• AppleTIL Updates (Wednesday_02.17.99)
   58265 System 7.5 Version 7.5.3: Available for Download
   MOD 7144 Obtaining Apple Product Support in the USA
   MOD 24800 AppleShare IP 6: Windows Client Troubleshooting
   MOD 17484 Macintosh 630: TV Tuner Card only for U.S.
   MOD 58244 Apple Software Order Center: How to Contact
   MOD 18836 Open Transport 1.0.8: Applications Compatibility Q & A (3/96)
   MOD 18835 Open Transport 1.0.8: Network Planning & Admin Q & A
   MOD 24415 AppleShare IP 5.x: Release History
   MOD 19010 QuickDraw GX 1.1.3: Urgent Read Me
   MOD 18840 Open Transport 1.0.8 and Servers Q & A
   MOD 18230 PowerBook Modem & Telecom: Frequently Asked Questions
   MOD 19080 Macintosh PowerBook 2300 Series Computer Read Me
   MOD 18839 Open Transport 1.0.8 and Cross-Platform Issues Q & A
   MOD 15724 Remote Access MultiPort Server:Quadra 840av Needs 2.0.1
   MOD 18889 PowerBook 190 Series: Read Me
   MOD 18471 Open Transport: Brief Review of Releases and Updates
   MOD 18050 GeoPort 2.1 Telecom Adapter: Read Me
   MOD 18448 Open Transport 1.0.7: Read Me
   MOD 18834 Open Transport 1.0.8: Availability & Distribution Q & A
   MOD 34029 Color StyleWriter 6500: Installing Windows Driver
   MOD 58280 About Your Wide Ultra2 Dual Channel SCSI Card
   NEW 24816 Power Macintosh G3: Confirming Video Output Using TV Mirroring
   NEW 58281 Power Macintosh G3 (Blue and White): How do I Open the Special Offers File?
   NEW 58282 Power Macintosh G3 (Blue & White): AppleWorks 5 Redraw Issue
• Newer MAXpowr G3 1.3.7 [drivers for G3 processor cards for PCI, L2C & G3 Macs.] (NewerTech)
• Interex USB Scrolling Mouse 1.0 [driver for the USB mouse] (Interex)
• Apple, Compaq, Matsushita(Panasonic), Philips, Sony and Toshiba Announce Support for IEEE1394 and Plans to Form Patent Pool [Apple Computer, Inc...Toshiba Corporation today announced their support of the high-speed IEEE1394 digital interface and their intention to form a patent pool to efficiently license patents required to implement the standard.] (Yahoo)
• MacWorld Won't Return to Boston [The popular MacWorld computer trade show won't be returning to Boston, costing the city millions of dollars in lost tourism revenue, organizers said Tuesday.] (Yahoo)
• eGain Communications Offers Discount to Apple Computer Developers [eGain(TM) Communications Corp., a leading developer of customer service solutions for electronic commerce, today announced it has extended a discount to Apple developers through the Apple Developer Connection program.] (Yahoo)
• Maxell Offers SuperDisk Media Solution For New Apple iMac Users [Maxell Corporation of America's Data Storage Group is expanding its growing family of SuperDisk(TM) solutions to include high-capacity diskettes for users of Apple Computer's popular new Macintosh iMac computers.] (Yahoo)
• Pinacor Adds New Apple-Complementary Hardware and Software Suppliers to its Distribution Offerings [Pinacor, Inc., a leading distributor of technology products and services, recently signed new Apple-complementary suppliers, including Aladdin Systems, Ariston Technologies, Aspyr Media, Inc., Bestware, Bungie Software Products Corporation, Casady & Greene, Dantz Development Corporation, Logicware, MacAlly, miroDisplays, Inc., Savant Interactive, and STF Technologies] (Yahoo)
• Industry Luminaries to Keynote Harvard Business School's Cyberposium '99 [Harvard Business School's High Tech & New Media Club announced today two industry luminaries will keynote Cyberposium '99.] (Yahoo)
• Boca Research First to Ship Internal Modem for Apple's New Power Macintosh G3 Minitowers [Boca Research, Inc. today announced the immediate availability of the TelePort(tm) Internal 56K Fax/Modem for new Apple(R) Power Macintosh(R) G3 minitowers. The TelePort Internal 56K Fax/Modem is a COM slot modem that fits into the modem port located on the motherboard;Now Shipping Global Village TelePort Internal 56K Fax/Modem] (Yahoo)
• Sigma Designs Announces REALmagic DVD Playback for the Macintosh [Sigma Designs, Inc., a leader in DVD/MPEG-2 decoder technology, announced today that it has selected Wired, Inc. as a development partner for the Macintosh platform...Collaboration With Wired, Inc. Opens New Market Opportunity.] (Yahoo)
• Polaroid to Debut Record Number of New Products and Innovations in Instant, Conventional, Digital And Computer Imaging at PMA '99 [Polaroid will unveil more than 15 consumer and commercial imaging products at the Photo Marketing Association International Annual Convention and Trade Show opening tomorrow at the Las Vegas Convention Center...Introduces New Product Category-Polaroid I-Zone-for Kids and Teens] (Yahoo)
• Tegu Software Ships PicServe 1.2 for Six Server Platforms [Tegu Software, LLC. announces the immediate release of PicServe(TM) 1.2, the first Web-RIP(TM) for Internet web graphics.] (Yahoo)
• Extensis Corporation Announces Portfolio Web Edition [Extensis Corporation today announced Portfolio Web Edition...includes Portfolio 4.0 digital asset management software and the Portfolio Web server plug-in tool that enable businesses to provide digital media including images, logos, photographs, documents, audio, or animations to users, partners and customers over the Internet.] (Yahoo)
• YARC Announces Order for Dual Processor HYDRA Boards [YARC Systems announced that it has received an OEM order for 50 HYDRA boards valued in excess of $150,000.] (Yahoo)
• Java Developer's Journal Announces LEIF as the Winner of the Editor's Choice Framework Award at the Java Business Expo [DTAI, Inc. has been selected by the Java Developer's Journal as the winner of the 1998 Editor's Choice Framework Award for the Lightweight Extensible Information Framework. The decision was announced on December 8 at the Java Business Expo in New York.] (Yahoo)
• IBM bringing more advances to chips [IBM is looking to introduce its "silicon-on-insulator" technology to its microprocessors for servers and desktops by early next year and, in effect, achieve a technological edge over Intel.] (News.Com)
• iMacs: Color Japanese retailers mad [Apple's colorful iMacs may be appealing to fashion conscious computer users, but Japanese retailers are finding the rainbow of configurations to be a hassle, according to a report.] (News.Com)
• Acrobat flexes new muscles [Publishing software firm Adobe Systems today unveiled the latest version of its document exchange and creation tool Acrobat] (News.Com) [note: according to reports on the web, the majority of new features and enhancements will not be available in the Mac version - just the Windows version!] (Carmine)
• Symantec offers more protection [Symantec has announced the latest version of its data repair and back-up tool Norton Utilities.] (News.Com)
• Chips Ahoy [Sony unveils its new PlayStation super-chip and wows an annual gathering of leading processor designers.] (Wired)
• The Net rules on college campuses [New study says college students are wearing out their mice-spending more and more time online.] (ZDnet)

ATI tells me they intend for the Rage128 Orion and Nexus 128 to ship at roughly the same time next month. They also have posted a Mac Rage128 FAQ at their site.

Jon Patterson sent a note that CompUSA today has 13.6GB Maxtor drives for $229.99, with the $30 mail in rebate (limited time offer I think), that's a net cost of $199.99.

Farallon has a press release on their new fiber converter for 100Base-TX devices. The Fast EtherTX-FX™ Media Converter easily connects 100Base-TX Fast Ethernet switches and hubs with unshielded twisted pair copper cabling to 100Mb fiber cabling. USA estimated street price is $299.

Powerlogix has now released AutoCache beta 3 at: http://www.powerlogix.com/support/betasoftware.html

Mouseworks v5.5 & Myth: Bob Van Burkleo replied to an earlier post on v5.5:

" Maybe if you are using Microsoft Office, but not if you are playing Bungie's Myth I or Myth II. 5.02 is the last version that works adequately at all with these games. If you upgrade from there, while playing the game you will miss mouse clicks so that double clicking is virtually impossible, and selecting or moving a unit is very hit and miss. "

For the last several days readers have reported they can't connect to www.vivistar.com, makers of the Vorb gamesprockets extension and controller cables. I don't see a problem with the domain name at Internic and can only hope that it is temporary. I know of no mirrors for their drivers, config sets or cabling diagram for making your own cable. I am leaving the links intact for now in my review of the Vorb.

The 3D Gaming News page was just updated with news of a Mac port of Heretic (requires PC pak files), Unreal co-op comments, a starcraft tips page, a Quakeworld trick, a leak of Unreal (PC) 2.21 patch to the web and more Quake III and Daikatana info.

C/Net has an article called Pentium III debuts to Yawns, noting mixed reviews. Like MMX, the PIII will require software support for its new enhanced instruction set (aka MMX2). Unlike MMX, the new instructions do not use the floating point registers (which meant floating point and MMX instructions could not be executed simultaneously), which was the Achilles heel of MMX.

For those readers that have asked if the retail ATI Rage128 cards will have a Mpeg card option like the B&W G3 DVD option, I received this reply from ATI:

" Hi Mike,
We currently do not have any plans to include support on ATI RAGE 128 retail cards for the Apple Hardware DVD module.

While the RAGE 128 chip is capable of powering software DVD (or MPEG2) playback but it would require MPEG2 support in QuickTime. If or when Apple decides to add support for MPEG2 to QuickTime we will evaluate adding the decode functionality to the Mac retail products.

Regards,
Deanna Perkins
ATI "

The Yosemite Performance page has an update for CPU Speed/Cache Speed tests in MacBench 4.0.

Alps SCSI Printer/B&W G3 Tips: A reader replies to today's earlier request for help:

" Mike...
On the Alps MD-5000 and SCSI.
Get the Alps USB connector which works well...Latest software on the Alps web page.

Oh, bye the way...If anybody needs an Alps SCSI adapter, I have an extra for sale
Hope this helps..
Fitz"

I assume his SCSI device termination was correct, another possible case (terminating the device with it as the lone external device would prove if that was the issue). OS 8.5 seems more prone to problems with termination based on reports last year when it was released (several readers reported OS 8.1 ran fine with incorrect termination (later discovered) but had immediate problems when 8.5 was installed.

Newer Tech has announced 3 new L2 slot cards for 6400, 6500 and TAM. The URL is http://www.upgradestuff.com/newerpr.html. [Thanks to Larry Kahan for the tip]

Sven, a reader from Switzerland sent a URL to a German site with a B&W G3 Review with applications performance. My Yosemite Performance page also has test results from several applications and also notes on OpenGL/Lightwave 3D.

I received several reports of OS X server beta running on G3 upgraded cards from yesterday's request for info. Most reported some sort of problems, either with networking or just stable operation. I'll try to summarize the comments on a separate page for posting later.

B&W/SCSI Printer Problems:

" mike,
I have a b&w 400Mhz g3 9gb scsi hd and I cant seem to get my alps md-5ooo printer to get recognized in the chooser. I can highlight the icon in the chooser, but I can't get it to choose a scsi bus . I've talked to apple, alps ,and adaptec about the issue but to no avail.

The printer is a scsi printer and I've installed an adaptec ava-2906 for the hookup. Also, I have a umax astra 2400s scanner and there seems to be no problem for the scanner to be recognized.
I ran a scsi probe utility and the scanner was recognized on bus 2 but nothing I could do would get the printer recognized.
Please Help as the ship is sinking fast! Billy "

Charmed Life: Possibly the luckiest B&W G3 owner in the world:

" Hi.
I hear about all the trouble with the 128 drivers and i have to wonder, because I haven't had one problem since day 1. I guess I got lucky and got the one 350/dvd that works perfectly. I have a B&W 350/dvd/128.

Unreal worked great at all resolutions up to and including my favorite, 1024x768. I used Unreal 1.0, then 1.02b3, now 1.02b4.

Then I did the ATI Rage 128 Update 1.0...still no problems!
I never had any problems with Flash, I use Photoshop 5, Illustrator 8.0. etc, Klingon Honor Guard...never any of these "problems"....
I use a cheapo PC monitor, I'm hooked up to ADSL, I use my Epson Stylus Color 800 with Epson's USB to Parralel [sic] connector, and my Kodak DC260 plugs right into the USB port.
I guess I got lucky. My G3 works great!
Rod "

I had heard once that the DC260 USB had problems with Macs. Rod also asked about Rave settings in games for the Rage128 - I told him to check the Yosemite Game Performance page.

Bob Snow reported he is returning the Sonnet G3 upgrade for this TAM, after experiencing repeated crashes and finally a failure to boot. I suggested he try Vimage perhaps as they are the only other vendor of TAM G3 upgrades as far as I know.

Craig Moritz sent a reminder that OS 8.5 owners should upgrade their Mouseworks software. This was noted on my OS 8.5 Feedback page last year (it's in the summary of fixes at the top of the page).

Site sponsor Bottom Line sent their latest list of weekly specials including reduced prices on G3 Upgrades and preorders on G3 466Mhz/311Mhz 1MB ZIF models at $1399.99. Prices good until 2/19/99 or while supplies last.

The Lacie Silverlining FAQ has a warning on the top line to _not_ attempt to use their disk driver on a new B&W G3, as it will corrupt the disk and make it literally impossible to boot (even from CD readers say).

One reader reports that a new G3/400 at his office loses the mouse and keyboard function a lot. I reported the issue of the USB extender cables last month (call Apple I'm told to have them replaced) on the Yosemite pages. I find it odd that my keyboard/mouse with extender cable works fine in port 2, but not port 1 (I have to remove the extender cable if I use USB port 1). There are no damaged connector pins, etc. in either the cable or the two ports.

I've gotten several reports of failures to restart with 3-switch model (the new higher bus speed range) PF G3/220/110 cards in PowerMac 7300s. Owners of older 2-switch (45Mhz max bus speed) models have reported no problems.

Ryan Tanaka sent a URL to Nikon's Press Release on the CoolPix 950, which features a 1600x1200 uncompressed tiff option.

Other Net News:

• Linux Users Demand Windows Refund Open-source supporters rally at Microsoft over unwanted bundling. [PCWorld]
• Siemens Previews High-Tech Gadgets Current projects include fingerprint security for PCs, and controlling the coffee pot by phone. [PCWorld]

Yesterday's News Summary

• Carmine's TIL Updates and Net News Feed
• Iomega Long Format Tip (ram allocat. to Iomega Tools)
• 3D Gaming News page updated
• MRJ 2.1 issues
• OS 8.5/Jaz problems with long format
• OS X and G3 upgrades
• MRJ 2.1 vs MRJ 2.0 (and Symantec JIT, Microsoft JIT) Performance Comp. Page
• Reader details on Upgrade to S900/cost comparison to new machine
• More feedback on Softraid Cache Tweak
• More TurboMax IDE Card owner comments
• Other net news
• Summary of prev. days news

For other recent site news/features links, see the Recent Site Features page.

Note: Before sending tech support related questions please check the Freq. Asked Questions, Site Contents, CPU Card reviews/articles, SCSI reviews articles, Graphics card reviews, Tips/Misc, Message Boards and Help pages - in many cases the answers to your questions are there and they have far more detail than I can list in an email. For Apple G3 system info - see the G3-ZONE. For links on recent articles, see the Recent Features page. Please try the Men in Mac Help page as an alternative on requests for tech support to help me be able to spend more time on reviews. Thanks.