MacWEEK articles from April 1997

MacWEEK archives from April 1997

Mac video editing an NAB focal point. (1997 National Assn of Broadcasters show) (Industry Trend or Event)
April 7, 1997... Visitors to the National Association of Broadcasters show have heard the buzzwords QuickTime and FireWire for several years now; at this week's show in Las Vegas they'll finally see these technologies reaching maturity. While video editing...

Next Communicator rev to halve RAM footprint. (Netscape's Communicator workgroup software) (Product Development)(Brief Article)
April 7, 1997... Netscape Communications Corp. expects to release this week a beta version of Communicator that slashes the software's RAM requirement by 8 Mbytes. Preview Release 3 of the company's Internet client suite for the Mac will require 6 Mbytes of...

Firewire API to hit NAB. (Apple's FireWire API, National Association of Broadcasters) (Company Business and Marketing)(Brief Article)
April 7, 1997... Opening up the Mac for 1394-based cards and peripherals, Apple this week will release Version 1.0 of its FireWire API at the National Association of Broadcasters show in Las Vegas. The company will also reveal its latest road map for FireWire...

FirstClass rev set to serve only intranets. (SoftArc's FirstClass Intranet Server)(Product Announcement)
April 7, 1997... SoftArc Inc. this Week is expected to split its messaging product line and announce a new rendition of FirstClass aimed primarily at Internet protocols. The newly named FirstClass Intranet Server, due at the end of May, will deliver the...

Letters.(Letter to the Editor)
April 7, 1997... HyperCard or vaporcard? What I've heard lately about HyperCard is enough to break my neck. Listening here and listening there, my neck just won't turn fast enough. Nor can my brain assimilate the seemingly disparate comments coming out of...

Saudi prince says he'll listen to Ellison's plan. (Alwaleed Bin Talal will consider Larry Ellison's Apple takeover plan) (Company Business and Marketing)
April 7, 1997... Who are the friends of Larry, and what do they want with Apple? Oracle Corp. CEO Larry Ellison's recent public ruminations on an Apple takeover was merely the opening act in the latest Cupertino buyout drama. Last week a new player entered the...

Connectix bets on PC emulator. (Virtual PC) (includes related article on Lismore Software Systems' Blue Label emulator) (Product Development)
April 7, 1997... Connectix Corp. last week announced a PC emulator for the Mac that the company said will let PowerPC systems run the full gamut of Intel-standard PC games and business applications. Dubbed Virtual PC, the software is scheduled to ship in June....

300-MHz PPC destined for 'low-end' Mac. (Apple Power Mac 6500 line features PowerPC 603e-based model, others) (includes related article on Apple Power Mac 8600/200)(Product Announcement)
April 7, 1997... Soon after shedding the Performa label, Apple has taken the wraps off three entry-level Macs, including the first-ever model with a 300-MHz PowerPC 603e processor. In its introductions last week, the company also boosted Windows performance on...

Sun JavaOne conference highlights applets, tools. (Sun Microsystems) (Industry Trend or Event)
April 7, 1997... San Francisco - Apple and Java developers alike showed off their latest Java wares at last week's JavaOne Conference here. Apple laid out its plans for future releases of the Mac OS Runtime for Java (MRJ) as well as its plans for Java in...

Iomega drops Zip drive price by $50, to $149. (Product Information)(Brief Article)
April 7, 1997... Iomega Corp. last week lowered the price on its popular Zip drive. The list price is now $149, down $50 from the original $199. The price drop comes at the close of a six-month-long rebate program, which required users to mail a proof-of-purchase...

Macromedia lays off 55; retooling for Web sales. (Company Operations)(Brief Article)
April 7, 1997... Macromedia Inc. laid off 55 sales and marketing workers last week. The action affected 35 staffers, or 7 percent of the company's regular employees. Macromedia also cut 20 full- and part-time contractors, about half its total number. The...

Epson delivers two new low-cost lasers. (Epson America EPL-N1200, EPL-N2000)(Product Announcement)(Brief Article)
April 7, 1997... Epson America Inc. last week shipped two new low-cost laser printers, one of which can output on oversize paper. The $1,099 EPL-N1200 and the $1,899 EPL-N2000 are 600-dpi devices that print at 12 and 20 pages per minute, respectively, Epson...

Alps blurs ink-dye divide. (Alps Electric (USA)'s Alps Masterpiece Photographic-Quality Printer MD-2300)(Product Announcement)
April 7, 1997... Alps Electric (USA) Inc. this month launched a photo-quality color printer that operates like a combination inkjet and dye-sublimation device. Aimed at the business and graphics markets, the $749 Alps Masterpiece Photographic-Quality Color...

Utility duo tightens up Mac security. (Pretty Good Privacy's PGPdisk file-encryption software, Highware's FileCrypt security utility)(Product Announcement)
April 7, 1997... Two companies are doing their best to keep Mac files safe from prying eyes. * Pretty Good Privacy Inc. last week debuted PGPdisk, its file-encryption software. PGPdisk uses 128-bit encryption algorithms that were optimized for the...

Data Ratchet extracts info. (MacSpigot Software's shareware Control Strip module)(Product Announcement)(Brief Article)
April 7, 1997... MacSpigot Software last month tried to tighten the information-gathering process when it released Data Ratchet 1.0, a shareware Control Strip module. Data Ratchet lets users extract information such as names, phone numbers, e-mail address and...

MAE blooms. (Macintosh Application Environment 3.0 terminal emulation software revised)(Product Announcement)(Brief Article)
April 7, 1997... MAE blooms. Apple is also shipping another upgrade to Version 3.0 of its Macintosh Application Environment. Update 3.0 to Apple's software that runs the Mac OS and applications in a Unix X Window includes all the fixes found in Updates 1 and 2...

Not really gone. (Game Sprockets standard) (Product Information)(Brief Article)
April 7, 1997... Not really gone. Apple clarified the status of Game Sprockets following the company's recent shakeout. Apple said that although it is putting its gaming software developers kit in maintenance mode, it still intends to release several updated...

NeoLogic updates NeoAccess. (NeoLogic Systems' NeoAccess 5.0 object-oriented DBMS)(Product Announcement)(Brief Article)
April 7, 1997... NeoLogic updates NeoAccess. NeoLogic Systems Inc. of Berkeley, Calif., recently shipped Version 5.0 of its object-oriented database management system. The company said the update to the multiplatform system adds support for databases larger than...

Data modeling. (Complete Data Solutions' Lynx data modeling software public beta) (Product Development)(Brief Article)
April 7, 1997... Data modeling. Complete Data Solutions Inc. of Austin, Texas, has available on its Web site a public beta of its upcoming data-modeling software. Code-named Lynx, the tool will model EveryWare Development Corp.'s Butler, Oracle Corp.'s Oracle7,...

No static at all. (Web Broadcasting's WEB FM 3.0 Solutiosn Distribution Kit)(Product Announcement)(Brief Article)
April 7, 1997... No static at all. Web Broadcasting Corp. in March shipped WEB FM 3.0 Solutions Distribution Kit (see 01.20.97, Page 18). The kit from the Palo Alto, Calif., company lets developers include unlimited, royalty-free versions of the StarNine WebStar...

RAID cards grab OEMs. (four vendors announce controllers)(Product Announcement)
April 7, 1997... RAID appears to be the flavor of the month in the OEM storage arena, as evidenced by a recent string of controller announcements. * Adaptec Inc. is getting into the external RAID controller market. The longtime RAID player, based in Milpitas,...

Agfa tones up Chromapress. (Personalizer-X software, IntelliStream hardware front-end, PrintCast distributed printing service for ChromaPress digital presses)(Product Announcement)
April 7, 1997... Agfa, a division of Bayer Corp., this month will introduce new features for its Chromapress line of digital presses, including variable-data printing, job management, file compression and a distributed printing service. * Personalizer-X is a...

Printware polishes new platesetter. (PlateStream)(Product Announcement)(Brief Article)
April 7, 1997... Printware Inc. in March took the wraps off a new platesetter that the company said will bring down the cost of computer-to-plate output. The PlateStream, slated to ship in the second quarter for less than $50,000, will use commodity...

Xante FilmPac cuts cost of film output. (PlateMaker II printer and FilmStar processing unit)(Product Announcement)
April 7, 1997... Xante Corp. in March delivered a low-cost system that the company said combines direct-to-film processing and direct-to-plate output at a base price of less than $6,000. The FilmPac system includes the PlateMaker II, the latest version of...

Plug-ins season video to taste. (Human Software's VideoTextissimo, Pixelan Software's Video SpiceRack desktop video add-ons for Adobe Premiere)(Product Announcement)
April 7, 1997... Macintosh users looking to spice up their video productions can now turn to two new add-ons for Adobe Premiere and compatible applications: Pixelan Software's Video SpiceRack and The Human Software Co. Inc.'s VideoTextissimo. Video SpiceRack...

Bentley modeler hits the Mac. (Bentley Systems' MicroStation Modeler for Macintosh CAD software)(Product Announcement)(Brief Article)
April 7, 1997... Heeding the call of its customers, Bentley Systems Inc. in March released a Mac version of its CAD modeling program. MicroStation Modeler, $5,325, is a high-powered solids modeler based on NURBS (nonuniform rational B-splines). The Power...

XLR8 preps video boards. (XLR8 by Interex's Video Scream Rage 1280, Video Scream Vision 1920 video-accelerator boards)(Product Announcement)
April 7, 1997... XLR8 by Interex, a subsidiary of Interex Corp., this month plans to pick up the pace of its Mac offerings with two new video-accelerator boards. Both the lower-end Video Scream Rage 1280 and the more pricey Video Scream Vision 1920 will be...

RubberFlex allows free-form distortion. (RubberFlex Software's RubberWeb and RubberWeb composer Web animation tools)(Product Announcement)(Brief Article)
April 7, 1997... For Web designers trying to put bounce in their artwork, RubberFlex Software last month shipped two Mac-only Web-animation programs, RubberWeb and RubberWeb Composer, along with a free browser plug-in for the company's AnimaFlex animations....

Audio, video Web tools to make Vegas debut. (Terran Interactive's Media Cleaner Pro 2.0 video compression tool, Wave's WaveConvert Pro audio-masetering application)(Product Announcement)
April 7, 1997... While the Web enjoys the limelight at most high-tech shows, it still has only a supporting role next to traditional media at the annual National Association of Broadcasters exposition. Nevertheless, this week's show in Las Vegas will feature an...

Web Crossing upgrade boasts real-time Java chat. (Lundeen & Associates' Web Crossing 2.0 Web conferencing software)(Product Announcement)(Brief Article)
April 7, 1997... Lundeen & Associates in March added a new level of interactivity to its Web Crossing conferencing software. The $995 add-on to StarNine WebStar now supports a real-time chat option along with bulletin board-style messaging. The new chat...

Emailer learns new rules. (Claris' Emailer 2.0)(Product Announcement)(Brief Article)
April 7, 1997... Claris Corp. this week is expected to ship Emailer 2.0, adding more mail actions and a mail database to its multiservice e-mail client. In addition to an improved interface, Emailer's primary new feature is a central database that stores all...

Dayna preps NetCenter line. (Dayna Communciations' NetCenter stackable hubs)(Product Announcement)(Brief Article)
April 7, 1997... Dayna Communications Inc. plans to ship in May its new NetCenter product line, a set of stackable hubs, switches and routers aimed at the small-office, home-office market. Noting that only one-quarter of small businesses with computers have...

AppleLink, 13, succumbs to Net. (Apple closes down Macintosh-only online service) (Product Information)(Brief Article)
April 7, 1997... At 4 p.m. on March 31, Apple officially pulled the plug on AppleLink. The online service was for many years the communication backbone among Apple employees, dealers, user groups and third-party developers. The Macintosh-only system is survived...

PGPfone 2.0 supports Internet conversations. (Pretty Good Privacy's encrypted telephony program)(Product Announcement)(Brief Article)
April 7, 1997... Pretty Good Privacy Inc. tossed Mac users a new security blanket last week with Version 2.0 of PGPfone, its encrypted telephony program. New to the software is support for voice conversations over the Internet; the previous version only...

Upgrading? CPU speed not always best investment. (upgrading performance of Macs)(The Second Decade)(Column)(Buyers Guide)
April 7, 1997... Is there such a thing as a system with all the processing power you need? For the long haul, probably not - even if you think you have more horsepower than you need, history suggests it won't be long before some new software gobbles up all your...

Renewed Mac moxie. (Apple's new 4400 and 6500 Power Mac lines) (Product Information)(Brief Article)(Editorial)
April 7, 1997... Like the climax of a classic boxing movie, Apple this week looks to have shaken off the blows taken in earlier rounds and come out swinging with affordable, 300-MHz PowerPC 603e systems. Last week's product launch should address fears about the...

Mac Manager: The Mac OS is not dead, but change is a constant.(The Mac Manager) (Product Information)(Column)
April 7, 1997... With all the downer talk about Apple minimizing itself and cutting the heart out of further Mac OS application development, I just have to scream, "Give me a break!" Let's get real. The last time I checked, Rhapsody (for the rest of us) won't...

Communicator 2 bulky but boasts full groupware. (Netscape Communicator 2.0 Internet suite)(Beta Test) (Software Review)(Evaluation)
April 7, 1997... Competition among the Web-browser vendors is heating up, and Netscape Communications Corp. is fanning the flames with its recent posting of Preview Release 2 of Netscape Communicator. The all-in-one Internet suite, targeted for the enterprise...

Handmade Software image converter handles batches well. (Image Alchemy PS 2.1.4a)(Reviews in Brief) (Software Review)(Evaluation)
April 7, 1997... Image Alchemy PS 2.1.4a 3 (Good) As Web publishing continues to grow in popularity, more users are discovering the need to convert graphics files to different formats, particularly JPEG and GIF. In addition, they must deal with the vagaries of...

Ethernet glitches in PCI Macs still waiting for fixes.(MacInTouch) (Product Information)(Column)
April 7, 1997... Serious Ethernet problems have been cropping up in both the hardware and software of PCI-based Power Macs since their debut a year and a half ago. Apple is secretly addressing the latest set of bugs and defects, while some customers independently...

Service bureaus redefine their place in digital world. (includes related article on DXP pre-press shop) (Industry Trend or Event)
April 7, 1997... Squeezed by designers who are installing scanners and other pre-press technologies and crushed by printers who are installing their own pre-press equipment, pre-press shops are developing new services and markets to replace those that have gone...

The prince and I.(Mac the Knife) (Humor)(Column)
April 7, 1997... A fresh bowl of juicy strawberries. A refreshing night's sleep in the Lincoln Bedroom. The awesome majesty of a comet streaking across the night sky. In these troubled times, Mac the Knife is happy to report that some simple pleasures still...

Fast CPUs, E100 card push S900 performance envelope. (UMAX Computer's S900/233, S900/250 PowerPC systems) (Hardware Review)(Evaluation)
April 7, 1997... Lately it seems that PowerPC clock speeds have been increasing every few weeks. In the case of the SuperMac S900 series, that's no exaggeration: It was scarcely a month ago when UMAX Computer Corp. delivered a new version of its flagship...

Macs pass speed limits: Power to catch 60-MHz bus with new line. (Power Computing's Power Center Pro line to include two models)(Product Announcement)
April 14, 1997... Power Computing Corp. hopes to redraw the Macintosh price/performance curve next month with its first two PowerCenter Pro models. The highlight of the new line will be a $2,395 machine that Power said will outpace its current top-speed and...

Exponential-driven 410-MHz Mac makes surprise NAB appearance. (Macs Pass Speed Limits) (Apple's upcoming Power Mac 9600/410 system previewed at National Association of Broadcasters show, features Exponential Technology chip) (Product Development)
April 14, 1997... Under the cover of a third-party technology demo, Apple's future high-performance machine got a workout at last week's National Association of Broadcasters show in Las Vegas. What ProMax Technology Inc. described as an Exponential Technology...

License tug-of-war: Apple versus IBM. (Mac clone makers object to hikes in OS licensing fees) (Company Business and Marketing)
April 14, 1997... Negotiations between Apple and Mac cloners last week spilled onto the streets - and newspapers - as the companies wrestled over Mac OS 8 and Rhapsody licenses. According to several sources, relations with licensees have hit an all-time low and...

QuickTime 3, Windows NT strange bedfellows at NAB. (National Association of Broadcasters show) (Industry Trend or Event)
April 14, 1997... Las Vegas - The National Association of Broadcasters show here marked new inroads for Windows NT into the Mac's multimedia stronghold, but Apple's QuickTime appears to be hitching a ride with Intel Corp. Apple's booth hosted Intel...

After 6 months, ActiveX passive in Mac market. (Microsoft's programming technology) (Company Business and Marketing)
April 14, 1997... It's been nearly six months since Microsoft Corp. threw its ActiveX bait to the Macintosh community, but so far, it appears few Mac fish are biting. Last fall the Redmond, Wash.-based company released the first beta version of its Mac software...

MetaTools to buy Specular, remodeling Mac 3-D scene. (Specular International) (firm to dominate Mac 3-D market) (Company Business and Marketing)
April 14, 1997... MetaTools Inc. said last week it plans to buy 3-D developer Specular International Ltd. for $6.4 million. Combined with its February proposal to merge with Fractal Design Corp., the acquisition will give MetaTools control of a sizable chunk of...

Motorola to accelerate StarMax to 300 MHz. (Motorola Computer Group's StarMax 5000/300 300-MHz Mac clone)(Product Announcement)(Brief Article)
April 14, 1997... Motorola Computer Group plans to ship in May a 300-MHz Mac clone. The $2,899 StarMax 5000/300 will be based on a PowerPC 603e chip and include 32 Mbytes of RAM, expandable to 160 Mbytes; a 4.3-Gbyte hard drive; 512-Kbyte Level 2 cache; built-in...

Personal Web Sharing 1.0 now available online. (Apple's Web server)(Product Announcement)(Brief Article)
April 14, 1997... Apple last week released Personal Web Sharing 1.0, which it called the TCP/IP equivalent to AppleTalk file sharing. Personal Web Sharing costs $19.95 and can be found at http://www.software.net/. The miniature Web server lets users designate...

Qualcomm mulls licensing or buying AIMS from Apple. (Apple Internet Mail Server) (Company Business and Marketing)(Brief Article)
April 14, 1997... Apple's stagnant Internet Mail Server may find new life in the hands of e-mail developer Qualcomm Inc., sources said last week. Qualcomm of San Diego is reportedly considering licensing or acquiring AIMS 1.1.2, a free Post Office Protocol (POP)...

Apple releases OS 7.6.1.(Product Announcement)
April 14, 1997... Apple last week released its latest periodic Mac OS upgrade. Users can download the revision to Mac OS 7.6, dubbed Mac OS 7.6.1, free from Apple's Internet sites. See http://support.info.apple.com/ftp/7.6.1.html/. Apple also offers Mac OS...

Mac software sales down 23% in 1996. (Industry Trend or Event)
April 14, 1997... Sales of Mac software declined more than 23 percent last year and 30 percent during the final quarter of 1996, a recent report concluded. According to a survey of the U.S. and Canadian software market by the Software Publishers Association of...

MYOB turning multi-user. (BestWare's MYOB Premiere multi-user accounting software)(Brief Article)(Product Announcement)
April 14, 1997... BestWare Inc. announced this month a multi-user version of MYOB, its accounting software package. Titled MYOB Premiere, the software is slated to ship for the Mac in mid-June. It will have the same feature set as MYOB Accounting 7.0 (see...

U.K. cloner intros CPUs. (Computer Warehouse's New York, Manhattan and Hollywood Mac CPUs introduced in Europe)(Product Announcement)(Brief Article)
April 14, 1997... Clones took a three-city tour in the United Kingdom last week as Computer Warehouse introduced a new line of Mac CPUs in the European market. Named New York, Manhattan and Hollywood, the models will feature 200-MHz PowerPC 604e processors and...

Designer makes crystals clear. (Crystal Structure Design AS's CrystalDesigner 6.0 visualization package)(Product Announcement)(Brief Article)
April 14, 1997... Crystal Structure Design AS released Version 6.0 of its crystal visualization package, CrystalDesigner, at the end of winter. A Mac-only program aimed at chemists and teachers, CrystalDesigner can be used to generate 3-D crystals from its...

Scanner prices falling; Epson, Mustek follow Microtek. (Microtek Lab cuts prices for ScanMaker E3, other products, four other firms follow) (Company Business and Marketing)
April 14, 1997... Many key players in the Mac scanner market have cut the cost of their wares in the past month. Driven by the rapidly growing market for imaging devices, the most significant effect has been to establish new price points for entry-level and...

StyleScript now supports Epson 500 and HP 550c. (GDT Softworks' StyleScript 3.5 printer support software)(Product Announcement)(Brief Article)
April 14, 1997... GDT Softworks Inc. shipped StyleScript 3.5 at the beginning of this month. Delayed since January - as a result mainly of licensing problems, GDT said - the new version adds support for Epson America Inc.'s Stylus Color 500 inkjet, as well as...

Sound and vision. (Sony Information Technologies of America's CPD-220VS 17-inch multimedia monitor)(Product Announcement)(Brief Article)
April 14, 1997... Sound and vision. Sony Information Technologies of America, a San Jose, Calif.-based division of Sony Electronics Inc., at the end of March released a 17-inch multimedia monitor with a built-in audio system capable of reproducing 3-D sound....

The KDS are all right. (KDS USA's VS-21 21-inch color monitor)(Product Announcement)(Brief Article)
April 14, 1997... The KDS are all right. KDS USA shipped a high-end 21-inch monitor at the beginning of April. According to the Garden Grove, Calif.-based company, the $1,599 VS-21 has a maximum Mac resolution of 1,152 by 870 pixels at an 85-Hz refresh rate. It is...

TFT heroes. (HP's new thin-film-transistor 14-inch LCD monitor) (Company Business and Marketing)(Brief Article)
April 14, 1997... TFT heroes. Hewlett-Packard Co. this month intends to release an LCD monitor with a 14-inch viewable area. Based on a TFT (thin-film transistor) active-matrix panel, the as-yet-unnamed HP display will have an estimated street price of $2,419. It...

Smash it up! (Iiyama North America's RM-17 17-inch color monitor)(Product Announcement)(Brief Article)
April 14, 1997... Smash it up! Iiyama North America Inc. of Costa Mesa, Calif., in February announced a tough, rackmountable 17-inch monitor for heavy-duty, industrial environments. Enclosed in a metal case, the $1,180 RM-17 has undergone extensive vibration,...

Illustrator 7 set for May. (Adobe Systems' Illustrator vector illustration program, May 1997)(Product Announcement)
April 14, 1997... Adobe Systems Inc. this spring will draw a new face on its vector-illustration software and revise its Dimensions 3-D and Streamline bit-map conversion tools. Illustrator 7.0, due for Mac OS and Windows in May for $595, will adopt the unified...

Radius plays latest video cards at NAB. (National Association of Broadcasters show) (PhotoDV video card, MotoDV software add-on, VideoVision ML video-production system)(Product Announcement)(Brief Article)
April 14, 1997... Radius Inc. showed its cards at last week's National Association of Broadcasters show in Las Vegas. In March Radius shipped PhotoDV, a $499 combination of the company's FireWire card, an interface cable and an Adobe Photoshop plug-in. With...

ElectricImage launches modeling career. (Electric Image's ElectricImage Animation System 2.8 ElectricImage Broadcast 2.8)(Product Announcement)(Brief Article)
April 14, 1997... Electric Image Inc. last week unveiled Version 2.8 of its $7,495 ElectricImage Animation System and $2,995 ElectricImage Broadcast packages at the National Association of Broadcasters show in Las Vegas. Version 2.8 of the rendering and...

Pro Tools plugs into PowerPC. (Digidesign's Pro Tools 4.0 digital-audio recording system, AudioVision 4.0 post production software)(Product Announcement)(Brief Article)
April 14, 1997... Digidesign last week retooled its Pro Tools digital-audio recording system with a Power Mac-native upgrade that supports a host of new plug-ins. The company also unveiled an update to its AudioVision postproduction software that will be honed...

Long documents to hit Java with WiredWrite. (J*Stream 's WiredWrite format conversion software) (Product Development)(Brief Article)
April 14, 1997... At San Francisco's JavaOne conference this month J*Stream demonstrated a utility that will convert large, formatted documents to tiny Java applets. Dubbed WiredWrite, the software will import files in Microsoft Word's RTF and the native format...

StarNine WebStar plug-ins multiply. (ClearWay Technologies' ClearWay Simple Cache Manager, Cyno Technologies' WebRadius, UpLate Software's Site Stat 1.3 Web-server log analyzer)(Product Announcement)(Brief Article)
April 14, 1997... A trio of tools for StarNine WebStar emerged this month, adding server-caching, authentication and logging features. Meanwhile, two developers have a proposal to help WebStar plug-ins interact. * ClearWay Technologies Inc. of Boston released...

LetterRip speeds up. (Fog City Software's LetterRip 1.1 mail list server)(Product Announcement)(Brief Article)
April 14, 1997... Fog City Software Inc. said it has improved the speed of LetterRip, its mailing list server. Version 1.1, available now as a free upgrade, optimizes the mail engine, which Fog City said allows the server to deliver thousands of messages per...

Liquid Audio arrives for Mac. (Liquid MusicPlayer for Macintosh software for playing sound over the Web)(Product Announcement)(Brief Article)
April 14, 1997... Aiming at Mac audiophiles, Liquid Audio Inc. last week released a Mac version of Liquid MusicPlayer, its software for playing sound over the Web. Liquid MusicPlayer is a free browser plug-in that lets users preview songs or entire albums on...

Keeping Mac servers healthy and happy. (suggestions for stable Mac servers)(Working the Net) (Internet/Web/Online Service Information)(Column)
April 14, 1997... Like many of you, I run Macintosh Internet servers. Mine support a busy Web site, the 45,000-person TidBITS mailing list and thousands of individual e-mail messages each day. I won't pretend that I never have problems, but I'm tired of hearing...

FirstStep unifies LAN access. (Millennium Computer's FirstStep Single Sign-On Authentication Server)(Product Announcement)(Brief Article)
April 14, 1997... Millennium Computer Corp. in March released a new client-server package that lets Mac users connect to the company's Windows NT-based FirstStep Single Sign-On Authentication Server. Available now, the system provides a single front end to a...

Network traffic. (News Briefs)
April 14, 1997... * Asante unveils new switch line * Vivo ships video tool * Global cuts PowerPort prices Asante Technologies Inc. of San Jose, Calif., this week will announce a new line of switches targeted at smaller LANs. Available now is the...

Caveat emptor. (Saudi Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal's investment in Apple) (Company Business and Marketing)(Brief Article)(Editorial)
April 14, 1997... Forget customer loyalty; Apple has billionaire loyalty. Who needs worldwide market share when you're attracting buyers who can spend more than most nations? The ever-stranger cycle of Apple-buyout rumors in the last month proves that the very...

Faster LAN, second screen may help more than MHz. (upgrading systems)(The Second Decade) (Hardware Review)(Column)(Buyers Guide)
April 14, 1997... I never met a megahertz I didn't like, and the more of them the merrier. Higher processor speeds never hurt (assuming your systems can support them), and for some compute-intensive tasks they can be a big win. But that doesn't mean that moving to...

Letters.(Letter to the Editor)
April 14, 1997... Don is cooked Your opinion man, Don Crabb, is fit to be fried (not tied or steamed). His latest opinions range from wishful thinking to ludicrous. Don's bit about Rhapsody as an OS to run Windows programs...

And the award goes to ... Power Computing team.(The Mac Manager) (News Briefs)(Column)
April 14, 1997... As much fun as I am having watching all the friends of Oracle Corp. CEO Larry Ellison jockey for position to buy Apple, I just have to get back to work. And there's no better task than awarding the Croix de Crabb to Mac folk who are trying to...

Radius and Newer go head-to-head. (Newer Technology's RenderPIX PCI/500 with RAM upgrade, RenderPIX PCI 502, Radius' Thunder 3D 3D accelerator cards) (includes related articles on Apple QuickDraw 3D 1.5's RAVE hardware abstraction layer, interactive rendering and on 3-D testing) (Hardware Review)(Evaluation)
April 14, 1997... Thunder 3D, RenderPIX PCI/500 and 502 speed creation of 3-D graphics. Three-D is booming on the Mac. Driven largely by surging processor power and the growing maturity of Apple's QuickDraw 3D architecture, current 3-D applications are adding...

Texture Creator 2.0 is one-stop texture shop. (Three D Graphics' texture generator) (Software Review)(Evaluation)
April 14, 1997... Web designers, illustrators and 3-D developers looking to add textures to their work have several choices: They can scan objects or photos, use premade textures from clip-art libraries, or paint custom textures by hand. Now they can add...

Reviews forum. (News Briefs)
April 14, 1997... Give credit to PC MacLAN Miramar Systems Inc. was astonished by the poor review of PC MacLAN 6.0 (03.24.97, Page 31). The problems the reviewer saw with our product were caused by one of the other products being reviewed, which conflicted with...

Eclipse's clever organizer realizes OpenDoc promise. (Eclipse Services' Canopy Outliner 1.0.2 tool for organizing information in outline form) (Software Review)(Evaluation)
April 14, 1997... Canopy Outliner 1.0.2 4 (Very good) Eclipse Services' $24.95 Canopy Outliner is a well-designed Live Objects component for organizing information in outline form. It's an excellent example of the strengths (and some of the weaknesses) of...

Nomai 540 takes the middle ground in removables. (Nomai USA's 3.5-inch Winchester device for storing data on removable cartridges) (Hardware Review)(Evaluation)
April 14, 1997... Nomai 540 3 (Good) High-capacity removable storage continues to be a crowded market. The latest entrant is Nomai, with its Nomai 540, a 3.5-inch Winchester device that stores 540 Mbytes on each removable cartridge. The quest for storage...

Developers wish Apple success, but faith slipping. (react to Apple's lack of future strategies)(MacInTouch) (Company Business and Marketing)(Column)
April 14, 1997... Working constantly with Macintosh systems, we are familiar with all the benefits this platform provides, such as easy reconfiguration; a wonderfully fluid user interface; a collection of applications that lead the industry in quality and design;...