Macking 43

News from Macworld Expo

MacPlaystation
Connectix Corp. announced at Macworld that they have developed a Playstation emulator, which will allow all Sony Playstation games to run on Macs! If you have ever lamented the lack of games available, this will put an end to the shortfall once and for all.
Connectix will sell the emulator for about $99, and there is talk of a bundle deal with all future iMacs. Due to the demands the emulator makes on the hardware, the product will be recommended only for the 233/G3 or later machines (which, of course, includes the iMac).
There will probably be a lot of used first-generation G3s around because the new Macs are so hot that anyone who can afford to will upgrade to the new units. (I'm damn tempted!)
Connectix says Sony's legal department may well huff and puff, but the fact is that Sony loses money on every player they make, depending on game sales to make up the difference. The new emulator will increase the size of their potential market without costing them a penny. Still, you can bet that several dozen lawyers will be making the big bucks over the next few months. (Update: After Sony determined that the emulator had been developed "clean room," that is, without relying on any proprietary Sony code, they approved the emulator. Cost is $49.)

More and Cheaper iMacs
Apple cut the price to $1199 and boosted the processor to 266 and the hard drive to 6 gigs. They also introduced five new colors: Tangerine, Grape, Lime, Blueberry, and Strawberry. (The Blueberry is apparently Bondi Blue.) See them on Apple's page and soon to a retailer near you. The old iMacs are being remaindered at $999 or less.
Second Wave introduced a USB to SCSI converter for $79 which allows you to connect SCSI devices to the USP port. It runs at the maximum 12mbs that USB is capable of, which is about 1/4 the speed of normal SCSI, but it lets you continue to use your SCSI devices. The company also makes PCI and NuBus expansion chassis for those who need more than three slots. iMac users should be sure to bookmark the iMacintouch page.

Radical New Pro Macs
Meanwhile, the professional G3 systems are in a redesigned case, and start at $1599. The MOST you can spend is $2999. They come with built-in ATI RAGE 128 graphics accelerator, faster than the PC's Voodoo2 add-in. The case is smaller than the old minitower, yet has built-in 10/100Mbps Ethernet, USB and FireWire, which is much faster (400Mbps) and easier to administer than SCSI.
SCSI has actually been left off the motherboard, but a $50 PCI card from Apple should be available in February. For faster SCSI, get the Advanced System Products' model ABP970-UA card, which works fine under 8.5.1 and costs just under $100. Apple's card will (probably) NOT support booting from the external drive!
The case hinges open sideways, exposing the RAM slots and PCI slots, and even the first-time user should be able to perform their own RAM and card upgrades. Oh, yeah. No internal floppy drive, but Zip option, Jaz option, and external USB floppies are available. It also retains the ADB connector so you can use traditional keyboards and copy-protection dongles (which you should always avoid buying if possible and loudly protest if not).
The new Studio Displays, both CRT and LCD, are based on the new plastics, and look very iMackish. The 17" monitor is Mitsubishi Diamondtron ($499), a variation on the Trinitron design, and the 21" is a Trinitron ($1499) with built-in ColorSync and a USB hub. The 15" LCD model has been cut to $1099.
And, AT LAST, Apple has switched from their traditional monitor connectors to the industry-standard VGA connector. Since there was NO advantage to the old connector, good riddance to the annoying adapters that we needed when we wanted to plug in a non-Apple monitor.
Be sure to visit Macintouch, Apple and MacOSRumors for all the latest info, especially regarding USP peripherals, bug fixes and options for the new Macs. There are a lot of them out there.
But whatever you do, DO NOT ACTUALLY BUY ONE OF THE NEW G3s until at least a month has passed, unless you are just buying for fun. There will be a period of adjustment as the inevitable bugs and incompatibilities are worked out.

SpaceSaver/Eudora conflict
Part of StuffIt 5.0, SpaceSaver causes loss of data files when it compresses Eudora's mailboxes. Remove this version before launching Eudora. I recommend you do not use SpaceSaver at all, unless your hard drive is just packed and you cannot afford to get a bigger one. This problem has been going on a long time, both with earlier versions of SpaceSaver, and an old program called AutoDoubler. The idea of transparent compression and decompression on the fly seemed like a good idea back when 100 megs was a large HD, but it was plagued with the slow 680x0 processors and data glitches. Best to simply stay away from all auto-compress applications and just compress your files when you want to archive or email them. Aladdin's True Finder Integration extension is also the cause of many problems for people; best disable that as well.

Avoid MacWarehouse
A letter recently showed up here at ComputerBits that detailed horrid treatment by one of the major Mac catalog retailers, MacWarehouse. I didn't run it in the printed version of this column (in fact, the naming of MacWarehouse was deleted), but it was sufficiently thought out, with pertinent references and dates, that I passed it along to my own client list. I figure that there has to be some truth to it because of all the verifiable details within.
Companies should know that if they treat anyone poorly, especially after a 2nd and 3rd try to get satisfaction, the Net will know about it within days. Even if the majority of MacWarehouse's customers have no trouble, there is always that chance it could happen to you, and nothing is more difficult that trying to get problems resolved by an out-of-town company. After posting that message to my list, I got back some stories from others who had trouble, too.
Moral: Stay away from MacWarehouse, and whenever anyone does a bad job of serving a paying customer, first try to get satisfaction through the regular channels. If things aren't made right, then let the world know.

Really obscure bug
I had been battling a strange bug I had thought was an 8.5 incompatibility, but just learned otherwise. The problem hits PageMaker 5 and 6 and causes the pages to be squashed into a single horizontal line across the center of the window, rulers and all. If I start with the shift key down, no problem. But when I turned off all extensions in the Extensions Manager, the problem was still there.
So I fired up my trusty copy of Netscape and made my way over to the place all us consultants go when we need answers like this: MacFixIt. This site is run by the author of "Bombs, Sad Macs and other Disasters," a useful reference book for every Macker.
The answer? An extension installed by IXMicro, the makers of IXTV, a television/video card I use for video input. The extension is called "ixTV vdig Extension" and it does not show up in Extensions Manager! Since the extension is needed only when capturing video, not when just watching television, I manually disabled it until needed. A thousand thanks, MacFixIt.
But guess what else: I discovered that if I merely launch IXTV, it leaves some corruption in RAM after it quits that causes the PM problem again. I have to restart to clear it out. Their tech department says this is not expected behavior and recommends I remove all pieces of the software and reinstall, and remove the extension right away. I will do that; if you have a similar problem, just email me and I will let you know the results.

More on 8.5
I have been getting varied reports from people who are using and liking 8.5 (and the upgrade to 8.5.1; got yours yet?) but the pros are all in agreement: Stick with 8.1, possibly until 8.6 is released in spring.
It is still too glitchy when in a production environment, especially when you come to depend on certain 3rd party extensions and panels to enhance your work. As yet, there are no updates to Suitcase 3.0.1 (which sort of works) or ATM Deluxe/Type Reunion Deluxe (which don't), or to Now Contact/Up-To-Date aka Eudora Planner, which is still in beta and still being excoriated by the people who try out the public beta. Now Contact works, but the extensions for both do NOT work - they just crash the machine - and I am not satisfied with Consultant. So I am in limbo right now, with no Reminder program to let me know when I should do things like answer the PMUG machine or give the cat his flea treatments.
Other Mac techies in town tell me they are sticking with 8.1 too; running it only to learn enough to help their clients debug problems. Me, I am using it pretty much all the time but all I ever run are net apps, PageMaker (see above), Quicken 98, and a bunch of utilities. When I must, I have my old 8.1 volume to return to.

Mac and Y2K
Are we safe? The short answer is yes, because the system clock has been 4-digit capable since the original 128. But not all programmers took advantage of the system clock, which means that there are programs that will break at the change. There is a site that is tracking non-compliant software and they encourage reports from users. You can also hit the Will It Work database to see if specific applications are compliant. They claim to have the largest database of applications to search.

Slow Global Village startup
Do you use your Global Village modem to do a lot of faxing? Do you archive your sent and received faxes? As the numbers mount up, the time it takes for the Global Fax extension to load at startup increases proportionally. The answer is to open the Received Faxes and Spooled faxes folders, copy the contents to a backup somewhere (on or off your hard drive) and then empty the folders. The folders are located in the GlobalFax Files folder inside the Global Village folder, inside the Preferences folder, in the System Folder. Keep them empty and you will get a quicker startup sequence.

The Microsoft/Apple investment
Well, it's 1.5 years along since Steve Jobs announced the $150 million investment in Apple stock by Microsoft, and .5 years remaining until that non-voting stock gains voting rights. Unless someone buys that away from MS, the future of the MacOS is in the least desirable hands it could be.
The best thing that could happen from a Macker's perspective is that MS be split into separate companies, one for system software, and another for applications. Then there would be no motivation to suppress development of Mac apps, especially all the little ones we never see (like the Timex DataBank watch, written under contract by MS) because the profitability of MSApp would not depend on MSWind. They would even be forced to write software that could compete on a level field with other developers. What an idea.
A conspiracy theorist called the Limbaugh show a while back (bet you didn't know I listened to Mr. L, did you? He's a Macker, too.) and suggested that Gates wants Microsoft broken up but he can't do it himself because there would be uncontrollable ramifications. But if he is "forced," then he can happily preside over two companies and probably make even more money.
But with Apple in his pocket where it really counts, the only guy fighting Gates directly is Sun's Scott McNeally. We can cheer him on, because the success of Sun in no way impedes the success of Apple and the MacOS. A Java competitor to Excel would find a lot of willing customers, I'm sure.

The iMac Apple Loan
Apple is offering iMacs with a low-interest loan; however some buyers at CompUSA in other cities have been having problems with lack of training; managers who don't know what is going on, and Windows machines that cannot print PDF files which contain the loan application.
One reader of Macintouch (where the problem is detailed) is a CompUSA employee and he suggests going to the Business Sales counter because it is more likely that the process works there than at the consumer checkout area.
I don't know if Portland has any of these problems; people I have talked to who bought from there, and others who work there, say things are handled well and smoothly. One sales agent moved 48 iMacs on the day I was over there. But if you are reading this in some other city, follow the suggestion to get your iMac from the Business Sales window, especially if you want the Apple loan program.
Of course you can also get your iMac from PowerMax, The Computer Store, and Power Mac Pac, along with the online Apple Store and all the catalog retailers, too.

Curing Windows Viruses with Macs
An issue of the EvangeList reports on a Windows user who had a floppy infected with a virus that could not be removed. Since the only choice was to reformat and lose the data, he instead took the disk home to his Mac, inserted it into his floppy drive and copied the data onto his HD. He then reformatted the floppy as a 1.4-meg DOS disk (a standard option when you are running PC Exchange) and copied the data back on. Presto, a virus-free disk with the files in perfect shape. The article did not say anything about files infected with the Word macro virus, but in WinWorld those are only a part of the galaxy of diseases that plague the platform. Macro viruses are the only ones that Macs can catch from Windows files, and they do not work outside of Word/Excel. Telling a Mac to "Format:C drive" is like telling your car to brew coffee. (It can, but you need a plug-in.)

No Microsoft products were used in the production of this column.

email mp at moonmac dot com. (I took out the mailto link because that's how the spammers find me.)