up a book

instead. Be prepared with one ofthese fine titles at the ready:Silicon Snake Oil, a wonderfulcautionary essay about the Inter-net; Microserfs, by Douglas Coup-land, a taut novel about Mi-crosoft programmers who flee

the mother ship to seek their for-tunes; and MacUser contributingeditor Ted Landau’s Sad Macs,Bombs, and Other Disasters, thehardware- and software-trouble-shooting guide that ought toship with every Mac.

WAIT A MINUTE! Still shoving that tired old mousearound? Spinning your wheels in squaresville with atrackball? Get hep to the scene, Daddy-o, with theALPS GlidePoint r touch-cursor device. Usingthe same technology as the trackpads in thePowerBook 500 series, the GlidePoint ($99) of-fers surprisingly fine, smooth cursor and pointer con-trol in a device that fits in the palm of your hand or in acorner of any keyboard. 800-950-2577 or 408-432-6000.

PARANOID? ME TOO, so here’sthe ultimate in data security,courtesy of Man & Machine, Inc.:the InvisiView — a specialmodification to your PowerBookthat makes the contents of itsscreen completely invisible to ev-eryone in the room but you . . .provided you’re wearing your

special lightly tinted InvisiViewspy sunglasses. When you’vemade it back to C.O.N.T.R.O.L.headquarters, a snap-on screenfilter restores the screen to nor-mal operation. $295, plus thecost of shipping your PowerBookto Man & Machine for installa-tion. 301-277-3760.

PERSONAL MAC

DO THE LUCKY FOLKS on your shoppinglist need a color printer? Unless they want tosupplement their scholarships by selling fake


DO YOU OWN A POWER MAC 9500? Wehate you. Are you whining about theof memory too? We hate you even mWe are also duty-bound, however, toyour attention to the adapters offerSIMMSaver Technology and NewerTechnology, called, respectively, theDIMMSaver ($79) and the DIMM Tree These nifty gewgaws allow two 72-pSIMMs to take the place of one 168-pDIMM. For the proletariat, SIMMSaveoffers adapters for using several oldSIMMs to take the place of a single 7SIMM. For those who feel that givinga thing to your sweetheart is like buhim or her a cubic zirconia, real memthe gift that lasts forever (or at leastthe next change in memory-moduledesign). 800-636-7281 or 316-264-22

Roll

DIM

M B

ones

IDs to underage classmates, probably not. Butcolor printers are dang fun nonetheless, andthere’s no easier way to get toddlers to pick

up lucrative Photoshop skillsthan to promise them color out-put. And these days, you can findcolor printers that are as cheap,crisp, and easy to run as mono-chrome inkjet models. TheApple StyleWriter 2400 l($525 list) isn’t the cheapestcolor printer available, but itsColorSync software makes it oneof the most accurate. 800-538-9696 or 408-996-1010.

PEOPLE WITH POWER MACSand a thirst for speed are usuallyfamiliar with the concept of“chipping”: yanking out the clockcrystal that the Mac came withand substituting a faster one, re-sulting in a serious speed boostfor frighteningly little money.Also more than a little frighten-ing, however, is the prospect ofperforming that sort of delicatesurgery by yourself. The NewerTechnologies PowerClip r

and MacClip products ac-complish the same thingwith a small clothes-pinlike device thatclips over your Mac’soscillator in a jiffyand can be re-moved as easily.The PowerClip ($129)boosts Power Macs’ speed byup to 33 percent; the MacClip(also $129) increases Quadras’by 40 percent. 316-685-4904.

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QUICK, WHAT’S THEDIFFERENCE between aGalaxy- and Constitution-classstarship? Where is StarfleetAcademy’s Flight Range located?Which Star Trek episode did JoanCollins appear in? If your kidsdon’t know all this stuff, then forheaven’s sake, buy them theStar Trek Omnipedia uCD-ROM ($79.95) before theirclassmates’ heartless taunts of“boch ghlchraj!” cause deepemotional scars. With voiceinput and output and scads ofvideo clips and stills illustratingpractically every aspect of theTrek universe, the Omnipediacan bring almost anyone up towarp speed in no time flat.Simon & Schuster Interactive,800-983-5333 or 310-793-0600.

FINALLY, WHAT COULD BE A BETTER GIFT than a getawayvacation for two to explore submerged ruins? But don’t worry aboutgetting your SCUBA certification, because you’ll be winging your wayto balmy Logan, Utah d, site of the landfill where Macintoshhistory — in the form of 2,700 Apple Lisa computers dumped therein 1989 to give Apple a huge tax write-off — is buried. The touristpotential of this attraction has never beenexploited, so you won’t be gouged byarea hotels (the CenterStreet Inn, 801-752-3443, has roomsreasonably pricedfrom $55 to $130 anight) and restaurants.For the true Macintoshfanatic, this sacredground beats a Civil Warbattlefield any day. s

It’s a Children’s Software Wonderland (to the tune of “Walkin’ in a Winter Wonderland”)

BY RIK MYSLEWSKI AND JIM SHATZ-AKINThe Two Dads Dads’ Gift Directory

Rated products

Earth Explorer mmmmh (ages 10 and up;CD-ROM; list price, $99), Claris, SantaClara, CA; 408-987-7000.Elroy Goes Bugzerk mmmm (ages 7 – 12;CD-ROM; list price, $50), HeadboneInteractive, Seattle, WA; 206-323-0073.Big Top’s Cartoon Toolbox Starring Felix theCat mmmm (ages 7 and up; CD-ROM; listprice, $55), Big Top Productions, SanFrancisco, CA; 415-978-5363.Jack’s House mmmh (ages 2 – 8; CD-ROM;list price, $40), Kids Count Entertain-ment, Evanston, IL; 708-272-9766.The Lion King mmh (ages 3 – 9;CD-ROM; estimated street price, $40),Disney Interactive, Burbank, CA; 818-543-4300.Math Workshop mmmm (ages 6 – 10;CD-ROM; estimated street price, $40),Brøderbund, Novato, CA; 415-382-4400.The Pagemaster mmm (ages 6 – 12; CD-ROM; list price, $50), Turner Interactive,Atlanta, GA; 404-885-7972.Sesame Street Letters mmmm (ages 3 – 6;CD-ROM; estimated street price,$40), E*A Kids, San Mateo, CA; 415-571-7171.

Other recommended products

Bumptz Science Carnival and Snootz MathTrek, Theatrix Interactive, Emeryville,CA; 510-658-2800. GeoSafari Multimedia,Educational Insights, Dominguez Hill,CA; 310-884-1931. Living Books series,Living Books, Novato, CA; 415-382-7818. Maya Quest, MECC, Brooklin Park,MN; 612-569-1500. My Make-BelieveCastle, LCSI, Highgate Springs, VT; 514-331-7090. Pantsylvania, HeadboneInteractive, Seattle, WA; 206-323-0073.Reader Rabbit series, The LearningCompany, Fremont, CA; 510-792-2101.Thinkin’ Things series and . . . Houseseries, Edmark, Redmond, WA; 206-556-8484. Wiggleworks series, Claris,Santa Clara, CA; 408-987-7000.

RIK: There. Was that so bad?JIM: Yes.

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Holidays! Time for giving,And extravagant living.For kids on your list,Not ready for Myst,It’s a children’s software wonder-land.

There are games that’ll teach ’em.Play’s a great way to reach ’em.Math Workshop is fun;It’s from Brøderbund,A top kids’ company in wonderland.

Thinkin’ Things are tons of fun toplay with.We like each collection: 3, 2, 1.Captivate your kids (if they’recreative),

’Cause only teasing siblings is morefun.

Claris software’s top-drawer,Wiggleworks, Earth Explorer,And Headbone’s Elroy,That bug-lovin’ boy,Will chase his dog through softwarewonderland.

(Instrumental break. Kazoos, jugs,and nose flutes are all acceptable.)

Reader Rabbit’s cloying butsuccessful,When it comes to teaching kids toread.Living Books are clever and lessstressful,

But cutesy Rabbit gives kids whatthey need.

Keep this one rule in mind,When kids’ software you’re buyin’,“It’s got to be cool,And more fun than school,”Then your kids will learn inwonderland;Mousin’ ’round in softwarewonderland;

It’s a —Children’s software —Wonderlaaaaaaand!

PERSONAL MAC

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JIM: The days are getting shorter.RIK: The lines at Toys ’R’ Us,longer.JIM: It’s that time of year again.RIK: Kwanza. Hanukkah. Thesolstice.JIM: Christmas.RIK: Holidays. Family. And theannual appearance of that time-honored holiday tradition: rankcommercialism.JIM: How convenient of you tomention rapacious greed.Gives me a chance to vent.RIK: Here it comes: DaddyJim’s character-licensingrant.JIM: Well, it bugs me thatsome softwarepublishers want youto shop for softwarejust like you do forbreakfast cereal.RIK: What’s wrong withwell-known fuzzy friendswho induce a child to fall underthe spell of an educationalmessage?JIM: Nothing. Trouble is, though,most kids’ software based onpopular characters is downrightcrummy. Disney’s The Lion Kinglumbers immediately to mind.RIK: You’re right, there. Slapdashanimations. Tedious games.JIM: Turner Interactive’s ThePagemaster is a little better butis still underwhelming. Choppyperformance. Film clips withsound tracks that don’t sync upright.RIK: In past months, you’vecomplained about ImageSmith’sweak Yearn 2 Learn Peanutsand Yearn 2 Learn Snoopy titlesand Big Top’s snoozy Hello Kittyseries.JIM: A lethargic litany of licensedlousiness.RIK: But aren’t you being a bitnegative for this happy holidayseason? Familiar TV and moviecharacters don’t always meanwretched software. E*A Kids’Sesame Street Letters lives up


to its PBS ancestry, and Big TopCartoon Toolbox Starring Felithe Cat lets kids have a blastmaking their own cartoons.JIM: OK, I’ll temper my rant.Parents shouldn’t shun allHollywood software, but theyshould definitely approach withcaution if there’s a popularcharacter on the box.RIK: More to the point, the best

software stands alone — itdoesn’t need characters from

movies or TV.JIM: Let’s give someexamples from the best of

the upcoming releases.They’re not out yet, bu

you can be sure mosof these will appear istores well before tha

last mad holidaybuying rush.

RIK: As sure as there’san “X” in Christmas.

JIM: For example, look for MECCMaya Quest — an inquiry intothe disappearance of the Mayancivilization, for ages 10 to 16.And don’t miss TheatrixInteractive’s Bumptz ScienceCarnival and Snootz Math Trekthey’re fun exploration and skilldrill games for kids in primaryschool.RIK: I’d elevate Bumptz and

Snootz from merelyfun to downrighthilarious. And formore holidaymerriment, checkout Pantsylvania,HeadboneInteractive’s trekthrough a trouser-centric town.JIM: Bad punsforever! For kids below the age ofpun-sentience, have a look for MyMake-Believe Castle, from LCSI;GeoSafari Multimedia, fromEducational Insights; and Jack’sHouse, from Kids CountEntertainment.RIK: Finally, being a shamelessfan of most Edmark software, I’llbet that Thinkin’ ThingsCollection 3 and Trudy’s Timeand Place House — the newestofferings in the excellent “. . .Things” and “. . . House” series —will join my all-time favorite-giftlist.JIM: Speaking of all-timefavorites, shall we list a few?RIK: Better yet, let’s wash down acouple of pieces of Hanukkah geltwith some fortified eggnog andindulge in that great — ifembarrassing — holidaytradition: caroling.JIM: You don’t mean . . . ?RIK: Yes. Software in song. You athome, gather the kids by the fireand join in.JIM: Are you sure you want to dothis?RIK: Trust me . . . .

PERSONAL MAC

The Game RoomBY BOB LEVITUS

IF THE BEST GIFTS are those that go on giving, then computer games are clearly the gift ofchoice for everyone on your holiday list, right? All you need to do is match the right gamesto the right loved ones — or not-so-loved ones, since a really good game can also get lessfavorite folks out of your hair for months.

For Your BelovedMy motto is, “If you really love ’em,give ’em something addicting.”That way, you’ll always know whereto find your Mac-enslavedsweetheart.

For puzzle lovers, check outJigsaw-It! d (mmmm; list price, $58on CD-ROM, $48 on floppy), fromDynaware (415-349-5700), withover 100 puzzles plus the ability tomake custom puzzles from any PICTfile that fits your beloved’s tastes— such as, say, a scanned-in photoof you looking your cutest. Whileyou’re cranking out custom puzzles,you can also make self-runninggreeting-card puzzles and sendthem to all your Mac-owningfriends — a nifty and thrifty gift,since all you need is a floppy disk(all those extra AOL disks areperfect).

A more cerebral but equallyaddicting choice is SimCity 2000(mmmmh; list price, $50 on floppy,$70 on CD-ROM), from Maxis (800-336-2947 or 510-254-9700). Morethan a game, SimCity 2000 is asophisticated city simulator; addictshave been known to spend monthsmodeling a single city. The playercontrols everything from power tobuildings to water (but not naturaldisasters), so it’s a great way tosatisfy your beloved’s thirst forpower outside of your relationship.

For stressed-out significantothers in need of a somewhat morecontemplative diversion, I suggestIshido (mmmm; estimated streetprice, $30), from MacPlay (800-462-2752 or 714-553-6655). The boardand playing pieces are beautiful,making Ishido refreshingly relaxing

to play. The game itself is insidious— simple to learn but difficult tomaster. Each game teaches playerssomething new about strategy andleaves them thinking, “I’ll try justone more time.”

For the Party HostWho needs roasted chestnuts whenyou can gather everyone aroundthe Mac for a rousing session of thenew Trivial Pursuit InteractiveMultimedia Game (mmmh; list price,$30) on CD-ROM? Yes, it’s the hoaryold board game, but Virgin/ParkerBrothers (800-874-4607) has spiffedit up for the ’90s by incorporatingaudio, video, and pictures. It’s ablast from the past for up to sixcelebrants, and the new fast-playgame provides all the fun of theoriginal but in a lot less time.

If you or your party-hostingfriend have the horsepower for it (aQuadra-class or PowerPC system),Links Pro Macintosh (mmmmh; listprice, $70), an incredibly realisticgolf simulation — on CD-ROM orfloppy — from Access Software(800-800-4880 or 801-359-2900),lets you gather as many as eightbuddies for some weather-impervious virtual golf. Here’s thecool part: All eight of you can be atone Mac, or you can play over anAppleTalk network (just telleveryone the party is BYOP —bring your own PowerBook). Ohyeah, and with an AV Mac, you canuse voice commands to choose yourclub and shot. FORE!

Kid StuffOK, I’m not one of MacUser’s official“Two Dads,” but I do have two kidswho share their computer with lotsof friends and neighbors. With luck,their tastes will be in sync withthose of the kids you know.

Six-year-old Allison’s friends tendto favor stuff with lots of click points— objects they can click on tomake things happen. Among theirmost frequently played CD-ROMsare the ones (there are several)

from HumongousEntertainment (800-499-8386 or 206-485-1212) thatstar the Putt-Putt and Fatty Bearcharacters — two faves are Putt-Putt Joins the Parade (mmmmm;estimated street price, $40) andFatty Bear’s Birthday Surprise(mmmmh; estimated street price,$40). Also high on their list are anyof the Living Books, from RandomHouse/Brøderbund (800-521-6263or 415-382-7818), especiallyArthur’s Teacher Troubles (mmmmh;estimated street price, $40). Three-year-old Jacob hasn’t quite got thehang of the mouse yet, but he stillenjoys watching his sister play theHumongous and Living Booksdiscs. In my humble opinion, youcan’t go wrong with either seriesfor kids between 3 and 8.

A more constructive CD-ROMfor prereaders would be ReaderRabbit’s Interactive ReadingJourney (mmmm; list price, $99),from The Learning Company (800-852-2255 or 510-792-2101).Allison fell in love with it lastspring, played it through twoseparate times, and pretty muchlearned to read by summer.

In the Teen SpiritIf your favorite teenagers are intoweaponry, aliens, and gore-strewnmayhem, by all means get them acopy of the greatest first-persondeathfest yet: Marathon (mmmmm;estimated street price, $40), fromBungie Software (312-563-6200).Rumor has it that Marathon 2 willbe in stores by the time you readthis; although I haven’t seen it yet,it’s probably a good choice as well.

For a nonviolent gift that’s alsoin tune with adolescent angst, tryTroubled Souls r (mmmmh;estimated street price, $30), agothic arcade game from VarconSystems (619-563-6700). TroubledSouls features gorgeous graphics,subtle music, and addictive gameplay. It requires a nimble mind aswell as a deft hand, which makes it

just right forthose less pugnaciouspubescent types.

For Everyone ElseIf any of your remaining gift targetsare sci-fi fans, try Dark Forces(mmmmh; estimated street price,$45), from LucasArts (415-721-3300). Players of this CD-ROM getto join the Rebel Alliance, infiltratethe Empire, and then battle everyman and machine the ImperialForces can muster. Fast and furiousfinger-twitching battles areinterspersed with motion-videosequences to make for a compellingMarathon-meets-Darth-Vader sortof experience.

Got anyone left on your list?Whether they’re Generation X’ers orGeneration Ex-Lax’ers, I recommendLoony Labyrinth u (mmmmh; listprice, $60), the latest pinballsimulation from StarPlay (800-203-2503 or 970-447-9562). Those oldenough to remember playing realpinball machines will be amazed athow believable it is. It’s just like thereal thing, except that all therollovers work all the time andthere’s no sticky Coke residue onthe tabletop. You can even nudgethe table to coerce the ball intogoing where you want it to (but becareful not to Tilt). s

Bob LeVitus is undergoing treatmentfor game addiction. He is also directorof evangelism for Power Computing.

JOHN C. DVORAK

The Applepaedia Britannica
I LOVE ANOMALIES — I’M ALWAYSlooking for what’s out of whack andtrying to understand why — and the high-
Here’s how it would work: You sell a ten-disk CD-ROM system called the Multime-dia Encyclopaedia Britannica. You can sellit stand-alone or as a complete computer

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technology scene never disappoints me.Here’s an anomaly that sticks out like a Macat PC Expo: We live in an age where infor-mation is king and terms such as informa-tion superhighway are tossed around alongwith information at your fingertips andthe regrettably unforgettable knowledgeworker. How, then, can an information iconsuch as the Encyclopaedia Britannica begoing down the tubes? After all, theBritannica embodies information.

On the surface, you could say it’s becausethis venerable institution exemplifies anold medium floundering in a new age. Thatmay be true, but how many other old-mediaoutlets are dying so quickly? There has to bemore to it than that! Besides, there’s nonew-media substitute for the Encyclo-paedia Britannica.

It’s probably a combination of societaland market variables that’s hurting theBritannica. Its marketing is old-fashioned.Door-to-door sales, if you haven’t noticed,are frowned upon nowadays. And the old-fashioned sales pitches probably don’t helpeither.

Whatever the reason for its decline, theEncyclopaedia Britannica must movequickly to a new format and model. Sup-pose you could get something called theMultimedia Encyclopaedia Britannica(MMEB) on an affordable CD-ROM. Wouldyou even consider the competition? I doubtit. The Britannica company has argued thatthe entire encyclopedia has to fit on one CD-ROM (who knows why that’s the thinking?).So it created a text-only CD-ROM that sellsfor $995. Needless to say, sales haven’t beenbrisk. Obviously the company simplydoesn’t get the picture.

Now how about this for an idea: Have


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Apple buy the Britannica operation andmaintain it as a resource oriented towardhome Mac users. To add value, Apple couldmake the encyclopedia real-time by turningeWorld into an information server to be usedin conjunction with the MMEB CD-ROMs.

Bear in mind that if Apple doesn’t do this,Microsoft will. Forbesmagazine has beengoading Microsoft tobuy Britannica for sometime now. Microsoft, incase you haven’t no-ticed, has been buyinginto publishing housesand obtaining the digi-tal rights to all sorts ofstuff. Hang out in pub-lishing circles, andyou’ll hear that Micro-soft could be the world’s biggest publisher ofprint and electronic media sometime afterthe year 2000.

Until now, Microsoft has concentrated itsenergies on grabbing rights to old materialfor repurposing on CD-ROM. But how longbefore Bill Gates sees a gold mine in thebacklist at Simon & Schuster or RandomHouse and starts making multibillion-dollaroffers? It’s reminiscent of Ted Turner buyingold movie studios to get at the archives.There’s gold in them thar hills. And the goldis now all the more valuable since Congresschanged the copyright laws so fewer andfewer products fall into the public domain.

Both Apple and Microsoft are in a goodposition to make a move for EncyclopaediaBritannica. So are CompuServe, Prodigy,and America Online, although their com-bined infatuation with the Internet lessensthe chances of their seeing this opportunity.

ystem (an Apple advantage) or with a mo-em and an account on the Britannicanline service (a part of eWorld, Microsoftetwork, or whatever). The online serviceould be an intense information provideresigned for basic research and as ahildren’s homework helper. Prodigy has

already demonstratedthat an online homeworkhelper can be a phenom-enal success. For yearswe’ve heard predictionsthat there would be aconvergence betweenCD-ROM technology andthe online world. TheMMEB could be the fuseto ignite a new marketsegment and begin thattrend.

Of course, the current Britannica man-gement is clueless. For example, it hasade its database accessible on the Web via

ime-Warner’s Pathfinder. Unfortunately,t’s a database-query engine — type in aord or phrase, and Britannica responds.

’m sorry, but database-query enginesake for lame encyclopedia interfaces, and

his one’s no exception. Let’s hope that nowhat the savvy Joe Esposito (formerly of ev-ry publishing house known to man) hasaken the reins at Britannica, he will imme-iately ashcan the current $995 CD-ROM,hut down Britannica Online, and sell thehole operation to Apple or some otherodern company with new ideas.If the new home of Britannica were to be

pple, eWorld could really become a placeorth visiting. As important, the intellec-

ual tradition embodied in Britannicaould live on. Hey Joe: Do it now. s