MacWorld0204April2002

‘ava iGatwoilticon THE MAC PRODUCT EXPERTS ae ee pul Z002 2002 Phot hop Adobe's Essential Image SU GEUSIVE Editor Comes to the FIRST LOOK Modern Mac OS, page 54 Plus: | Optimizing Classic | All-New AirPort | Virtual PC 5.0 | Flatbed Scanners GIGAHERTZ G4 _ We Test Apple’s Power Mac Powerhouse, page 18 _ It’s infused with the latest Mac innovations. Sorry, nifty bio-suits sold separately. Outstanding Color, Unlimited! Possibilities. For Screenprinting Specialties ® Film positives q S E's color management v put up to 13” x 19" st RISC processing ™ Color proofing, labels, & more! mie pe $137” ithe 137% MORE GREAT PRINTING | SOLUTIONS FROM XANTE: Accel-a-Writer 3N Serves as a workgroup laser printer © Resolution up to 1200 dpi © Output up to 13° x 18.5" 00 Lease pice pr month”. DB ScreenWriter 3 ‘Desktop film positives for screen printing applications Resolutions up to 1200 dpi © Output up to 13" x 35.5" 00 Lease pice per month HOD PlateMaker 3 © Resolutions up to 2400 dpi © Output up to 13° x 35.5" 168 1 FE HED nae DLO Accel-a-Writer® 3G * Monochrome graphics up to 2400 dpi © Output up to 13" x 35.5" © Fast RISC processing ase pes pot hor cian BOO FilmMaker 4 © Computer-to-film © Resolutions up to 2400 dpi © Output up to 13” x 35.5" Lease pce per month an 1 13% CLEARLY™ Adobe <> IMAGING **Lease Prices based on 36 month lease. Also available from the XANTE ColourLaser product line: | P| es ——T ~ | =; » Be J | a & = Introducing the XANTE ColourLaser 21, XANTE's latest and most dynamic digital color printing solution. Along with the precision color performance and consistency you've come to expect from XANTE, you get the ultra high-speed printing you've craved. The XANTE ColourLaser 21 is the ultimate digital color workhorse - combining XANTE's color management expertise, product versatility, and an affordable price — its quality is unsurpassed * High volume, high performance *XANTE's color management * Oversized printing up to 12" x 35.5" ¢ Low cost-per-page * Duplexing capabilities * And much more! Lease price per month**......... $257 VOXANTE Innovations in Printing Technology 1-800-926-8839 exr.2171 Enter online for your chance to win a FREE ColourLaser 21! WWW.XANTE.COM / MW9 Choose 113 at www.macworld.com/getinfo CEINION From the Editor's Desk Macworld’s editor in chief, Rick LePage, discusses Photoshop 7.0, our redesign, and banishing OS X's Classic mode forever. 14 51 Feedback Readers respond. The Game Room PETER COHEN Meet your twitch-factor quotient with two new action games: Aspyr Media's Spider-Man and Ambrosia Software's Deimos Rising. 120 Ihnatko ANDY IHNATKO Apple's iDVD and the SuperDrive have taken over Andy's office—and his life. MAG BEAT Dual-1GHz Power Mac G4s, what's next for OS X, QuickTime 6, the iGesture Pad, Turbo Squid, USB flash storage, and an interview with special- effects artist Stephanie Powell. SELREDS Teach Word New Tricks NAN BARBER AND DAVID POGUE Use easy-to-create Microsoft Word macros to remove much of the drudgery in your work. Create Sophisticated Style Sheets JEFFREY ZELDMAN Explore creative opportunities and take your Web site in new directions with Cascading Style Sheets. 79 Make Videos More Efficiently JIM HEID, ANTON LINECKER, AND TOM WOLSKY Our experts offer advice on using Adobe After Effects, Apple's Final Cut Pro, and Roxio’s Toast. 82 Optimize Classic ROB GRIFFITHS Until every app becomes OS X-native, you'll need to use OS X's Classic mode. We offer advice on how to make Classic as small and stable as it can be. Mac 911 CHRISTOPHER BREEN Launch OS X applications with the press of a key, find ways to connect old Macs with new scanners, and convert Real Audio files to MP3s. April 2002 www.macworld.com MacUser COVER STORY The Wait Is Over DEKE McCLELLAND AND KELLY LUNSFORD Adobe Photoshop for Mac OS X has at last arrived. Whether you need to get organized, get better images, or get up-to-date with Apple's next-generation OS, Photoshop 7.0 has something for you. Here's our exclusive first look at one of this year’s most highly anticipated new programs. pets Become an iExpert JONATHAN SEFF AND JASON SNELL Apple's “i-products” (from iPhoto to the iPod) are admirably easy to use, but they still have hidden depths. Join us as we delve into the digital hub, and learn how to get the most out of these products, {4 | MacwoRD | April 2002 __|_wwwmacworld.com_| REVIEWS Wireless-networking router $685 Apple AirPort Base Station Midrange flatbed scanners $883 Canon CanoScan D1230UF $$$8 Epson Perfection 1650 Photo $8$5 Hewlett-Packard ScanJet 5470CXI $$% Microtek ScanMaker 5700 Accounting software $ MyBooks 5.1 $8$% MYOB AccountEdge 2 $6943 Oracle Small Business Suite 7.5 Graphics suite $486 Canvas8 FORE Suitcase 10.1 Font-management utility Speech-recognition software te ViaVoice for Mac OS X PC-emulation program $996 Virtual PC 5.0 Video-compression utility $8$ Sorenson Squeeze 1.0 PowerBook dock $883 BookEndz Titanium Docking Station VST-compatible software sampler $688 Halion 1.1 Web-searching utility $889 Watson 1.1 3-D-animation program $983 LightWave 3D 7b Cross-platform-networking software $988) Dave 3.1 Graphics plug-ins $68) KPT Effects Photoshop plug-in $4} Grain Surgery 1.0 for Photoshop TV tuner $$$) VBSOHRTV On the Cover: Photograph courtesy of Apple Computer wewwemacworld.com piv2002 | macwortD | 5 | ys S110 Digital ELPH 5300 Digital ELPH ‘ Canon knownow- a _wvewsmacivorid.com FROMTHE EDITOR'S DESK | Mac OS Evolves, and So Does Macworld Classic Begone! | I'VE BEEN RUNNING MAC OS X IN ONE FORM OR ANOTHER since September 2000, and last August it became my daily operating system. Since then, I’ve become more and more impressed by Apple’s efforts. Sure, I miss a lot of things from Mac OS 9 (could I please have a full Location Manager that switches ail my settings, including print- ers?), but I've finally stopped going to the upper right- hand corner to switch applications, and I’m much more adept at working with some of the, uh, nuances, shall we say, of the marriage between Unix and Mac OS. What I don't like about OS X is using its Classic mode. Yes, being able to run unmodified OS 9 apps inside OS X is an awesome technical achievement, but its also a huge pain in the ass. I'm tired of watching that old happy Mac and its sorry trail of extensions rum- bling across my PowerBook’s screen. Last November, Microsoft Office v. X finally got me to the point where I no longer needed to run Classic all the time. And a number of cool OS X applications and utilities have kept me happy. But until recently, one reason to run Classic remained: Adobe Photoshop. I spend nearly as much free time in Photoshop as I do work time in Word and Entourage. I've looked at a number of intriguing OS programs, including Caffeine Software's very TIFFany ($233; www.caffeinesoft.com) and the open-source GIMP ($30; www.openosx.com or www -macgimp.com). But after more than ten years of Photoshop, I’m not quite ready to move away from it. With Adobe's announcement of Photoshop 7.0— detailed in this issue by Deke McClelland, Kelly Lunsford, and Jason Snell—Classic will quickly become a distant memory for me and, I think, many other users. In addition to Carbonizing its hip program, Adobe has managed to add quite a few new features. (To those who complain about the wait, I answer that such a crucial application must be brought to OS X properly; I'd rather have a clean, stable upgrade than a quick port any day.) Some will feel that Adobe didn’t go far enough, but after playing with a beta version for a few weeks, I can tell you that the company seems to have done a fine job. And anything that k ssic away from my Mac isa step in the right direction. A New Look As you can see, we're unveiling a new look for Macworld. Redesigns are very subjective; whenever you change a magazine's appearance, you'll find as people angry about it as happy about it—and a sizable group of people who just shrug their shoul- ders. And we all move on. We tried to give Macworld a cleaner look and more flexibility in its different sections. Most important, this redesign increases the amount of text we can fit on our pages, giving us more room to write about what matters most to you: the Mac. With the previ- ous design, our reviews, for example, were quite a bit shorter than they had been in earlier designs. That amount of space is appropriate for some products, but there are plenty that deserve more space—and many others that we haven’t had the room to cover before now. OS X, Step Forward Starting with this issue, most of the products we evalu- ate and report on will be OS X products. There will be some exceptions (for example, QuarkXPress 5.0), and we'll still look at OS 9 compatibility during the review process. But for the most part, we plan to be even more aggressive in our coverage of OS X. As we've been doing for the past year, we'll continue to provide you with tips and tricks for getting up- to-speed on OS X, reviews of new programs and upgrades, and plenty of product news. For longtime Mac users, making huge, especially once the switch to OS X is not as easy 4 as jumping from OS 8 to OS 9 developers get over the (although once you're there, OS X's stability makes it much easier to use). But the long-term benefits will be huge, especially once hardware and software developers get over the initial compatibility hurdle: And when we see new applications developed specifi- cally for OS X—along with the maturation of long- lived Next applications (such as Stone Design’s Stone Studio and the aforementioned ” ‘any)—OS X will be a great place to be. We'll help you get there. RICK LEPAGE The long-term benefits of Mac OS X will be compatibility hurdles. Let me know what you think—good or bad—about our new look, Macworld in general, or anything else related to the Mac. Drop me an e-mail atrick_lepage@macworld.com, or join the discussions in our forums, at wwawmacivorld.com. I'd love to hear from you. __Assil 2002 MACWORD 7 FastIrack Schedule The vey 0) | venvon of the award-winning project manager will soon make its debut on sereens and in stores. To preview, pre-order, and find out more information on features and availability, call 800.346.9413 or visit wou fasttrackscheduleS.com Choose 84 at wavwmacworld.convg VP of Contentiéditor in Chief Editor Executive Editor, Mac 1ld.com Senior Features Editor Senior News Editor Reviews Editor ‘Associate Editors, ws Lab Ditector Test Manager Associate Technical Analyst copy EDIT aging Editor Assistant Managing Editor Copy Editor ART AND DESIGN Design Ditector Senior Designer Design Associate Design Consultant Prepress Consultant MACCENTRAL.COM News Director Senior Editors INTERNATIONAL EDITORS oshio Moriya Tomasz Bitner Engin Gedik Simon Jary Jason Sn Jennifer Berg kristina De Nik Austra France Germany tnaly Japan Poland Spain Sweden Turkey United Kingdom wwnw.macworld.com PANTONE® ond other Pontone, Inc, trademarks are the property of Panzone, inc. ©2002 HewlettPodkord Company. Al rights reserved, Why some lips get kissed Why fruit gots picked. Why embarrassment is and others get CPR, not easily disguised. PANTONE” PANTONE PANTONE 293C 164C 178C Why people come in Why fall is unable to Why the sky is sometimes ‘out of the sun. sneak up on us. blamed for depression, PANTONE PANTONE PANTONE 199C 770 445C Why burgers get flipped, Why teeth get pulled. Why men color their hair. PANTONE PANTONE PANTONE 478C 127C 427C Accurate color matters. The new HP Designjet 10ps and 20ps printers. ® ; Proof-quality printers starting at $849. _4/ For a print sample, visit our Web site at www.hp.com/go/accuratecolor invent New! Support for inkjet printing in OS X. My files are important. Very important. I only share my files with those I trust. I trust DAVE’. the File, share Follé" Balto Mc C8 Choose 124 at wwrwzmacworld.com/getinfor Mac to PC, PC to Mac. Cross-platform file and print sharing is too vital to your business to risk. Trust Thursby, the company with 15 years experience. Trust DAVE, the solution with | a proven track record, Share files and printers across a network with no barriers. DAVE installs on your Mac with no additional software required for the PC. It’s fast, secure and easy to use. Download a free evaluation today! Trust DAVE. www.thursby.com Mac \s a trademark of Apple Computer, Inc Fegistered in the U.S. and other countries: ‘The "Built for Mac OS X" graphic is a trademark of Appie Computer, Inc., used Under license. DAVE js a registered trademark of Thursby Software Systems, @ 2002, Thursby Sokware Systems, Inc | 40 | macworto | Apri 2002 | President and CEO | Colin Crawtord VPIChief Operating Officer | Stephen Daniels Director of Finance | Fos de Feminis | ‘Accounting Coordinator | Ronda Bittner VP of Human Resources | Sue Murphy Human Resource Manager | Su-Tsen Wu Network Services Manager | Sean Greathouse I Manager | Jennifer Torres DISPLAY ADVERTISING SALES VP of Sales/Publisher Associate Publisher, East Sales & Marketing Coordinator National Accounts Manager Account Executive Western Advertising Director Account Executive Sales Assistant Showcase Account Manager Showcase Account Manager Online Sales Manager Steve Plevin (415/243-3509) Cynthia Ramsey (973/243-1197) Kasey MacMullen (415/243-3642) Paul Bonartigo (508/533-4020) Jo Zotarel (516/277-4134) Sara Culley (831/475-0565) Margaret Level Green (15/243 3582) Franck Zamora (415/243-3628) Aiki Stan (415/243-3664) Carol Johnstone (415/243-3691) Doug Detlefsen (415/243-3598) MARKETING Senior Marketing Manager | Sharon. Cordesse | Marketing Services Manager | Joanna Bock Col PRODUCTION Production Director | Steve Spingola Prepress Manager | Alan Anzalone bo Booking and Billing Manager | Ricardo Sandoval ‘Ad Coordinator | Megan Matteoni ONLINE PRODUCTION Senior Web Producer | Christina Gonzales Online Production Manager | Ron Neal Sotlags ete ae te petite 3 Praed nthe United Sates of wewwmacworld.com Feast your ears on our 40-watt USB-enabled SoundSticks' speaker system. Ideal for Apple's iTunes; iMovie" and iDVD, they sound even clearer than they look. Get yours at www.harman-multimedia.com. harman/kardon HA Harman interns — itaern trademark and sTunes ahd Move are trademarks of Choose 3 at winwmacworld.comigetinfo EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO GET THE MOST OUT OF OS X COMING TO NEWSSTANDS MARCH 31 SPECIAL ISSUE TOTAL OS X * Tips & Tricks for Power Users * Making the Transition ° What You Need to Know About Unix ° OS X Product Directory * Secrets of the Pros PLUS 2 CD-ROMS featuring test drives, demos, videos, games, and hundreds of OS X shareware programs BONUS! 40-PAGE OS X POCKET REFERENCE GUIDE ORDER BY PHONE 1.800.288.6848 for $7.95 plus $3 shipping and handling* *Delivery available to US residents only. Supplies are limited. 12 | MACWORLD | Apt 2002 | HOW TO CONTACT MACWORLD ‘Subscription information and Services Phone 800/288-6848, from the United States and Canada 303/604-7445, trom all other locations US. Mail Macworld Subscription Services PO, Box $4529, Boulder, CO 80322-2529 (include a malling label with correspondence.) World Wide Web hp//servce macworld.com (or service) oF btp/sutscibe macword,com (to order) E-mail subhelp@macworld.com (Gend your full name and the address at which you subscribe; do not send attachments) Fax 641/842-6101, trom the United and Canada 303/604-0518, from all other locations es SUBSCRIPTIONS The one-year (12.ssue) subscription rate is $34.97 inthe United ‘and $54.97 forall other counties, Checks must be made rayable in US. cutency to Macworld. Pease allow 3 to 6 weeks to receive your first issue o for changes ta be made to an existing subscription, BACK ISSUES OF MACWORLD Back issues (subject to availabilty) are $8 pe issue lor US. delivery ($12 ouside the United States); prepayment in US. cumtency ta id istequited, Send check 0” money order to Back Hsu, sword, RO, Box $3131, Boulder CO 80322-3131 REPRINTS AND PERMISSIONS ‘You must have permission before reproducing any materia from Macwork. Write to M Reprints and Permissions, 30 Howard Sweet, 15th Foot, San Francisco, CA 94105; include a phore number, To order reprint of your company’s editorial coverage, call Reprint ‘Management Services at 717/399-1900; fax, 717/399-8909, e-mail, sales@rmsreprints.com MAILING USTS We periodically mabe lists of our customers available to mailers of ‘goods and services that may interest you. f you do not wish to receive such mailings, please waite to us at Macworld, PO. Box $4529, Boulder CO 80322-4529, Please include a copy of your mailing label MACWORLD EDITORIAL The editors of Macword welcome your tips, compliments, oF complaints, i duct reviews from past issues can be located at ssvese macwvold.com, We are unfortunately unable to look up stories from past issues; recommend produ : problems by phone, email, ofa, Cont ext, $00, for Information on user gioups in your atea et, 13th Foot 5; fx, 415/442-0766, Nac lastnamestmacworld.com, tegarding any aspect of tne magazine yorid.com. Due tothe high volume of mai rece spond personaly to each leer We reserve the right to edt all submissions. All letters published in blacword or Macwarld.com become the propery of Mac Publish MAC 911 Send yout questions or tips on using Mac computers, peripherals, of software to Macwork, Mac 911, 301 Howard Street, 1Sth Floor, San Francisca, CA 98105; fax 415/442-0766; or email mac9)1@ macuvorldcom, Please include your name, address, and telephone number To share tips and discuss Mac problems vith other Mac users, vist the Macworld.com forums. MACWORLD CONFERENCE & EXPO As the flagstip sponsor of Macworlc Conference & Expo, Macworkt ‘encourages all subscribers to attend this exciting biannual industry ‘event. For information about registration, ehibitor lists, con‘erence schedules, dates, and much more, please visit www. macwotidespa.com, ‘Vera wowrwmacworld.com, what will you make of it? Inspiration is everywhere. How will you bring it to life? ke Corel GRAPHICS SUITE 10. Intuitive and powerful graphics software specifically designed for Mac® OS X. 3 CorelDRAW® 10 Corel PHOTO-PAINT®’ 10 3€ Corel R.AME www.corel.com/inkblot Choose 79 at www.macworld.comigetinfo GRAPHICS um 3 z 5 k 3 8 8 2@ A Smashing Good Time No Macs were harmed in the making of our January 2002 cover—sort of. Our art department made a few cosmetic adjustments to the hollowed-out case of a blue- and-white Power Mac G3—its working parts safely removed. We then used Adobe Photoshop to provide the more destructive touches. As to whether Apple laptops figuratively crush their desktop siblings, our readers seem evenly divided. But there's little argument that the iPod's arrival means Apple has big things planned for digital devices, And whatever Apple winds up developing next, we promise not to break it. VON BY JAMES TURNER. PAUL LINDEN iE The Laptop of Luxury? MELONIE JACKSON eS Andrew Gore finally said what a lot of us portable-Mac people have been noticing about the slim difference between portable Macs and desktop systems (“Time to Desert Your Desktop?” January 2002). For die-hard desktop users who have been looking for a reason to try getting by with a Titanium PowerBook or one of the new iBooks, this article is a must-read. MARY JO DISLER ie} I took the plunge more than a year ago when I replaced my trusty Power Mac 8100 with a Pismo 400MHz G3 PowerBook. I've got the Pismo hooked up to a new 19- inch Mitsubishi monitor; a 30GB FireWire backup drive; a USB Zip 250; speakers; and my ever faithful Apple LaserWriter Select 360, through an AsantéTalk Ethernet-to- Local Talk adapter, As much as I drool over pictures of the new tower, my setup allows me to run a small print-publishing business quite adequately, using a variety of apps. ‘The biggest bonuses: a quiet environment, a second monitor, and of course, laptop portability when needed, MARK SHAW Q P've never bought a Mac for myself before because I've moved a lot in the last few years—a desktop would have had little use for me. And Apple's laptops were not pow- erful enough or were too expensive. Then the dual-USB iBook came along. I still think $400 is a big enough difference to warrant buying a desktop if it suited my life, but it doesn’t, so the current iBook is per- fect. Computers are entering a new phase where portability is king, so prices and fea- tures will continue to improve, and desk- tops will have less of an advantage. 14 | MACWORLD | April2002_ | _ ‘The article was very well done, except for one crucial point—ergonomics. Laptops are very hard on the body because you cannot simultancously get the sereen high enough to relieve strain on your neck and get the keyboard low enough to relieve strain on your arms and hands, If you're going to use a laptop as a replacement for a desktop—and use it ata desk—the safest thing to do is put the laptop on a box to raise the screen and add an external mouse and keyboard. PHILLIP HARRIS. e While I appreciate the many points offered on the subject of portability, you made a glaring omission. Most of us who have experience working with portable computers know that it would be impos- sible to see the screen under the condi- tions presented in the article’s photos. I’m a photographer, and the computer is nota fashion accessory for me; rather, it’s a tool for use under all possible conditions. MIKE WOFSEY, ies} When I saw the cover, T wondered how the Macworld special-effects crew managed to show a desktop G3 crushed under the weight of the Titanium PowerBook. Then Ipicked uy nium PowerBook for the first time, It slim, dense, and a whole lot heavier than laptops by Sony and oth- ers. A few hours of lugging one of these beasts around the city would make me as tired as I was when I used to deliver news- papers as a kid. InDesign, Table for One SCOTT TURNER EN} David Blatner clearly does not under- stand the needs of people who create long, complex technical documentation if he thinks that “InDesign’s new table features alone may sell the program to designers of technical documents” (“InDesign Takes Flight,” January 2002). While the new table features are impres- sive fora pasteup-based program, they are pitifully inadequate for processing long documents. Using Adobe FrameMaker, I can create a format for each type of table T normally use and apply that format at will. I don’t have to create a new table and reformat each time. I don’t want to have to fool around with manually intensive actions such as text frames for each page. I need to apply page, paragraph, and char- acter formats. I need to create cross- reference formats that will dictate what appears in the reference. I need live cross- references that change if the position of the referenced text changes. I need fea- tures InDesign doesn’t offer. WHITNEY CENTER a While I look forward to the release of the new InDesign, I’m not as excited as you seem to be about the transparency fea- ture, Admittedly, my experience is limited to Illustrator 9, but T have been most unhappy with the results and limitations of transparency in that program. Issues that Adobe must greatly improve upon include the guaranteed ability to use and spot colors; the use of duotones and tri- tones; overprinting; and the need to embed photos so as to avoid conflicts with transparency effects. These are problems in Ilustrator 9, but [ can’t imagine how smoothly an InDesign document will rip if you place an Illustrator file with trans- parency effects in InDesign and then apply more transparency. Not all of us will be using the new, supposedly improved Illustrator 10. APRIL 2002 FEEDBACK Music to Your Ears? JONATHAN R. WING = I think the iPod will be another one of Apple's failures, just like the Newton. It's only for the Mac; not a lot of the MP3 world uses Macs, compared with PCs, It costs $400; you can get so many other players that work well for much less. Apple could have done more-innovative things with an MP3 player than just make it look cool and give it some fast features. PAUL SAMAAN S ‘The iPod is the center of a Mac user's dig- ital world. Sure, it plays music. Bur it can also store a backup disk image of my files. When I’m on the road, I can back up everything on my iBook before I restore the factory software. I can edit videos on my PowerBook and save them on this little gadget. When I get home, I simply drag and drop files to my desktop Mac. In addi- tion, I see more in store for this device. If there's a reason to criticize Apple, it’s for the lack of emphasis on what you can do with the iPod besides listening to music. Moneydance Review JAY COLSON Si Tam a very happy Moneydance user and can’t imagine that any customer would be unhappy with the product (Reviews, Decem- ber 2001). There must have been minimal research put into the review, as I didn’t see the URL for Moneydance 2002 (www -moneydance.com/preview). This work- in-progress version has online banking and bill payment, as well as improved Quicken Interchange Format (QIF) importing. JOHN BRENDLER Si Tom Negrino admits to being a Quicken user—hardly the right person to review a competing application like Moneydance. He completely missed the boat on the potential value to Mac users of this new entrant in the field. Granted, the purpose of the review was to tell people what to buy today, and maybe Moneydance is almost ready for prime time, as opposed to being a good alternative to Quicken. The tone of the article is what was wrong—it ridiculed the program. Moneydance offers things that Quicken doesn’t, because Moneydance has a better interface, and it will be better than Quicken. It should have been por- trayed as an up-and-coming competitor vwewwemacwarld.com offering value in areas Quicken has not addressed. Negrino breezed over the fact that Moneydance pure Java applica- tion—a landmark achievement, compared with Quicken’s lack of cross-platform com- patibility. Furthermore, Moneydance’s Java basis makes it uniquely suitable for future evolution into hybrid architectures. JOE DELUCA ies Although the entire Quicken package is very good, Intuit’s first attempt ing brokerage-account connec! Quicken for the Mac is horribl. get it right, Intuit should have wa the next release to include this feature. About the only thing the brokerage con- nectivity is good for is downloading stock or bond transactions. Outside that, this feature has major shortcomings. Two Views on X EDWARD DITTERLINE [Ex T have to tell someone, anyone, everyone how much I love Mac OS X. And I am about as picky, cantankerous, and impos: sible to please as anyone could be. OS X | really changed my creative, business, edu- cation dl personal lives, all for the b ter. Working in an inherently © environment like OS X is fun, and it exponentially incre: ideation—which puts more money pocket. I love the artistic integrity of the Aqua interface. It’s beautiful and brilliantly conceived and executed. I am. totally psyched by the ultimate customizability of OS X and the remarkable intelligence that has gone into the platform's design. JOHN CHIASSON. ics) I can understand the excitement over the new operating system that seems to perme: ate Macworld these days. I’m usually the first one on the block to try the latest system, However, Lam very skeptical about OS X. Te will be a long while before all my favorite software companies catch up, with Carbon- based versions of their products, On top of that, I think we're setting ourselves up for the same quagmire of virus troubles our PC friends have been dealing with for years. Tracking the Mac PAUL SAHNER 2 “Don't Know Much about History” (Mac Beat, January 2002) failed to mention a great freeware app called Mactracker (hetp://plaza.powersurft.com/mactracker). While it won't give you the history of Apple Computer, as www:apple-history .com will, it does an excellent job of telling you about Apple’s products. It has infor- mation ranging from start-up chimes to the number of ports a computer has. An EPS Secret CHRISTOPHER LEE jes} Bruce Fraser states that QuarkXPress 3.3 and later can break down an EPS file its current plate data (Print Publishing Secrets, J ry 2002). How does he accomplish this? The EPS files bave to originate from Photo- shop, you have to be printing separations, and the EPS files can't be JPEG encoded. If all these things are true, you should see near-iden- tical print times for EPS and TIFF versions of the same image, provided you haven't cropped them in XPress. Reportedly, InDesign 2 will offer the same functionality.—Bruce Fraser © Post comments on our forums (www .macworld.com), or send them by mail to (34 Letters, Macworld, 301 Howard Street, 16th Floor, San Francisco, CA 94105; via fax to 415/442-0766; or electronically to letters@macworld,com, | Include a return address and daytime phone umber, Due to the high volume of mail received, we can’t respond personally to each letter, We reserve the right to edit all letters and posts. All published letters and forum. comments become the property of Macworld. CORRECTIONS In our review of the Espon Stylus C80 (February 2002), we inadvertently misreported results in the section that referred to printing photo- graphs, The C80 does print photographic images very well on matte-finish and semigloss paper. Photos printed on glossy paper, however, will appear dull, due to inherent qualities of the pigment inks that Epson uses in the C80. As the review noted, if you are looking for the best photographic cutput, we recommend a six-color, dye-based photo ink-jet. Stephen Sugg was the Photoshop artist for our March 2002 cover. Apa 2002_| MACWORLD | 15 | EYE-PC There’s a Xerox network printer that the page at a stunning 22 ppm. With Xerox color, details pop and get noticed. The Xerox white, but speeds out your first color page in just 13 seconds. It Phaser* 7700 tabloid color laser printer will surprise you in prints up to {1x17 fulk-bleed, with 1200 dpi for the photog! countless ways. It not only prints 22 ppm, color or black & color quality you and your clients demand. And PhaserMatch™ © 2002 XEROX CORPORATION, Al nghts resorved. XEROX* The Document Cemoany* the digtalX* Prasor® and There's a now way to look at are registered tadamarks end PhasaeMatch” iso wademark of XEROX CORPORATION “Estimated US rotal price, Reseller pice may vary. 36USC220506, delivers vivid color that leaps off A r A re ‘To see what a difference detailed color can make, simply give us a call at 1-877-362-6567 ext. 1872 or visit us at xerox.com/officeprinting/frog1872 color management software ensures the colors you want are what you get. It’s just what you’d expect from one of the full line of Xerox network printers. T COMPANY ‘THE DOCUME! 99° Xerox Phaser 7700 36.95 Choose 101 at wwwmacworld.comigetinfo WHAT'S NEW WHAT'S IN THE PIPEL POWER MACS REACH THE GIGAHERTZ MARK | A Whole New Gig > Mac users know that it takes more |WHAT'S | NEXT Does Apple have anything else up its sleeve? Find out at Macworld Expo Tokyo, which begins | March 21. Apple debuted an updated | iMacat last year’s | Tokyo Expo and released new laptops at 2000's. than megahertz to make a fast computer. Everything from the system architecture to the operat- ing system can affect your Mac's performance. But there's about reaching a numeri stone—and for many Mac users, that milestone is 1GHz. While Pentium processors have surged past the gigahertz mark, the Power- PC chip has picked up speed more gradually. The PowerPC G4 debuted in 1999 with a top speed of 500MH7z. When Apple upgraded the Power Mac last summer, the top-of-the-line processor was an 867MHz G4. Apple's latest Power Mac update leaves that machine in the dust. Along with single-processor 800MHz and 933MHz configura- tions, Apple offers a dual-processor Power Mae with two 1GHz G4s. Boosting the speed of its Power Mac desktops meets two important objectives for Apple. First, it gives pro users a more powerful com- puter, matching many of the improvements introduced in the consumer-friendly flat-panel iMac. Just as important, hitting the giga- hertz mark breaks a psychological barrier, defanging the Wintel crowd’s argument that Macs are obviously slower than Pentium- powered PCs. Power Play ‘The updated Power Macs feature the same silver-tone face, flat and buttonless drive-bay doors, and recessed speaker as the models introduced last summer, And inside, you'll find largely the same archi- tecture—except the new top-of- the-line machine is powered by two G4 processors running at |GHz. But there's more to the new Power Macs’ performance than just a faster processor. All three models feature the same 133MHz system bus found in previous generations. Both the dual-pro- cessor machine and the single- processor 933MHz model include 2MB of double data rate L3 cache to further bolster performance. Macworld Lab’s tests on the new Power Macs showed that with everyday tasks involving the hard drive, the dual-processor Mac was only slightly faster than the 933MHz model. The 800MHz G4, which does not have the addi- tional L3 cache, lagged behind _The Speed of Gigahertz: The New Power Macs Speedmark Photoshop iMovie Cinema Quake tl wn? 34 6.0.1 244 ADXL7.3— iTunes2_—v 1.3061 SCORE sutTe RENDER RENDER ENCODE NORMAL 400 157 35 nS) 859 GN CO m6 64/933 7 2 88 GaNGH2 OP mm 213 M22 M37 3:42 M30 150 64/867 et 33 4 os? 8 Gveooop = 186 S27 47 S10 36 112 BETTER> << BETTER <BETTER <BETTER << BETTER BETTER > BEST RESULTS IN BOLD, REFERENCE SYSTEMS IN ITALICS. ‘Speedmark scores ate relative to those of a SOOMHe iMac (Flower Power, which is assigned a score of 100. Photo- shop, iMovie, ad iTunes scores are in seconds, Cinema AD XL scores are in minutes:seconds. Quake scores ae in frames pet second, We tested all the Power Macs with Mac OS X 10.1.2 installed and 256MB of RAM, except for the ddual-1GHe Power Mac, which ships with $12MB. We set displays to 1,024:by-768:pisel resolution and 24-bit color. The Photoshop Suite test (which runs in the Classic environment) is a set of five scripted tasks using a SOMB file cn systems ‘upgraded to 512MB of RAM. Photoshop's memory partition was set fo 200MB and History was set to Minimum. In the Cinema 4D XL test, we rendered a model at 640-by-480-pinel resolution with oversampling set to 4 by 4. We tested MP3 encoding with an audio-CD track that was 9 minutes and 25 seconds long and converted it using the Better Qual: ity setting of 160 Kops in Tunes, We tested Quake tl ata tesolution of 640 by 480 pixels with Graphics set to Normal For more information on Speedmatk, visit www.macword.comispeedmark.—twacwORLo LAB TESTING BY UNS More Power to Your Mac PROCESSOR INSTALLED STORAGE OPTICAL GRAPHICS SPEED MEMORY CAPACITY DRIVE PROCESSOR PRICE 800MHzG4—_256MB 4068 “CD-RW AT|Radeon 7500 $1,599 933MHz G4 —-256MB 60GB SuperDrive Nvidia Geforced MX $2,299 1GHz G4 (DP) 512MB “80GB SuperDrive Nvidia GeForced MX $2,999 the previous Power Mac models (see “The Speed of Gigahertz”). ‘The dual-processor Power Mac will especially benefit from OS X. Apple's new Operating system supports symmetric multiprocessing, which means speedier per- formance. “Te isn’t just a hand- ful of applications that take advantage of the dual proces- sors,” says Greg Joswiak, Apple’s senior director of ardware product marketing. s the entire OS.” So when you run multiple apps simultaneously, you'll see better performance in the dual-processor system—and our tests bear that out. The dual-1GHz Power Mac was dramatically faster than its competition in tests of multi- processing-enabled applica- ions such as Photoshop and Cinema 4D XL. More Memory, Cooler Graphics In addition to ratcheting up the processor speed, Apple has increased the installed memory. The former low- end configuration shipped with 128MB of RAM; the new low-end configuration has 256MB. Buy a dual-pro- cessor machine, and you'll get 512MB of memory (a build-to-order option lets you assemble a dual-1GHz Power Mac G4 with 1.5GB of RAM). The other major addition to the Power Mac involves new graphics processors. Apple says the dual-1GHz and 933MHz Power Macs are the first computers to ship with Nvidia’s GeForce¢4 MX www.macworld,com graphics card, which features 64MB of DDR SDRAM and the ability to generate 1.1 bil- lion textured pixels per second. entially, that translates to improved 3-D-graphics per- formance, a boon for Power Mac-using graphics pros. Indeed, in our Quake II test, the GeForce4 MX-equipped dual-1GHz machine achieved the highest score yet. The 933MEHz Power Mac also produced better results than the 867MHz model, which features an Nvidia Geforce2 MX graphics card. Continuing a trend begun with the flat-panel iMac, the updated Power Macs ship with OS X as their default operating system (OS 9 ships you can switch th if you so desire OS X’s status as the operating system of choice, Apple is including native applications aimed at graphics and pro users on its computers. The Price of Power ‘The dual-800MHz Power Mac released last summer cost $3,499. The new dual-1GHz Mac, with the same hard-drive capacity and SuperDrive, and twice the memory, costs $500 less: $2,999. And the prices of the 933MHz and 800MHz. models have fallen by $200 and $100, respectively (see “More Power to Your Mac”). Having reached the giga- hertz mark, what new mile- stone lies ahead for the PowerPC processor? Apple isn’t saying. But Mac users hope the company gets there as quickly as these new Power | Macs run.—PHILIP MICHAELS | say they plan to develop OS X-native versions.—MATHE | to fit on a key chain. Now you can add convenience to the COOL STUFF _| More Drives Go Driverless For portable and compact storage, it’s hard to top USB flash drives, which can hold dozens of megabytes and are small enough slender storage devices’ growing list of benefits. The first flash drives required you to download drivers before you could plug them into a Mac’s USB port. But the latest models offer true plug-and-play functionality—no drivers are necessary. The driver-free devices, such as Sonnet Technologies’ Piccolo USB flash drive, are compatible with the USB 1.1 specification, | explains Sonnet product marketing manager Debbie Michelle, so | you can mount these drives on any machine running Mac OS X or the classic Mac OS. But flash drives have added more than just convenience; some have also expanded capacity to 1GB, After all, | bigger is better, especially when it’s small. —PuiLiP MICHAELS ESTIMATED. COMPANY PRODUCT —_PRICE CONTACT CAPACITY | Agaté QusB- $70 to $300. 877/982-4283, 16MB~128MB Technologies Hard Drive vawwvagatetech.com CD Cyclone Cyclone $39t0$179 714/247-0099, 16MB-128MB | iPlasiKey wwew.cdeyclone.com EasyDisk EasyDisk $59 to $299 wwwweasydisk.com —_32MB-256MB Bhs eR FER JMTek UsBDrive $40 to $900 253/952-7000, 16MB-16B “a5 Ee ___wnwusbdrive.com MeSystens DiskOnKey $30 to $150 866/347-5665, ‘8MB~128MB a ____wwwni.diskonkey.com Sonnet Piccalo USB -$100to $250 949/587-3500, 32MB-128MB | Technologies Flash Drive ar swwwisonnettech.com T&M FlashDio $46 to $1,000 630/886-7893, 16MB~1GB Corporation a www flashdio,net Trekstor ThumbDrive — $39'to.$149——_888/873-5199, 16MB-128MB Smart www.trekstorusa.com WEIRD STUFF _| Icon? | Can Tf nature abhors a vacuum, then it probably can’t Bi stand wasted screen real estate either. And few things occupy as much space and provide so little benefit as the browser throbber—that a a bouncing, twirling, pulsating icon in the upper right-hand corner of your browser window. There are a handful of free or nearly free applications that let you customize the throbber on most major Web brows: can put this screen space to use. ‘Two of the most user-fi e shareware programs from Vizspring (www.vizspring.com): | hrobberDeveloper 2.1.1 ($10) lets you create your own throb- ber. ThrobberEdit 2.0 ($5) imports your creation into a browser, preventing you from deleting a line you'll need in a ResEdit file. Both programs are ideal for anyone running an online presenta- tion, creating browser-based Mac software, or daring to tinker with their browser's look-and-feel. The shareware apps run only in Mac OS 9 and earlier, though Vizspring’s teenage developers y HONAN April 2002 | MACWORID | 19 OS X HAS MADE GREAT STRIDES, BUT MORE WORK IS STILL NEEDED What's Next for OS X? > The release of Mac OS X 10.1 changed Apple's next-generation ating system from an OS for adopters into one that could conceivably be used by the rest of us. The update offered improve- ments in performance and such sorely missed features as DVD. playback, support for CD burning, and OS X-native AirPort-configu- ration software. But even Apple would admit that work remains to be done on the interface and under the hood. Here are some changes to hope for in future updates. oper: early Aqua Absentees When Apple tweaks OS X’°s inter face, it usually restores OS 9 fe: ‘amiliar elements still miss- tures. ing from OS X include labels; spring-l Control like hierarchical menu for system preferences; an application menu; pop-up folders; contextual menus that offer more than a scant few commands; a windowshade led folde es ure that doesn’t send you to the Dock to find minimized windows; and of course, Trash on the desk- top. OS X's Open and Save dialog boxes—impossible to navigate with the keyboard—also call out for more attention. Many users would be pleased to find support for the AirPort Software Base Station and USB Printer Sharing in OS More-technical users will be pleased when the SMB (Server Message Block) networking proto- col, which allows Macs to log on to Windows network: to configur Scripters will feel more at home when OS X supports folder actions. Hardware Hitches ‘The old Mac OS's plug-and-play prowess has yet to be achieved in OS X. There's no game-con- troller-input API. And even if'a version of Adobe Photoshop came out today, some users would stick with older versions—and OS 9.2—be ‘TWAIN support for their scanners and compatible drivers for their production printers. na se many people require Many USB and FireWire devices ared as well. A number of SCSI rds don’t work with a Mac running OS X, and those that do don’t work as well as they could. Pitfalls for Publishers Systems that developers depend on must also be finished. OS X-com- patible drivers for MIDI devices are starting to appear, but the Core- Audio and MIDI systems that make up OS X’s musi and audio from complete. And many developers we spoke with wish that Apple would pro- vide more ways for applications to tap into OS X. For example, OS X's preemptive-multitasking scheme allows a host of applica- tions to grab the attention of the Mac's processor, but game devel opers would be tickled if they could tap into a high-level fune- tion that shut down all nonsystem processes, thereby gaining more processor time for their games and boosting performance architecture are Looking Forward While OS X isa work in progress, it will get better with each new version, providing better perfor- mance, greater support for attached devices, and more compelling rea- sons to forget about the Mac OS of old. CHRISTOPHER BREEN QUARKXPRESS UPDATE Web Now, X Later QuarkXPress 5.0 is the first major update to Quark's desk- top-publishing standard in more than four years (800/676- 4575, www.quark.com), Mac OS X users hope the next release will arrive much more quickly. But until that version comes—and brings OS X compati- bility with it—we have QuarkXPress 5.0, a page-layout application that looks to make print and Web design as seamless as possible (see “Quark's Leap of Faith,” October 2001). The program now sports Web-design tools for creat- | ing image maps, forms, hyperlinks, and rollovers. Those tools 20 MACWORLD | Aprd use the same palettes, menus, and dialog boxes as the print- design features, easing the learning curve for QuarkXPress veterans. Version 5.0 has also picked up the ability to import and export XML files, making it easy to publish the same content in print and online form. Other highlights in the QuarkXPress update include new Tables tools that help you build tables more quickly. A new Layers palette lets you group objects into named layers that can be hidden, locked, suppressed, and moved. What's missing is OS X compatibility. Quark says the next version of QuarkXPress will run natively in the new OS; it won't say when that release will come. QuarkXPress 5.0 sells for $899. XPress 4.X users can upgrade for $299; XPress 3.X users, for $399.—ruiuin michaets XPress Yourself Version 5.0 puts greater emphasis on the Web. sw macworld,.com PRO FILE _| Q&A WITH STEPHANIE POWELL Etfect-i S G | ve Computer animation’s greatest thrill, The film world lost one of its top special-effects | the ability to create anything, can also artists late last year, when Stephanie Powell suf- | be one of its most tedious require- fered a fatal heart attack on December 5. Powell | ments—the need to create everything Turbo Squid is developing similar plug- was a longtime visual-effects supervisor—and from scratch. You can animate charac- ins for other Mac 3-D programs—just Mac user—whose work can be seen in a host ters spouting witty dinner conversation, — one more way it’s making the animation of films, including The Devil's Advocate, Water- but unless they’re chowing down in a process more animated.—GREGG WRENN world, and The Flintstones. Before her untimely void, they’re going to need forks, chairs, death, Powell spoke to Macworld about the part | candles, and other background para- that Macs play in creating movie magic and | phernalia. For animators with no inter- how Mac OS X could mean a starring role for est in designing virtual cutlery, the folks the platform.—ANTON LINECKER at Turbo Squid are ready to help— www.turbosquid.com offers thousands of prop and character models, textures, and motion-capture files. But Turbo Squid doesn’t offer its own animation. CLICK HERE ; heir workin anyone wha wanidecs by. Art for Art's Sa ke It offers material for LightWave, Maya, Poser, and Shockwave—the Mac version of LightWave even has a Turbo Squid button for one-touch access to the online vault from within the application, How long have you worked with Macs? T was involved with Steve Wozniak when he was still working at Hewlett-Packard. He designed some computer systems for ‘Think of Turbo Squid as an electronic me, and then when he built his first Apple farmers’ market where artists can sell I, he called me up and he said, “I built a — _ color computer.” I said, “Sure you did,” and | MACS ATWORK hung up on him. Then he called me back | . . Xing Out Unix and said, “No, I really, really did.” So he | ten circuit boards ever. | brought it down here and we sold the first Used for decades at colleges, Unix has become the platform of choice for generations of sive high- - bandwidth. VO chan- How do you use Macs at your company, Out of the Blue Special Effects? collectors within the scanner. We have an iMac as our main machine for our accounting, For business correspon- dence, I'll use my PowerBook. I'll also use it for accessing the Internet. I do a lot of pre- visualization for the movies that I work on—3-D rendering or blue-screen render- ing. There’s also breaking down scripts, budgeting—everything that’s needed for the motion picture work that I do. Where do you see the special-effects busi- ness heading in the next few years? It’s exciting, especially now that OS X has become a reality and is working much, much better. You'll start seeing more and more high-end software porting over to Mac OS, programs from companies like Discreet Logic. And that'll be good for everybody. It really is all about software. research and data-acquisition software. But try telling that to Dr. Thomas Lewellen, director of nuclear medicine physics at the University of Washington School of Medicine in Seattle. Lewellen was looking to build a positron-emission tomography (PET) scanner for laboratory rodents, The cancer- research device lets researchers observe lab animals’ biochem- istry so they can progress of the d effectiveness of treatments. Instead of a Unix system, Lewellen and his team (assis- tant professor Robert Miyaoka, graduate student Ki Sung Lee, and staff scientist Charles All that remained was to get the scanner’s Unix-based software to run on a Mac, Fortunately for Lewellen, OS X gives Mac users unprece- dented access to Unix soft- ware. With only minimal code changes, savvy OS X users can download Unix applications and run them on their Macs. “We decided to use the Mac because of its intuitive case of use, high-quality hard- ware, and our own user pref- erence,” Lewellen says. “But the strength of OS X for us is in the Unix part.” ‘The ease of porting soft- ware over to OS X impresses We've seen Maya come over. Having Flame or Inferno software would make it easier Laymon) picked a Power Mac for me to work on my own, without always X-Men From top: G4 running Mac OS X to having to go to a [post-production] house. —_| Lewellen, Miyaoka,- power the PET. An AltiVec- Lewellen. “Aspire, the general medical-imagery software tool package, was a two-hour spe- cial,” he says. “We changed Moai? = 5 a www.macworld, com/2002/04/macheat/powell html Read more about Stephanie Powell's favorite spe- | cial effects in our extended online interview. wwwimacworld.com | Lee, and Laymon. enhanced G¢4 offered the requi- site processing power for the iterative image-reconstruction systems, and the Mac’s use of FireWire provided an inexpen- one line in the make file, and it compiled.” That's no small feat, Lewellen adds, since the software's creator “has never touched a Mac.”—DavID READ _| Amn 2002 | wacwon | 23 | macbea QUICKTIME 6 Coming ual | The latest version of Apple’s QuickTime will feature full support for MPEG-4, which will let you create and view higher-quality streaming video at lower bit rates that tequire less bandwidth. The only catch is, you'll have to wait to get your hands on it. Apple previewed the latest version of its multime- | dia technology in February. And while the com- pany says QuickTime 6 is ready to go, Apple is —. waiting for a change in MPEG-4 video licensing terms before it releases the new version. The MPEG-’4 licensing terms include royalty payments from companies, such as Apple, that ship MPEG-4 | compression and decompression “software (codecs), as well as royal- ties from anyone who uses MPEG-4 to stream video. Apple objects to the latter licensing restric- tion. At press time, QuickTime 6° official ship- ping date had not been determined. ‘The upcoming version of QuickTime features an Apple-developed video codec for encoding and decoding MPEG-4 video content. It includes support for Dolby’s Advanced Audio Coding (AAC) and CELP, the MPEG-4 speech codec for the reproduction of natural speech. QuickTime will now sport MPEG-1 and, for the first time, MPEG-2 playback, as well as support for Flash 5 and DVC Pro (PAL). In addition, QuickTime 6 has an updated interface | and skip-protection enhancements. caster, which permits live broadcasting of events | over the Internet. QuickTime Broadcaster cap- tures and encodes QuickTime content, including MPEG-’4, for live streaming via the Web. Other features include li ig with real-time pre- view, recording and hinting in real time to the computers hard disk for quick video-on-demand | posting, support for all QuickTime codecs and AppleScript, and autoconfiguration of the con- | nection between the broadcaster and the server. As with QuickTime 6, Apple isn’t distributing | QuickTime Broadcaster until MPEG-4 licens- | ing issues are resolved. When it does ship, Apple will make QuickTime Broadcaster a free download that requires QuickTime 6 running on Mac OS X and a compatible streaming server. Apple recently released QuickTime Streaming Server 4, the latest update to its free streaming-media serve IS SELLERS 22 MACWORLD | Api! 2002 NORTON UTILITIES 7.0 PRODUCT Ym ae” ci APRIL 2002 ) ATT irene Steps Up | Symantec (800/441-7234, www.symantec.com) first introduced its Mac OS X-ready software last June, but even the company would characterize those releases as temporary solutions for early adopters of the new operating system. “People were glad to have [the native releases] out there,” says David Loomstein, group product manager for Symantec's | consumer products division. “They got us to the next step with minimal complaints. But people want the added functionality.” Symantec's latest updates add missing features to Norton AntiVirus and Norton Personal Firewall, and make Norton Utili- ties fully native. The updates, which also run in Mac OS 8.1 and higher, include: upgrades, $70). line scanner ($70; upgrades, $40). NORTON PERSONAL FIREWALL 2.0 The firewall utility adds a Stealth Mode feature that prevents denial-of-service attacks and allows for easier FTP transfers (570; upgrades, $40). NORTON SYSTEM WORKS 2.0 | The utility suite includes OS X- | native versions of Utilities, Anti- Virus, Dantz Retrospect Express | Backup, and Aladdin Spring Cleaning ($130; upgrades, $80). NORTON INTERNET SECURITY 2.0 _ The AntiVirus, Personal Firewall, and Aladdin iClean bundle adds | Norton Privacy Control, which stops personal data from being sent without permission and blocks online flash ads ($100; The disk-repair and optimization Displays | utility offers repair and recovery Veepes epee for OS X, with features such as pes Gefen (e005 Norton Disk Doctor, UnErase, and 6900, www.gefen.com); FileSaver ($100; upgrades, $50). PATS Sen OAS DVI Conversion Box ($399) lets you NORTON ANTIVIRUS 8.0 ————_ attach a DVI-equipped (Digital Video Inter- Autoprotect, SafeZone scanning, es — fe bites and LiveUpdate scheduling run ins Box ($399) ets you attach a DVI Mac OS X, as does a new command- to a monitor that supports only Ve Two LCD monitors from NEC-Mitsubishi (888/632-6487, wwvwnecmitsubishi.com): The LCD1720M ($799) is a 17-inch screen that sports front-fring stereo speakers and a 160-degree horizontal and vertical view- ing angle, The LCD 1850E ($899) is an 18.1- inch display. Both analog LCD monitors use VGA inputs, have native resolutions of 1,280 by 1,024 pixels, and feature internal Ei MP3 Players ‘A multimedia player from Archos (949/453- 1121, wwewarchos.com): The Jukebox Multimedia ($325) isa 10G8 MP3 player and real-time recorder with a built-in micro- phone and photo and video viewer. Ithas an expansion port for add-on modules, includ- ing a flash-memory card drive, a 1.3-mega- pixel camera, and MP3 and video recorders. The Rio Riot from SonicBlue (800/468- ‘5846, www.richome.com): The $400, 20GB portable musical player features the new Rio LogicTrack user interface, a scroll wheel, and dedicated one-touch buttons and play controls. t comes bundled with Apple's iTunes softwa In with the new... TechTool Pro 3 is the super utility for your Macintosh. Besides repairing and recovering data, TechTool Pro can help you circumvent problems in the first place. Our new virus detect and repair feature, as well as our software conflict check feature, lets you keep your computer in tip-top shape. When booted from the included emergency CD, you can even check, repair and optimize your OS X computer. Every day, more and more Macintosh professionals are choosing TechTool over other system utilities. In fact, even Apple Computer includes TechTool Deluxe with every copy of their AppleCare™ Protection Plan. Simply put, TechTool Pro 3 is the most complete and powerful troubleshooting utility available for your computer. Why would you settle for anything less? i Micromat Inc. 800-829-6227 707-566-3831 In with the newer... The titst an, al disk ir 4 and tina) yi, utility for Mac og C> BRIVE15 So. Sn 1 <_ For Apple's next-generation operating system, you'll need a next-generation disk utility. That's why Micromat has introduced Drive 10, the first and final disk utility for Mac OS X. Problems with your drive? Drive 10 can repair almost any drive problem with one simple click of your mouse. All within OS X's native environment. While Drive 10 is a new product, it is derived from TechTool Pro, Micromat's world-class diagnostic and repair utility. Using TechTool's time-tested routines as well as some new routines developed exclusively for OS X, Drive 10 offers many tools for checking and repairing any drive on your system. Don't entrust your OS X drive to ancient utilities. Protect your data and drive safely with Drive 10. info@micromat.com www.micromat.com ©2001 Micromat, Inc. All rights reserved. TechTool is a registered trademark of Micromat, Inc. Drive 10 is a trademark of Micromat, Inc, Macintosh and AppleCare are trademarks of Apple Computer, Inc. Choose 37 at www.macworld.com/getinto. PRODUCT WAT Printers A color ink-jet printer and color scanner from Hewlett-Packard (800/752-0900, wwewhp.com): The DeskJet 920c ($99) nine pages per minute in black-and- white and 7.5 pages per minute in colo, It offers color resolution as high as 2,400 by 1,200 dpi. The Scandet 5400c ($199) scans at resolutions as high as 2,400 dpi with true 48:bit color, Storage Devices ‘An internal CD-RW drive from Plextor (800/886-3935, wowwplextor.com): The PlexWriter 40/12/40 optical disk drive (5209) offers 40x CD-recording, 12 CD: rewriting, and 40x read speeds, It also features Burn-Proof technology designed to prevent buffer underrun errors. A FireWire-based flash storage device from WiebeTech (316/744-8722, wwrwuwiebetech .com): The FireWire KeyChain ($100) stores as much as 1GB on a 1.75-by-2.35- by-0.75-inch device, The flash-memory storage device, which incorporates the Oxford 911 bridge chip set, should be shipping by the end of March, 4 VectorWorks Mecha cal 9.5, from Nemet- schek (888/646-4223, wvaw.nemetschek.nel): The latest addition to the VectorWorks Industry series, this CAD application pro- vides 2-D-drafting and 3-D-modeling capabilities for designers, drafters, and fabricators ($1,190; upgrade from Vector- Works 8.X, $465), Multimedia Software Combustion 2.0, from Discreet (800/869- 3504, wivwadiscreet.com):The latest ver- sion of the painting, animation, and 3-D- compositing program provides new multi format project capabilites for film and Video, including 64-bit image-processing, advanced film grain tools, and color Look- Up Table management. It runs in OS X and 05 9 ($4,995; upgrade, $795 until May 2002, $1,495 afterward) Discribe 5.0, from CharisMac Engineering (530/885-4420, wwwwicharismac.com): The CD/DVD-mastering software now supports DVD Audio and Video formats and runs in 08 X, as well as Mac OS 8.6 and higher (670; upgrade, $30), Productivity Software Final Draft 6.0, from Final Draft (00/231- 4055, www.finaldraft.com): This update to the screenwriting application runs in OS X Ialso adds Ask The Expert and Format Assistant features, as well as the ability to save scripts as POF files ($249; upgrade, 469 before April 30, $99 afterward). RagTime Solo, from ComGrafix (727/585- 7199, wow. comgrafix.com): The release is a free version of RagTime, a $495 business publishing suite that includes word-proces- sing, spreadsheet, drawing, charting, and 24 | MACWORLD | Apri 2002 Graphics Software slide-show programs. The free version of the software is available for private, non- commercial use, ./) An end to online banking £ support for Quicken for Mac by Bank of America Sk * (800/792-0808, www .bankofamerica.com): The bank was slated to automatically switch Quicken for Mac ‘users to its Online Banking with Bill Pay service in February, due to changes in Bank of America’s online banking plat form.—cowei.eo ay PHP MICHAELS —— powered by . versiontracker Aladdin Spring Cleaning 4.0.2 Update lets utility delete internet history files Aliens vs. Predator Gold 1.0.2 0 X-only patch for game Apple Mac 0S X Server 10.1.2 Improves performance and adds security fixes ‘Auto FX Photo/Graphic Edges 5.0 Tool adds edges to images Barcode Producer 1.1 Bar-code-generation and EPS-export software Brother OS X Drivers updates Drivers for printers and SOHO devices Captain Bumper 1.12 Bug fixes for cartoon-style game CyberGauge 4.0 SNMP-based bandwidth-monitoring tool Discus X 2.5 CDIDVD-labeling software Font Doctor X 5.0 Diagnosis and repair tool for font problems MAC STUFF Graphic Converter X 4.2.4 Views, edits, and converts graphic file formats icontact X 1.1 Stores data such as URLs, addresses, or dates iPhoto Librarian 1.0 Scriplet runs iPhoto from a different library folder iPhoto Toast Export Plugin 1.0 Burns directly from iPhoto using Toast Titanium JBuilder Personal 6.0 Java application-development environment Macintosh Explorer X 3.0 File-browser and file: management tool Macromedia Shockwave Player 8.5.1 ‘Adds 0S X compatibility to browser plug-in Mariner Write 3.0.1 Bug fixes for word processor MYOB AccountEdge 2.0 5.6.2 Update to accounting and business- management application OmniGraffle 2.0b6 Bug fixes for beta of diagram and charting program PhotoFixer 1.0 Fixes photos iPhoto won't accept PicZicon 1.1 Creates 128-by-128 icons for picture files Rosetta 1.4.5 Decodes archive formats and rejoins binary files Spy 2.0.2 Displays CPU and network usage in menu bar Tri-Catalog 5.04 Catalogs files and pictures on CDs and disks XFree86 4.2.0 Implementation of the OS X window system For these and other current updates, Vi www.macworld.com/subject/updates WHAT'S el 4 Power Macs reach the 1GHz mark, You've heard of Moore's Law? Well, this is Motorola's corollary: Processor speeds will double when we're damn good and ready. 2. Netscape sues Micro- soft for anticompetitive practices in the browser ‘wars. They laughed at Bill Gates a few years ago for buying his lawyers in bulk, but who's laughing now? 3. Apple takes 150,000 iMac orders in the first three weeks after the machine debuts. Unfortu- nately, Apple made only one of the new iMacs, o all 150,000 people will ust have to share Let Your Fingers Do the Clicking Mice and keyboards have been standard issue with Apple computers since the days of the Lisa, FingerWorks (302/831-8615, www.finger works.com) thinks it’s time for another input device to provide some relief for your aching body. Enter the iGesture Pad, a 7.1-by-5.5-inch mouse pad-like surface that plugs into your Mac's USB port and runs in either OS 9 or OS X. As with a trackpad, you slide your finger on the iGesture Pad to move your Mac's cursor. Unlike a trackpad, though, the ergonomically friendly iGesture Pad lets you use your fingers to select text, copy and paste, open files, and perform all sorts of tasks that would normally require a keystroke or mouse click. Using a patented 2-D touch technology, the device recognizes specific gestures by monitoring the movement of your fingers. The $189 iGesture Pad has a numerical pad that responds to the lightest touch; the company’s $329 TouchStream Stealth features a QWERTY keypad. Computers have gotten easier to use in the nearly two decades since the Lisa's debut—FingerWorks wants input devices to do the same.—PHILIP MICHAELS wwmacworld.com APC introduces the hest protection available for your Mac 10 million computer users can’t be wrong about APC power protection Don't let a lightning storm destroy your Mac system in the blink of an eye. Your hard drive, modem and RAM are all at risk, not to mention peripherals like your zip drive, scanner, monitor and printer. Rely on an APC Back-UPS Pro’ to save your invest- ments from high voltage surges. APC power protection also provides clean, continuous power that lets you function without frustrating interrup- tions, unlike cheap power strips that don’t prevent any of the power problems that can cause keyboard lock- ups, systems crashes, and lost Internet connections. And if your system is ever damaged by a surge, even lightning, APC's Lifetime Equipment Protection Policy* will pay up to $25,000 to replace your equipment. * (see policy for details) Discover why 10,000,000 customers trust in APC’s Legendary Reliability” and protect your Mac system with an APC power protection unit today. AAFC Beck-Ps Pro 500 Use provides: APC Back-UPS Pro* : 500 USB BP5O0CLR + Emergency battery power for contin- * iMac-colored, configurable speaker uous uptime to help save your data guards to match your computing through brief power outages environment Auto-shutdown software that saves Se » Mac your files and data, even when you're APC Back-UPS Pro® 500: “APC' latost plugs into a USB port, making it completely painless to protect your PC ‘Audible andivtstble alacme wlert'you from power snafus and electrical spikes.” + PC Computing 4/99 ° to power events as they occur $25,000 Equipment Protection guarantee ospae rs tees 2 year comprehensive warranty reat et Legendary Reliability away from your computer Re iF Enter to win a clear APC Back-UPS Pro‘500 for your Mac! Enter to win APC's legendary power protection for your Mac, a $179.99 value! All entrants will also receive an “Are You at Risk” Kit. (See APCs Website for complete promotion details) Enter now: Visit http://promo.apc.com Key Code e177y « Call 888-289-APCC x4092 - Fax 401-788-2797 ‘on, RI 02892 USA DOE USa # Pos x: (8001347-FAXX « E-mail ancno@ance com # 132 Fargrounds Rd, W (©2002 Amencan Power Conversion Al Trademarks ate the prop Choose 73 at wwwwmacworld.com/getinfo (on > Supporting the Mac afficionado since 1987 We know Mac! Rely on Mac Warehouse for: ¢ Our Experience 15 years, 34 million orders fulfilled ¢ Our Knowledge You have a question, we have the answer ¢ Our 24/7 Workday We’re open for business whenever you call Oh, and our 24/7 Tech Support ‘ is FREE for the lifetime of — @ your product. Authorized Reseller We carry a full line Adobe® Adobe® Adobe® of tools for'eveative Acrobat” Publishing Collection Design Collection professionals from leading a manufacturers Acrobatso — like Adobe — that are dedicated to supporting the Mac platform. Get NEW VERSION 7.0 now — and get creating! Adobe Photoshop zo The professional image-editing standard ° A everywhere Adobe you look~ Choose Mac Warehouse for the latest and greatest new products from all the top " vi manufacturers! Adobe Healing Brush Adobe’ Paint Engine Pattern Maker Mac OS X removes flaws in ImageReady’ creates custom generates patterns and Windows® photos with a single software — view slices, brushes, adjusts based on any area XP support — take tool and automatically rollovers, image maps _ settings and simulates of an image advantage of the latest preserves originals and animations different canvas textures NEW! operating systems NEW! NEW! NEW! NEW! | | Get the most from your Mac — we have everything ait took Sang pac-F707 you need. Call us today. WAREHOUSE ‘A MICROWAREHOUSE Company 1-800-725-1450 - macwarehouse.com Choose 19 at wwnw.macworld.com/getinfo PHOTOGRAPHY COURTESY OF APPLE REVIEWS | _Reviews you can trust: Macworld rates only final shipping products, not prototypes. What we review is what you can actually buy. BY SHELLY BRISBIN The wireless-networking revo- lution, which has spread from a few hotels and airports to the coffee shop down the street and homes everywhere, began in late 1999, when Apple released | the silver, flying-saucer~shaped | AirPort Base Station and the AirPort card—the first commer- cially available 802.11b wireless products. But three and a half | years later, the AirPort is one product in a crowded wireless- networking market. With its new and improved AirPort Base | Station, Apple is finally respond- Indicator lights AirPort internal modem port added a 10/100-Mbps Ethernet port. AirPort Still Flying Apple kept the flyina- saucer shape of its AirPort Base Station but AIRPORT BASE STATION Though Newest Iteration of Apple's Wireless | Network Product Offers Improvements, It Still Lags Behind Similar, Less-Expensive Competitors ing to users’ demands; however, our testing revealed that this new AirPort leaves Apple fol- lowing, rather than leading, the wireless pack. New on the Network This new Base Station has the same unique shape as the origi- nal, but the new model is white, not silver. The other visible difference is the addition (a long-overduc one) of a 10/100- Mbps Ethernet port next to the original 10-Mbps Ethernet port and modem ports. This new LAN port lets you connect / 10-Mbps Ethernet port {28 | MACWORID | Apri2002 | the AirPort to an existing, wired Ethernet network, or a single, non-AirPort-capable Mac, at high speed, leaving the 10-Mbps port for WAN, DSL, or cable-based access to the Internet. Apple has added firewall and DHCP-bridging capabilities as well, making for a seamless link between wired and wireless net- works. This feature alone may make the AirPort worth its price to anyone who operates a network that includes both wired and wireless Macs. It uses NAT (Network Address Trans- lation) to share a single IP address among as many as 50 clients (up from the original AirPort’s 20), or it can function as a DHCP server. Unique AOL Support With the first AirPort products, it was not possible to dial up to 10/100-Mbps AC adapter Ethernet port input on t AOL and deliver Internet access to the other machines on a net- work, The new AirPort fixes this problem. Though AOL provides TCP/IP access to its content, other wireless access points— even those equipped with a modem—cannot connect to AOL as an ISP. Owners of the original AirPort can access AOL by upgrading their Base Station with the AirPort 2.0 software, available for free from Apple. Batten Down the Hatches Data security is a significant concern with wireless networks, which are vulnerable to any mischief maker wielding an 802.1 1b-equipped laptop who comes within range, so it’s easy for just about anyone to read everything that is transported over your network. The Air- Port, like other 802.11b access points on the market, relies on WEP (Wired Equivalent Pri- vacy) for encryption of network data. The new AirPort software has increased WEP encryption: 128 bits (up from 40), and though WEP is still a funda- mentally flawed security mech- anism, the update brings the AirPort’s security in line with that provided by competing products. The 128-bit WEP upgrade is also part of the Air- Port 2.0 software upgrade, so it’s available to owners of the original AirPort Base Station. Upping the security ante for education and corporate envi- ronments, the AirPort now supports user authentication through RADIUS (Remote Authentication Dial-In User Service) servers. RADIUS serv- ers use a wireless network card’s MAC (Media Access Control) address to authenticate users seeking access to the network. The AirPort Base Station and AirPort 2.0 software also support Cisco Systems’ LEAP (Light- veww.macworld.com | 28 Wireless-networking router 34. Graphics suite 40 PowerBook dock 44 Cross-platform-networking Apple AitPort Base Station Camas 8 BoakEndz Tarim Docking Station software 30 Midrange flatbed scanners 35 Font-management utility 40 VST-compatible software sampler Dave 31 Canon CanoScan 12300 Suitase 10.1 Halen 1,1 45. Photoshop plug-in 'pson Perfection 1650 Photo 2 ic . i Hewlett-Packard Scanlet 5470CXI # a ry pro seftuiry “ bs Sercieg: utility ‘ Reon suey ta Fay Micotek ScanMaker $700 95 seaieees abi 6 sresdl vasoRry : emulation program -D-animation program 2 romped software for MacOS X Virual PC 5.0 LightWave 30 7b MYOB Accountdge 2 39 Video-compression utility 44 Graphics plug-ins Oracle Smal Busines Suite 7.5 Sorenson Squeeze 1.0 PT effets $$) ~VERY GOOD: $%$$ GOOD: SEE FLAWED: $$ UNACCEPTABLE: $ OUTSTANDING: weight Extensible Authentica- tion Protocol) security protocol. Although those features will not be useful for home users, they may allow AirPort users and Base Stations to join some large wireless networks that use non- Apple equipment, Some compa- rably priced competitors of the AirPort offer RADIUS support, but very few offer both RADIUS and LEAP. Though flaws in the WE encryption scheme have been confirmed and well documented in the press and are nota failing of the AirPort product, Apple makes no attempt in its docu- mentation to warn users that WEP is subject to attack by “war driver who search for and infiltrate wireless networks by running programs that can quickly disarm WEP. Apple should be warning AirPort users against transferring sensitive data over wireless networks or choosing passwords that would compromise data if discovered. Competing Interests Apple has benefited from a widespread belief among Mac users that only the AirPort can connect Macs wirelessly. ‘This may explain why updates to the original Base Station have been so long delayed and why the AirPort’s price, $299, has failed to keep pace with less-expensive products. A number of ven- dors sell wireless routers and access points in the $150-to- $400 range, and most of these products are compatible with Mac-only networks. The majority of wireless access points can be configured in a Web browser and used to provide wireless connectivity for Macs or any other computer that employs TCP/IP and Ethernet. But just as AirPort requires a Mac application for configuration, some non-Apple devices must be configured using Windows software. These are not practical choices for a Mac environment. Similarly, AirPort, though it’s compatible with PCs, requires at least one Mac on the network for config- uration purposes. While Apple has only now added a second networking port to the AirPort, many access- point vendors include 10/100- Mbps multipore switches, allow- ing you to connect wired devices directly to the access point, eliminating the need for a wired hernet hub, at least in small LANs. Several vendors have added full routing capabilities (in addition to selling bare- bones access points at a lower cost), and a few provide VPN (virtual private network) sup- port for those who need a completely secured connection between a wireless network and a corporate VPN. There are access points that include Win- dows print servers, DHCP serv- ers (the AirPort includes one), and more. In this competitive market, the AirPort holds its own in terms of features—at a much higher price. There are devices that have comparable features—such as the D-Link DI-714 and the Proxim Skyline Wireless Broadband Gateway— available for $200, about $100 less than the AirPort. Advantage, AirPort Though the AirPort isn't the most feature-rich product on the market, most Mac users will find thar the innuitive configura- tion interface is quick and easy to use, whether they are setting up the AirPort for the first time or making configuration changes later. The AirPort Setup Assis- tant and AirPort Administration Utility, both of which can be launched from OS 9 or OS X, bear Apple’s trademark ease of Name: Apple Base Station 2 7 create a dosed network | In-Flight Adjustments The AirPort Admin Utility's easy-to-use, multitabbed interface makes changing AirPort settings after the initial configuration a straight- forward process, Tabs along the top of the window give you access to options for IP-address sharing, access control, security protocols, and more, use, which is especially welcome in a networking product that might seem daunting to the casual technophile, But if the software fails you, don’t look to the skimpy printed documenta- tion to bail you out. A few of its pages skim the basics of setting up the AirPort for the first time, but you won't find much beyond that in the way of help, and there is no discussion of alter- native network or Internet- access scenarios. Macworld’s Buying Advice If friendly Mac software and an intuitive configuration interfa are your paramount concerns, the AirPort Ba tion is the right choice for building your wireless network. People who depend on AOL for Internet access over a network will also find that the AirPort provide: simple and unique solution. However, cost-conscious buy: ers and those who require advanced networking features may want to look into other products that cost less and do more, such as providing the flex- ibility of Web-based configura- tion and multiple network ports. Owners of the original Air- Port will find that most features included in the new model will be available to them in the Air- Port 2.0 software update, which is a good reason not to replace an old unit with a new AirPort— until Apple releases updates available only for the newer Base Station, (1) | RATING: $89) PROS: LAN port adds network flexi- bility; easy to configure; AOL support; easy bridging and firewall. CONS: Expensive compared with similar products; skimpy trouble- shooting documentation. ESTIMATED PRICE: $299 OS COMPATIBILITY: Mac 05 9, Mac OS X COMPANY: Apple Computer, 800/692-7753, wwwapple.com |_wwewmacworld.com | April 2002_| MACWORLD | 29 REVIEWS | MIDRANGE FLATBED SCANNERS New Models Provide Higher Resolution, Great Value BY TONY A. BOJORQUEZ For less than $100, you can buy a flatbed scanner that will give you decent results. But if you want higher-resolution scans and the ability to scan 35mm slides and color nega- tives, you'll have to look a bit higher in the price and feature range. Picking from the crowded desktop-scanner market, Macworld Lab looked at four USB flatbed scanners that had an optical resolution of at least 1,200 dpi and could handle scanning 35mm slides and film: Canon's CanoScan D1230UF and Microtek'’s Scan- Maker 5700, which have an opti- cal resolution of 1,200 by 2,400 dpi; Hewlett-Packard’s ScanJet 5470CXI, 2,400 by 2,400 dpi; and the Epson Perfection 1650 Photo, 1,600 by 3,200 dpi. Alll the units we tested connect to the Mac via a USB port. The ScanMaker also sports a Fire- Wire port, while the ScanJet includes a parallel port, which is compatible only with PCs, Basic setup for all these scanners was a painless task. Mac-specific documentation from these vet- eran scanner vendors is thor- ough and helpful. As of press time, native OS X supporthadn't yet arrived for these scanners, but with the pending arrival of the Carbonized Adobe | Photoshop 7, OS X scanner drivers should not be far behind. (Check the vendors’ Web sites for the latest driver updates.) All of the scan- ners we tested worked well in OS X's Classic mode and in OS 9 using the existing drivers, Mission Control Scanning software should be easy to use and flexible enough to guide novices through use- ful presets while allowing experts to change and highlight control, brightness and con- trast, and color correction. All the scan- ners’ software had these controls, but HP's Precisionscan Pro software and Canon's CanoScan software lead the rest in terms of usability. Precisionscan Pro's interface, for example, felt very Mac-centric, with intuitive controls and menu structures that put the important features in the main window. All the scanners include TWAIN drivers to pro- Epson Perfection 1650 Photo vide easy access to applications that support this feature, such as Adobe Photoshop, Microsoft Office, and OCR (optical charac- ter recognition) software such as OmniPage. High-resolution scanning isn’t the only thing these scanners are good for. All but the CanoScan let you send a scanned image directly toa printer, attach it to an e-mail, run it through an OCR program to convert it to editable text, and even share it on the Web, by using buttons on the scanners themselves. ‘These timesaving features are useful, but you can achieve the same results with a scanner The Trouble with Bits These scanners offer more than the 24 bits of color (8 bits each for red, green, and blue) you'll find on lower-end models. The Cano- Scan and the ScanMaker offer 42-bit color depth, while the ScanJet and the Epson Per- fection offer 48-bit color depth. For many users, this higher bit depth will add up to one noticeable difference—a doubling of file sizes. This advanced feature captures tril- lions of colors instead of the 16.7 million you get with 24-bit color. Though you may assume that the more colors captured, the better the scan, this is not always the case. ‘The quality of the scanned image depends on your software and the output device's ability to process information. Image-editing applications such as Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Photoshop LE can open and manipulate 42- and 48-bit scanned files. But Adobe Elements (bundled with the Epson Perfection) doesn’t support 48-bit image files and will convert files down to 24-bitimages. ‘The key advantage of a higher bit depth is that if you capture more data, you'll have much more head- room for editing images that need major corrections to tone or color. If you don’t need to make big adjust- ments using an image editor that supports 48-bit images, we recom- mend that you save storage space by avoiding this option. From cropping a scan to remov- ing red-eye, the image-editing soft- ware included with these scanners is your ticket to a better final image. The CanoScan and the ScanMaker include Adobe Photo- shop LE, and the Perfection bundles Adobe Photoshop Elements. The ScanJet includes ArcSoft PhotoStudio. Scanning Speed If you're scanning low-resolution images for the Web or on-screen viewing, the amount of time it takes to complete the scan is mini- mal. On the other hand, higher-resolution scans can take much longer because the file parameters such as gamma curves, shadow and the appropriate software. is so much larger. | ompé MOUSE ESTIMATED 05 OPTICAL RESO- COLOR COMPANY PRODUCT RATING PRICE COMPATIBILITY CONTACT LUTION (DP!) BIT DEPTH INTERFACE PROS CONS _ Canon 29 Macos9 800/652-2666, 1,202,400 42-bit USB Fastest USB performance, Mediocre transparency eee = Sonning, Epson Macos9 800/463-7766, 1,603,200 48-bit USB Least expensive; excellent Mediocre transparency wwewepson.com reflective scans. scanning. Hewiett- MacOS9 800/752-0900, 2,402,400 48-bit USB and Excellent criver software. Mediocre transparency Packard vewwhpcom 7 parallel scanning. Microtek MacOS9 310/687-5940, 1,200 2,400 42-bit —-USBand —_Fast performance Expensive; mediocre 7 vwnwnvemicrotek.com rt FireWire over FireWire. transparency scanning. 30 MACWORLD | Apri2002 | eww macworld.com How Midrange Flatbed Scanners Measure Up “= 1,200-DPI SCAN Photographic Print Color Negative COLOR COLOR QUALITY DETAIL QUALITY DETAIL Canon CanoScan D1230UF ove Epson Perfection 1650 Phot HP Scanlet 5470CXI Microtek ScanMaker 5700 NN) 4:31 (USB) B10 (FireWire) - ‘< BETTER BEST RESULTS IN BOLD. EXCELLENT @@ ACCEPTABLE @ POOR Timed scores are in minutes:seconds. We recorded the time it took to scan our 4-by-6-inch photographic test target at 1,200 dpi and 24-bit color depth, We tested the ScanMaker using its USB port and is FireWire port. Our panel of experts rated a olor print ofthe scan, printed on an Epson Stylus Pro 5000. We scanned a color negative at 1,200 dpi and 24-bit colar depth, and we rated the scans on screen, Our test system was a Power Mac G4 SOOMH2 with 512MB of RAM, Mac OS 9.2.2, and Photoshop 6.0.1 installed.—acwoRio 1AB TESTING Br ses GALBRAITH We tested the scanners’ speeds by scanning a 4-by-6-inch photograph at a high resolution of 1,200 dpi in 24-bit scanning mode. The scanners’ perfor- mance varied widely: When connected via USB, the CanoScan, which employs hardware compression to send image data over USB, took top honors, com- pleting our high-resolution time test in 2 minutes and 29 seconds. The Epson Perfection came in second. When con- nected via FireWire, the Micror: n= Maker proved to be the fastest con- tender, with a scan time of only | minute and 10 seconds. Image Quality Low-end scanners have a limited ability to reproduce high-quality images. Higher- resolution scanners can enlarge an image without losing all its subtle details—this justifies their higher prices. To judge image quality, we printed scans from these scanners on a high-end graphic-arts ink-jet printer, the Epson Stylus Pro 5000. The quality of the images was superior to that of output from these scanners’ lower-resolution counterparts. ‘The Epson Perfection 1650 had the best overall image qua with good color reproduction, as well as excellent highlights and shadow detail. Our only complaint with the Epson Perfection—and with the Scan- Maker—was that the scanned image lacked the sharp, crisp details of the original. The ScanJet and the CanoScan had great image detail, though the images were dark in some areas. The CanoSean's color accuracy beat out that of the ScanJet, which exhibited a subtle red cast. The output from Microtek’s ScanMaker 5700 looked soft and the color quality seemed dull when com- pared with the original image. Transparency Scanning Scanning photographic prints and other reflective media is the core job of a des! top scanner, These fe capable of scanning trans such as slides and color negatives. If you're scanning transparency media, you'll need a backlight unit to assis scanner in capturing data. ‘he CanoScan, Epson Perfection, and ScanMaker have this functionality built into the scanner lids, and the ScanJet comes with an exter- nal unit that you place over the flatbed scanner’s glass. For simplicity and ease of use, we preferred having the transparency unit built into the lids, While this dual functionality makes , our image-quality tests made it very that the resulting scans would need me retouching help from an image- editing program. The Epson Perfection 1650 Photo and HP Scanjet 5470CX1 yielded good detail but suffered (along with the other scanners) from brightness and contrast problems. The CanoScan, ScanJet, and ScanMaker scans also showed some noise that affected image qu: scanning transparencies i part of what you do, we recommend that you invest in a slide scanner, which will yield much better results. (For a review of slide scanners, see Reviews, October 2001.) Macworld’s Buying Advice If you occasionally need to scan tra parencies, these scanners will do the job, but expect to do some cleanup work after you scan. But if you're looking for a speedy midrange scanner that offers excellent color and a strong feature set, we recom- mend the Epson Perfection 1650 Photo, It not only placed first in our image-quality tests, but also costs less than the other scan- ners in this roundup. © wwew.macworld.com | | scan values between two known scan values—to reach Being familiar with your scanners settings and capabil- ities will help you achieve the best scans. f you don’t fully grasp the concept of resolution, your scanned image may end up in one of two camps: a large file with extraneous, imperceptible information or a file that looks distorted when viewed or printed. The optical resolution ofa scanner represents its abit to capture data using only the available hardware. When you start coming across maximum resolution specifi- cations like 12,800 dpi or “unlimited resolution” (espe- cially in the midrange flatbed scanner class), it means the scanner will interpolate—a process of estimating the that resolution. This allows you to enlarge scans to more than what your optical resolution supports, But because the scanner estimates data where there is none, image quality may suffer. Try to stick with the optical resolution when considering a scanner and its uses, Here are some general guidelines that will help you choose the right scanning resolution, Web and On-Screen Viewing The average computer monitor's resolution is less than 100 dpi; therefore, the scanning resolution for images meant only for on-screen viewing should be around 72 dpi (the standard display resolution for a Mac). Anything higher will just use more disk space without improving the quality of the image. Photo Prints Scanning photos for print is a little trickier. Try sending that 72-dpi scan to your printer, and you'll get a blocky mess. When scanning photos, however, there's a point at which the file size will grow but your resulting output won't look any better. For the current generation of photo ink-jet printers (the | Epson 1280 Photo, for example), plan on scanning at 240 | dpi if you'll be printing to matte paper and at 360 dpi if | you'll be printing to glossy paper. You should scan at higher resolutions (such as the ones available in the scanners in this roundup) if you intend to enlarge the print. A good rule of thumb is to scan at 200 | dots per printed inch, For example, if you intend to print the scanned image at 600 percent, you would scan at 1,200 dpi. Text and Line Art There are no levels of gray involved in scanning text and line art, so the scanner will represent what it scans | with either a black dot or a white dot, This is also how a monochrome printer outputs information, so it’s best to scan text and line art at your printer's resolution. The size of a dot on the scanned image will correspond to the size of a dot on the printer, minimizing the jagged edges on your output, | Transparencies | Usually, when you scan a transparency or film, you plan to enlarge the image before printing it. In this case, you should scan at 100 to 200 dots per printed inch of the desired enlarged size. Mileage will vary, but if you stick with these guidelines, you can achieve the best and most efficient images your scanner has to offer. | REVIEWS ACCOUNTING SOFTWARE FOR SMALL BUSINESSES Oracle Small Business Suite 7. BY JEFFERY BATTERSBY Before the days of low-cost, high- speed Internet access and Java applications, MYOB Account- Edge 1—a versatile cross-plat- form application powerful .5, MyBooks 5.1, and AccountEdge 2 Broaden Your Choices AccountEdge Enhances Ease of Use MYOB AccountEdge was the first accounting application optimized for the new, untested OS X, and it was clear from the gon, replacing it with easily understood terms such as Spend Money, Receive Money, and Pay Bills, You can also view your accounts either by account number or, for those of us who are accounting-impaired, by account name. So instead of having to remember that account number 6-1080 is ‘Tele- phone Expenses, you can simply enter Telephone, and Account- Edge will take care of the rest. ‘The program can now import your bank and credit card state- | enough to satisfy even the picki- start that MYOB had gone ments, as long as your bank | est accountants—was the allows you to download | only viable accounting pack- [Pee them in OFX, QFX, QIF, | age for the Mac, Now DSL, —— — or OFC format. But bear cable, and a new wave of Jav, 3s a in mind that this is an applications give Mac users = ee a tad import, nota direct connec- a wider range of options sm ssiunte emma} | tion to your banking data | when it comes to handling | (2 jw = “me! (as you may have come to their business finances. ‘The expect if you use Quicken). three products in this review ee ge In our testing, importing achieve their goals with | ooo0 tan Mage a was not intuitive, Addi- varying degrees of suc Weroey | Wa) Bem tionally, we experienced | AccountEdge 2 and Net- alel@ unspecified import errors Ledger's Web-based Oracle Ls bis 6 } (with unclear error mes- Small Business Suite what it takes to handle all your accounting needs, while the Java-based MyBooks 5.1, from AppGen, falls far shore. 3 Packages, 3 Worlds When it comes to applica- tion software, AccountEdge, MyBooks, and Oracle come from three completely different worlds. AccountEdge is a tradi~ tional Mac application: you buy itin a box, install it from a CD, and run itas a native OS X appli- cation from your hard drive. MyBooks can also be bought in a box, bur it’s a Java-based appli- cation—which means that it can run on both Windows and Linux systems, as well as your Mac. Oracle exemplifies a completely new paradigm for computer soft- ware: the Application Service Provider (ASP). With an ASP, you don’t buy a box of software and install it on your computer; instead, you pay a monthly fee to use the application via the Web and store all your data remotely. It doesn't matter what operating system you use, as long as you have a version 4 or later | Web browser. (32) mac voRUD | Agnt2002 | ve Speaking Your Language AccountEdge has di pensed with accounting jargon and replaced it with everyday terms that make the program easy to use. to great lengths to create an accounting package that took advantage of everything OS X had to offer, With version 2— which is designed to run on OS X 10.1 and OS 8.6 and higher— the program continues to be an excellent all-purpose Mac accounting package. It sports a streamlined setup process that is less confusing than setting up previous versions; it will have you up and running in six sages) while importing some Quicken data, We had to dig through an import log to resolve the problem, Unfortunately, MYOB has not addressed a few issues we mentioned in our review of Accountkidge 1.0 (9996); Reviews, March 2001); sending e-mail to anyone other than a company’s primary. business contact requires you to change the e-mail address to reflect the alternate contact’s address; the HTML-based manual remains difficult to. navigate; and searches of the manual rarely yield useful results, Also, at press time, AccountEdge ran only in single-user mode under OS X 10.1. The MYOB Web site stated that if you attempt to run the program in multiuser mode, you run the risk of irreparably corrupting your AccountEdge data, Check with MYOB to make sure this prob- lem has been rectified if you plan to run AccountEdge with multiple users. MyBooks Looks Good, Works Bad If there’s any question as to why Java hasn't succeeded as an application platform, MyBooks 5.1 may provide most of the answers. While MyBooks is beautiful visually—the interface right down to the icons—it’s incapable of handling even basic business tasks such as data entry. When MyBooks first loads, you have the option of using it with test data or setting up your own company via a wizard. The setup process is simple, and we had our initial business data loaded in a matter of minutes. But as soon as we began using the program, MyBooks fell flac on its face No customers, no vendors, no, sales—essentially, there was no data in the database whatsoever. And the program appeared to be running in slow motion—so slow that there wasn't a moment during our use of MyBooks that we weren't either watching a window redraw on almost a qui . Several new features, a well as some redesigned ones, make AccountEdge sier to use and more intuitive for anyone who cringes at the thought of crunching numbers. The new Bank Register gives you an immediate overview of all your accounts (in a way that is reminiscent of Quicken) and lets you directly edit transactions a) line-by-line basis or won- dering whether we'd actu- ally pressed the button that was supposed to take us to the next module. ‘This slow- ness pervaded every aspect of the program, includi data entry. For instance, MyBooks couldn't keep up with normal typing speed, sometimes resulting in || words with missing letters. Other interface quirks include data fields that from within the register window. Version 2 has dis- pensed with accounting jar- Looks Can Be Deceiving MyBooks looks areat— it's pure Aqua—but it can't withstand the rigors of even rudimentary business tasks. aren't wide enough to dis- play the single-character data they contain; the inser- wwew.macworld.com tion point moving from field A to B to C to D when you're clicking in field L; and buttons (with labels such as WP and ‘Turn It Up A Notch) that have no contextual help and make no sense until you click on them. ‘To its credit, MyBooks does have excellent contextual help. for every data-entry field, but the program runs so slowly and has so many interface problems that is truly unusable. Oracle Reveals the Future On the surface, the idea of rent- ing a piece of software seems ludicrous. First, you never own the software, so if you stop pay~ ing the monthly fee, you don’t have it anymore. Second, the software and your financial data never really exist on your hard drive; it’s stored on someone else’s computer—a thought that may terrify some users. But if you listen to Microsoft, NetLedger, and a variety of other software vendors, this is the application-software wave of the future. Oracle Small Business Suite 7.5 makes it clear that this is one wave that’s worth the ride. Here's how it works. For $100 a month, you get business accounting, sales-force automa- tion, a 100-item Web store, customer-support tools, online bill payment (with as many as 20 checks per month), payroll, employee-expense manage- ment, time billing, unlimited telephone and e-mail support, and backups of your data twice a day. The price also includes full access for two master users and your accountant, as well as limited access for ten employees. Want to add more master users? It'll cost $30 a month for each, Have more employees? You'll pay $50 dollars a month for each block of ten. Need to write more checks? It’s $13 for each additional block of 20 checks, And so it goes for every other feature that Oracle offers: if you want more func- tionality than you have in your ‘isting plan, you can get it for a monthly fee. While Oracle lacks the visual appeal of the other two pack- ages, it remains a powerful and versatile program. Like the two desktop-based applications, it uses a simple setup process to help you get your company in order, But unlike Accountkdge and MyBooks, Oracle will take you a couple of hours to get set up and ready to go. Once your accounts are in order and you've set up employees, ven- dors, and customers, you can give them all varying degrees of access to your data; for example, you can let customers and vendors see their account his- tory and order information on the Web, Oracle handles _ estimates, orders, and invoices seamlessly, pulling inventory items from your database—whether they're entered by a salesperson or via your Oracle Small Business Web store—and it allows you to have multiple price points for your customers. The Web store does have some limitations. While it’s easy to put together maintain a Web store when it’s hosted on the Oracle Web site, if you want to inte- grate the store into your existing site, you can expect to spend quite a bit of time cutting and Accounting Software Compared MOUSE COMPANY AppGen PRODUCT RATING MyoB NetLedger ESTIMATED os COMPATIBILITY CONTACT wawwmacworld.com Oracle Small Business? Sweet! Web-based services give your employees, cus~ tomers, and vendors access to their business data from almost anywhere, anytime, and pasting HTML into your nd checks that you want to print locally are down- loaded to your hard drive PDF files, but you can also e-mail or fax invoices directly to your customers from within Oracle, There are dozens of reports, from stan- dard accounting to Web- store-traffie reports. You can view them online or download them to your hard drive as either Excel or Word files. If Oracle has one major shortcoming, it’s the need for speed. NetLedger strongly sug- gests that you have a DSL, cable, or T1 connection to the Internet. In our experience, even at DSL and TI speeds, the Oracle Web pages were not always snappy and sometimes the data took several seconds to load. PROS MacOSX 800/231-0062, Nice Aqua look-and-feel; easy setup; wwvewappgen.com good contextual help. Mac 0S 9, 800/322-6962, Improved ease of use due to new Bank Mac OS X