MacWorld9804April1998

We Pick the Best: 56-Kbps Modems, p.87 ¢ Tax Software, p. 40 Some people think the Pentium II is the fastest processor in the world. Not quite nserea. pple tbe ple logo ad Pocer Macnlos are registered trademarks, an Think ciferet isa trademark of pple Computer Ine. "hn BYTE mark esting. wae apple.com The chip inside every new Power Macintosh’ G3 is up to twice as fast. % Think different? GWOr Cross-Platform Essentials 62 Save Your Mac! BY HENRY BORTMAN How to make your Mac fit into an office full of Windows. 70 Mac Life Preservers BY GALEN GRUMAN We tested 25 software solutions for navigating the cross-platform waters. 73 Can the Mac Really Do Windows? BY SUSAN SILVIUS See if hardware and software emulation products match up to a real PC. 78 Windows Beauty Tips BY GALEN GRUMAN ANDO INGALL w. Butt it Getthe look-and-feel ofa Mac on a Windows workstation. 81 Publishing Power Play sy eruce FRASER Willan NT workstation win over Mac publish- ing pros? 87 April 1998 MACWORLD APRIL IB 98 You can't keep a good Mac down, page 62. Features The Modem Showdown BY RIK MYSLEWSKI Fourteen 56K modems: these bauds are built for speed, but how much? FireWire ignites digital video, page 26. 103 106 109 114 Incorporating MacUser Create Print Spot Color and Photoshop— Oil and Water? BY DAVID BLATNER AND sanoee COHEN Macworld fools Photoshop into working with spot colors. Print Spot Color and QuarkXPress 4 BY DAVID BLATNER Quark- XPress shines at letting you com- bine spot colors and preview the results. Web Watch This: Streaming Video on Your Web Site By JIM HeEID Streaming tech- nology frees Web video from its bandwidth bottleneck. Motion Distorted Reality— the Magic of Displacement Mapping BY DAVID BIEDNY AND NATHAN moooy Displacement map- ping lets you produce your own reality-distortion fields. S| 15 19 We take NT to the publishing proving ground, page 81. 178 News 46 22 Apple Delivers QuickTime 3.0 Updated multimedia-delivery system offers enhancements but awaits greater developer support. 23 Apple Dismantles Claris The new FileMaker, Inc., retains FileMaker Pro and Home Page. Other Claris products meet an uncertain fate at Apple. 23 The Year of Mac DVD? E4’s CoolDVD brings this hot technology to the Mac. 24 = ~=Merger Wave Hits Plug-in Publishers Consolidation in the graphics- software market filters down to plug-in and XTension vendors. 26 ~=FireWire Heats Up Digital Video 93 Video-editing systems and DV camcorders incorporate new high- speed interface, 97 ON THE COVER Photograph by Kevin Candland; screen image by Douglas Fraser Apple's hefty, high-quality new laptop, page 34. Opinion The Vision Thing BY ANOREW GORE Power- PC positioned to blow the doors off Pentium. The Desktop Critic BY DAVID POGUE Brows- ing for bargains: the Web offers sweet deals for penny-pinchers. How to Contact Macworld ae at eed ‘Modem mania of the 56K variety, page 87. Secrets The HFS+ Survival Guide BY JOSEPH SCHORR Allocation reclamation: take back hard-disk space block by block. Quick Tips BY LON POOLE and shortcuts. Tips, tricks, 30 32 34 36 38 40 42 44 46 48 50 52 54 54 56 56 58 60 Reviews $88 Art Dabbler 2.1.1; $8 LivePix 1.1; $8§ PhotoDeluxe 2.0 Low-end image editors $888) QuickMail Office 1.0.2 POP3 e-mail server software 48% PowerBook G3 Portable system $4%% Dreamweaver Web-page editor $948 Epson PhotoPC 600; $46%% Kodak DC210; 48% Olympus D-320L; $# Panasonic CoolShot KXL-601A Midrange digital cameras $668 Kiplinger TaxCut 1997; $84$% MacinTax Deluxe 1997 Tax-preparation software $980 Bryce 3D 3-D-terrain generator 898% Creator2 Page-layout program $896 ~HexWrench 1.0; $48 ImageVice 1.0; $46 =MC-P/CoCo and Channel 24 Color plug-ins for Adobe Photoshop $996 VST Zip 100 PowerBook Zip drive 69% PhotoTools 2.0 Adobe Photoshop plug-ins 8% Insider Updates 2.01; $99 Shaman Update Server Personal Edition 1.2 Software-updating services 998%” Commotion 1.1 Video-painting software $999 NetCloak 2.5 Internet utility $84%% PowerPrint 4.0 PostScript interpreter for ink-jets $9¢ ClockWork Personal information manager 88% CD-Copy 2.0 CD-ROM-duplication utility $8667 Ray Gun Real-time sound processor www.macworld.com April 1998 3 AnthroCarts! Configure them the way you want! Lifetime Warranty * Dozens of Shapes and Sizes Over 75 Accessories * Tough as Nails ¢ Order Direct! Call for a free Catalog: 800-325-3841 6:00 AM to 6:00 PM PST, M-F Anthro Corporation” Technology Furniture” latin, OR 97062 : 800- ANTHRO ea aie Since 1984. Prices from $299. GSA contract. Available for OEM applications. forToR mw cnt Andrew Gore executive asisrant Patricia Carberry-Harris EDITORIAL tortor Galen Gruman executive to1ToR Carol Person sti10n eorronsnews Stephen Beale SEM1OR EOMTOR/FEATURES Elizabeth Dougherty sewion eorronsneviews Anita Epler seu1on eorton/osrantEnTs Naney Peterson SHOR TECHNOLOGY EDITOR Henry Borman SENIOR ASSOCIATE EDITORS Linda Comer, Jason Snell, Katherine L. Ulrich ASSOCIATE EDITORS Allyson Bates, Scholle Sawyer, Brooke C. Wheeler EDITORIAL LAB COORDINATOR Shawn S.J. Sadler CONTRIBUTING EDITORS | David Biedny, Christopher Breen, Bruce Fraser, Ted Landau, Deke McClelland, David Pogue, Lon Poole, Joseph Schorr, Franklin N. Tessler Lap as oinecron Jeffrey S. Pittelkau ASSISTANT LAB OIRECTOR Susan Silvius SeWIOR LAB ANALYSTS Jefly K. Milstead, Kevin Mitchell ASSOCIATE LAB ANALYST Gil Loyola "COPY EDIT MANAcING (010K Chaire H. Breen cory ener Paul-Michael King seu108 COPY eoIToRS Elissa Rabellino Jon Zobeniea ART AND DESIGN DESIGN OIRECTOR Eleanor Leishman ART O1RECTOR Sylvia Chevrier ASSOCIATE DESIGNERS Martha Katt, Michael Rattary DESIGN ASSOCIATE Jackie Gov Juice Up Your Mac With Windows Compatibility! .. Squeeze OrangePC into Your Apple! Our newest Windows® compatibility card, the OrangePC® 550, when armed with the AMD-K6™ or Intel® Pentium 233 MMX™, provides the highest performance solution on the market. To demonstrate the phenomenal power of real hardware-based Windows® compatibility, the OrangePC was benchmarked against a software emulation competitor. Using the Ziff-Davis Business Winstone benchmark running on a Power Macintosh G3, OrangePC ran 7 times fa: 700% more performance, now that’s some serious juice! The new OrangePC 550 has a stunning set of exclusive features including accelerated 3D video, 3D wavetable sound, 512 KB L2 cache, and 4 MB of video SGRAM — all leading edge stuff! And the OrangePC’s software application has made quantum strides as well. It sports 32-bit drivers facilitating CD-ROM long file names and NDIS3 networking. Our exclusive SnapShot™ feature allows a Now available from: CRO CENCET Computer Town (800) 613-0622 (800) 615-3183 © Orange Micro, Inc. 1998 Windows® screen to show the Mac environment and the Mac screen to display the Windows® environment in a Mac window. It’s like a “picture in picture” on your TV! OrangePC 550 C is avmilable in 12” or 7” PCI cards (7° cards support AMX Intel, Cyrix® or AMD-K6; expandable RAM to 6 MB; up to512 KB pipeline burst L2 cache on madel 550: puallel port (for PC dongles); speed serial ports; game port: 3D wawetable sound infout; 2/4MB video memory. @Orange Micro inc. ca Years of Innovation and Excellence” 1400 N. Lakeview Ave., Anaheim, CA 92807 (714) 779-2772 www.orangemicro.com The Technical Spees: Orange Circle 33 on reader service card Did you get yourg*%)? Available Now! VST Zip™"100 Drive for your: 4 G3, 3400, 1400 and 190/5300 Series PowerBooks ° 1-800-222-2808 MacConnection ClubMac 800-998-0040 1-800-258-2622 1-800-248-0800 1-800-255-6227 Circle 73 on reader service card 8 April 1998 MACWORLD Macworld DISPLAY ADVERTISING SALES. 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With our breakthrough low profile design, Legacy Electronics" has created the only 1OOMHz 128MB SDRAM DIMM available today that meets the specifications for the desktop 63. Now, this design is available to you. Call Legacy Electronics LEGACY today and find out what's next. Dealer Inquiries Welcome A 888/466-3853 A www.legacyelectronics.com Circle 35 on reader service card April 1998 MACWORLD Macwor'd HOW To CONTACT MACWORLD ‘Subscription Questions Phone 303/665-8930 Fax 303/604-7455, US. Mail Subscription Services PO, Box 54529, Boulder, CO 80322 ‘America Onine Keyword Macworld World Wide Web www 2dnet.com/adsubs/macworld/service Reprints and Permissions ‘You must have permission before reproducing. any material from ‘Macworld, Waite to Macworld, Reprints and Permissions, 801 Second St, San Francisco, CA 94107; inclu hone number. To order reprints ‘of your company’s editorial coverage, cll 800/217-7874 Back Issues of Macworld hack sues (ubject to avaabilty) ate $7 pe sue for U.S delivery ($12 overseas); prepayment in US, funds is required, Send check or money corder to Back sues Department, 2Hf-Davis Inc, PO. Box 53131 Boulder, CO 80322-3131 ‘Macworld in Microfilm ‘Macworld is available on microfilm and microfiche from UMI, 300 N Zee Ra, Ann Arbor, Ml 48106-1346; 313/761-4700. ‘Macworld Editorial ‘The editors of Macworld welcome your tips, compliments, or complaints. ‘We are unfortunately unable to lk up stories from past sues: recom: mend produts or diagnose your Macintosh problems by phone, ema or fax Contact Apple tol-re at 800/538-9696, ext. 00, for informa: tion on user groups in your area, Our offices are located at 501 Second St, San Francisco, CA 94107, 418/243-0508, fax 415/442.0766, LETTERS TO THE EDITOR Direct all comments and suggestions regarding ary aspect of the magazine to leters@macworld com. Due to the high volume of mail received, we can't respond personally to each eter. We reserve the right to edit al submissions letters published in ‘Macworld oF Macworld Online become the property of Nixcwvorld QUICK THPS Send your questions or tips on how to use Mac comput ers, petipheras, oF software to the attention of Macworld, Quick Tip, 501 Second St, San Francisco, CA 94107; fax 415/842-0766; e-mall uicktipstamacworld com. Please incude your name, address, and tele phone number ith Apple Computer, ne. Atco Mac, and Macintosh ate tegstered trademarks, an States of Amenca. Copyright © 1998 Mac Publihing. LL. Al rights ‘VBPA. | + Soggeste etal pce. Newer and MARQom ae registered trademarks of Newer Technology nc. Alte ames ae trademarks oftheir respectv holders. © Newer Technolgy. 1997 Your” Mec What Newer Technology does is simple: we sell products Apple can outperform it. Or if you're looking for a lot of bang for that make Macs” faster and better. the buck, the MAXpowr Citation is the way Many times upgrading your existing to go. It lets you replace your older processor Mac is smarter than buying a new one. with a fast 6oge for as little as *359% That's For instance, if you're looking for the right, you can bring your machine out of the absolute fastest Mac you can own, then stone-age and make it as fast as the new you have to buy a MAXpowr™G3, because no shipping system from top-of-the-line Macs without spending tons of cash for a new system. Call 1-316-943-0222 for more info or surf to www.newertech.com ¢* email: info@newertech.com After all, your basic system is still fine; technology has just left (MWESES%9 your processor in the dust. So keep the box, save the cash, and just give your Mac a brain transplant. Plus, with Newer Technology you're buying from a company you can trust. We're not some dinky company being run out of a garage. In fact, we've been engineering and selling Macuori products that make Macs better since 1984. So you can be assured that you're going to get top-of-the-line products, great service, knowledgeable support and total compatibility. So come by our website and see which processor is right for your particular machine. No matter what kind of aMac 9004 or Mac-compatible you're using, Newer Technology has a product that can make it better, Let us prove that sometimes Newer” is better than new. L»> Newser ssi yeirs Sometimes Newer Is Better Than New. Circle 83 on reader service card i/ ph Sane New Bryce 3D ee lets you create | incredibly realistic, > fully animated ! 3D worlds! Real-world atmospheric effects. Set every part of your 3D world in motion, including clouds, the phases and positions of heavenly bodies, star fields, and fog and haze that react realistically to light intensity and color. Complete animation control. Scale, resize, or position object paths in seconds, then link them to create motion, Set camera and lights to track objects automatically, Unbelievably realistic terrains. Paint height values for peaks, valleys, plateaus, and erosion, then animate the entire scene. For instant results, check out the real- time, rotating 3D preview. Fully animatable materials and textures. Picture brick ‘melting into water or a snow capped mountain emerging from winter into spring-now you can make it happen! Get Bryce 3D and set your M world in motion, the easy way! Ca¥ 800.846.0111... www.metacreations.com & MetaCreations The Visual Computing Software Company Circle 5 onreader service card JEFF NEUMANN ot Lellers Missing Andy, Bob, Chris, and Jim I WAS DISAPPOINTED TO SEE THAT Andy Thnatko will no longer be writing for your magazine (“Transitions,” January 1998). You are losing one of the best columnists of both Macworld and MacUser, Andy’s column was unique, a nice change of pace in the middle of all the news, reviews, and oh-so-serious columnists discussing the oh-so-serious state of Apple and the Mac. Andy’s column allowed for humor in the magazine. Face it—without some lev- ity, Macworld might as well be one of those dime-a-dozen PC business magazines that just happens to cover the Mac. You have succeeded in one thing: I can now read Macworld from cover to cover without cracking a smile. Congrat- ulations, I guess. Davio Gore San Antonio, Texas NDY IHNATKO IS ONE OF THE FEW technically savvy people that I have read who is intentionally humorous. Every month, the first page I turned to was Andy’s column. After the merger of Macworld and MacUser, I was relieved to see that he was not lost in the shuffle. Now that I find he is a goner, I am very distressed, He will be very sorely missed by a lot of fans. RicHarD Beirne via Macworld Online HEN I ASKED MY NEW DOWN- stairs neighbor where she was from and she said, “the former Yugoslavia,” I wondered what it would be like to be from a“former” place. As a member of the Mac community, I'm starting to get an idea, ‘The bemused possessor ofa “former” Power Computing box, I also have a sub- scription to the “former” MacUser: With this issue I learn that Andy [hnatko and the team of Bob LeVitus and Christopher Breen (“Help Folder,” January 1998) are about to become “former” columnists. Bummer. These guys have style, know a lot, and are irreverent without becoming tedious about it. They brought a little more fun into my life. I’m sorry to see them go. Lucy Tinkcompe Boston, Massachusetts ‘M SORRY TO SEE THAT JIM HEID IS leaving Macworld. There are those of us out here in Macdom who have been with him since the start, and will miss him. Jim’ articles have always been timely and informative. He has helped us learn, and i's been appreciated. MIKE CHicHester Spring Hill, Florida We, to0, will miss the columns from these contrib- tors. But look for their continued contributions in other sections of the new Macworld. A merger is never easy and there wasn’t room for everyone, but we're doing our best to keep the original MacUser and Macworld contribu- tors involved in the new Macworld.—Ed. Top-Notch Typography K ATHLEEN TINKEL'S “10 TYPO- graphical Blunders” is excellent (Jan- uary 1998)! Her article is invaluable for people in my position, untrained in page design but responsible for helping make it look better. We publish four magazines, and I am sure we are committing several of these blunders. Thanks! DEREK NELSON Norfolk, Virginia SET AND POLICE TYPE STYLES AT the Watertown Daily Times in New York. Kathleen Tinkel made one blunder in her article: you can’t generalize that it’s better to set type ragged. Studies have found that it’s far easier for readers to deal with lines of the same length—justified— if the text goes on at length without inter- ruption. Newspaper news stories and novels are almost invariably set justified. On the other hand, in a treatment such as a newspaper feature, magazine article, or art book where the text is bro- ken by pictures, ragged type is attractive and acceptable. Mark HOLSERG Watertown, New York HAT A WONDERFUL ARTICLE! 1 wish I could have shown it to a cou- ple of hundred clients over the years. Kathleen Tinkel does a superb job of pointing out many of the pitfalls that await the novice. continues www.macworld.com April 1998 15 LETTERS © The $1,999 base-model Power Mac 63/233 system (“Apple's Next-Gen- eration Systems,” January 1998) does not include a modem; the modem is $150 extra, The G3 tower model bas only three slots for RAM, not six. You can still install up to 384MB of RAM, dite to the tower case’ allowing taller 128MB RAM modules. I would add two more to the list: First, be conservative in how many fonts you use in a document. If you use more than three fonts on a page, you should have a pretty good reason. The second is one of my pet peeves, a mistake I see a lot of pros making: before you use all caps, be sure it’s appropriate for your font. Old English and italic faces, for example, should never be set in all caps, Tim DoNonor Grand Rapids, Michigan Quicken Still Falls Short ENDY SHARP’S REVIEW OF INTU- W it’s Quicken Deluxe 98 (January 1998) gave it an overall positive rating. However, the Investment portion of the program is still filled with bugs and prob- lems that have existed since Quicken 4, Quicken does not know the difference between options, bonds, mutual funds, stocks, or money-market funds. Major inadequacies in Quicken, such as its inability to report capital gains and losses for any short sales or covered call writes and its incorrect calculation of ROIs, have plagued it for years, Intuit has been aware of these investment issues and still has not fixed any of them. Monty Lee via Macworld Online 7) VERY REVIEW OF QUICKEN FOR “) the past three years overlooks one fea~ ture where it falls short: Cash Flow Fore- casting, Quicken clumsily bases cash flow on the Calendar instead of the Budget, necessitating re-entry of all your infor- mation. Cash-flow forecasting based on the budget is very useful for maintaining checking balances and preparing for investing or spending. BILL Colorado Springs, Colarada BRAAK 16 April 1998 MACWORLD Cultivating a New Generation Y FIVE-YEAR-OLD DAUGHTER AND I were watching television when the Emergency Broadcast System test came on. My daughter immediately grabbed the remote and turned the TV off and back on. “It bombed and we have to restart it,” she informed me, She isa real Mac child—I guess that’s why I put up with her constantly chang- ing the desktop pattern to teddy bears. AFPLEGK Muple Ridge, British Columbia, Canada Joun J) OR OUR HOMEWORK ASSIGNMENT in my ninth-grade computer class we had to find any article remotely connect- ed to computers and enter it for typing practice. When I saw David Pogue's arti- cle, [knew my search was over (The De top Critic, January 1998), Unfortunately, my school uses PCs. Although normally I would never lower myself to using anything other than a Mac, 1 am forced by this country’s educa- tional system to submit myself to torture by means of Windows 9: When I received thi ignment T saw itas a chance to stand up for what I believe in. My class, including my teacher, got a good laugh out of my article, and it is with joy that I say she may finally be seeing the light. In the meantime I will continue to read David Pogue’s articles in hopes of inspiring other poor lost souls in PC land to return to the place they know they belong. DEVORA WHT MAN New Haven, Connecticut Genealogy Gripes DIDN'T KNOW WHETHER TO LAUGH ] or cry at the reviews of Family Tree Maker Deluxe and Ultimate Family Tree Deluxe (January 1998), While I have never used either, I had purchased Ulti- mate Family Tree at what I thought was a bargain price of $18.05, until I opened the box. I decided to laugh and continue using Personal Ancestral File 2.3.1, devel- oped by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, While the Mac ver- sion leaves several things to be desired, it's right up there with Leister Produc- tions’ Reunion. SUARRON STANDIFER ASTON Naren, Olson ACWORLD'S REVIEW OF GENEAL- Mee. software was informative but failed to mention one feature important to anyone seriously into genealogy: the bility to save the data in GED format. This standard format is used for sharing information between different comput- ers and programs, I should also mention a good shareware program, Gene 4.2, from Diana and David Eppstein. Tt may not have all the bells and whistles of Reunion, bur it has easy data entry. in HTML and GED formats; and has most of the same features, including reports, charts, and the ability to link pie- tures to cards, For the shareware price of its a great bargain and a good place start for anyone who finds the price of Reunion a bit steep. Kent Jacobson, Minnesota LORENTZEN OS 8 Ain't So Great E RLIER IN THE YEAR 1 BOUGHT A Performa 6400/200. and installed Mace OS 8. One week later my system started its ominous, slow descent into computer hell, First it wouldn’t load the final five extensions upon start-up, and then it wouldn’t boot altogether. I did the usual diagnostics, but to no avail. When I called Apple Support they apologetically told me that OS 8 ha: major problem with the Performa drivers. ‘They mailed me a free update, and all was forgiven—until now. ‘The slow descent has started again, Am I going to need to update my drivers every time something goes wrong with this piece of technology? Why didn’t Apple plainly state this prob- lem to people who bought the OS 8 upgrade? I think Pl dump System 8 for good ole 7.5 Tery Howry via Macworld Online ters should be se nd St, H1S/42.0766; (70370,7002), M (keyword M: the Internet (letters@macworld.com). Include a to , Macworld, 501 cise, CA 94107, tronivilly via Compuse Mail 204-8078), world), AppleLink (Maeworld |), merica Onl return address and daytime phone number. Due w the high volume of mail received, we can't respond personally to each letter. We reserve the right to edit all letters. All published letters become the property of Macuurhl. The World's First Do-It-Yourself Ad. Rather than try and sell you on Canvas 5, we invite you to sell yourself with a 30 day free trial offer. \ nly one person knows © what you want in a graphics program: you. So go on — try Canvas 5 (fully functional, not some weenie sampler) for 30 days, free. If you like, you buy. If you don't, you don't. - Canvas 5 has everything you need to tackle any graphics task, from technical drawing and photo editing, to desktop publishing and web design. All fully integrated. All easy to use. And all yours for the asking. - Call 1.800.6CANVAS (622-6827) or 305.596.5644 ext. 2, and ask for your free Evaluation CD or visit our web site at www.deneba.com/macworld/ to © Copyright 1987 Deneba Software. Limited tim in North America, This ad was made using nothing but Canvas 5. Any quest download it gratis. And if you've already sold yourself, visit your favorite reseller or call us and pick up a copy today. Circle 57 on reader service card For more than a decade, professionals seeking an out-of-box CAD solution have selected the award- winning MiniCAD. This stand-alone program lets you create everything from precise working draw- ings to sophisticated client presentations to extensive materials lists and cost estimates. As always, MiniCAD 7 offers the same core features that have made i | Windows'/Macintosh™ ws The Easiest, Most Cost-Effective Way to Design tries—multi- decimal accu- racy for pre- cise drafting, a built- in database/ spreadsheet to track costs and materi- als, extensive library of industry- specific symbols, cross- platform compatibility (Mac and Windows), and a macro program- it the program of choice ming language for for design professionals in more than 80 coun- automating complex and routine tasks. Now this total CAD solution speeds your design process with these new features: * True 3D Boolean Solid Modeling * DWG and DXF Import/Export * Dual-Unit Dimensioning * Auto Wall Framing * QuickDraw 3D Rendering * Associative Hatching * Automatic Wall Joining Next-Generation SmartCursor * Precise Sun Positioning * Expression Evaluation Inside Textboxes * Automated Databases/ Spreadsheets * Multi-Decimal Dimensioning * Rotatable Grid and Customizable Coordinate System * Plus Dozens of Performance and Interface Enhancements MiniCAD 7—The only thing small is the price. i, To learn more about MiniCAD’s extensive feature set and why the program has been called “the easiest, most cost-effective way to design,” call 1-888-MINICAD or visit our Web site: www.diehlgraphsoft.com MiniCAD 7, which retails for a suggested price of $795, comes with 18 months of FREE Tech Support and a 30-Day Money- Back Guarantee! The Vision Thing Look, Up in the Sky . . . It's SuperChip! THE RUMORS OF THE POWERPC'S DEATH HAVE BEEN GREATLY EXAGGERATED OMETIMES THE MOST damning insult is the one that comes dressed as a compliment. Take the recent commentaries by PC pundits about the PowerPC microproces- sor architecture that the Power Mace is based on. ‘The pundits believe that, despite its cur- rent speed and price advantages over the Pentium, the PowerPC’s decline into irrelevance is inevitable. One analyst went so far as to say thar the PowerPC 750, also known as the G3, delivers impressive performance only when you take its price into considera- tion... as if this were a bad thing! His ultimate point was that Intel would, in the not-too-distant future, be delivering pro- ors that could meet or beat the 750. OK, T can play by those rules. Let's talk about the future. Let's talk about speed so fast that companies building products using the PowerPC are going to have to add an extra zero to the names of their products, By the time you read this, PowerPC partner IBM will have announced a major breakthrough in PowerPC technology. year, there will be PowerPC chips running at 1 gigabertz—thar'’s 1,000 megahertz—thanks to an IBM innovation that uses copper instead of aluminum to make computer chips. Even assuming that what the pundits claim about new Intel chips is true, the 1GHz PowerPC should still be here sooner, run faster, and cost less. ‘The first new chips probably won't break the gigahertz barrier— see them late this year, running a 500MHz. But once the copper-chip process is up and running, it will be pos- sible for PowerPC-based Macs to make even multiprocessing Windows NT boxes seem sluggi Of course, as these selfsame multi- processor NT workstations are currently proving, speed is fairly meaningless if most users can’t afford it, That’s why the 750's unique combination of high speed and low cost is so critical and why, as the PowerPC zooms into the Gigahertz Zone, it will be critical that the chips be affordable and flexible. Think about it: the 750 is the only high-performance chip that appears in low-end as well as high-end computers and portables as well as towers, This must continue to be the hallmark of the Power- PC, with the G3 and beyond. Intel will something faster in the Not- he PowerPC’ goal always bi ‘Too-Di: must be to keep performance affordable and accessible. Think of itas Performance for the Rest of Us. More Powerful Than a Locomotive Just as speed is meaningless if you can’t afford it, it’s also worthless if there aren’t good uses for it. Running Microsoft Word ten times faster might be nice, but irs hardly a compelling use of 1GHz of processing punch. When the first Macs featuring next-generation PowerPC chips arrive, they'll need to offer users some- by Andrew Gore thing beyond the obvious speed boosts to current hertz-hungry applications. First, Windows emulation should be built into the operating system. If new processors end up being more than twice as fastas Intel chips, then it should be pos sible to offer no-compromise Windows emulation on the Mac. (As you can see from our story “Can the Mac Really Do Windows?” elsewhere in this issue, effec~ tive Windows emulation doesn’t exist just yet.) Imagine the irony if, in 1999, the best computer to run Windows applica tions turns out to be... a Macintosh, ‘Talk about thinking different! ‘The next-generation Mae should also offer a significant improvement in its interface. While hardware has advanced tremendously in just the last few years, the interface that runs on those machines. hasn’t made any quantum leaps in over a decade, Now it’s time to take ad- vantage of that processing power to effect real change. For example, Apple could as- sume that every Mac has an Internet connection and fol- low the interface implications from there. And voice recog- nition should become an inte- gral part of the operation of the computer. IBM has ama: ing voice-recognition technol- ogy in its labs that’s just wait- ing for a desktop computer fast enough, and an operating-system developer clever enough, to make voice a truly powerful way to work with a computer, Before you scoff at this idea, remem- ber that there once was a time when peo- ple thought that controlling your com- puter with an upside-down trackball was pretty dumb. But 200 million mouse users can’t be wrong. m I'm sorry, Dave. can’t do that. However; I can forward your comments on this column to visionthing@macworld.com. www.macworld.com Apri| 1998 19 WE'VE GOT 10 YEARS 24 HOURS BEH 600 x 600 dpi resolution 16 pages per minute 1 year Platinum Exchange Warranty* Maximum print area: 11.69" x 20" Ledger, letter, legal, Ad, envelope 250 sheet Universal Tray PostScripf® Level 2 compatible, PCL 5 80 PostScript fonts, 15 PCL fonts * 8MB RAM expandable to 64MB Connectivit © Ethernet® (10 BaseT, 10 Base2) © EtherTalk® TCP/IP * Parallel, Localfalk? RS422 Serial Extra Universal Tray Add $129 Second Paper Feeder** Add $319 (Includes 250 sheet Universal Tray) Second Paper Feeder** Add $419 (Includes 500 sheet Letter Tray) Extra 8MB memory*** Add $89 Platinum Exchange Warranty Program Additional year Add $219 Two additional years Add $330 Three additional years Add $468 $2199 Business Lease: $79 month/36 month lease Featured with additional paper trays BACKED BY GCC’S EXCLUSIVE PLATINUM EXCHANGE” PROGRAM IND OUR TECHNOLOGY. OUR SERVICE. G.. Technologies® has spent the last 10 years refining printer technology for high- performance graphic arts printers. Now, GCC applies all of that knowledge and experience to our new line of business printers. A line of business printers that gives you the quality, reliability, and value your business demands. Whether you need camera-ready 1200 dpi resolution or large-format (11" x 17") output, or just about anything in between, there’s a GCC Elite that’s right for you and your business. 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Purchase a new GCC business printer with Platinum Exchange and see for yourself what 10 years of printer experience can do for your business. * 600 x 600 dpi resolution * 8 pages per minute * 1 year Platinum Exchange Warranty* © Maximum print area: 11" x 17" * Ledger, letter, legal, A4, envelope * 250 sheet Universal Tray * PostScript Level 2 compatible, PCL 5 * 80 PostScript fonts, 15 PCL fonts * 8MB RAM expandable to 64MB- Connectivity: © Ethernet (10 BaseT, 10 Base2) © EtherTalk, TCP/IP * Parallel, LocalTalk, RS422 Serial Extra Universal Tray Add $129 Second Paper Feeder** Add $319 (Includes 250 sheet Universal Tray) Second Paper Feeder** Add $419 (Includes 500 sheet Letter Tray) Extra 8MB memory*** Add $89 Platinum Exchange Warranty Program Additional year ‘Add $179 Two additional years Add $270 Three additional years Add $383 1799 Business Lease: $65 month/36 month lease * 1200 x 1200 dpi resolution * 12 pages per minute © 1 year Platinum Exchange Warranty* © Maximum print area: 8.5" x 14" * Letter, legal, Ad, envelope © 250 sheet Universal Tray * PostScript Level 2 compatible, PCL 5 * 80 PostScript fonts, 15 PCL fonts * 8MB RAM expandable to 64MB Connectivity: * Ethernet (10 BaseT, 10 Base2) © EtherTalk, TCP/IP * Parallel, LocalTalk, RS422 Serial Extra Universal Tray Add $129 Second Paper Feeder"* Add $399 (Includes 250 sheet Universal Tray) Envelope Cassette Add $129 Extra 8MB memory*** Add $89 Platinum Exchange Warranty Program Additional year Add $139 Two additional years Add $210 Three additional years Add $298 $1399 Business Lease: $50 month/36 month lease “Platinum Exchange included for one year. Extended options avilable. Some resrcions may opply. Cal for det “The Elite XL608 IC supports one optional poper feeder. The Elite XL616 supports hwo o ***Please cali for pricing on additional memory configurations. GCC Technologies is « registred trademark of GCC Technologies, Inc. Elite 1212, Elite XL 608 LC, Elite XL are trademarks of GCC Technologies, nc. All other trademarks or registered trademarks are trademarks of thei Service. Satisfaction. Guarantee l Platinum Exchange. Every GCC printer purchased direct is backed by our exclusive Platinum Exchange Program. If anytime during the warranty period a printer problem can’t be resolved through GCC Technical Support, we'll send you a replacement printer' by the next business day. No downtime while waiting for repairs. 30-day money back guarantee. Every printer and toner cartridge is fully backed by our unconditional, no-questions asked, 30-day money back guarantee. > One full-year warranty. Every GCC printer is protected by a minimum one year parts and labor warranty. Yearly extensions are available. (> FREE unlimited technical support throughout the warranty period. GCC Technologies is on call for you at 781-276-8620, Monday through Friday, 9 AM to 8 PM (et); Saturday, 10 AM to 4 PM (et) or * Shipping ond handling will be reimbursed only if produc is defective. 24 Gcc =. TECHNOLOGIE To order, Toll Free ‘Mon-Fri 9 AM to 8 PM (Eastern Standard Time) Sat 10 AM to 4 PM (Eastern Standard Time) Circle 43 on reader service card Keycode 804MWC - NUS [multimedia Apple Delivers QuickTime 3.0 BUT KEY AUTHORING APPLICATIONS AWAIT UPGRADES by Stephen Beale uickTime 3.0, the lat- est version of Apple’s multimedia system software, is finally here—with a fast new video compressor and a long list of other enhancements. But don’t expect to see Quick- Time 3.0 movies dancing across your screen anytime soon. To create QuickTime 3.0 movies, you'll need Quick- Time 3.0-enabled production tools, and so far only a handful of authoring packages support the new software. QuickTime, one of Apple's few unabashed success stories of recent years, provides soft- ware developers with a rich set of resources for producing and playing back multimedia content. Its most visible com- ponent is the QuickTime movie, which can play syn- chronized tracks of video, audio, and text. But Quick- Time also offers a wide range of system-level multimedia functions, including the ability 22 April 1998 MACWORLD to import and export more than 50 media types. This makes it much easier for devel- opers to add new video, audio, and animation features to CD- ROM titles and multimedia- production tools (see “What New in QuickTime 3.0,” in this section). Apple first announced QuickTime 3.0 about a year ago, offering sneak previews of a new video-effects architec- ture that lets you apply Adobe Photoshop-style filte time to moving i The company posted a beta version of QuickTime 3.0 on Decem- ber 1, 1997; the final release was scheduled to hit Apple’ Web site (www.apple.com/ quicktime/) in early February. There is no charge to download the software, which in real includes a new version of the plug-in for viewing ime movies on the World Wide Web. Early Applications Dozens of hardware and software ven- dors have announced that they plan to support QuickTime 3.0 in future products. But so far, only a few authoring programs offer access to QuickTime’s new features. To get the ball rolling, Apple announced HyperCard 2.4, 2 $99 update to its author- ing software, which can open any QuickTime 3.0-readable file, including QuickTime VR panoramas. HyperCard’s scripting lan- guage lets you use a Find com- mand to navigate to any por- tion of a QuickTime movie text track, You can also use scripting commands to scale, flip, mirror, rotate, and skew QuickTime movi At Maeworld Expo in San Francisco, Apple’ chief Qu Time architect, Peter Hoddie, demonstrated a $30 program called QuickTime Pro that lets you drag and drop one Quick- Time movie into another. However, Apple has not offered further details on the software, such as what other features it may offer or when it will ship. Among other developers, Scitex Digital Video (415/369- 5111, wwwiscitexdy.com) an- nounced support for Quicl Time 3.0 in Microsphere, its $2,000 digital-video-editing package. Script Software (916/ 546-9005, www.scriptsoftware .com) has released iView, a free QuickTime 3.0-based media- cataloging program that can be downloaded from the compa- ny’s Web site. Macromedia (415/252- 2000, www.macromedia.com) developed a QuickTime 3.0 Asset Xtra for Director and Authorware that lets you crop, mask, rotate, and scale import- ed QuickTime movies. The $200 plug-in should be avail- able by the time you read this. Macromedia says that Final Cut, its forthcoming digital- video-editing software, will offer full support for Quick- Time 3.0. Adobe Systems (408/536- 6000, www.adobe.com) has offered few specifics on its plans for QuickTime 3.0. However, Maclleek, citing continues on page 28 Apple Dismantles Claris FILEMAKER, HOME PAGE GO TO NEW COMPANY by Stephen Beale pple’ revitalization efforts took an unex- pected turn January 27, when the compa- ny announced that Claris, its ten-year-old soft- ware subsidiary, will be rechris- tened FileMaker, Inc., and will focus exclusively on the File- Maker Pro database and Home Page Web authoring tool. Apple—at least for now—will assume responsibility for other Claris products, including ClarisWorks, Emailer, Impact, and Draw, as well as Mac OS 8, HyperCard, and other Apple- branded software that was dis- tributed by Claris. Some 300 Claris employees, including an unspecified number involved in software development, will lose their jobs. Apple declined to say how many employees would remai FileMaker Rocks Apple says that FileMaker Pro, the best- selling database software for the Macintosh, is also the sec- ond-leading file manager for Microsoft Windows, which now accounts for about half of the product’ sales. The re- structuring theoretically frees the subsidiary ro pursue the Windows market as Apple focuses on the Mac OS, Home Page remains in the FileMaker fold due to the program's ight integration with the database software. FileMaker Pro 4, released last year, includes fea- tures that make it easier to put databases on the Web. Claris president Domi- nique Goupil, who retains the top spot in FileMaker, Inc., says the subsidiary has other data~ base and Web publishing prod- ucts in development. Forth- coming products will build on FileMaker Pro's reputation as an easy-to-use database. Murky Future Prospects are murkier for the Claris- branded products that have returned to Apple’ fold. Apple that Works remains a. strategic asset for the company; Apple bundles the integrated produc- tivity software with its Mac sys tems and claims that it is the best-selling productivity. pack- age in the education market. However, ClarisWorks for Windows could be in trouble; Apple says the Mac version will get the lion’ share of attention. Apple would not comment on plans for the other Claris packages, but Emailer in partic- ular appears to be living on bor- rowed time. Jud Spencer, the only programmer credited on the e-mail client, has moved to Microsoft and is working on the Mae version of Outlook Ex- press, the e-mail software bun- dled with Internet Explorer. Missing Details Apple exec: utives were cagey when dis- cussing the 300 layoffs associ- ated with the Claris restructuring. Claim- ing that the Claris and Apple work- forces are inter- twined, Apple would not reveal Clari: total employment, making it difficult to assess the move’s overall impact on the subsidiary’s bottom line. However, ana- lysts who follow Apple say the layoffs represent 30 to 40 percent of Claris employees. Apple says the layoffs were ‘across the board,” affecting personnel involved in software development in addition to sales and marketing. The com- pany would not reveal how many programmers were let go, but the magnitude of the layoffs strongly suggests that Apple plans to curtail develop- ment on at least some of the Claris-branded products. The Year of Mac DVD? AS DVD HEATS UP, E4 BRINGS THE FIRST DRIVES TO THE MACINTOSH by Jeffy Milstead VD, the high-capacity successor to the com- pact disc, is suddenly hot. Consumer DVD players are filling elec~ tronics stores, and more than 300 DVD movie titles are now available. They're fast becom- ing standard equipment on PCs. And now Apple has added support for DVD's: Universal Disk Format in Mac OS 8.1. There's just one small problem: the currently avail- able DVD drives use the [IDE interface found in PCs and £4's CoolDVD is the first DVD drive for the Macintosh, Apple's latest Macs; they do not support the SCSI connections in older Mac models. As a result, drives for PCs have been available for more than a year, while Mac users have been forced to wait. However, continues www.macworld.com April 1998 23 the wait for the latest DVD wrinkle—rewritable DVD- RAM—may be over soon with drives hitting catalogs this March. Hitachi is leading the pack with its firss DVD-RAM drive, but you can expect to see rewritable drives from Toshiba and Panasonic as well. £4 Debuts ‘The first Macs with built-in DVD drives are scheduled to appear by mid- 1998; Apple originally had planned to offer DVD by the end of last year, For now, your only choice is CoolDVD, a $499 Mac DVD upgrade kit from E4 (408/441-6060, www .e4.com), CoolDVD consists of an internal IDE-based DVD drive, software, and a single- slot PCI card, which is used to decode the DVD MPEG 2 video stream; the card also accepts audio input from the drive. The drive works with the Power Mac +400, the new G3 desktops, and other Macs with IDE, connectors; E-4 plans to ol SCSI version of CoolDVD by March. A sec~ ond optional board provides outputs for S-Video, RCA analog audio, and SPDIF digi- tal audio. A New Generation [4 is using whats known as a sec- ond-generation DVD drive. ‘The first generation of drives could read CD-ROMs, but not CD-R discs, including Photo- CD media. Current DVD drives support CD-R. And future DVD-RAM drives will be backward-compatible with all CD-ROMs. ‘The E4 package includes DVD player software that uses an interface similar to that found in the Apple CD Audio Player. You can control DVD movies as if you were using a stand-alone DVD player. You also have access to unique, title-specific DVD fea tures, such as parental restric- tion and the ability to choose different camera angles or alter- native language tra 24 April 1998 MACWORLD | News Merger Wave Hits Plug-in Publishers RECENT MARKET TRENDS FAVOR LARGER VENDORS by Stephen Beale hanges are afoot among vendors of graphics extensions—Adobe Photoshop plug-ins, QuarkX Tensions, and other products thar add_new functions to popular design programs, ‘On January 6, Extensis (503/274-2020, www.extensis .com) announced that it had acquired Astrobyte, publisher of the BeyondPress Quark- XTension, for creating Web pages from QuarkXPress docu- ments. ‘Two weeks later, the World Wide Power Com- pany (303/940-0600, www thepowerco.com) announced that its owner, Cyndie Shaffstall, along with Jim Jensen, president of GeneSys, had purchased XChange, a major distrib- utor of QuarkXTensions that also publishes X-Ray magazine, for QuarkXPress users. The World Wide Power Company (WWPC) distrib- utes plug-ins, QuarkXTen- sions, and other graphics prod- ucts; GeneSys is a developer of database-publishing tools for the Web. The timing of the acquisi- tions may be coincidental, but both point to the special chal- lenges facing developers of graphics extensions—and could have implications for the avail- ability of innovative new exten- sions in the future. Limited Resources Photo- shop plug-ins and other exten- sions have been a boon for con- tent creators, because they offer a low-cost means of enhancing and customizing key design applications. Most plug-ins have come from small software developers—even solo programmers—that may have innovative product ideas but limited marketing and dis- tribution resources. ‘To compensate, many have turned to outfits, such as XChange and the WWPC, that provide a central source for graphics utilities. XChange, founded in 1989, focused exclusively on QuarkX'Ten- sions and other Quark-related products. However, the com- pany hit financial difficulties about two years ago and was heavily in debt at the time of the WWPC acquisition, Shaffstall say One QuarkXTensions de- veloper, Dacques Viker, of Vision's Edge (904/386-4573, www.xtender.com), says that XChange fell behind in pay- ments to some developers and failed to pay others at all, While XChange accounted for just 25 percent of his compa- ny’s business, he says, other, smaller developers were almost completely dependent on XChange for their revenue. Shafistall says she plans to pend the next six months pay- ing off XChange’ creditors. Once XChange is back in the black—about nine months from now, she hop he plans to merge its operations into her own, with a single set of offices in suburban Denver. Shafistall is also seeking a pub= lisher for X-Ray. A Different Approach Extensis chose a different path to fortune, Beginning in 1994 with a single ser of Adobe PageMaker add-ons—Page- ‘Tools—Eatensis used acquisi- tions, distribution deals, and its own software development resources to build a product line that now includes) QX- Tools, QX-Effects, Photo- Tools, VectorTools, Intelli- hance, Portfolio, PreFlight Pro, PreFlight Designer, MaskPro, BeyondPress, and its latest release, PhotoFrames. This gives Exten tage over smaller extensions developers, since it can divide marketing costs and other overhead among a larger num- ber of products, In addition to bringing BeyondPress into the fold, the Astrobyte deal gives Extensis extra programming: expertis in QuarkX'Tensions and Web publishing. You can thus expect to see more of both from Extensis, although the company has not yet announced any new prod- ucts arising from the Astrobyte acquisition. jack in the Fold Mean- while, MetaCreations (805/ 566-6200, www.metacreations .com), which last year said that it was getting out of the Photo- shop-plug-in business, has had a change of heart. Later this year, the compa~ ny plans to release an upgrade to Kai's Power Tools, the pack- age that launched the boom in Photoshop plug-ins. However, chief interface officer Frank Casanova says the company has not yet decided whether to release the upgrade as a plug- in, a stand-alone application, or both. Nor has Meta- n advan- continues PEACE OF MIND For many years, Norton Utilities for Macintosh was the premiere utility for correcting drive problems. Until now. TechTool Pro 2 is now the best troubleshooting utility available for Macintosh. Why? We've recreated all of the best features of NUM and combined them with TechTool's large arsenal of diagnostic tests. This means that not only can you find and correct drive and file problems (like Norton does), but you can also test all those other critical parts of your system that Norton ignores like RAM, CPU, Floppy drives, CD-ROM drives and much, much more. In fact, no other utility on the market can check the fitness of your Macintosh to the extent of TechTool Pro. Just because TechTool Pro is the most advanced diagnostic utility available doesn't mean it's difficult to use. In fact, with version 2, we've added an easy-to-use interface that makes checking your Macintosh a snap. For the advanced user, our Expert mode allows you to control and configure TechTool Pro in almost any way you wish. For more information about TechTool Pro 2, call us at the number below or visit our web site. You'll see that anything else is just a box full of bones. For More Information: Toll Free: 800-829-6227 ¥MIMICROMAT International: 707-837-8012 YY COMPUTER SYSTEMS _ FAX: 707-837-0209 8868 Lakewood Drive info@micromat.com Windsor, CA 95492 www.micromat.com TechTool is a registered trademark of MicroMat Computer Systems Inc. Norton and NUM are registered trademarks of Symantec Inc. N SNOOPER i tra 108 UTmiTiES FOR MACINTOSH JBNUBRY TechTool® Pro Gprives — AiChips SKIP PAUSE RUN STOP - = = = Mac 800-213-6359 Source Code #MCM8 WNC Order #87067 Circle 45 on reader service card ™ Creations determined the fate of KPT Convolver, an image- enhancement plug-in intro- duced in 1995, MetaCreations also offers plug-ins for Adobe After Effects and Adobe IIlus- trator/Macromedia FreeHand. Implications Extensis’s acquisition of Astrobyte fol- lows a general trend toward consolidation among graphics- software vendors. The big fear among users is that this will lead to fewer innovative products. However, Astrobyte founder Ralph Risch says the acquisition will spur innova- tion, by allowing him to focus on product development rather than marketing and other considerations. Jeff Butterworth, founder of Alien Skin Software (919/ 832-4124, www.alienskin.com), acknowledges that a relatively large vendor such as Exten- sis—whose PhotoTools com- petes with Alien Skin's Eye Candy—has marketing and distribution resources he can’t match. Nevertheless, he be- lieves there will always be a place for companies like his. “Bigger guys will keep swal- lowing smaller guys, but small guys will keep coming along,” he says. Shaffstall says she doubts that the Extensis/Astrobyte deal indicates a larger trend toward consolidation among [ News plug-in vendors. If anything, she says, the popularity of extensions has bigger implica- tions for Adobe and Quark. Because plug-ins make it so easy to customize your soft- ware, she says, many users are hesitating before they upgrade Photoshop or QuarkXPress. As a result, she expects to see fewer revisions of major graph- ies packages. FireWire Heats Up Digital Video NEW PRODUCTS USE HIGH-SPEED INTERFACE by Brooke Wheeler ireWire, the high-speed digital-bus interface also known as IEEE 1394, is igniting a new generation of author- ing tools for digital-video producers. While Apple has been slow to incorporate Fire- Wire into its motherboards— that’s slated to happen by the end of the year—developers are rushing to market with digital-video systems that take advantage of FireWire’s blaz- ing 400MBps transfer rates. Adaptec Connects Fire- Wire-based video-editing sys- tems typically include a PCI card, FireWire cable, and QuickTime authoring software. Three vendors, ProMax (714/727-3977, www.promax.com), Pin- nacle Systems (650/526- 1600, www.pinnaclesys com), and DPS (606/ 371-5533, www.dps .com), have unveiled sys- tems based on Adaptec’ new HorConnect Ultra 8945, which features three FireWire connectors and an Ultra Wide SCSI accelerator ona single board. The $695 FireMax-2, from ProMax, slated to ship in February, includes Adaptec software drivers and plug-ins for Adobe Premiere and After Effects. ProMax has also dropped the price of its origi- nal FireMax—based on Adap- tec’s single-port_ AHA-8940 PCI card—from $595 to $495. Pinnacle Systems’ $799 miroVideo DV300 FireWire digital-video capture board includes Adobe Premiere LE for video editing and DV Tools software for controlling digi- tal camcorders. The forth- coming DPS Spark video- editing system, priced at $999, will include a full version of New Kodak Digital Camera Uses FireWire FIREWIRE MAY BE A BOON FOR DIGITAL VIDEO, but it can also provide a speedy gateway for high- resolution still images. Eastman Kodak (716/724- 1568, www. kodak.com) has built a FireWire inter- face into its new DCS 520, a $15,000 digital single lens reflex camera based on the Canon EOS. Targeted at photojournalists, the camera cap- tures 36-bit color images at 1,736-by-1,160-pixel resolution, producing a 6MB file. With files that big, a serial connection would be too slow, says Kodak product manager Gerard Magee. Magee admits that Kodak |s a bit premature in offering FireWire. When development began on the 26 April 1998 MACWORLD new camera, the company expected that Apple would have its first Macs with built-in FireWire con- nections by the end of 1997; Apple currently plans to offer FireWire Macs by the end of 1998. Magee expects that many DCS 520 resellers will bundle the camera with FireWire interface boards. In addition to the FireWire interface, the cam- era includes dual PC Card slots for removable stor- age and image transfer. It also features a burst rate of 3.5 frames per second, an ISO range of 200 to 1600, and a color LCD that shows a histogram of each captured image. Kodak expects to ship it in March.—MACWORLD STAFF Adobe Premiere in. addition to the new Adaptec card. Ger- man developer Octopos Sys- tems (49-40-270965-0, www soctopos.de) is shipping the $3,500 DV Studio 1394, which includes a FireWire PCI card, external connector box, and Adobe Premiere. Radius Deals At Mac- world Expo in January, Radius (408/541-6100, www.radius .com)—one of the first com- panies to offer FireWire- based digital-video tools— announced a deal with Media 100 (508/460-1600, www -media100.com) under which the latter will incorporate Radius technology into its video-editing systems. Media 100 will acquire distribution rights to EditDV, Radius’s $999 video-capture system, along with the PhotoDV Fire- Wire card and MotoDV video- capture software. DV Cameras As FireWire- based video-editing products hit the market, other vendors are keeping pace with DV camcorders that include Fire- Wire interfaces. Panasonic (201/348-7000, www-panasonic.com) is ship- ping the $2,000 PV-DV700 and $2,500 PV-DV710 DV cassette camcorders. Canon (516/488-6700, www.canondy .com) is shipping the $4,500 Canon XL1, the professional big brother to the $2,500 Optura mini DV camcorder. In February, Sony Electronics (408/432-0190, www.sony .com) plans to ship its light- weight $1,000 DFW-V300 video camera. These machines with| — your The SuperMac $900 line provides reliable and expandable architecture, so you always have the best creative tools at hand. You've got great ideas, and you deserve a machine to match. The SuperMac $900 family offers a range of models that combine superior engineering and performance with convenient upgradeability— all for a very competitive price. Plus the $900 architecture makes it easy to upgrade to a faster processor or even a dual processor. You can also add many PCI cards, internal SCSI drives, and lots of memory. So there’s no need to worry about your machine becoming obsolete. All this from UMAX, a company dedicated to the Mac OS system and rated #1 in both service and purchase satisfaction in a June 1997 Macworld poil. The SuperMac S900 from UMAX. Finally, there's a machine that can meet your creative demands. 4404 MacWeek EB high Upyradeabiity Litil MacOS For more information on where to purchase the $900, call 1-888-625-UMAX or visit us at http://www.umaxcc.com UMAX Computer Corporation ivity. A, S900 SPECIFICATIONS: MODEL NAME Processor Type 604/150MHz 604e/250MH2 (Upgrade now o PowerPC 750°) Interleaved RAM ‘64MB up to 168 G4MB up to 1GB CD-ROM Speed UK SCSI AX SCSI Hard Drive 4GB SCSI AGB ULTRA SCSI Drive Bays T otal/4 open 7 total/3 open Total PCI Slots 6 6 Ethernet V0Bose-T 10/100Base-T Ultra-Wide SCSI Card Optional Yes Tip Drive Optional Yes Video Memory 4MB AK Micro 4MB 1X Micro ‘Spe S900m ted ie fer: 1395 for a 250MHE 750 Processor upgrade oth MB backside cao sa for datas, ono ot nuded Estate soa ico fr SOO0H i $2695, a or '5900/250 $2695. Price nd leatces subject fo change witout oie © 1998 All rights reserved. SuperMac isa registered trademark licensed to UMAX Computer Corporation. Mac and the Mac OS logo are trademarks ot ‘Apple Computer, inc. used u Circle 99 on reader service card icense, PowerPC and the PowerPC logo are registered trademarks of International Business Machines Corporation "APPLE DELIVERS QUICKTIME 3.0" continued from page 23 anonymous sources, has reported that Adobe plans a May 1998 release for Premiere 5.0, a new version of the com- pany’s digital-video-editing software. It's a safe bet that the | News upgrade will support Quick- Time 3.0, The Vector Shuffle new feature in Quick Tim a vector-animation track; vector animations typically consume much less file space than equiv- alent bitmapped animations and are thus ideal for use on the Web. Lari Software (919/968- One 0701, www.larisoftware.com) offers a $99 program. called LightningDraw/Web for creat- ing QuickTime 3.0 vector ani- mations. By spring, the compa- ny plans to release a more com- prehensive package, Electrifier Pro, that produces bitmapped and vector animations in a vari- 28 ety of formats. What's New in QuickTime 3.0 NEW FEATURES IN QUICKTIME TRANSLATE into new capabilities for multimedia and digital- video-production tools. Here's some of what you can expect to see in authoring programs that support QuickTime 3.0: A Better Codec With QuickTime 3.0, Apple has licensed compression/decompression (codec) technology from Sorenson Vision; Sorenson Video is now QuickTime’s default codec. It's faster and offers better video quality than Cinepak, the default codec in previous ver- sions of QuickTime. However, if movies are compressed with Sorenson Video, you'll need to install QuickTime 3.0 to view them. Cinepak remains in QuickTime 3.0 for backward compat- ibility, and the Apple software supports other codecs as well. Audio Connections Apple has signed a series of technology-licensing deals that extend QuickTime’s audio capabilities: voice-compres- sion software from Qualcomm, a music codec from QDesign, and a pair of MIDI applications from Roland. Roland's Sound Canvas provides QuickTime with 128 built-in MIDI instruments; GS Format software adds support for Roland's GS technology, an enhancement to the basic MIDI specification. Down the Stream Seeking to improve QuickTime'’s appeal as an Internet standard, Apple has added streaming-audio and -video capabilities, which allow a movie to begin play- ing as it is being downloaded. You can also tie multiple-resolution versions of a QuickTime movie to a single link, sending the version most appropriate for the browser's data rate. Unlike with other streaming-media technologies, such ‘as RealNetworks’ RealAudio, you don't need special server software; you put the QuickTime movie on your Web site, and the movie auto- matically streams when downloaded. Early demonstrations with QuickTime's new video and audio codecs indicate excellent sound and image quality. However, if you want to pro- April 1998 MACWORLD duce a live Webcast in which the audio and/or video streams in real time, you'll need one of the competing server-based streaming technologies. Vector Animation A new vector-anima- tion track lets you create animated logos, text treatments, and other effects in small file sizes ideal for use on the Web, Lari Software supports QuickTime 3,0 vector animation in Lightning- Draw Web; PaceWorks says it will support the format in a future version of ObjectDancer, New Formats QuickTime 3.0 adds several new media types to an already long list of sup- ported formats. These include the DVCAM for- mat for digital-video cameras, which allows QuickTime applications to work directly with DVCAM video streams. Previous versions of QuickTime supported two flavors of Motion JPEG; QuickTime 3.0 adds support for OpenDML M-JPEG and Avid Video Resolution M-JPEG. Video Effects A new video-effects archi- tecture allows developers to create filters that can be applied in real time to QuickTime movies. For example, you can add an emboss effect to give the illusion that video frames are etched in stone. Cross-Platform Parity QuickTime 3.0 is the first fully cross-platform version of Quick- Time. Previously, QuickTime for Windows was limited to movie playback; now you can also create QuickTime content under Windows. PaceWorks (415/261- 6180, www.paceworks.com) says it will support the Quick- Time 3.0 vector track in a future version of its Object Dancer animation software. But Macromedia says that Flash, its vector-animation program, will not write to QuickTime’ vector format un- less users demand the capabi- lity. Until recently, you needed the Shockwave Flash browser plug-in to view Flash anima- tions; Flash animations in the QuickTime vector format would be viewable by anyone with the QuickTime plug-in, However, a new Xtra from Macromedia lets you export Flash animations Java applets that can be viewed on any Java-capable browser, Deployment Far and Wide One of QuickTime’ strengths is its transparent support for a wide variety of digital media types. This makes it a good vehicle for delivering content over the Internet; with the lat- est version, you can stream audio and video without re- quiring users to keep a closet- ful of browser plug-ins. But for QuickTime 3.0 to succeed as an Internet technology, a criti- cal mass of users—ineluding those on the PC side—must install the software. Apple expects that many Macintosh users will download the upgrade from the Web; QuickTime product manager Mitchell Weinstock estimates that as of January, 1 million users per month were down- loading QuickTime 2.5, Buc given QuickTime’ file size of SMB to 6MB, many will no doubt balk at such a band- width-chewing download, So Apple is also counting on CD- ROM-title developers to pol- linate desktops with the up- grade, Weinstock figures that every PC sold these days in- cludes at Jeast one title created with QuickTime; install the title and you also get the Apple software, Featuring Nexus GA from Al 2D Performance Comparison « MacBench '98 ATINEXUS GA XMICRO Twin Turbo 128M8 09 Matrox Millennivm 8 Now You See It. www.atitech.com/macwo Circle 256 on reader service card Personal Ima BEGINNERS WITH AGING HARDWARE NEEDN'T APPLY F YOU'RE LIKE MOST FOLKS, YOU take your snapshots to the cheapest lab you can find and rely on the pho- tog churn out your precious memories as fast as you can say, “Shouldn’t the sky be blue?” Fast photos have their place, but wouldn’tit be great if you could be in con- trol of your own digital darkroom? You could select the best shots, balance the colors, sharpen the details, and crop away the extraneous background stuff that you didn’t mean to photograph in the first place. No more apologizing about the one where your finger got in the way—every photo would be picture-perfect. For the uninitiated, the thought of operating a digital darkroom may be a bit intimidating, Armed with the proper soft- ware, however, a reasonably intelligent person should be able to figure it out. ‘That's where the latest round of personal image editors comes into play. MetaCre- ations’ Art Dabbler 2.1.1, The LivePix Company's LivePix 1.1, and Adobe's PhotoDeluxe 2.0 are all designed to help the burgeoning electronic shutterbug correct and experiment with pixel-based photos. Any of the three can be yours for $49, and both LivePix and PhotoDeluxe are bundled with many brands of digital cameras. Also encouraging, each of the companies produces a professional-level editing tool—Painter, Live Picture (a product of LivePix’s parent company), cook to aphic equivalent of a fr and Photoshop, respectively. But that’s where the similarities end; the three prod- ucts take very different approaches, with varying degrees of succes Dabbler Makes New Demands Art Dabbler is more an image enbancer than an image editor. Like Painter, it offers a host of natural-media tools and paper textures for embellishing your pho- tographs. If you get particularly ambi- tious, you can integrate a string of photos into a simple flip-book animation. But the feature of most interest to digital-camera buffs is cloning: Art Dabbler lets you take any tool and use it to paint an image onto a blank canvas. With only a modicum of drawing experienc photograph into a pencil s coal drawing, or an impressionistic paint- ing. It's a lot of fun, and the results can be downright charming. I do have two complaints about Art Dabbler. First, its outrageous hardware requirements exclude many of the artistic novices it’s meant to appeal to. While its predecessor, Dabbler 2.0, cost $20 more, it ran speedily on a 68030 Mac and required just 4MB of application RAM; Art Dabbler requires a Power Mac and a , you can convert a etch, a char- REAL RATINGS OUTSTANDING: Reviews you can trust: Macworld rates only final shipping products, not prototypes. What we review is what you can actually buy. VERY GOOD: coop: FLAWED: UNACCEPTABLE: ¢ 30 April 1998 MACWORLD staggering 12MB of application RAM. ‘This might be OK if your more-powerful hardware bought you access to more- powerful features, but it doesn’t—Art Dabbler 2.1.1 is functionally identical to Dabbler 2.0, ‘The CD comes with some extras, including plug-ins from the Kai’s Power Tools collec- tion, but not so much as a sin- gle command in the core application has changed. Second, Art Dabbler isn’t much more than a subset of Painter, Its only unique fea= tures are the online guides adapted from the old Walter Foster drawing libra proud owner of the original Animation book by Preston Blair—the Disney artist who created the dancing hipp the movie Fantasia—I'm par- tial to these online adapta- tions (see “Back to Basics”). However, I would have welcomed a few more features catering specifically to beginning artists. None of which is to say that Art Dab- bler isn’t worth $49; even a subset of Painter's capabilities makes for a pretty nifty program. Still, [can't help but imag- ine what MetaCreations’ clever program- mers could have done with Art Dabbler if y had tried harder to remember how it felt when they learned to draw. Night of the Living Pix If Art Dabbler is more of a painting pro- gram than an image editor, LivePix is more of an illustration program. LivePix lets you merge and edit images inside an independent project file, ensuring that you never harm a pixel of the original images. Every image in the project is treated as.a separate object, selections are defined as point-by-point paths, and a line of text remains editable from one session to the next, When it saves the finished composition as an image file, LivePix re terizes the images at a new resolution. In short, LivePix is a miniature ver- sion of Live Picture. But while this object-oriented approach makes sense for editing large images—say, more than 1OMB—it actually slows down the process of editing IMB digital-camera files. When you import an image into your project, LivePix generates an inter- polated proxy so the image looks its best on sereen. Any time you zoom in or out, Back to Basics s in original Animation guide (circa second grade, left), so naturally I'm all for the electronic edition built into Art Dabbler (right). Other- wise, Art Dabbler is merely a subset of Painter's capabilities. LivePix has to redraw each and every object to produce a smooth screen pre- view. If you select a portion of an image and then paste it into the project, LivePix treats the selection as an editable clipping path so you can mask or unmask portions | spent my formative years pawing Preston Blair's of the original image later. This makes for a lot of heavy-duty computations. On a PowerPC 730 machine, a typical compo- jon with six or seven elements routinely takes 30 seconds or more to display on screen, compared with a second or two in a standard image editor. If all of this strikes you as a bit com- plicated for a $49 consumer application, you've anticipated my next complaint: Most professional artists have a hard time figuring out Live Picture, and LivePix in its own small way is every bit as obtuse, Here’s a program that’s bundled with such entry-level products as Panasonic’s Cool- Shot camera and Epson’s Stylus Photo printer, yer it requires a Power Mac and 20MB of application RAM. (For what it’s worth, I encountered frequent low-inem- ory errors until I raised the memory par- tition to 24MB.) LivePix suppresses the standard Macintosh scroll bars, requiring you to switch to a hand tool when you want to scroll. Meanwhile, you can’t access the hand tool from the keyboard, an ease-of-use convention thar dates hack to MacPaint, Drag-and-drop support is limited to applications that support OLE 2.0, thus ruling out the Finder and just about every mainstream program with- out the word Microsoft in its title. Although LivePix is object-dependent, there's no way ro examine the stacking order of objects in a palette—making the program harder to use than Live Picture in this respect. Finally, LivePix has a known conflict with Mac OS 8.0: if the System-Wide Platinum Appearance option is active, LivePix crashes during start-up. The upshot is that while LivePix might seem a real bargain to a proficient artist—you can buy 80 copies of LivePix for what it cost to buy the original Live Picture—I had an easier time getting to first base with Photoshop. It’s hard to imagine a product less suited to the needs of week- end image editors. Shedding Light on the Darkroom While PhotoDeluxe draws freely on Photoshop's capabilities—many of its fil- ters are lifted directly from the image edi- tor cum laude—PhotoDeluxe manages to go its own way in no uncertain terms. Although I don’t altogether agree with its approach, PhotoDeluxe makes consider- able efforts to meet the needs of first-time pixel polishers. Like LivePix, PhotoDeluxe offers a lery feature to help you organize your ages. (With a gallery, you can pick and choose from hundreds of images dis- played as thumbnails.) But unlike LivePix, PhotoDeluxe launches a separate pro- gram, Storm Technology's EasyPhoto, every time you access the gallery. The good news is that EasyPhoto is substan- tially more capable than LivePiy’s gallery feature. To add an entire folder of image: to the gallery, you just drag the folder from the Finder and drop it into Easy- Photo; in LivePix, you must laboriously load an image at a time. The bad news is that the interaction between PhotoDe- luxe and EasyPhoto is a bit clumsy. By default, EasyPhoto wants to save its gal- leries to one folder, and PhotoDeluxe insists on opening them from another. If you're a novice, this design quirk makes for considerable con! When it comes time to edit images, PhotoDeluse holds your hand and walks you through the process (see “Magical Pixel Tour”). Imagine a Microsoft-type wizard that doesn’t treat the user like a mindless dweeb, and you have an idea of how PhotoDeluxe works. Say you want to remove a telephone line that drops down into your otherwise gorgeous sunset picture. When you click on the Remove Elements button, Photo- Deluxe displays three index cards pre- senting three steps: select the offending phone wire, clone it away, and exit the continues www.macworld.com April 1998 34 Remove Elements mode. Not only are the steps as easy as pie, but the selection and cloning tools actually surpass their equivalents in Photoshop for sheer usabil- ity, And it’s entirely up to you if you want | Reviews its hardware requirements, but even its minimum requirements of a 68040 with 16MB of RAM place it well outside the reach of many home users. But enough ranting, If you have the hardware, Art Dabbler is a diverting tool for enhancing your digital scrapbook, and PhotoDeluxe is a fine intro- duction to the world of image editing. My only concern is that both programs have rela- tively low feature ceili If you're the kind of per- son who catches on pretty quickly, you're likely to get frustrated with Art Dabbler and PhotoDeluxe after about year. For $49, a year of use ‘Magical Pixel Tour If you so desire, PhotoDeluxe will walk you through every process step-by-step. Here, I've asked PhotoDeluxe to help me crop an image down to its most essential elements— namely, the three kids looking up at the fireworks to perform the steps or not. PhotoDeluxe gives you a leg up, but you're always the one in control. PhotoDeluxe gets big points for ease of use, but I wish I could do more with it. There’s no way to lighten or darken the medium colors in an image (the so-called gamma), making it almost impossible to correct brightness prop- erly. And when sharpening the focus of an image, you have no control over the intensity of the . Both of these exceedingly important operations could have been handled very simply with- out burdening novices with unintel- ligible controls. Macworld's Buying Advice At the risk of sounding like a grizzled old curmudgeon, I must say that T remember a time when programmers took special care to make their software compatible with low-end machines. As late as 1992, for example, every major graphics program listed the Mac Phus— by then seven years old—as its mini- mum system requirement. ‘Today, even $49 consumer products refuse to run on a four-year-old Quadra, Let’s face it, there’s simply no excuse for the fact that Photoshop runs just peachy on a PowerBook 540c, but Art Dabbler and LivePix—which are perhaps 10 percent as capable—won’t even launch. Photo- Deluxe is considerably more realistic in 32 April 1998 MACWORLD a pretty reasonable deal, Bur if T were just starting out, I would go with the $149 Color It 3.2 from Micro- Frontier (see “Tweak It,” November 1997), It’s more expensive, but it’s also several times more powerful than PhotoDeluxe and runs on a 68030 processor with just 2MB of RAM. Now that’s what I call a low-end image editor —peKe mecLeLLAND Art Dabbler 2.1.1 RATING: $94 PROS: Turns photos into painter- {y artwork; includes online drawing guides. CONS: Excessive hardware requirements; little more than a subset of Painter's capabilities, COMPANY: Meta- Creations (805/566-6200, www.metacreations com). LIST PRICE: $49, LivePix 1.1 RATING: $# PROS: No chance of harming orig- inal image files; fully editable text. CONS: Exces- sive hardware requirements; poky screen redraw; complicated, awkward interface; OS 8 conflict, COMPANY: The LivePix Company (415/908- 1067, wwwlivepix.com), LIST PRICE: $49. PhotoDeluxe 2.0 RATING: $4# PROS: Flexible gallery feature: walks novice users step-by-step through image manipulation. CONS: Limited capabilities; inter- mittent interface display problems. COMPANY: Adobe Systems (408/536-6000, com). LIST PRICE: $49, www.adobe SECOND LOOK QuickMail Office 1.0.2 UPDATE PLUGS SECURITY HOLES — UR RECENT REVIEW OF QUICK- Mail Office 1.0 (see Reviews, Feb- ruary 1998) reported two serious security problems, along with C Software's promise to fix those problems in an upcoming release. After posting a temporary fix to its Web site to mitigate some of the security risk, CE in mid-January released version 1.0.2, with complete fixes for all known security problems. In addition to these fixes, the update adds several useful functional and performance enhancemen A new set of TCP/P security prefer- ences resolves the security hole that let out- siders reprogram mail filters remotely vin e- ges; you can list the specific IP addresses that can change filters remotely, preventing abuse by outsiders. A second security problem let junk-mail distributors station to pass junk mail to other network: A new set of controls parches that hole by limiting mail relaying to a list of domain names and IP addresses you specify. In addition, this version improves the filters’ overall security by sending alert m when it detects attempts to breach st Functional enhancements include the ability to list subsets of users in list win- dows, locate users in a list by typing their first names, and initiate mail retrieval by using the Unix “finger” protocol, Perfor- mance improvements speed up mail pro- cessing significantly and increase the number of attempts the server makes when delivering mail to offline users. Macworld's Buying Advice CE. Soft- ware responded quickly and responsibly to our report of security problems, and our testing found version 1.0.2’ fixes very effe tive at blocking server attacks by outsiders. This update makes QuickMail Office a first-rate Internet mail server.—Mmet Beckman RATING: $949 PROS: ETRN, for nondedicated server connections; POP3 bridge; list server, client- setup wizard; fax and pager gateways, CONS: Weak remote administration; requires PowerPC computer. COMPANY: CE Software (515/221- 1801, www.cesoft.com). LIST PRICE: Five users, $380; 25 users, $1,200; 100 users, $4,000. Introducing P2C2” the PANTONE Personal Color Calibrator™ HOW THE WORLD AGREES ON WHAT IT SEES | Achieve perfect color balance in less than 3 minutes! Finally, an | inexpensive and easy way to match your on-screen images to your printed output and the Internet, too. The P2C? color calibrator couldn't be simpler to use; just install the software and answer a few simple questions about the way you see color. P@C? then creates sophisticated color profiles (ICC’) for you. Suddenly, and without compromise, your printed images look exactly like they did on your screen, precisely the way you designed them. fon Personal Color Calibrator’ PANTONE Personal Color Calibrator To order: Works wit 1 Win5/NT and all maj ate call 888-PANTONE $9 or visit www.pantone.com. PANTONE “ICC profiles are the powerulindusty standards for color calibration and matching between ditferent devices. All trademarks (TM) and registered trademarks (@) used herein are either he property of Pantone, Inc., Sonnetech, Ltd. or other companies. Process color reproduction may not match PANTONE®-identified solid color standards. Refer to current PANTONE Color Publications for the accurate color. © Pantone, Inc., 1997. Circle 15 onreader service card | Reviews PowerBook G3 SPEED CHAMP NEEDS TWO HANDS, TOO MUCH MONEY ESPITE COMPETITION FROM the PC-laptop world, Apple Computer still makes the fastest laptop on earth: the PowerBook G3. By a happy coincidence, the speedy PowerPC 750 chip inside Apple’ popular G3 desktop machines gives 0 very little heat, making ita natural for use ina laptop. The resulting PowerBook is identical to the heavy, luxurious Power- Book 3400 (see Revi May 1997) in every respect except one: the PowerBook G3 is nearly twice as fast. How can this be? After all, the G3’s cial megahertz rating is “only” 250 (compared with the PowerBook 3400's 240MHz rating). But the new model's faster circuitry, bigger/faster/closer high- speed memory cache, and superior PowerPC 750 design make this new PowerBook blow past its predecessor— and all of its Pentium rivals. The G3 comes decked out with top- of-the-line extras. The SGB hard drive ought to keep Adobe Photoshop gurus happy for a while (especially since it’s 38 percent faster than previous PowerBook drives). The 20x CD-ROM is also a bump. up from past offerings (although the “x” numb s cial discs are generally mastered to play on 4X drives, max). According to Apple, the PowerBook G3 glorious 12.1-inch screen up- dates itself 74 percent faster than the PowerBook 3400's, and there's more video RAM— enough to fill an 832-by-624- pixel monitor at the “millions: of colors” setting or a 1,024- by-768 screen at “thousands.” Otherwise, the Power- Book G3 is the same as the 3400, warts and all. You still n't display a different image on an external monitor, and even with all that VRAM, you can’t set the PowerBook’s own screen to anything higher than “thou- sands of colors.” You still get four speak- ers, a two-hour battery, and an ingenious ‘thernet/33.6-Khps-modem jack that accepts whichever connection you plug in: LOBase'T cable or phone line. And as before, you can exchange the floppy drive and CD-ROM unit—plus VST Zip drives (see the review elsewhere in is mostly meaningless—commer- 7100/80 has a SpeedMark score of 1.0 ‘Apple Power Macintosh G3/266 tower — ‘Apple Power Macintosh G3/233 desktop > Apple PowerBook G3/250 Apple PowerBook 3400c/240 ‘Apple PowerBook 240/180 SpeedMark - 5 es —— SL 0S — - C= this issue) and other add-ons—without ving to put the laptop to sleep. Macworld's Buying Advice Faster than most desktop Macs, this lap- top requires little lowering of expecta tions; once it’s in front of you on a stur- dy-legged table, using this machine is pure joy. Productivity applications—even Microsoft Office 98—launch nearly instantaneously, Web pages appear as fast as they download (despite the built-in modem’s lack of 56.6-Kbps speed), and even games get a kick from this high- horsepower multimedia dec But the G3 is a behemoth; at 8 pounds (with CD-ROM and power plug), lugging this thing around is like hauling a barbell in your briefcase. If you've ever handled Apple’s sleek, ultralight winne the PowerBook 2400¢, you'll find that the requirement to lift the G3 with two strong hands is especially disappointing. And then there’ the price: you'd be nuts to pay $5,700, especially when sources are saying that one of Apple’s new PowerBooks, slated for April, will of the same speed, a slimmer case, a larger screen, a faster modem, and a battery with longer life—for $2,000 less. (See “New Laptops on Course,” Nes, March 1998.) In other words, owning a PowerBook G3 is highly recommended, but baying one isn’t.—DAviD POGUE RATING: $84 PROS: Awesome speed; bright 12.1-inch screen; built-in Ethernet/modem jack CONS: Heavy; limited video features; too ex- pensive. COMPANY: Apple Computer (408/ 996-1010, www.powerbook.apple.com). LIST PRICE: $5,700. PowerBook G3: Apple's Speediest Portable Yet a Best overall performance. Longer bars are better, Bold indicates best results in a specific test. » New system. An Apple Power Macintosh CPU | OFPU Disk | Video [se_[-a7_[ as | 7a 5 | a1 | 25 | 67 39_|_39_|23 | _aa_] (oan laa ae 23 teas a] Behind Our Tests supervised by Gil Loyola 34 April 1998 MACWORLD For detailed information on our systems benchmarks, see Mac Superguide, September 1997, or www.macworld.com/tests/—Macworld Lab testing This EPS image was printed on an inkjet without StyleScript This EPS image was printed on an inkjet with StyleScript The difference always raises a lot of eyebrows If you've been using your inkjet to print EPS For only $99, you'll be able to print: clip art and graphics, you've probably seen the @ crisp clean EPS images “jaggies”. StyleScript is an easy to use solution @ sharp PostScript fonts at any size ; that eliminates jaggies by turning your printer @ improved screen/dither patterns Adobe PostScript into a genuine Adobe PostScript printer. @ more accurate color StyleScript supports inkjets from Apple, Canon, Epson, and Hewlett-Packard. StyleScript turns your inkjet into a genuine Adobe PostScript printer NOW supports the Call now: 800-865-5501 Canon 4550, featuring or come visit us: www. infowave.net “3” tabloid-size printing : - “Sepyee ela StyleScript. Circle 32 on reader service card [Reviews Dreamweaver DYNAMIC HTML NO LONGER JUST A DREAM HE NEW DYNAMIC HTML technologies supported by Net- scape Navigator 4.0 and Micro- soft Internet Explorer 4.0 offer some exciting new capabilities— cascading style sheets, absolute position- ing, and JavaScript-based animation, to name a few—but they require a lot of complicated programming. Macromedia's Dreamweaver 1.0 is the first major pro- gram that lets you use DHTML while shielding you from its underlying com- plexities. Dreamweaver’s design capabi ties and respect for clean HTML should bring smiles to the faces of designers and code geeks alike, DHTML Dynamo In Dreamweaver you create DHTML animations by placing text and images on movable layers that can fly across the screen. You can then manipulate those layers in a Timeline Inspector reminis- cent of that in Macromedia Director. The program includes several behaviors, canned JavaScripts that automate com- mon tasks. Adding behaviors is easy: you simply select text or an image and choose the desired behavior from a palette, and Dreamweaver adds the appropriate Java- Script to the page. If you know how to program in JavaScript, you can create your own behaviors. Dreamweaver provides very good support for cascading style sheets. You can define text styles that can then be used throughout your document, or you can create external style sheets that are refer- enced by all pages in your site; changing a style definition automatically changes all instances of that style. While other programs position text and images precisely on a page by creat- ing complex tables, Dreamweaver uses the much cleaner DHTML absolute positioning. But because absolute posi- tioning works only in version 4,0 browsers (which fewer than half of Inter- net users have), it’s easy to create pages that look great in current browsers and awful in last year’s model. And aside from its DHTML features, Dreamweaver isn’t as capable a design tool as competitors like GoLive’s CyberStudio or NetOb- 36 April 1998 MACWORLD jects Fusion; in this respect it bears a clos- er resemblance to the simpler Claris Home Page. One nice feature in Dreamweaver is Roundtrip HTML: you can edit a page either graphically or in the HTML source code, without having the graphic editor rewrite changes made in the HTML. source code as competing programs do. Compared with other programs, Dream- New Arrivals Dreamweaver's animation support brings a Director-style Timelines window to Web- page design. Each image in the top frame is flying into the frame under the timeline’s control weaver generates tight, clean HTML that’s easy to edit by hand. A good HTML source editor is built in, as is Bare Bones Software’s BBEdit 4.5. Buttons in both programs let you bounce back and forth easily between the two. In an attempt to generate pages that work in most browsers, Dreamweaver writes extra HTML and JavaScript that takes into account the differences between Navigator and Internet Explor- er. Most of the time the program succeeds admirably at this difficult task; it checks your pages’ syntax against browser pro- files and generates a report listing the fea- tures of your site that will cause errors. The Wrong Tool for Site Architects Dreamweaver is good at building pages but weak when it comes to building sites. Unlike CyberStudio and Fusion, it offers minimal site-management capabilities; it simply maintains a site on a local drive that’s an exact duplicate of the site on the remote server, checking the server peri- odically for changes. If you accidentally breaka link, Dreamweaver won't help you find it or fix it automatically, And clicking on a link to another page in your site—a good way to check links—doesn’t open that page. In addition, the program lacks a graphical site overview showing links between pages. On the other hand, Dreamweaver has an innovative system for managing group collaboration on a Web site, something that’s notably missing in competing pro- grams: it locks files that a user has “checked out,” preventing someone else from changing them at the same time. That keeps, say, an art director from mod- ifying a page to which a coder is adding JavaScript behaviors. Dreamweaver’s performance is fine in some areas but mediocre in others. The Site window, for example, shows both the remote and local copies of a site, so every time you open a local page there’ a delay while Dreamweaver checks the remote site for changes. The program is also a bit of a RAM hog, asking for 17MB of memory (although 20MB is preferable). Asa complex, professional-level tool, the PowerPC-only Dreamweaver re- quires significant time to master. Getting up to speed would be easier if the printed documentation were better—the skimpy user manual is accompanied by HTML and Shockwave help files that are exten- sive but lack an index. The program also needs some interface refinement: the array of palettes can be bewildering, and you often need to open several dialog boxes to complete a task. Macworld's Buying Advice Dreamweaver's debut kicks off the next round of competition in the field of high- end Web page editors. If you’ve been looking to add DHTML to your sites but want to avoid the complexity of style sheets and JavaScript, Dreamweaver is a good choice. Just remember that if your users don’t have the latest browsers, many of Dreamweaver's flashy effects will be naught—rom necrino RATING: $§4'/2 PROS: Supports Dynamic HTML; excellent access to underlying HTML: includes BBEdit 4.5. CONS: Poor site manage- ment; needs better documentation; RAM hungry; quitky interface. 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What's more, it = e a : es ' Some : + OmniPage Guide provides easily converts your scanned pages into offers dramatic accuracy improvements comprehensive online help editable text and = ere = when you OCR poor- + Outputs to HTML 3.0, and more! : SS SS graphics in seconds, — |) avro Fae ae ee IP quality documents — - ecro=o ere) | Which means you can [fimareronenerr cope te stem terenpmnrenmr faxes, small text, quickly input text The AutoOCR Toolbar™ performs OCR with a single click. — skewed pages, into your favorite applications like Word, reversed-out type, bad copies and more. WordPerfe OmniPag , Excel and others. Don't settle for anything less than the Pro 8.0 is a quantum leap most accurate OCR in the world. Call — now to order, or visit your local reseller MacWEEK today. Who knows, they may even let you CANURAY 77 trade in your old keyboard. Sraniicéerecoen costes One wit dot Circle 69 on reader service card [Reviews Midrange Digital Cameras KODAK PROVES THE BEST OF A GOOD SUB-$1,000 BATCH F NOTHING ELSE, MACWORLD'S first roundup of digital cameras for 1998 proves that there’s no reason to put up with 640 by 480 pixels any- more. Of the four models discussed here, three sportan image resolution of at least 1,024 by 768 pixels (equivalent to the default resolution of a 19-inch monitor), and just one, the Panasonic CoolShot KXL-601A, tops out at 640 by 480 pixels (13-inch resolution). Yet despite the fact that the CoolShot provides fewer than 40 percent as many pixels as its competitors, its estimated street price of $599 is just $100 less than that of the first of the high-resolution models we'll look at, the Olympus D-320L. And for $300 more than the CoolShot, you purchase the Kodak DC210 with its brilliant array of 1,152 by 864 pixels (just shy of the resolution of a 21-inch moni- tor). Granted, $300 is nothing to sneeze at, but if you consider the price per pixel, the DC210 costs less than half as much as the CoolShot—and those cheaper pixels are in a heck of a lot better shape! One of Q's Lesser Efforts In the spirit of getting on with the good stuff, Pll dispense with the worst of the cameras first. The CoolShot KXL-601A is actually two pieces of hardware: a pock- et-size camera unit (sold separately for 399 as the KXL-600A) and a detachable LCD viewfinder. On its own, the KXL- 600A looks like the sort of sleek platinum spy camera that the fictional gadgetmeis- ter Q might have created for James Bond. But after a few hours of beta testing on the bad guys, 007 would have found plenty to beef about. The camera combines a wretchedly inaccurate viewfinder with poor image quality, It lacks but it’s utterly incapable of taking pictures under low-light conditions. And although the CoolShot is too dumb to automatically account for dra- matic variations in light and focus, it’s smart enough to scold you when you fail to anticipate the variations manually. I'd hate to be in Q’s shoes when James re- turns from “The Beepy Camera Mission.” The KXL-601A’s LCD attachment addresses the inaccurate viewfinder prob- lem, but it also doubles the camera's dimensions and weight. Without the LCD, the CoolShot is elegant but inept; with the LCD, it’s just plain clunky. As a final snub, Panasonic assumes you own a PC. If you want to attach the CoolShot to your Mac, you'll need to purchase the special KXL-D43 interface kit. For $59, you get a cable and a floppy disk. Not even archvillain Jaws gouges that deep! Pick a Camera, Any Camera In stark contrast to the CoolShot, the remaining devices are easily the three best digital cameras under $1,000 that I’ve seen, Naturally, each a has its own peculiar quirks, but it’s no exaggeration to say that you can’t go wrong with any of them. The Kodak DC210 earns the highest mouse rating, thanks to its supe- rior image quality, but if you find a good deal on the Olympus D-320L or Epson PhotoPC 600, then by all means, pur- chase without hesitation, amer: Digital Cameras Under $1,000 Company Epson America Kodak Olympus America Panasonic Product PhotoPC 600 pc210 0.3201 Coolshot KXL-601A Mouse rating we rr te " Estimated street price $699 $899 $699 $599 Phone number 310/782-0770 716/726-7260 516/84 Web address wwenepson.com worw kodak.com wwwwrolympus.com 201/348-7000 www.panason Dimensions 56x28x19 52%32% 19 50x26x18 10x5.3%27 (Wh dn inetes) (1.9 wide with LCD) Weight (with battens, in ounces) 3 a = 7.(93 with CO) ‘Maximum image size (in pixels) 1,024 x 768 1152x864 1,024 x 768 640 % 480 Default memory = ame aMB 28" 2a" Expandable media format CompactFlash ~ Compactflash SmartMedia ~ CompactFlash = Maximum storage capacity _ Ain images) 16 19 10 24 Closest focal distance (in inches) 8 es > 8 Optical com function no" yesQx) no = = Sullin flash/red-eye setting yes/no yes/yes = LCD preview and playback yes a 7 yes — Optical viewtinder a yes - yes yes ‘Adobe Photoshop acquire module no - yes no Rechargeable batteries with charger yes no 10 no = ‘Macintosh connectivity yes 525 extra yes S59 ena ~ * Expandable media; no on-board memory. 38 April 1998 MACWORLD Maximum image size, medium quality. 2x digital 200m only. The Olympus D-320L and Epson PhotoPC 600 are equivalent in a half- dozen respects, For starters, both cameras pture sharply focused, highly saturated images measuring 1,024 by 768 pixels. In fact, photographs taken with the two re virtually indistinguishable, tending toward slight yellow casts, Both cameras include an attached lens cover, minimizing your need to clean the lens ‘To turn the camera on, just open the lens nd away you go. And both cam- eras include Macintosh cables and soft- ware as part of the base package. But the PhotoPC 600 offers a hand- ful of noteworthy advantages over the D-320L. First, the PhotoPC 600 includes 4MB of on-board memory with optional expansion via CompactFlash cards (essen- tially miniature PC Cards). By contrast, the D-320L ships with 2MB of memory on awafer-thin SmartMedia card that you I ap out to expand. The Photo- PC 600 offers more compression options than the D-320L, and it’s the only mid- range camera that lets you shoot both in color and in black-and-white. In terms of camera controls, the PhotoPC 600 re- members its settings from one session to the next, something neither the D-320L nor Kodak’s DC210 do Another distinction is power. Epson bundles four rechargeable NiCd batter- ies and a compact charger with the PhotoPC 600; the other cameras ship with single-shot disposables. To make sure your batteries last a long time between charges, PhotoPC employs a more deliberate LCD design. You slide switch to activate the LCD screen, com- pa ssing a button on the D- may sound | distinction, but it means the D-320L’s LCD has a habit of turning on by itself and wasting precious battery power every camer: cover a to sv a minor time it’s pressed up against another object in your camera bag or brief King of the Midrange Pack Last year, I was one of the very few voices critical of Kodak's previous effort, the DC120 Zoom (Reviews, October 1997), and the excellent performance of the DC210 confirms my criticism. Kodak's new camera isn't merely more stable than its predecessor, it’s redesigned from the ground up. Where the older DC120 captured images to an 850-by- 984-pixel CCD and then interpolated the Still Life with Blowout Although | photographed this tire early one winter afternoon, the light was sutti- ciently low to set off the automatic flashes on all cameras but the CoolShot (A), which has no flash, The DC210 (8) produced the most vivid image, with the D-320L (C) and PhotoPC 600 (D) serving up slightly more muted colors. All three cameras