"Just turned on "The Edge" on CNBC, (not to be confused with "The Edge with Paula Zahn" on Fox News Network.) They are about to do a story on Apple's high flying comeback and "a look at what's coming".

...Well, they showed it within the first seven minutes of the program. I've never seen a more positive report on Apple!

*First of all, the stock is up about $9 today for a new all-time high: $144.375

*Secondly, although Feb. is usually a slow month, this Feb has been steady due to the new releases in Tokyo.

*Apple has a good product line with a good mix all the way from the low end to the high end.

*PC makers which try to imitate Apple "just don't get it. Their products look lame in comparison."

*Next, there was a business phrase that I didn't quite catch. ["Return on investment"]. They compared Apple's performance to other computer makers like Compaq, Gateway, etc. The very highest one besides Apple was @40% higher than last year. Apple was 120% higher.

*The Earthlink kickback is starting off well and expected to bring in 30 to 50 million dollars.

*OS X is supposed to bring in more money at $100 a pop.

*One analyst said, "I think this comeback still has more legs left in it." "

I know the PowerBook Firewire and Cinema display are the top 2 products on my computing 'lust list'. Everything else is so far down I can't remember what #3 is...

Pismo ColorSync Profile Feedback: Pismo owner John Garde comments on the profiles posted earlier today:

"Mike,
I downloaded and tried the ColorSync profile you offered today. I am not a professional graphics person bit the profile is a much improved look to anything that was available. Very pleasing to the eye.
Thanks
John "

Barney Buoy sent today's list of other net news and TIL updates including a Zd/net Future Power vs Apple Poll.

Pismo/iBook ColorSync Profiles Here: I've not had time to try them personally yet, but I've made Brock Brandenberg's colorsync profiles noted earlier today available for download here. Read the earlier post below from Brock for more information.

George Cole of sponsor Other World Computing sent a note of a sale on a limited supply of XLR8 G3/300 cards:

"Hey Mike,
I got a deal on some XLR8 300 cards that your readers might be interested in:

XLR8 MachSpeed G3/300 MHz w/512k 5:2 Backside Adjustable
Part Number: XG3001
Special Price: $219.00

I only have 8 available then that is it...it is on the main site, not the xlr8yourmac specials page.

Cheers,
George"

The direct link to the XLR8 G3/300/512K card sale page is here or call 1-800-275-4576.

PowerBook G3/500 Review (a real one): I'm sure my tired eyes missed a few typos, but the Pismo review is posted. It took longer to complete, but I guarantee it has far more useful information and real world performance results than any other review to date on the new Powerbooks.

IDE DVD RAM Drive From Promax A reader notes the only source I've seen of a IDE DVD RAM drive for the Mac (coming soon from Promax)

"Hi Mike,
I don't know if you've heard this from anyone else yet, but according to the latest (May) issue of Macworld (mine just came in the mail today) ProMax is selling an internal ATAPI DVD-RAM drive. Macworld reviewed the ProMax drive along with five other (all SCSI) DVD-RAM drives.

I went to the ProMax site to check it out. It's not listed in their products yet, but it is listed in a PDF news file on the products page. They claim the drive will be compatible with the Apple CD/DVD drivers and list it's price as $499. It got 3.5 mice in Macworld's review, the main caveat being slow backups with Retrospect which they blamed on the Apple driver not the drive.

Hope that helps. You might be able to get more info from ProMax I'm sure.
Paul Banfield."

Toast Deluxe 4.02 Update Still Not Available: Despite Adaptec's promise (via mail) that the 4.02 update would be posted yesterday (available via the builtin Web Checkup), readers say it still has not appeared. Hopefully it will today.

iBook vs PB Screen Comments: Here's another reader's opinion that the iBook has a nicer LCD display than the PowerBook:

"I'll have to second the person who found the iBook screen to be superior to the Lombard. Today I set up an iBook for a client and last week I was troubleshooting a bronze keyboard Lombard and the iBook screen did have a much better viewing angle. I could never get a great position with the Powerbook where I really felt like I was getting the best out of the screen. Sitting at an angle with the iBook and I could still see the text and colors well.

I really liked the iBook but one thing that needs to be worked on is the vibration caused by the cd-rom. While installing some software the progress bar would sometimes stop until I used a finger to stabilize the door of the cd-rom. I almost think that this machine would be better off with a slower speed unit.
It is very cool machine.
Shane "

Some CDs that have heavy ink or labels are very noisy. Sometimes I've seen CDs that are not perfectly flat also, which makes matters worse.

Yamaha 8X CDR Firmware Update Due: A reader replies to the feedback page on the drive posted recently here (see storage area sidebar or page for link).

"I thought you [might like to know] Yamaha will be releasing a firmware update for their 8424 CD-RW drive to fix the SCSI freeze problem. See the email below that I got from Mike Morse at Yamaha. I thought you may want to update your Yamaha 8424 page.

Subject: Firmware
Date: Tue, 21 Mar 2000 08:43:54 -0800
From: Mike Morse mmorse@yamaha.com

Yamaha will be releasing a new firmware to solve these problems. It should be released Wed. Visit the Japan firmware site at: http://www.yamaha.co.jp/english/product/computer/index2.html

I have heard many positive results from customers that have installed the beta version.
Mike Morse
Application Specialist
Yamaha Corporation of America
1-888-926-2426

John Salmento "

Tips/Info/Profiles for PB/iBook LCD Display Color Matching: The latest reader comments on the issue noted in yesterday's news.

"Hello.
With as much reader activity as I've seen concerning poor LCD color, I thought it a good time to contribute a solution to the issue.

Because LCDs are constructed with and operate on a very different principle than CRTs, they have a very different behavior than do CRTs. For this reason, a visual CRT calibrator like the Apple Default Calibrator will not work properly on an LCD.

A CRT has a response curve that is a power function. That is, the light output from the front of the monitor is approximately proportional to the input voltage raised to a given power. The general shape of this response curve is a shallow curve, which you can visualize by typing "y=x^1.8" into Graphing Calculator, hitting "Graph" and watching what happens between x=0 and x=1. Try different powers such as 2.5 instead of 1.8 and you will see how a different power, or "gamma", affects the relationship between y (output) and x (input). In the real world, the adjustment of the monitor and the behavior of the electronics and tube will alter the behavior slightly, but all CRTs follow this basic response behavior.

In contrast, an LCD has a response curve that is typically "S" shaped. Try typing y=x^(.4/x) into Graphing Calculator, hitting "Graph" and watching what happens between x=0 and x=1. Between x=0 and x=.5, you will notice that the graph curves increasingly upward, then after x=.5 it begins to curve the other way and flatten out. While you can try and calibrate an LCD with a CRT calibrator, you will either improve the shadows and make the highlights worse, or improve the highlights and make the shadows worse. You simply can't correct the behavior of an LCD with something designed for CRTs.

We've created a number of tools over the years to help us with certain jobs, and among these is a plug-in calibrator for ColorSync 2.6+ for LCD displays. We've used it very successfully in-house, but have never had the time put the finishing touches on for public consumption. We've planned on releasing it as shareware at some point, but we really need to finish it first.

However, I'm attaching a ColorSync profile that I have for a Pismo display and one for an iBook display. Just drop the profile(s) into the ColorSync Profiles folder in your System Folder, then go to the Monitors control panel, choose the Color button and choose the proper profile from the list. The display should change significantly. If the profile does not show up in the list, make sure that it has the correct type (prof) and creator (sync). Sometimes these can get screwed up by Stuffit Expander, turning the profile into a generic file which the Monitors control panel will not recognize even though the file is actually fine.

The profiles have color look-up tables in them, but do not have the appropriate phosphor colors or white point set in them (this is the part of the calibrator that's not yet finished). The Monitors Control Panel loads the color look-up table from a profile into the video driver to correct the LCD to a 1.8 gamma curve, then the gamma value in the profile tells ColorSync that the display is now a 1.8 display. I could get into the characterization vs. correction argument here, but I won't. Suffice it to say that we wanted our displays to be partially corrected and characterized, not just characterized.

All displays are different so it may not work properly for everyone, but it should be an improvement over not having one at all. Because all displays are different, you should calibrate each one uniquely, but until we get time to finish ours or one like it is publicly available, it's kind of difficult to do.
Brock Brandenberg
bergdesign "

I've made Brock's Pismo/iBook profiles available for download here.

The Owner's CPU Upgrade Ratings database was updated at 4AM with new reader entries.

Other Net News/TIL Updates

NEWS
• ZDNet have a Future Power vs Apple Poll
• Setting Up a Cable or DSL Router (lowendmac)
• SmartDisk Announces New Technology That Extends Internet Digital Music To Millions of Audio Cassette Player Users
• Viking announces IntelliFlash USB Flash Memory Reader
• Walking the wireless Web (Zd/net)
• Surf Express goes free (MacUser UK) 
• Keyspan Expands Cross-Platform USB Line With New Hubs (Yahoo)
• Aladdin Systems, Inc. Acquires Trexar Technologies, Inc.(Yahoo)
• Co-op offers airwave action (mercury center)
• Could cell phones be the Palms of the future? (news.com)

  TILS

• AirPort Version 1.1: Software May Damage Some Lucent WaveLAN Cards
• Power Mac G4: AppleShare IP 6.x Support
• Power Macintosh G3 (Blue and White): When to Install Available Updaters
• Display Adapter Matrix

The recent features page also lists articles posted (most recent first) as does the sidebar links here. The site topics pages (systems, cpu upgrades, etc. - see top and sidebar links on this page) also are places to check as well as the FAQ.

Tuesday's News Summary

• More on Pismo ColorSync
• QPS IDE DVD-RAM Drives (PC Only)
• XLR8 Lowers G4 Upgrade Pricing
• Toast Deluxe 4.02 Update Available
• iMac Internal CDrom Recorder:
• Another USB ZIP CDR Report
• Pismo LCD ColorSync Profile
• Slot Loading DVD IDE Drives
• Sources for IDE DVD RAM Drives?
• Linksys 10/100 Switch Report/Tip
• Owner's CPU Upgrade Ratings updated
• Other Net News/TILs/Software Updates

Monday's News Summary

• Mac GLQuakeWorld/GLQuake 0.6 Released
• Flashing PC SIIG IDE card Question
• Iomega ZIP CDR Problem Report
• Wanted: Pismo + USB Tape Drive Feedback
• Interview with Stephan M. Sprenger of Prosoniq
• PCI Timing Update Fixes 6500 Audio Issues?
• 10/100 Ethernet Switch Report
• 20th Anniv. Mac/Proformance3/G3 Upgrade Report
• More Turbomax AV Performance Comments
• More on 80Min CDRs and Matshita OEM DVD drive
• Reminder on $69.95 Pismo/Lombard Battery Sale
• Nikon CoolPix 100 Not Compatible with Pismo
• Owner's CPU Upgrade Ratings, Mac Game Reviews, and Mac Game FPS databases were updated
• Other Net News/TILs/Software Updates

Weekend's News Summary

• iBook/Pismo Sleep Extension
• Atto ExpressPro Tools updated
• Another $69.95 Pismo/Lombard Battery Sale
• 80 Minute CDRs/B&W G3 DVD Drive Issue?
• Pismo Battery Life during DVD Playback
• Feedback on latest Beta Villagetronic drivers
• iBook/CVGS Update
• Adaptec Tech Note on Pismo/SlimSCSI 1480
• Owner's CPU Upgrade Reviews database updated
• Other Net News/TILs/Software Updates

For links to older news pages see the Archives page.

The recent features page has a lists reviews/articles you may have missed.

For a guide to finding answers to questions - see my Site Guide page.

Considering a CPU Upgrade? Search the CPU Upgrade Owner's Survey results and search for owner reports by Mac model and/or card brand. The current database has more than 3,300+ reports and growing.