Aug. 29, 1997, PR Newswire reports that Apple Computer, Inc. has
announced that an update kit for MacOS 8 as a free download.
The updater has been added to the following language kits: Arabic
1.0.1, Chinese 1.2, Cyrillic 1.0, Indian 1.0, Japanese 1.2 and
Korean 1.0.
[1997/09/02]
Aug. 6, 1997, PR Newswire reports that Lotus announced Organizer
97 GS for the Macintosh at MacWorld. Used with Lotus Notes,
Organizer 97 is supported by Domino servers for mobile integration.
[1997/08/12]
July 29, 1997, Newsbytes reports that Irez Research Corp. has
announced a video capture card for Powerbook 2400 and 3400 models.
Delivering data to screen at 27MB/sec., the video is streamed
directly to the screen buffer. Shipping Aug. 15, the $150 (US)
"Capsure" card shows full screen images. A version for Toshiba
laptops will be available in September or October.
http://www.irez.com/
[1997/08/02]
July 23, 1997, Computer Retail Week reports that Brother has
announced the GeoBook NB-60 notebook computer at $599 US.
Shipping in August or September the computer runs Geos
3.0 with GeoWorks with 4MB RAM and 1MB Flash, a GlidePad
trackpad, 33.6Kpbs Modem with 14.4Kbps FAX send and an
HTML 3.2 compatible Web browser. Also included are a 1.44
MB 3.5" floppy drive and Type II PC-Card slot, backlighted
VGA monochrome display with VGA monitor output, and serial
and parallel ports.
[1997/07/26]
July 14, 1997, PR Newswire reports that Apple has increased speed of
upper end Powerbook(R) 1400 notebook computers from 133MHz up to
166MHz PowrPC(TM) 603e, larger HD's, larger L2 caches and faster
CD-ROM drives.
PowerBook 1400c/166: 166MHz PowerPC 603e RISC CPU, 16MB RAM, 2GB
HD, 8* CD-ROM drive, 128KB level II cache, 11.3" active matrix
colour screen and 1.4MB floppy drive will be about $3,500 (US).
[1997/07/18]
July 14, 1997, PR Newswire reports that the PowerBook 2400c will
be delayed till August in order to ship all units with MacOS 8.0.
Apple reports that this is due to preferences of the majority of
potential customers.
[1997/07/18]
July 14, 1997, Computer Reseller News reports that Tadpole has
announced new Sparcbook 3000XT and 3000ST TurboSPARC powered
notebook computers. The Sparcbook 3000XT comes with a 12.1",
1024 * 768 TFT active matrix screen, starting at $21,350 (US).
The 3000ST comes with a 12.1" 800 * 600 display starting at
$18,650 (US).
[1997/07/18]
June 30, 1997, Computer Retail Week reports that IDC and Dataquest
predict that notebook computers will fall in the Fall as vendors
clear out old technology stock.
[1997/07/04]
Apr. 18, 1997, PR Newswire reports that Apple has cut the prices of
Powerbook 1400 series by up to 30%. The bottom line 1400cs/117
12MB RAM/750MB HD now sells for $1,700.00 US. The top line
1400c/133 16MB RAM/1GB HD, 6x CD-ROM now sells for $3,200.00 US.
[1997/04/25]
Feb. 27, 1997, Canada News Wire reports that NTS Computer Systems
Ltd., of Vancouver sold 900 DreamWriter(R) IR and 30 Rol-A-Labs(R)
to schools in Huron County, Ontario. I don't know what these are
but they sound like movable computer technology, and they use Infrared.
If anybody can tell me I'd appreciate it.
[1997/03/02]
Every now and then I have to point out that Canada is not part of the US. So a Canadian release is often different from a US release. So just reading US Newsbytes doesn't give us the story. In Canada, today's Apple demonstrations covered the desktop/workstation PowerMacs from model 7300 and up (not the 4400 which was announced, but not brought up to be shown), and not the Newton based eMate 300 and Newton 2000 which will have to wait for the date mentioned before.
We saw the new 3400 Powerbooks though, and the first models will be the 180MHz model and 200MHz model which are will be available "in volume" in March with the 240MHz model will follow a month later. These are fully PCI based circuitry laptops.
The QuickTake 200 digital camera looks like a Fuji model this time, though I didn't ask about it's heritage. The lens is in the upper left corner and viewing is on an 1.8" LCD screen. The camera does not use a conventional shutter and the camera which has NTSC output can be used as a full motion video camera for a digitizer or videotape. The QT-200 system produces all pictures in 640 * 480 * 24 bit, but in "standard quality" and "high quality" modes.
While not strickly "mobile" issues, there are a couple of points that were
made:
First, Apple, pointing to the recent Byte benchmarks notes that the 603e
performs on par with the Pentium CPU at the same clock rate. They also
point out that the 604e equals the PentiumPro in integer operations and
exceeds the PentiumPro in floating point. Lastly, they point out that
Pentium MMX overall still doesn't come up to 604e levels overall. The
Feb. 1997 Byte Magazine p. 26 benchmarks show that MMX enhanced Pentiums
barely exceed PowerPC 604e in "default Unsharp Mask" and "Gaussian Blur"
but in "RGB to CMYK" conversion 604e exceeds Pentium MMX by a larger
factor than Pentium MMX's advantages where they exist, and in "Arbitrary
Rotation", "custom Unsharp Mask" the PowerPC 604e far exceeds Pentium MMX,
roughly doubling the MMX performance at the same clock rates. In effect
Apple had MMX last year -- before Intel. Apple furthermore points out
that not only are the faster on a per-cycle basis, but they are taking
a far lead in CPU cycles, with 500 MHz range products coming out this
year -- roughly 2 years ahead of Intel scheduled equivalents.
As an example of this performance, the new 3400 series laptops are capable of MPEG full screen video via software.
There were a couple of interesting demonstrations of MacOS 7.6.0. The new "installer" and "extension manager" look like very good upgrades from previous versions. For mobile users, the "location manager" was demonstrated and it looks very well done, with a complete menu driven interface in the Mac style. Properly used, I believe it will save mobile works a lot of time.
Lastly, we covered the new MacOS development plan, and that brings us to
the only real "news" I have to report. I say that the above isn't really
"news" because I believe that you could have found all the facts above
"elsewhere" on the Web before I posted this message but I believe I am
the first to say the following:
First, there has been progress correcting the problem with the "68K
code fragment manager" ("68K CFM"). Alpha coding is in progress or done,
and a version should be available on the Net in the next couple of weeks.
The final version should be available no later than the end of March. Since
the "68K CFM" extension was the only known serious problem for OpenDoc, that
will mean tha OpenDoc along with CyberDog will be completely usable. Also
the MacOS for 68K users will be more easily supported by developers focusing
on PowerPC compatibility, and from what I understand of what it's being
used for, performance for programs using the "68K CFM" should be better than
previous Mac programs. I won't go into detail why I'm saying that right now.
I hope to do that later.
Second, I asked about the problem of using CPU upgrades such as 68040 processor
upgrades in 68030 machines. 7.6 won't work with such upgrades. I was
told that Apple is "looking into it." That does not commit them to fixing
the problem. They are not obligated to do so through any reasonable
stretch of moral obligation since they never sold such upgrades themselves,
so it's gratifying to hear that at least they aren't turning their backs on
it yet.
[1997/02/17]
Feb. 14, 1997, Newsbytes reports a massive roll-out of new products
by Apple. Of primary concern to this Webzine are the new PowerBook
3400 laptops with 240MHz PowerPC CPUs that are, at least for now,
the fastest laptop computers in the world. Also joining that announcement
were the release of the eMate 300 (25MHz ARM 710 CPU) and Newton MessagePad
MP-2000 (160MHz StrongARM CPU) which is likewise the most powerful handheld
computer in the world. Hopefully I'll be testing these in the coming
months. And lastly, a new QuickTake 200 digital camera, which I will
know a bit more about shortly.
[1997/02/16]
According to their press release "Apple Location Manager Makes it Easy
to Use PowerBooks". Toshiba had this sort of technology years ago. I
expect other manufacturers have caught on too. It recognizes the fact
that laptops in particular usually have a couple of configurations for
a couple of specific work sites. For "home" use, they are usually set
up one way, and at the "office" they are set up another way. So by
grouping the relevent settings you can work almost as if you had separate
computers at each location, with things like network settings or printer
selection all "ready to use" almost as soon as you sit down in the
chair.
Apple Location Manager for PowerBooks
[1997/01/12]