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PAPER JUNE '92 3
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'

rr Pr?mm'2 m'.u '4'.'~T?l+' j ???'

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Upgrade to Full Tower w/2 fane, wheele 4140

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" YAGER Super Tower

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AMI 4 86-50 Super Voyager
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eto128 MB
z
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em
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.>
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"

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Irsnet TopoloBy
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$5040B.OO
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$38,448.00
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200MS
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THE COMPUTER
PAPER JUNE'92 5

Letter From
The Editor

Table ofContents

The Virtual Comnsunlty

Telecommunications is a world that
most computer uaxs discover eventuaHy. It is a world of online services
such as CompuServe, GEnie and
Prodigy with message areas, databases of information and downloadable
files of computer programs or data
files places to meet, discuss, find
information and communicate your
views.
A new vocabulary has emerged to
describe the phenomena. People
talk about "going online," "cyberspace" and "virtual communities."
Unfortunately, this vast array of
information is notoriously dHficult
to access. I see a need for easier,
more accessible, and affordable
online services.

Interview: Alan Ashton.................10

The president of WordPerfect Corp..speaks out.By Geo
f Whcelueight.

Multimedia Design Issues ............14

The challenges of developing a multimedia app. By 17iwesaGuay.
Le
M ultimedia
t
....................................16
~

Buzz word of the '90s. By Peter Talbot.

Choosing The Right Laser Printer... ...25

e Laser printers have finally come of age.By Geo

P~>;,::
f il%eehesight.
Prin t e r

E n g l n e s e sssaoeasersoeeeoesaere
rrees eaoaeeeseeoesonen aaeoeaeeeeeaosee33

In k

j e t P r l n t o r s n oe e eseeseoeoooeeaseaeasassaseaeeeoeessossresseeereeaaesaaaaesaeao34

Co l o

r P r l n t e r s se e sseoeeeeoaroreeerresseeoeeeaeeeeaeseeeeoseossosoesssseeeeereoeseeae35

User ServiceTips for Laser Printers .....36

Technical tips for do-it-yourselfers. ByChristopher Smak

FailedAttempts

The Evolving Meaning of "Network Printer" .........36

We have had a few noble attempts to create a Canadian national information service. Bell Canada has poured millions and millions into Alee.
This service uses low~de graphics to send pictures as weH as words. It
is userMendly and similar to the U.SAmsed Prodigy network and the
French Minitel. It has unfortunately met with little success. Sasy was an
attempt by the folks who brought you Bedford Accounting software to
create a user-friendly
service. They poured mere millions into their
attempt, which sadly closed last year. I had high hopes for this one. Both
these services had problems reaching the critical mass necessary to a
large audience. Stssy
just plain ran out of money.

a d l n g Y o u r P C $$ e $$ eeee e e e e e $$ e $$ e $$ $$ e $$ e e e e e e $52
The many ways to speed up your machine. ByBoeslyGttsesL

Free Trade

Upgrade your old LaserWriter to 600 dpi. By Graeme Bessrsett.

GEnie, one of the American services, has been strong in Canada, and
recently improved its service to include most major Canadian cities (they
finaHy made it to Winnipeg). GEnie recently announced the Canada
RoundTable,an area exdusively for Canadian topics-a forum where we
might be able to refiect on our national identity.
Still, the lion's share of GEnie users are American and the service
reflects the identities of itsusers.

Those Eastern BBS'ers

Many of these ponderings were brought up by a recent visit to the head
office of Canada Remote Systems (CRS). Canada Remote is a Torontobased, Canadianawned BBS with over 100 phone lines, massive gigabytes of storage, doors to stock market reports, Newsbytes and loaFs of
other good things. CRS is a great BBS. It is a large, wefi-run, afFordable
online service. But it is only available as a local call &om Toronto and
the immediate environs. They do have e-mail connectors with many
remote BBSes throughout Canada (and a U.S. line in Detroit) but interBBS cemail is not for the faint-hearted, and you don't get access to aH the
great stufF that is on CRS. Owner Neil Fleming sees a day when he can
reach out across Canada with affordable access (he hopes that the Unitel
bid to create competition will result in better telecommunications access
for Canadians).

Some questions to ponder when choosing an office printer. By Didier Gombert.

Upg r

aa
Accel-a Vdrlter............""-""
""" .38

ss File f dit AadiasTII

Star Micronics NX-2430 Printer...40

The latest member of the Star Micronics line.ByJohrs NfeCormieh.

Ra d I l l STae
s sssssesa s s s e e e s e s s eea eassssss a a s s e s s 2
~

Multimedia TV for the Mac. By Graeme Bearsett.

AII Computers 486 Upgrade ........58

New for PC.From Neseslsttes.

Earth Summit in Rio .... .... .47

Computer Network at Earth Summit. ByEdie FarseeiL

Nantucket to Play Key Role.........61

in CA's database strategy.From Nesesgtes.

Screen Machine ............................21

A video hacker's delight. ByGraeme Bersrsett.

vs

P4PS .. ... ..... .. . ... ... .. . . ..27

PC printing utility for PostScript printers. By Paul usher.

Make ltEasier
Another shortcoming of most BBSes is a command-line interface.
Although a windowing interface often makes life easier for PC users, in
the online world, graphical interfaces are rare. The major reason is that
they tend to slow down things substantiaHy because everything is limited
by the speed of the modem (those little boxes that allows computers to
talk over phone lines). One service that has overcome this is America
Online. This slick interface, which is available in both Mac and PC
(GeoWorks) versions downloads many of the user-fiiendly screens to the
user's computer, and just transmits data over the phone lines. This
allows for pointwndaclick ease of use. Alas, it is American, not locally
accessible Rom some tnajor Canadian cities, expensive (Canadians pay a
$12/hour surchargel) and Hmited to Macs and PCs.

Somewhere Out There

Somewhere out there, there is some company or person that will eventually put together aH the pieces. What I want to see is an affordable
national service, instantly connecting aH major Canadian cities through
a local call, with a fast, user-friendly, windowing interface. In the long
run, I believe this will do more for national unity than more constitutional conferences. Please-someone just do itt
Enjoy the issue.

Kirtan Singh Khalsa

Editor/Publisher

SF e'
Mal l b o x r os s seessseesssoseeosoeoesereeeeeeeeeoenseseeooaersooo6
Mast h e a d e oesssaeoe
ooaasoeosoossoeaoaeeeeeeeeeeeeereoseeses7
What S N e W seo oaoossssseoeoseeeooesesseessseeoeeeaeeesseose7
N eWSbl t t e a eeeessreooseeoeooroooooesesso orossssssssooosee64

MultimediaNews....................................75
Pen-based Computer News ................SS, 68
PC News....... .............

............69, 78, 83
P'rinter News ..........................................72
Trends.............................. ....................71
U nix
' News .............................................87

Apple News ..........................................S3

C Ias s l f

C AD

Ca l e n

N & W S rreeeoeensneeaooaeesssaerssenseeooseoson64

Canadian News ......................................64

General News............................ ......67, 78

l e d s e s eesssaaenooseseaseoenaesrsnsrsoroseeeoreeeo90
d e r e e e s r eeeaeeeraoeerosoeeeeorenssrn eeseesorareos09

Ad v e r t i s e r s '
Ab o l l t

I n d e x \ s ee reeeeeeserrrrrereeseeeesea .92

t h e C o v e r n e e reeeaeeeseeroeeenaeasnnaeeaeree94

Ediioiial Schedule .

ISSUE

TOPICS

July '92

Backup Software
Mass Storage Options
point of Sale

COPY '

Juno 10

Networking
July $
Home Office Computing
SOftWare fOr WholeSAIAIDiStribution

Education & Training

Workstations Unix

Juno 11

DISTRIBUTION

Juno 26

CAlL

Aug '12

Sept '93

CAMERA
READYseS

AQS 5

July 9

July 24
o

Aaag 6

4"B

for advertising
infOrmatiOn

6 T H E COMPUTER PAPER JUNE '92

Nlailb'~,,-::-:
-"-'::.:-.::.'"-:.
O 'b

OI2 2.0 Shows IIIndows the Door

I am very happy to finally be able to put
both my DOS 5.0 and Windows S.O to bed.
Both have given computer users years of service and their existence has been appreciated, but the thne has come to give the business world an operating system which is
extremely easy to use, faster and more Sexible. Sofar OS/2 version 2.0 has met that
demand (as far as I am concerned). I have
been using the system for only three weeks
and I can already perform all the system
tasks I would perform on DOS/Windows
systems at at least twice my old productivity
(the programs themselves also work faster
but I can't estimate how much).
So far the third-party programs I have
been using are all DOS or Windows applications; they are: WordPerfect for Windows,
Timeline 4.0 and 5.0, ACAD 10.0, Quattro
Pro, Lotus for Windows, Word for Windows,
Borland C++ 2.0, dBASE IV 1.5, MathCAD

for Windows, and CorelDRAW 2.0. As well,

one of our staff has a Logitech Scanman
and has had no trouble with it. I should
note that all my comments are based on
battle testing (getting project work out the
door in a rush; I am a project engineer). I
have not had time to play with OS/2 2.0
(although I have loadetI Falcon S.O at home
and it works fine except for the sound
whichI have not had time to fix) so I can't
really comment on any issues involving tinkering or technical perks.
N ow in f a irness I h ave no t t r i e d
Windows S.l, and I most likely will not.
Gates-Microsoft has kept DOS alive for far
too long and I have no desire to keep living
with a 16-bit operating system and a GUI

Many say that we should wait for

Windows NT to come out, but ask yourself
this question: if you were a soflwaredevel-

opment company would you preferto

develop software for an operating system
(which works) owned by a company that
doesn't attempt PC software development
or an operatingsystem owned by your competitioni Now if I am wrong and in a year
or two Wmdows NT does knock out all the
competition, I will most happily change
over that's life. In the meanthne I have
made the transition to OS/2 2.0; it was
painless, it's I'aster, and it works.
Boyd Mason, P.Eng.
Project Engineer
Stothert Engineeiing Ltd.
Vancouver, B.C.

which piggybacks. A Phased S2+it operating system should have been here long
ago (I notice that most of the people poohpoohing OS/2 arepeople who make their
living off the inefficiencies of DOS and
Windows Peter Norton take heed). Of
course some of the industry gurus have predicted deathto OS/2 2.0 and they may be
right, after all Beta VCRs didn't beat out
VHS, but the almighty voice lives in the wallet, and my fl 9 went to OS/ 2 2.0, not
Windows S.l.

All That You Need To Know

A fiend of mine gave me your May 1992
issue of Thc Computer Paper.First of all I
would like to congratulate you for your
excellent publication.
I was impressed with the easy'-understand writing style of your staff especially
Jim Clements' artide on CD-ROM. It was
very. informative. Rather than calling it
"What You Need to Know About CD-ROM,"
you could have called it "All That You Need
to Know About CD-ROM.
I'm sendingyou a cheque for a onegear
subscription.
Avtar Dhanota
Toronto, ON

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Keep up the good work,
Gregoiy Volk
Toronto, ON

99

these Naleee eae yaebahlg oas f date

(604)737-8057
2005 West 4ds Ave
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Rn/eyed April issue

I really enjoyed your April issue when I

picked up one in Vancouver. The ariides
on DTP and fonts were really helpful in
seletzmg the kind of system and software I
eventuallybought Keep up the good worM
Victor Nishi
Kelowna, BC

Important liulsllcation
I was pleased to read the article in your
March '92 edition, T h e Cel l u l ar
Connection. The line between cellular

phones and PCs is disappearing, as evidenced in the article you published about
the alliance with IBM, with NovAtel building the cellular component for the PC
Radio. NovAtel recognizes the importance
of your publication in the industry and
appreciates the space you gave us.
LaDawn Bly
Calgary, AB

Computer Literate
Computer novice turns into computer literate byreading your magazine.
Thank you and keep up the good
worki
A new reader,
Vancouver, BC

Care to drop us a ling

We welcome response from our readers.
Send your Letter to the Editor to:
Thc Computer Paper,8, S661 West 4th Ave.,
Vancouver, B.C. V6R 1P2
or e-mail us viaMind Linkl at 604/576-1214
(use the name 'Computer Paper" to sign on.)

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THE COMPUTER
PAPER JUNE'92 7
A

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PUSUSIIER I EDITOR

Kirtnn Singh Khalsa

MANAGING EDIIOR
Grooms Bonnett
CONTRISUTING WRITERS
Greeme Bennett, Edie Ferweg, Didier Gombort,
Roody Green,TheresaGuay, John Mccormidr.
Chrhtopher Small, Peter Talbot, Goof
Wheelwrlghfa Pilul Zuchor
Newsb)tfes CanadianEditor. Grant Budder

Wo uld you Rhe to recycle

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Are you loohlng for a

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New Darius laser printer

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Burnaby based Darius Technology is now

shipping its new Darius LaserFlow laser
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With its ability to handle tractor-feed
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Mouse Ergonomics

No two human hands are alike, but many of

the "mice" built for computer users are
exactly identical in size and proportions. As
a result,
when you use your hand to move
the mouse around, it may not always be a
comfortable fit. It's the kind of problem
you don't know that you have until someone offers you a solution to it. One company claims to have the answer: Ergopads.
These are ergonomicallyAesigned soft
foam pads which attach to the outside of
your mouse so that you can shape it more
closely to your hand. Ergopads come in a
variety of colors, induding blue, maroon,
purple, grey and black. Canadian distributor Integra Ventures sells them for f7.95
each.
Call Integra Ventures at (604) 8284580
for further details.

Print Connection established

You can buy a printer at almost any computer dealer, yet there has until now been
nowhere in Vancouver that you could go to
look at printers and only printers.
The Print Connection, a new printer
s pecialist store r e cently op ened i n
Vancouver, claims to change all of that.
The Print Connection handles all manner
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terna.
It is also a place to buy the we)lweceived
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print text f r o m y our L a st;rJ et II o r
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and half<oneimages at2400 dpi

To hear further details on Thc. Print
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S T HE COMPUTER PAPER JUNE '92

Unauthorized Bill Gates biography

promises to tell all

PocketFax/Modem

It had to happen. Given the massive publiccomputer industry. Having recently won
ity surrounding the success of Microsoft
part of a five-billionAollar legal dispute
chairman and co-founder Bill Gates over
with Apple over copyright issues, Microsoft
the past couple of years, it was only a matter
seems poised to monopolize the world of
of time before someone sat
personal
c o m p u tersdown to write a book about
despite a U . S . F e deral
him.
Trade Commission antiIn this case, it was two
trust investigation.
someones: S e attle P o stWallace and Erickson
Iarclligeaeerreporters James
claim that Bill Gates is driWallace and Jim Erickson,
ven and that t h ere are
who have written what may be
many who believe that he is
the first "tellM" biography of
out of control. Hanf Driv
the computer i n d u stry's Blii GROS
calls itself "a candid inside
bigg"t st
look at the man and the
anti Lite
The book, published by
company that built PC softJohn Wiley and Sons, is called
ware, including MS-DOS
Hani Drive Bill Cafes are/ the 0 i fl l B
and Windows."
Mahisg of the Iifiervso
P EmPire MI(g'tm0ft,
It further contends that
and relishes in anecdotes such
Gates, with his unnerving
F+JII,B
a s Gates' appearance a t
passion for computers,
Microsoft's most recent annuI + ~ I iI un s toppable ambition, and
al staff meeting for its more
intimt ating intellect, has
than 7,000 employees. Bill
led Microsoft to wrestle
Gates entered the Seattle Kingdome on a
with IBM for its control of the computer
Harley Davidson, escorted by a gang of bikindustry. Microsoft is supposedly "the little
ers. It then tells how the company's
guy turned bully, who calls the shots in
multi+illion dollar profits, escalating sales
standards setting for PC operating systems."
and brilliant business projections were preTo get your copy of this dirt-dishing
sented to Gates' devotees with the fervor of
tome, look in your local book store or cona religious revival meeting.
tact the publisher: John Wiley Sc Sons
The authors point out that with Excel
Canada Limited at 22 Worcester Road,
4.0 and Windows S.l now launched, the
Rexdale,Ontario, M9W lU or by phone on
company Gates had originally planned to
(416) 675-5580.
keep small and private now dominates tbe

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Microsoft claims DOS/Windows

"2 to 5times faster" than OS/2
In an effort to woo IBM PS/2 users away
from the OS/2 2.0 operating system which
now comes standard with their systems,
Microsoft recently announced an integrated package of Microsoft Windows S.l and
MS-DOS 5 for PS/2 machines at a special
price. According to Microsoft, the offer is
"for customers who want PS/2 machines
but want MS-DOS and Windows to get
faster performance, easier use, and superior functionality for desktop applications."
The offer has been made in reaction to
IBM's recent announcement that OS/2 2.0
is being pre~stalled on PS/2 models 56
and 57. Microsoft says that this "leaves purchasers of those machines with no choice of
operating environments." So Rom May Sl,
computer resellers can preinstall Windows
and MS-DOS on PS/2s for customers or
customers themselves can easily "upgrade"
their machines from OS/2 to MS-DOS and
Windows.
"In tests performed on a variety of PCs,
including PS/2s, Windows is consistently
two to five times faster than OS/2
(Notl EcL) in running applications
for Windows," claimed B r ad
Silverberg, vice president of personal systems at Microsoft. "As
a result, customers are addng
us to provide an alternative. The overwhelming
II ~ eatI
majority of customers

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forced to
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slower and less
c omp a t i b l e .
Corporate customers
told us that it is essential to have built-in support for major networks
such as NetWare and LAN
Manager, support that is included with Windows but lacking in
-OS/2. And IBM resellers are being
put in the position of losing computer
sales to other PC brands that come preinstalled with Windows, because Windows is
in such demand. Thispackage of MS-DOS
and Windows gives all our customers the
flexibility to choose the system that best
meets their needs."
Microsoft says the package will install
successfully over OS/2 2.0 on any new
PS/2, regardless of the original configuration. The product will be available May Sl
only to PS/2 resellers. The suggested retail
price is $199.95, with a promotional suggested retail price of $149.95 through the
e nd of 1 9 92 . A d d itionally, th e n e w
Microsofi package for IBM PS/2s includes a
discount offer for Qualitas BlueMax version
6, thePS/2~pecificversion of S86Max. The
memory management utility provides up to
62SK of conventional memory for MS-DOSbased applications by loading as much as
244K of memory-resident programs into
the upper memory area.A coupon in the
Microsoft package entitles the user to
acquire BlueMax version 6 for only $19.95
plus freight, 80 percent off the suggested

retail price of $124.95.

THE COMPUTERPAPER JUNE '92 9

Vancouver Artist the Sip Winner

in Corel Design CoInpelition

GEnie attempts to

OTTAWA, ONTARIO, MAY 19 (NB)-

inspire national unity

In an effort to add an onhne voice to the national debate, the GEnie
information service has set up the online Canada RoundTable
(CRT). It is GEnie's first French/Enghsh RoundTable and it is
the first RoundTable to focus on Canadian culture.
Stephen Holtzman is the chief System Operator (Sysop) and
Bob Marcy and Bob Perez are assistant Sysops. All three live in
Qacbcc. On Thursdays at 10:00 pm - 12:00 pm EDT, you can
join the Sysops for some lively discussion in th Real Time
Conference (RTC) on page 1225.
G Enie says tha t t h e
Canada RoundTable is for all GEnie
users interested in Canadian news and
politics, sports, travel, art and culture,
Canada-US. relations, En Pranqais segments and 'The Great White North."
Access to it is part of the $5.9&per~onth
GEnieeBasic Services fee. There .are also
library files about Canada, induding travel
and current events. GEnie has also recently
added nodes for telephone access in
Victoria, Winnipeg, London and Halifax.
Contact GEnie Information Services at
(416) 85$4589 or 1400-2814091 for more
information.

At a formal ceremony held at the National

Gallery of Canada, Corel Systems gave out
prizes to nine winners in its third annual
World Design Contest.
Corel launched the contest, for users of
its CorelDraw graphics software, to publidze the software, recognize designers, and
gather topquality designs which it can then
re~ k e t to its customers.
This year's grand prize went to Bill
Frymire of The Showmaker Productions
(604875-9880) in Vancouver, for "Rex,"
which also took top spot iu the "People,
Plants, and Animals" category..The grand

prhe was a gold bar worth $10,000.

MichaeI Cowpland, Corel's founder,
president, and c hief executive, told
Newsbytes entries in the competition
jumped from 1,000 to 8,000 this year.
People have spent literally hours and
hours on some of these designs," he said.
Corel recovers some of the. costof the contest by seHing a CD-ROM disk containing
all the designs for $99. This provides buyers
with ideas and allows them to study thc
drawings to learn about the techniques the
winning artists have used, Cowpland said.
Coral, tei 61 3-728-8200
... crore fecal fserrrros Page 76

Canada Newswire
now available on
Dow
Jones
The full text of all news releases transmitted by electronic news provider Canada
NewsWire is now available on Dow Jones
News/Retrieval and DowVisfon. CNW transmits news for a wide range of corporations,
federal and provfndal government institutions, trade associations and public and
investor relations agencies. News releases
indude earnings announcements, dividend
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Canada NewsWire is headquartered in
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De sign and Engineering by North American awardwinners

boasts $100,000royalty payment

One of the British Columbia government's
recent entries into the commercial software
market has started to pay off hansomely. As
part of its Technology Commercialisation
programme, the BC government sold the
rights t o m ark e t i ts Cor r e c t ion
Administrations Records Entry (CARE)
software - originally developed for the BC
Corrections Branch for usc, in prisons - to
Richmond-based OC S T e c h nologies
Corporation.
OCS has succeeded in seUing versions of
the software to police and corrections officials in Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba
and Ontario - as well as to US law enforcement organisations in Washington State,
Idaho, Texas and New Enghnd.
Under the terms of its agreement with
the BC government, a$100,000 paymentrepresenting the government's share of
profits so far - was made to the province in
early April. 'The CARE software has
enabled automation ofa wide range of corrections information and has proven valuable in maintaining a modern British
Columbia corrections system," said
Attorney General Colin Gablemann;
Prisoner booking and court appearances, sentence calculation, prison visits,
cell location, parole and relc:ase dates arc
among the information automated under
modules of the CARE system.
For more details on CARE, call Neil
Hummel at OCS Technologies Corporation

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10 T HE COMPUTERPAPER JUNE '92

R V

an s

CW: What is your feeling about hcw well

Wordperfect for Windows has been taken up't Is
Il more triNicult to sell in the Windows market
than expected, particularly as one Windcws
womlprccessor tends to look and feel a lct more
hke any other Windows wordprocessor than has
traditionally been the case in the DOS wcrld7

en

The President of WordPerfect Corp. Speaks Out

Q Goof Whcehrrright

LAN C. ASHTON isn't a name you hear bandied around in the computer press very often. He rarely gives interviews and largely shuns
personal publicity, yet he is president and co-founder of
WordPerfect Corporation, the world's largest wordyrocessing software company.
Despite his key position at WordPerfect, Ashton comes across as a sofi~oken and
unassuming university professor from Utah. This shouldn't come as too much of asurprise, as that's exactly what he is. Ashton, now 49, graduated magna curn laude in
mathematics from the University of Utah in 1966. He received his Ph.D. in computer
sdence from the same university in 1970.
WordPexfect, in fact, evolved from an idea which originated as early as 1969 when
Alan, then a graduate student, submitted two computer projects for possible
research one involving music and the other word processing.
His professors opted for the first idea. It was not until nine years later, in 1978, that
Dr. Ashton revived his second idea and started on the path that eventually led to the
bestmlling WordPexfect 5.1.
Dr. Ashton was a full professor of computer science at Brigham Young University
for 14 years. He says he enjoyed worhng with students on advanced degree projects
and that his willingness to help others leazn prompted BYU's computer science class
of 1986 to elect him the "Outstanding Professor of the Year." Ashton continued to
teach computer science dasses until 1987 when he left BYU to work ful14me as president of WordPerfect Corporation.
Ashton was given the Entrepreneur of the Year Award in 1987 by the Small Business
Association of Utah. He says he is a family man at heart and enjoys spending time with
his wife and 11 children in their family home in Orexn, Utah. Ashton's other interests
include farming, music (especially his trumpet) and cdrmpetitive tennis.
Ashton is ago interested in getting out to meet his company'susers. The Corwprsfor
Papor'sconsulting editor Geof Wheelwright was granted an interview with hhn last
month after Ashton's visit to The Wmnipeg PC Users Group.

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AA: We have been vexy excited by our sales

of WordPerfect for Windows. Around
400,000 copies sold within the first month
and around 800,000 copies have been sold
in total. And last night, at the Winnipeg PC
Users Group presentation, we showed a
new intexim release which includes new features such as drag and drop, the aMity to
incorporate dialogue boxes as part of your
WordPerfect for Windows macros, so that it
looks like an actual separate application
launched from within WordPexfect.
So, we are very excited about future
enhancements andreleases ofWordPerfect
for Windows, as well as new OS/2 and DOS
versions. Although it is difiicult to measure
[how big the challenge is in selling into a
particular marketplace] because we sell
through distributors, we have been happy
and excited about the numbers sold in the
Windows environment.
Admittedly, as GUI products develop,
most companies will be looking to ofFer the
same kind of features and the same ways of
getting at those features. So we will have to
also rely on the broad number of platforms
w e support: W i n dows, D OS , O S / 2 ,
Madntosh machines, NeXT, Unix and even
the IBM main&ames.
It is important t hat ou r software
becomes compatible and becomes a great
strength on multiple platforms because we
find that our customers require word processing on their multiple platforms rather
than just the one.

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THE COMPUTER
PAPER JUNE '92 11
GW: Where does WordPerfectsit in the baNe
between 0$2 2.0 and Windows 8.1?
WordPerfect was an early 08/2 boostersnd
hsd a fairly advanced bate of WordPelfect for
Presentafion
Manager on show as Iong as two
years ago. Can you explain hcw you now see
approaching the OSi2 market?
AA: The OS/2 marketplace in general is of
the utmost important to us. We began
doing WordPerfect the WYSIWYG version
for OS/2 but then Windows 5.0came
out. It was so weil~ccepted that we had to
divert our energies to getting our Windows
product out, because the customers were
crying for it. Then we looked at doing a
very quick upgrade of WordPerfectfor
Windows product to run under OS/2 and
found that it already worked there because
OS/2 2.0 runs Windows applications as well
as DOS applicationL So we decided instead
that wewould do our future enhanced version of WordPerfect and target it towards
32-bit architecture and the multitasking
operating system under OS/2.

We are worhng verydosely with IBM-

as we have done in the past in making

sure that our existing software runs well on
OS/2 and we're very exdted about future
versions of WordPerfect and our other software that win take advantage of the unique
capabilities of OS/2 2.0. We are actually
able to save money in our offices using
OS/2 2.0 because, rather than giving programmers multiple computers, we can give
them OS/2 and additional memory so that
they can run multiple tasks simultaneously
doing the hnhng and compTiing along with
other work In the future, I see both operating environments as being viable. Windows
on DOS and on NT in the future is a
substantial operating environment and will
serve quite a number of people.

I think that OS/2 is a great operating

environment that will continue to get better. It's not a matter of making a decision
and siding with one or the other. It' s
important for us to have our very best software available on both of the platforms.
And while we do that, let's not forget DOS,
where we are working to enhance our software and make it available in new releases
with new capabilities and options. We are
working very hard on that right now and
certainly planning to show our next DOS
version of WordPcrfect at Fall Comdex. We
are near the end of the beta cycle on it.
The DOS marketplace right now is really
exciting and we don't sce so much competition there. We aren't concerned so much
about competition in the DOS market as we
are in other environments, and we will
meet that competition by increasing our
strength on multiple platforms.

You am even reply to and forward messages croseplatfonct forwarding messages

and inducbng in them documents and messages of all types whether they are scannedin images compound documents and even
video images. This is a very strategic and
important area for WordPerfect. In the
past, WordPerfect Odice has been the
name we have given to this, but we are now
changhlg thc nalnc to WordPcrfcct MSS
although it is radly mail and more. It offers
capabilities such as scheduling that help
people when they work in groupL Work on
the Windows version of the product has

the package. It's abo very important that we

are able to pass around multimedia information such as sound, video and other
elements-and can ensure that they can be
passed f'rom place to place. If, for example,
you are doing a large proposal with a budget in it, including graphs, spreadsheets
with sound annotations and presentation
materials, they should all be able to be integrated together in a single document. This
is an area we have been worhng on, along
with calendaring and scheduling. This has

enable;d us to help people work in an office

environment with capaMities way beyond
what existed.

begun,and our plans are to "malleable

Coatinucnf oIIpcrgr 19

At

K f YN f

ST

GW: Wonf Perfect was a pioneer in what everyone ncw calls wolkgroup compulng" with
WordPerfect Office. Hcw has the company's

WE WILL DO THE WORK

YO U D O N'T WANT TO DO!
YOU D ON'T HAVE TIME TO DO!
YO U ARE UNABLE TO DO!

workgroup computing strategy evolved as this

market has matured?

AA: This is a v e ry e xciting area for

WordPerfect. Because WordPerfect has
such a dominance in the documents area
and it is used worldwide, it is very important
that we provide software for workgroup
computing. It is crudal, for example, for
people workmg on the same proposal or a
singe document and so our latest version
of WordPerfect CMicc indudcs document
management.
We are also now moving to have versions of all our products that are mailenabled, so that as you move information
around in the workgroup, you can send
and receive messages f'rom directly within

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THE COMPUTER
PAPER )UNE '92 13
CorI(irIwed ponI page ll
all our applications under Windows. There
will, for example, be an option to send mail
right from within WordPerfect. And we are
being vexy open about the mail systems we
will work with; if you use Microsoft Mail or
Lotus cc:Mail, you will still be able to send
mail.

COMPUTER PRODUCTS LTD.

GW: WocdPerfect recently entered the 'integrated software market for the first time. What was
the impeNs behind this mnve7

Aki The product is called WordPerfect

Works and the way it came about was that
we had spent a lot of time in the past in
proving and implementing spreadsheet
technology, graphics technology and combining this technology (in products such as
PlanPerfect and WordPerfect Executive).
People have been asking us to upgrade our
offerings in these areas and give further
capability. WordPerfect Executive offered a
limited number of functions but integrated
very nicely. So after seeing the successof
Microsofi's Works in the Mac market, we
took elements of WordPerfect Executive
and added communications facilities nnd
it turned out to be a very high~nd product
with high~ e f u nctions.
We Cooed at putting all the major capabBities of all our products in it and found
that it would be too large, so we put in it all
the functions it made sense for people to
want to take around with them. They
include the functions of LetterPerfect
(WordPerfect's entry-level word-processing
product), w h i c h a c c e pt s c o m plex
WordPerfect files with items such as tables
in them and, although they don't appear
on-screen, they are still there and can be
edited.
We have also taken the essence of
DrawPerfect (WordPerfect's presentation
graphics software) and PlanPerfect (the
company's spreadsheet) code and our notebook (a fi
atfi
le database for notecard and
address lists) and added that as a database
capabiTity. And people just cried for us to
have communications capabilities, so we
got together with Magicsoft and they did a
marvelous job of providing us with comms
capabilities for logging onto bulletin
boards, online services, supporting different terminal emulations, as well as file
transfer protocols such as kermit, X; Y- snd
Zmodem.
We have also added fax capabilities so
that right f'rom LetterPerfect you can just
do your document and fax it right off. All
of these products are integrated well
together so that you can be in the graphics
portion and bring images right into wordprocessed documents, while databases of
names and addresses can be easily mailmerged. It looks like one, complete operating environment.

%~
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THE COMPUTER
PAPER JUNE '92 15

ii '

, :

=: -*

NEC's PC-VCR has a built-In

character generator, search
capabilities, even the ability to
control its on-board AC outlet.
Combined with a program like
MedlaMeker or ProMotion, it
becomes possible to createonscreenanimations and 'print to
vkleo' as you would to a printer.

-8'8 8:8-'8t8

Mwtgchcs m'D-o-uc
cBDcl c l c l t = t c 28 5a
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s3@ct 0 ts o@80 8

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A PC-VCR is a VCR (made by NEC)

which is computerwontrolled via the serial
port. Since it uses standard videotape it is
excellent for creating custom applications,
such as interactive courseware, espedafiy if
you need less than 100 copies. While both
tape and laser disc/CD-ROM require the
production of a master tape, laser discs and
CD-ROMs require the further step of mas.
tering the disc from the master tape.
Therefore mastering a video tape is significantly cheaper. The main disadvantage is
that proquality VCRs are not cheap, ranging from $2500 to over $10,000, with the
low-end models missing crucial features
such as the ability to step back a single
&arne at a time. Also remember that if you
choose to use video tape, a custom laser
disc, or a custom CD-ROM, you will either
need to purchase or rent time on a video
editing suite in order to assemble the master tape.
Currently WORM optical discs are still
rather expensive, but show promise as the
future peripheral of choice for multimedia
applications as they share the advantages of
both laser discs and PC VCRs and have
none of the disadvantages.

The User Intssrfaco

The user interface is the most crucial factor
in the success of a multimedia application.
The user will judge the quality of your multimedia application by the quality of its
interface. Issues to consider are the amount
of information presented on each screen,
the intuitiveness of the interface, and the
nature of the spedal efFects used.
It is all too easy to dutter up the application's screens with too many buttons, too
much text,and extraneous and/or obnoxious fpraphics. This is a temptation that even
the big boys succumb to, as the latest crop
of Windows applications seem rather cluttered.
There are several problems that the
user of your application will experience if
your screen is too duttered. First of all, it
will take longer for them to navigate the
application as they search for the appropriate button among all the dutter. Secondly,
the dutter will distract them &om the real
information. And finally, they will suffer
&om information overload.
The best applications are those that present only those buttons or text that are
absolutely necessary to efficiently use and
understand th application. You should
also use only a plain background; cute
graphics can confuse the user as to what is
information and what is just decoration.
Simplicity is beauty.
As well as simplicity, your user interface
should be consistent. An inconsistent interface can not only confuse and &ustrate the
user, but can also paralyze them into inaction. An example of this was when I first
encountered the Macintosh. I had been
told that the trashcan was used to both
delete a file and to eject a disk, a very
inconsistent combination of functions. I
hesitated to drttg a disk icon to it; visions of
the Mac equivalent to the DOS DEL a:e.e
fiashed through my mind.
The interface must not only be consistent within the application, but should also
be consistent with other applications of a
similar type, following the written or unwritten guidelines for that authoring package
or platform. An example is HyperCard.
HyperCard applications follow certain conventions in the design of their user interface: dicking on the home icon (a small
picture of a house) takes the user to the

Home Stack, dicking on the right arrow

takes the user to the next screen, the left
arrow to the previous screen, and so forth.
To reverse the functions of the arrow will
cause problems for those users experienced
with HyperCard.
Granted, there are times when you must
break the conventions of the particular

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very intuitive input devi< -.

The next most intu.'tive things are those
which are culturally learned. These cultural
artifacts include language, customs, and
syntbols. Examples of some of the symbols
from North American culture are the stop
sign, the question mark, and the home.
Having a question mark icon trigger the
help function is very intuitive to those users
exposed to North American culture, as
would clicking on a stop sign to halt the
current operation. At this level of intuition,
it is important not to assign a counter~tuitive meaning to a symbol. Again I use the
example of the Mac trashcan. To use it to
dispose of a file is intuitive; to use it as a
disk ejector is counter-intuitive.
Contintterf onpage I6

package or platform you are using, but

think it through and do it if there is no
other choice.If you do break with convention, make sure that it is well documentedl
Besides simplicity and consistency, a
user interface should be intuitive, But what
is intuitive? Something that is intuitive to
me may not be toyou. There are several
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16 THE COMPlffERPAPER )UNE '92

The next level of intuitheness is at the
level of the platform or GUI. All Mac.
Amiga, and Windows appHcations tend to
have a similar inter%ace. Once the user has
learned the interface, aH applications following the interface guideHnes for that platform or GUI are Sairly mtuitive to the user.
It is at this point that a counter-intuitive
aspect of an interface becomes intuitive,
once the user has learned that dragging a
disk icon to the trashcan ejecta
the disk,
then it becomes intuitive. Violating the
interface guidelines is dangerous, since it
will affect those users who have become so

comfortable with the interface that they no

longer botherreading the manuaL Confuse
a beginner and they will blame themselves;
confuse an experienced user and they will
blame youl
The fmal level of intuitiveness is at the
level of speci6c applications. An example of
this is WordPerfect's command key
seeluenceL Agaila, it is the experienced user
who is most affecte by chaaging the interface in the latest version of your applicatioa. Watch the look on the face of a
WordPerfect for DOS user who presses
ALT-F4 in WordPerfect for Windows (in
the former, this means "Block text;" in the

latter it m e an s E x i t w i t hout saving

changes" Ed). Even if you tell the user of
the changes, it is Hkely that they will, out of
habit, use the interface in the same way as
in the previous version of the application.
To sum up the issue of intuitiveness:
1. Strive to provide the highest level of
intuithcness pcs%hie.
2. Avoid including counter4ntuitive items
ill your ill telface.

3. Once you' ve established a level of intuiuveness, do not violate it.

4. Document any aspect of the interface
that may not be immediately obvious,
such as dicking on a picture of a muacal instrument to hear it play.

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HopeMly this article has raised your

awareness of the some of the issues involved
in multimedia design. Remember: keep it
simple, keep it mtuitive, and focus on the
informational needs of the user. Avoid creating yet another narcissistic monument to
the developer's creativity.
Thereas i6uey is empkiyed as the technical
cconfinatcr for both the Department of
Communicaaonand ihe School ofResource
Management at Simon Fraser University. She
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There are several issues dealing with how a

user wiH navigate the application. The Srst
deals with format: are the navigation paths
hnear, relational, or both? If the purpose of
the application is to teach the user the
seiluence of steps in performing a task,
such as learning how to tune up a car, then
a linear navigation path is the best. A danger in using a linear path is that the application will end up a simple page turner. An
applicatioa which is just an electronic page
turner is best not written a book on the
subject is cheaper. Relational
paths are best when the application s purpose is to aHow users to explore aH the Sectors aad relationships involved with the
topic at hand. There are also situations
where it is best to provide both hnear and
relational paths, such as in the case of a language tutorial.
The problems with using the relaaonal
navigational method, such as Hypertext, is
that it imposes a high cognitive load on the
user. The user has to remember both where
they are within the application and what

links they have already explored. Failure to

do so will get the user lost and confused,
This problem is compounded by the fact
that most of our learning has been linear.
The traditional book fosters a linear
approach to knowledge. Hypertext and
hypermedia are still, for the most part, an
uaSuaHiar approach to knowledge.
Therefore you must provide the user
with navigational aids when you employ
relational navigation. These aids should
include a means tobacktrack, oaHne context~
ti v e help, and a graphic map aH
of
the hnkages ia the application. This map
shouM be dynamicaay updated to show the
user what Hakages they have explored and
where they are at the moment. The cogaithe load caa also be reduced by minimizing
the use of distracting graphics, sound
effects, aad transitions. Does the application really need to go "woot" while the
screen shrinks and rotation-flips off to
reveal the next screen? A simple, silent
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Coatisacdfnne pogt1 y
Some manufacturers,such as Canon,
have taken the technology a step further
and invented imaging cameras that capture
p ictures on diskette instead of f i l m .
Combine these technologies with readily
available software, and you' ve got a final
product that superimposes fiction onto
fihn. Ifyou've ever been fooled by those
Duracell commercials with the Energizer
Bunny parading across the screen with his
drum, you realize where the controversy is
coming from.

Nostalgiaand tho Generation Gap

But aside from the technology's use (or
misuse) in the advertising field, many viewers continually reject multimedia for nostalgic reasons. The rejection is not dissimilar
to the one that plagued television in its
early years, because the new medium of
television lacked "the creativity and polished image projected by radio.
Nothing can change this, of courseexcept time. New generations will soon
become accustomed to multimedia; perhaps today's youngsters will even come to
regard it as passe when virtual reality and
artifidal intelhgence mature.
Until such a time the medium will have
its share of critics. A recent Aldus presentation at Calgary's Convention Centre is a
good example. To many, Aldus' reputation
for slick p r e sentations waa f u r ther
enhanced through the use ofanimated
sequences compiled with Adobe Premiere.
But along with all the "oohs and aaha"
could be heard the occasional comment of
"overkill, p r oving once again that you

ticism of the technology right now may in

fact be healthy critidsm of its content an
inability to comprehend the message
through all the bells and whistles of the
computer.
Multimedia is just now beginning to
shed its reputation as a Singe technology.
Critics who daim that the medium assaults
the viewer with too much information may
have a tough argument ahead ofthem; in
fact, Sns of the medium say it is a more natural form of communicating. The logic
here is that, because multimec6a appeals to
both the visual and aural senses, it is easier
to get a complicated message across to other's.

This aMity to express complicated messages is what has educators ao excited by

the medium. Not only does multimedia
promise to entertain and hold our interest it promises a way of interacting with
the user like we' ve never seen before. Realthne medical software, capable of simulating human responses during surgery is
already a reality. Coupled with digitized
film dips of blood fiow, heart sounds and
nervou~stem reactions, the educational
possiMities here are impressive.
For students, what better way to explain
science than by showing rea14fe examples
captured on diskP Allow them to change
the conditions of a dangerous chemical

experiment on a computer, then show the

resulting explosion on a color monitor with
the sound turned on. The message gets
across. No one gets hurt. There's no mess
to dean up.

GotInli Started in Ilac Ilaaltlmodie

If you' re intrigued by. multimedia and feeling a little left out, there are some reasonably priced software packages available for
Mac users.You can do some wonderhxl presentations with the Claris HyperCard
Development Kit, and you' ll find no shortage of willing viewers as HyperCard is
included with every Macintosh computer
sold. ADDmotion, f rom V a ncouver's

can omo,
a.

mn't please everyone...especially computer

enthusiasts.
Neil Postman's latest book, Tcchaopoly,
addresses many of the concerns echoed by
the critics of multimedia. Overwhelmed
with oral and visual stimuli, and occasionally called upon to interact with the computer, it's no surprise that we sometimes
accuse multimedia of overkilk This new
technology demands more attention in a
sodety that is aggressively competing for
our.interest. But multimedia, the mixing of
video and animation, of sound and text,
packs so much information into a given
time Same that it's hard to ignore.

Uslnl and INisaasini the Technology

New technology often has a strange way of
emerging through less-than-honorable
intentions, such as the inhmoua 900 telephone numbers in the United States.
Multimedia is no exception. Electronic bul-

letin board users have, for years, known

about i n t eractive H y perCard s tacks
designed by Madntosh SLns tinkering with
the medium. Although developed for entertainment purposes, some of these stacks
challenge your definition of obscene, and
have given multimedia a bad reputation.
Content aside, the success of computer
users tinkering with multimedia for entertainment illustrates just how far the software has progressed. When technology
becomes so accessible that even nontechnical users can produce a f i l m-quality
sequence on disk, you know it will be popu-

lar. Employed for more productive uses,

multimedia promises a lot of potential for

the homewomputer market,
It'a not dd5cult to envision individuals
producing studioguality commerdals or
even movies &om their own homes in the
near future. Like the desktop publishing
industry of the '80s, muldmedia also oKers
some interesting possibilities for selfemployment.
Unfortunately, assembling a multimedia
production with a strong message or sales

pitch in mind is no small task, Multimedia

demands a multi&sdphned approach if it
ia to succeed here. Educational specialists,

technical personnel, writers and markedng

experts all have their place in the field. And
just to ensure that the content emerges
from the packaging, a subject~tter expert
doesn't hurt either. What looks like a skep-

IBM and os/2 are ragfsteredtrade-marks of International Business Machines corporation. IBM Canada Ud., a relaled company,ls a registered user. windowsIs a regaaered blade-o

THE COMPUTER
PAPER JUNE '92 19
M otion Works, is a g ood add-on t o
HyperCard, allowing users to incorporate
both sound and color animation in a basic
HyperCard stack. Both packages include
fairly good documentation, and enable
novices to create impressive multimedia
presentations.
For p o wer u s er s a n d w o u l d-be
moviemakers,products such as MacroMind
Director and Adobe Premiere offer incredible fiexibility. Three~ e n s ional
productions aren't wishful thinking, either, Swivel
3-D Professional and SwivelMan are great
fun. Keep in mind that these products
require a fair amount of RAM and are
painfully slow to work with on the lower-

RIl

priced machines.
Whatever your level of involvementfrom viewer to multimedia addict you can
be fairly confident that multimedia will
grow in popularity in the years to come.
Best of all, there's room for involvement for
entertainers, educators, and computer
fanatics alike.
If you remain unconvinced that the
technology is accessible to non-technical
users, take a look at the new GssadiauMulti
Me@a Magasiac, published by the Alberta
Communications Group. In it you' ll find a
diverse collection of articles and product
information ranging from law enforcement
to medical software. Better yet, consider

an eve

same ime.

IBM Multimedia Centre

based in Vancouver

attending t h e 19 9 2 I n te r n a tional
Multimedia gc Laserdisc Conference &
Exhibition from September 3-5 at the
Edmonton Convention Centre. Contact the
wide variety of multimedia products
Alberta Communications Group at (403)
and systems are available from IBM:
448-7319 for more information.
'deo and audio capture/playback
With this level of interest, multimedia and networking, computer-based TV display,
could eventually become the information touchwcreens, and software for authoring,
source, learning tool, and entertainment presentations and education. From its multitechnology that makes television look
media division headquartered in Vancouver
rather pale in comparison.
(reputedly due to the success of the company's Expo 86 touch<creen display kiosks and
Petor Talbot isan editor with the city of Calgary related developments), IBM's multimedia
in the Data Processing Services Dept., and a
expert Cathy Munn spoke to 1%cCmaputcr
freelance writer for several focal magazines.
I'epcr.
Contact him at 408/288-5821.

After all the trumpeting, you can now try IBM's new version
of OS/2 for yourself. We' re confident you' ll find the finished

product is everything you' ve been hoping for.

OS/2 2.0 has been developed to bridge the gap between the
present and the future. It protects your existing software
investment. Yet it's capable of running virtually every enduser application, no matter whether it was originally written
for DOS, Windows or OS/2.
OS/2 is a master of multitasking. It lets you initiate one
task, then move quickly to a second or third while your hardware works happily away on the first one. For instance, OS/2
can install a spreadsheet application while you' re opening a

file or printing ouf. a page of graphics.

OS/2's refined Workplace Shell (the way it organizes your
screen) allows you to group files, programs and devices under
a single icon. Click on the icon and everything you need for
your work is automatically opened up. Information can be
dynamically linked from a variety of application sources, so
that the data you see on screen is always the latest. Graphics
and text can be 'cut and pasted' between applications no

matter what operating system the application was originally

written for.

Finally, the new OS/2 is virtually crash-proof. If any

individual application goes down, the whole system doesn' t
follow. Only one application has to be re-started.
All in all, you' ll find that the new OS/2
I is a completely new lund of animal, at once
verypowerful and a very popular pet
with your end-users.

Contact your Marketing Representative

for more information. To find the IBM
Authorized Dealer or Retailer nearest you, call IBM Direct,

1-800-465-7999.
* protects your software investment

* runs DOS, %indows and OS/2 programs simultaneously

* easy to install and use

* makes the most of386 SX (and above) personal computers

* upgrade from Windows for 879'

s af Mhrosoltcorporation. Umscd lime over expires July w, tssz Upgradeprice reverls to $159 on Ausust1, 4ssa Ust pace $10a Authorized Retailers end Dealers maysell for lees.

TCP:What does the Multimedia Centre do?

CM: We have account reps whose job it is to

work with the client. We have product specialists knowledgeable in specific areas;
videos detailing the benefits of the products.
We do trade shows and consulting.

TCP: Where do you perceive the market

opportunities to be for 1992?
CM: The market for 1992 is not home or
retail. It is the commercial market. One of
the most successful areas in B.C. is safety
training. For one thing, the information
these systems are installed to convey is not
optional, it's critical. It's also an appropriate
method of conveying information to users
who may be semiwomputer illiterate.
We' re working on a lot of pilot programs.
A bank, for example, is planning to roil out
DVI (digital video interactive)-based training. You can have a video signal transmitted
over your network for what you might call
"justice training."
A pilot project at one of the big brokerages uses our PS2/TV to put CNN and FNN
on every desk.
A lot of people who have been in film
production or advertising are now seeing
that the next place to go is multimedia.
For the developers, we' ve created what
we call the Ultimedia Developers' Program.
For $4000 US, they get very deep technical
support.

TCP: People have commented that DVI has

the wrong price-point; that it's priced too
high.
CMt Not everyone needs DVI in a multhnedia system. The minimum requirements vary
widely, depending on what the system will be
used for. After all, a 386 system with a CDROM drive and a sound board is minimally
"multimedia capable," but a fuller definition
would include video in and out and mass
storage.
Not too far in the future, we foresee
portable systems that will have color, pen~ven touch screens, cellular communications
capabiTities, CD-ROM XA (an improved CDROM data format that supports the interleaved datastreams required for full-motion
video with simultaneous audio), and a readwritable solid<tate device for storage. When
these systems hit a price-point of $1000 or
so, muldmedia will achieve critical mass.

TCP: What Is Person-to-Person?

CMt P2P is a DVI-based videoconferendng
system we will have available by the end of
this year. A lot of the early development was
done in IBM's Canadian Lab.
P2P is essentially a shared window. You
can cut~d-paste, use it like a chalkboard,
capture stuff. It runs under OS/2.

TCP: Will it run under Windows?

CMt No. We could do the basic functionality
but it would break more ofiten. It needs the
multichreiding of OS/2 or something like
Windows NT.
IBM publishes a magazine called IB M
Multsnsalla Solutiosc. Readers interested in
subscribing should send their name and
address to IBM Mnlthncdla Solutions, 4111
Northside Parkway, internal Zip H04L1,
Atlanta, Georgia 30527.

Contact: SM CustomerRelations, t-80h4658800.

20

T HE COMPUTER PAPER JUNE '92

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0 Desktop or tower case with 200W CSA approved

power supply

I 3 7 5 T rison 386DX-33
01Meg RAM
0 1.2 and1.44 Floppy Drive
0 2 Serial, 1 Parallel, 1 Game Port
0 101 Keys Enhanced Keyboard
0 52 MB Hard Drive-1 7msec
0 Trident super VGA card with 1MB

0 Super VGA Monitor 1024x768.28

0 Desktop or tower case with 200W CSA approved

power supply

I >425T rison 386DX-40

01 Meg RAM
0 1.2 and1 A4 Floppy Drive
0 2 Serial, 1 Parallel, 1 Game Port
0 101 Keys Enhanced Keyboard
0 52 MB Hard Drive-17msec
0 Trident super VGA card with 1MB

0 Super VGA Monitor 1024x768.28

0 Desktop or tower case with 200W CSA approved
power supply

I >750Trison 486DX-33
01 Meg RAM
0 1.2 and1.44 Floppy Drive
0 2 Serial, 1 Parallel, 1 Game Port
0 101 Keys Enhanced Keyboard
0 52 MB Hard Drive-17msec
0 Trident super VGA card with 1MB
0 Super VGA Monitor 1024x768.28

0 Desktop or tower case with 200W CSA approved

power supply
'' ' ' V ;

Phone: (604) 222-2326

Fax: (604) 222-2372
pU

~ E R S 37 3 7W.10thAve.(10thandAlma
Vancouver, B.C.

THE COMPUTER
PAPER JUNE '92 21

S creen Mac ine

Your Recharge Specialists

Live Video in a Window for PC or Mac

I e I

From: Fast Hectronic GmbH, 508-655-FAST;

fax 50816504447. Oistrhuted in North
America by Commercial Electronics,
604689-5525
Price: PC version (SM-PC) $2,500
Mac version (SM-Mac) $2,900

en it comes to high-tech, we' ve

n oticed t ha t p r o d ucts f r o m
Germany tend to be deep, with
rich feature~ts and a wealth of programming possiblities. Almost invariably,
German engineers push theenvelope of
what's possible with software or hardware
products that are "hacker's delights.

KHSl

$(PkkM

If you ever wanted to know how to build

your own Sony IA"ontrolInterface or how
to remotely control a Canon Still Video
Player, this is your hnd of product.
' I

We saw both the PC version and the Mac

version in operation. Both have comparable featurooets, with minor differences. For
example, the PC version has color keying
capabilities and an optional teletext
decoder not available on the Mac version.
The Mac version, on the other hand, supports QuickTime (allowing, among other
things, /PEG image compression). The following review is based on the Mac version,
which we tested on a Macintosh Iifx with
SMB of RAM, Radius and Apple video cards
Coftrifsurrd onpage 22

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PC anat Mac Voreioeas

The Screen Machine is such a product.

Sure, there are other video-in-a-window
products for the PC and the Mac, but
Screen Machine (SM) has more programmability, and more technically oriented
documentation. It is one of the only products we' ve seen that can overlay a truewolor
(24-bit) image on a display of any bitdepth even blackcmdmhite. At $2,900, it' s
also one of the most expensive.

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Summary: a real-time color video digitiaer for

PC, PS/2 and Mac II that captures images in
true color or gray scale. Screen machine is a
multimedia board for the display of text and
graphics on the screen and enables full-motion
video in a window of any size, shape and position, controlled by the computer.

II

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Mini-Tower Case with Power Supply

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1.2/1.44MB Floppy Disk Drive

105MB Fast IDE Hard Disk Drive

2 Serial/Parallel/1 Game I/O Ports
101 Enhanced Keyboard
1MB Super VGA Card (1024x768/256 colours)
14" Super VGA Colour Monitor (1024x768/.28mm)

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New Style Case with Power Supply
1MB System RAM on board
1.2 or1.44MB Floppy Drive
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16-Bit IDE FD/HD Controller
2 Serial/Parallel/1 Game Ports
101 Enhanced Keyboard
Monochrome MGP Card
14" TTLAmber Monitor

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22

TH E COMPUTER PAPER JUNE'92

Cofftintsdfff ffrffs plsgd 21

and an NEC PC-VCR.

The Read Me file betrays the product's
Germanic origin when it advises that 'The
behaviour ofthe graficscard pop up has
berm changes slightly." Fortunately, the
manual is clearly written in morewr-less
proper English. Installation and setup proc edures are c l e arly i l l u strated a n d
described, although, as noted below, we did
note occasional misinformation.

Sofhv are
The software is fully System 7.0 compatible,
although it does not take advantage of 7spedfic features such as Balloon Help or
Publish/Subscribe. We experienced several

program errors during our tests, but, as it

turned out, the culprit was an incompatibility with the Radius DirectColor/GX video
carcL For example, one such problem was a
"Save Image as JPEG" feature which we
could not manage to invoke without aborting the SM-Pocket Camera program. The
error occured even if our Apple video card
was the one the Screen Machine was connected to, but the Radius card was still
installed in the computer. We talked with a
Screen Machine owner using Apple's
Display Card 8624; these errors apparently
did not occur with that configuration.
Curiously, all functions on our system
appdsfsdf to work it just didn't save proper-

Screen Machineimage
quality is vely good
the
best we' ve seen from a
computer video-capture
device. The product
includes atime-base corrector to stabilhe video
input signals, and captures in full 24-bit color.

Edit rt origo: oooo orred":: I on1:oh d':e.:.1no

Folder fse Dried dntlone 6ronn

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Seoo om

RsdiusTV, also reviewed

this issue, only captures
16-bit color.

Seoe
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forProsroml Ddohe Pholoshoo
Ci sooe Ielecllonenid

ly.

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We found the process of grabbing images

to be very convenient. With a simple press
of the Return key,an image may be captured and opened in SM-Snapshot for
image-processing. Using the Enter key
instead grabs the image without showing
the "Darkroom" controls, using the last
parameters. We did note, however, that on
an eight-megabyte machine, the program '
frequently complained that it was unable to
"develop" an image if we had captured
more than 8 or 4 shots to the "I|lm Folder"
it uses to hold images to be processed. No
wonder Screen Machine hsts 8 MB of RAM,
as its minimum requirement.
We were unable to use the Mac IHx'6
internal audio capabilities to hear the
sound. The product includes wires to connect the audio signals from a Mac IIcx or
Iici's motherboard to the audio input, but
this seems much l ess elegant t h an
Radius TV's "all-in-software" method.
According to the manual, Mac IIsi owners
may connect the audio source directly to
their computers' audio inputs advice that,
we presume, also applies to other NuBus
Macs with audio input capabilities, such as
the Quadras.
We were mildly disappointed to find
that image captures of the Screen Machine
video window are only possible when the
capture utility SM-Camera is the foreground application. In fact, the SM video
window is not visible at all while runriing
another application unless you are running
the desk accessory (DA) version, or, using a
feature called "Retain and Quit erroneously referred to as "Replace 86Quit" in
the manual you can quit the DA, leaving
the video window active on the screen. We
noted with some amusement that the manual describes the key sequence to quit this
" Retain an d Q u i t " m ode with t h e
key s e quence
"Option-Alt-Shift-S."
Unfortunately, we' ve yet to see a Mac keyboard with an Alt key. Actually, "Alt" should
have said "Command."
Plug4ns are supplied for ColorStudio,
ImageStudio, Photoshop, Quark XPress,
and RagTime, allowing images to be captured and processed directly from these
applications.

Programming Possibilities

For programmers who want to incorporate

the possibiTities of Screen Machine in their
own HyperCard stacks, the package ships
with an XCMD that is used to operate SM
from within HyperCard.
The various features of Screen Machine
a re controlled using the XCMD. Th e
XCMD is compatible with HyperCard,
S uperCard, P l us , A u t h orWare a n d
MacroMind Director.
It is very simple to access Screen
Machine from HyperCard. All you have to
do is to teil Screen Machine which rectangle of the window should contain live video.
Screen Machine manages everything else,
such as changing the position of the window, overlapping or clipping, on its own.
Function calls are included to control the
video and audio facilities of Screen

THE COMPUTER
PAPER JUNE '92 23
a s you would t o a p r i n t e r .
Although lacking the image 6delity of high~nd decks, we feel it is
the best unit for multimedia
enthusiasts with modest budgets.
Commercial Electronics is also
one of the only places in Western
Canada where complete muldmedia setups (with video cameras,
laserdisc and videotape, digital
audio, and computer-based editors~ Inlxers and control)ers) can
actually be viewed and tested. The
coxnpany also sells the Amigabased Video Toaster still the

Machine, as well as effects such as fading

video, wipes or live/still.
According to the company, a Screen
Machine development toolkit containing
Pascal and C routines is available as a separate product.

4th Dixnension Toolkit

The package also comes with a demo version of a Screen Machine external for 4th
Dixnension version R.'R.l. This release of the
SM~ e xtension already supports the com-

ression manager of QaickTime. With the

elp of QuickTime you are now able to
store a truecolor image of the size $40e180
in less than KKBytes without visible loss of
image quality, This means 5040 images on
an 800K disk. This opens a totally new
opportunity for database application.

king of low-cost multimedia production

tools. Of course, in videMand "lowest"
applies to just about anything under
$15,000. At around $10,000 for a reasonably complete setup, the Video Toaster is a
veritable bargain.

Fast Forward
Fast also promises to release later this year a
new product it calls Video Machine, a PCor Mac+ased desktop video editing and
special effects system said to be a 'Toaster
killer" a reference to NewTek's popular
Video Toaster for th e Axniga. Video
Machine is expected to retail for$6,000.

The Amiga-based Video Toaster is slimthe king cf fcw-cod

mutlmedia production tools.

Condaaslon
Screen Machine offers more prograxnmability than any other Mac or PC video product
we' ve seen or heard about, and would make
a good choice for developers interested in
producing custom applications that take
advantage ofcomputerKased video.
Nevertheless, potential buyers of this, or
any other hardware add~as, should be
wary of possible software or hardware
incompatibihties. The safest bet is to assemble a system using components known to be
compatible. Your dealer should be able to
help you put together an opthnal conaguration.

with

ML)ltlxnacla Maast4uvas
We were particularly impressed with the
NEC PC-VCR graciously lent to us by
Conunercial Electronics (604/6694525)
for this review. Thh computerwontro)lable
SVHS video deckperformed like a chunp,
and has dozens of features that beg for
experimentation, such as a built4n character generator, search capabilities, even the
ability to control its on-board AC outlet.
C ombined w i t h a pr og r a m like
Media144er, it becomes possible to create
on-screen animations and "print to video"

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T H E COMPUTER PAPER J U NE '92

r

Connect a television antenna, CATV

cable, VCR, camcorder, video camera or

tile

t O I t l l t talUsllt

lasers playerto RadiusTV, and you can

Multimedia TV for Mac

by CraerlteBersrtett

Product: Radius TV
From:
R a dius International (Canada),
41 6-777-9900
Price:
C $ 2 199
Warranty: One year
Summery: Radius TV ia a system Icr integrating
television with the Macintosh. Radius
TV converts raw tehviaion signals
intosounds and moving images on
your computer's screen.

adius Inc.'s RadiusTV is a system for

i ntegrating t elevision with t h e
acintosh. Like computer-based
video display systems for the PC such as
TVM's AVA Pro or Fast Electronic GmbH's
Screen Machine for PC or Mac, RadiusTV
converts raw television signals into sounds
and moving images on your cpmputer's
screen.

h ave television in a w i n dow on t h e

Macintosh screen, accompanied by a
soundtrack on the Mac's speaker.
Radius TV differs from its competitors
in a few significant ways. The one that first
piqued our curiosity was RadiusTV's ability
to decode closedwaption broadcasts and
capture the closedwaption transcript to a
filel The possibiliues for researchers are
thought-provoking. Imagine setting up a
system that would scour news broadcasts for
a topic of interest (up to three keywords
may be searched for). Once found, the system can turn on the transcript feature
and/or beep to alert you of the event. Also
notable is the fact that RadiusTV, unlike

s g ~~' se "1i "

-

the Phased products, actually digitizes the

TV audio signal and passes it through to '
the Mac's audio speaker.

Multimedia VV

Titstrstitrs tttst

rsg.reastst ~

and Authorware's Professional software

smwe s

directly support Radius TV.

Cssh ~

o tstt.'ststr

Hardware and Installation

~ sttttss

RadiusTV is also a platform for the development of multimedia applications, and

Radius makes a programmer's toolkit and
documentation avaiilable separately at no
cost to Applewertified developers. The kit
includes HyperCard external commands
(XCMDs) as well as Pasml and C support.
M acroMedi a
I nc.
(formerly
MacroMind/Paracomp) has announced
support for RadiusTV in its Director software (via Xobjects extensions), and Radius
also is working with other companies to
develop systems based on the hardware.
Currently, EduDisc's Full Mentor software

etssbtst

i stpsa ~

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The RadiusTV system comprises a NuBus

card (the v i deo engine ), a large-butattractive external box called the audiovideo input processor (AVIP), various files
on a disk and cables for joining the AVIP to
the NuBus card. A Macintosh display card
and monitor are also required. RadiusTV is
designed to work with Radius display systems or with the Radius DirectColor/GX
board driving an Apple 15" color monitor.
We tested RadiusTV on a Mac Ilfx with
8 megabytes of RAM and a Radius
DirectColor/GX card driving an Apple 18inch color monitor. I n stallation was
straightforward and well-documented in
thc 10$page user's manuaL

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The induded image~ocessing application,

Theatrics, is a gimmicky (and fun specialeffects toolbox, that can perform many of
the same sort of image extrapolations as

Available at Egghead, London Drugs,

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Visit your local Dealer or Call

1-800-563-3314
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can Photoshop or Aldus Gallery EfFects,

induding color palette optimization (useful
for 8-bit displays), sharpening/softening,
edge-tracing, solarization, posterize, tile,
mosaic, and emboss effects, plus a dozen
others. Several more radical image distortions are available, too, including ones that
Corttissaed otspage 93

THE COMPUTERPAPER JUNE '92

25

assr printers havef inally come foage .They aresmatter

+r ice
and cheaper than ever. These days the lowest
assr printerssell for around the same price you used to
pay for dot matrix printers M.eaniehiie, the cost fo"consumabks" such as toner cartridges traditionally the biggest operhas atsofallen dramatically .
ating expense
for laser printers

Q Goof Whcdueight
One of the consequences of all these events
has been that the market for laser printers
has broken into a number of distinct market sectors: "small footprint" printers based
around the Canon LBP4 design (and using
the Canon LX printer engine) and running
at four pages per minute; low-cost HP
LaserJetwompatible systems which sell for
as little as $1,000; a new range of affordable
PostScript systems which sell for less than
$2,500;and a growing number of "leading
edge" lasers with higher resolution, lots of
memory, PostScript Level 2 compatibility
and support for True Type fonts.
Given the increasing likelihood that you
may soon want to buy a laser printer, it is
worth briefly reviewing the key factors
involved in choosing a laser printer no
matter which category you are looking in.
To start with, you will want to consider the
quality of output.

Printer Rasolutlon
Canon LBP-4 Plus

Resolution determines the sharpness of a

printed image. For anyone familiar with
how screen display resolution is determined. you might call this "addressability" due to the number of individual picture elements (pixels) that affect resolution. Most laser printers these days offer a
resolution of 800 x 300 dots per inch (DPI)
meaning that each square inch of drum
surface is made up of 90,000 separate pixels
that can be individually addressed by the
laser or other light source (such as an

LED).

Hewlett-Packard
LaserJet IIIP

Don't be fooled into thinking that

because most printers ofFer the same resolution, they will offer images equally as
sharp. Laseryrinter designers seeking better resolution and achieving smoother sloping edges (avoiding what many call "the jaggies') are often limited in what they can do
by the memory available to hold the bit
map of the image.
Decreasing the size of the dots which
make up the image is therefore only part of
the solution but the most effective part.
For example, a move from SOO dots per
inch to 400 dots per inch gives a 55 per
cent improvement in edge smoothness.
But a 78 per cent increase in RAM memory
is needed to achieve this better definition.
However, the increase from 300 dpi to
400 dpi gives little improvement in image
quality except along sloping character
edges. The exception to this is in reproduction of scanned halftone pictures,
where there is a recognizable improvement.

Font Scalinl
The key advantage of using pageAescription languages such as PostScript and PCL
has been the ability to select an appropriate
type style and use it in any point size. A
number of printer manufacturers including Apple, Canon, Epson and HewlettPackard have recognized this need and
offer this fadlity as part of their built4n font
scaling systems.
You would be well advised to get samples of actual pages printed using scalable
fonts from any printer you are considering
buying. The main issue here is whether or
not the font scaling system is supported by
your software as is HP's LaserJet III,
Epson's EPI 7000 and Canon's PSL in popular applications such as M i c rosoft
Windows S.L

Memory
Most printers do not come with more than
the very minimum RAM, as this contributes
significantly to the cost of the machine.
This abstemious approach means that manufacturers can make a great deal of money
selling you RAM aden kits. A number of
the printers in this test, for example, did
not have enough RAM to print more than
one page of ourtestdocument at once.
The print buffer became full after being
sent the first page of our test document and
could not handle the other nine copies of it
which we tried to send.
RAM holds a variety of different kinds of
information-to start with, the information
needed to put a page together. It is generally in the form of a "page bit~ap" which
uses around 1 MB of RAM for each page
printed at maximum resolution.
Secondly, memory is employed to store
down-loadable "soft fonts." These are particularly important on HP LaserJet~ompatible printers which do not come with the
same huge selection of fonts (commonly %
outline fonts) as are provided on PostScript
systemL

A Faw Examplas
To give you a brief idea of just how these
criteria can be applied in looking for a laser
printer, we offer our comments on a few
recent laser-printer launches.

Hawlatt-Packard LaserjatIIIP
When HP entered the small4ootprint laserprinter market last year with its HP LaserJet
HP, it brought down the cost of laser printing

by as much as 40 percent
and reduced by
around the same amount the desk space area
Cosstinssedosspage 27

26

T HE COMPUTER
PAPER JUNE '92

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Intel 486/50DX - 256k Cache

4INB RAM [60ns]
120INB IDE Hard Drive [64k Cache)
1.2 or 1.44MB Floppy Drive

Intel 486/33DX -128kCache'.,

4MB RANI [60ns]
105MB IDE Hard Drive k -'
1.2 or 1.44INB Floppy

ATI XL SVGA Card with Mouse

101 Key Enhanced Tactile Keyboa

14"SVGA Monitor [1024',f~"

1MB SVGA Card
101 Key Enhanced Ta II@;
19" Tower
200 Watt Power Supplyi.

1 Parallel, 2 Serial; 1 Game Port(i)

14" Non-Interlaced INonitor

1 Parallel, 2 Serial; 1 Gem'ei,.

19" Black Tower

200 Watt Power Supply

s I I
r

IYIM)
'

386/40DX - 64k Cache

4!NB RAM [70ns]

' 105MB IDE Hard Dr)ve [64k Cache]'"

1.2 or 1.44MB Floppy Drive ~sp,.; '

1 Parallel,2 Serial;1 Game p s '

14"SVGA INonitor [1024'7681,28mm].

1MB SVGA Card

101 Key Enhanced Tactile K y
* 19" Tower Case

s II
ur

Upgrad-e to AlR ' Inquire about 4~$pecial

NEe4t:t- gp yp.y5....
ea""g
(while supplies last)

0 Corporate PO's 0 Loca/Bus Systems

,Ask us .about aur 2 year Mrarranty

... from an All C ij cf p company.[JPQ

e e

INYO
UIISYSII
YII I

200 Watt Power Supply .

s r s

THE COMPUTER
PAPER JUNE '92 27

Laser Printers:
Smaller, faster, higher resolution
seem to be the order of the day

GMMfippo
dcdf fpxses
page 25

that most entry4evel laser systems take up.

But with the huge success of the eightyageper~ u t e HP LaserJet III with its built~
resolution enhancement system even
those enjoying lowcost printing have started demanding the higher print quality
ofFered by the bigger machine.
HP has obhged with the LaserJet IIIP. It
has been designed to produce very quick
ffrstyage delivery speeds. While there are
lots of smallkootprint lasers around which
emulate HP LaserJet II (and even IIP) systems, they generally use PCL 4 and don' t
have the resolution enhancement system
offered on the LaserJet 111.
Not surprisingly, the IIIP offers both
these facBities. Resolution enhancement
works by tahng the mixture of dots which
normallymake up a 800dotgerinch image
or character and using a "smoothing" algorithm to adjust the size of those dots so they
provide smooth curves and arcs.
Of course, not all is rosy in the HP garden. The paper tray offering room for
only 70 sheets (and that's pushing it)could be larger, and having it stick out the
side of the machine does add to the overall
footprint of what is supposed to be a small
machine. To be fair,however, HP does
offer an optional lower cassette which will
hold 250 sheets
although the IIIP will not
be such a bargain if you have to buy this.
Overall, however, all the quality you
would expect in an HP LaserJet is evident
in the design of the IIIP~ e spite the fact
that the price is defmitely entry leveL

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Unlike most of the Canon Leased sys-

between the rudimentary quality of HP's

PCL 4 and Adobe'5 PostScript. The only
problem is that HP has since introduced
PCL 5 which makes it a much more direct
competitor to PostScript in and of itself.
At any rate, sufBce it to say that one of
the Srst things you would have to ensure in

EpsoEE EPL-7500
Epson has had an interesting history in the
laser printer market, but with the arrival of
the EPI 7500 it is fair to say that the company fmally appears to have it all figured out.
Gone are the incompatibilities of yesteryear, replacing them is a keen awareness of
the importance of both performance and
Ceaappod
eTf opppage 28

$ $ $

tems, the Sharp JX-9500 (and lookalike

Texas Instruments MicroLaser) features a
paper tray underneath the inner workings
of the printer, rather than at the side of the
machine. The Sharp machine is also fastrated at 6 pages per minute by the manufacturer.
All in all, however, this fs an exceptional
printer despite the fact that the design is
starting to grow a little long in the tooth.
Only one small detail counts against it in
any way. It uses a nonstandard engine (i.e.,
Sharp'5 own proprietary one) and therefore consumables cannot be as readily purchased at the aggressive prices you might
be ableto count on when buying toner cartridges for, say, a machine with a Canon
engme.
Despite being the world'5 leading supplier
of laser printer engmes, Canon has always
been a bit of an "aleocan" when it comes to
actually selling complete laser printers to
endmsers. At the heart of this difBculfy has
been the company'5 inability to builds HP
LaserJet emulation as part of the base
machine. This has always been understood
to be the result of a tacit agreement
between Canon and HP (one of Canon'5
largest' customers for laser printer engines)
23ot to compete with one another directly in
the LaserJet arena.
To get around this difBctflty, Canon has
developed its own page description language known as CaPSL II I ( C a n on

ing to the PostScript and HP LaserJet III

standards.

c onsidering the Canon LBP4 Plus is that pri n t l a ser based on th e C a non L X
either your package offered support for
eng i ne with a few extras thrown in. To
CHPSL Ill or that you were willing to spend s t art with, it comes with all the basic fonts
the extra money needed to buy an emula- y o u would expect (Courier, plus scalable
tion package for it. Canon itself lists IBM
v e r sions of Times and Helvetica in their
Proprinter, the Epson FX85, PostScript and S w iss and Dutch incarnations), parallel and
HP s earlier LaserJet and LaserJet Plus stan- serial interfaces, plus a 12-month onsfte
service agreement and a toner cartridge
dards as optional emulation modes.
So what'5 the LBP4 Plus? It is basically a ( t h at'5 one 'cartridge, not free cartridges for
standard four-page-per-minute sma114'oot- 1 2 months).

Sharp jXASOOPS

Sharp'5 natty little JX4500 is not the newest

smallkootprint laser on the market, but it is
still one of the most elegantly designed and
versatile. This PostScript version of the
machine offers the full 85 fonts provided by
more conventional (and much larger)
Canon-baaed PostScript systems yet also
ofFers both parallel and SCEfal interfaces, as
well as AppleTalk as an option.

The LBP4 Plus is a well+uflt and dean-

ly designed alternative to printers conform-

55

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28

TH E COMPUTER PAPER JUNE '92

EpsoaaEPL-7500
The EPI 7500 is driven by a poweaful 20
MHz RISC processor, and includes a fullblown version of Postscript with the requisite 85 fonts, 2 MB of RAM as well as parallel, serial and Apple Talk interfaceL Epson

claims that this RISC processor allows the

printer to process data about six to eight
times faster than a conventional 68000
microprocessor.
The 7500 uses a Minolta print engine
rated at 6 pages per minute. Although
Mnolta is not the world's leading printengine manufacturer and we might have
been concerned about the use of its print
engine in a machine from a smaller company the buying power and popularity of the
Epson name mean that getting consumables for this machine should not be a
problem.
If there were any concerns at all about
this otherwise excellent PostScript laser,
they would only be that it is a little larger
than most four~age-per-minute systems-

s,q Save
Sn
Laser
Services inc

the machines it is priced to sell againstand you' ll therefore have to give over just a
bit more desk space to make room for it.

Apple Laselvanter IIF

Apple LasserlNrlScar llf shel lie

Ever since the launch of its Srst LaserWriter

in late 1985, Apple has been at the fore&out of developing Postscript+ased laser

printers suitable for highend desktop and

Canada's Leading Toner Cartridge Remanufacturer

professional publishing applications. Even

today, when a Good of cheap PostScript
printers have made the market far more
competitive, A p p le's "Rolls Royce"
LaserWriter range keeps selling.
But last October Apple announced a
substantial revamp of its laser printer
range ip two most expensive lasers (the
LaserWriter H and HNT) were discontinued and replacedby two even higher~eci-

REMANUFACTURED TONER CARTRIDGES

Full SoLWarranty
Free Pickup and Delivery
6 Recycles Guaranteed with ourSOLDrum
24 Hour Turnaround Time
LASER PRINTER SALES New
AN0RE00NDITSNE0

Sed machines: the LaserWxiter Hf anYHg.

While based on the same Canon engines as
the machines they are repladng, Apple has
built a great deal more power and Mtelhgence into the new machines.
To start with, both machines use one of
the fastest computer processors you are
likely to see in a laser printer: the Motorola
68050. In the Hf it runs at 20 MHz and in
the toff- the-line Hg it ramps up to an
hnpressive 25 MHz.

SERVICINQ AN0
CONSUMABLES
Ask us about High Resolution Cartridges for today's new High Res Printers.

At Sot, we don' tjust say It weput it on paper.

call88 lAS-ER eez->7~7

289 West 8th Ave. Vancouver B.C. V5Y 1N3
Bus: 685-2737 F a x: 874-2737

328S Main St h.

The Hf complements this processing

power with 2 MB of RAM (upgradable to 52
MB), along with built-in AppleTalk and RS252 connectors (the latter being because
Apple expects to be able to sell a fair number of these machines to users of IBMcomIaatible PCs). Despite Apple's involvement
an
t he
deve l o p m en t of
the
T rue Type/TrueIma'ge alternative t o
Adobe's PostScript, Apple has chosen to
u se th e l a t e s t i m p l e mentation o f
PostScript Postscript Level 2~ i t s paged escription l a nguage fo r b o t h n e w
machines. All TrueType fonts (including
the TrueType screen fonts in Apple's
S ystem 7 o p e r ating system fo r t h e
Madntosh) are, however, supported on the
new machines.
Apple has also felt the need to olnr an
alternative to HP's enhanced resolution system. Known as FanePrint, it is designed to
smooth the jagged edges of printed text.
pie has also developed a system known as
P otoGrade to do the same for photos. Ic is
an option on the Hf, but colnes standard on
the Hg.
In short, these new Apple printers represent a major evolution of laser printing
technology and, if they point the way to the
path the rest of the industry will be tahng,
there are going to be some very nice lasers
around soon,

Cohclcseloh
Smaller, faster and with higher resolution
seem to be the order of the day. A growing
number of manufacturers (Apple, HP and
Epson Ea IBM/Lexmark among them) have
seen the value of providing resolution
enhancement systems, all manufacturers
have dropped their prices and the competition between PCL and PostScript seems
keener than ever. It all bodes well for the
future and, in the meantime, proves there
are real laser~rinter bargains to be had
here and now. 5

Ckmal Namtuy

lismil thaJ'ril080 7pm Ql@

8O4 7 -

Vancoiillr, B.C. V5V3M6

Set 10am.S
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,Iji liem'

THE COMPUTERPAPER JUNE '92 29

COMPUTER $Y$TEM$ INC

'sr
t the 486 Kl A erformance for th

'

KiCKS Computer is proud to present the revolutionary KiCKS 486 Local

Bus System. With the 32-bit local bus slot on board, it enables the CPU to
communicate with I/O device ( graphics card, disk controller, 8r LAN
devices etc.) at 32-bit which was not possible for conventional 486 ISA
system. The problem with 486 ISA bus system is that it can only
accommodate 16-bit I/O device; in these systems, the CPU still has 32-bit
communication with the on-board memory, but everything slows down
when it is sending and receiving information through a 16-bit ISA bus
device. Up until now, the only way you can fully utilize the 32-bit 486
CPU is to spendextra $2,000 to invest in an EISA bus sytem; now with the
introduction of KiCKS's 486 Local Bus System, you can gct EISA
performance for the price of an ISA system.

8 undni Su er -NB386S ZOMHz Notebook

rice of an ISA s stem

Features:
True Intel 486 CPU,64K Cache
4MB (70ns) RAM, Expandable to 32MB
n
1.2MB 5.25 or 1 44MB 3.5 n Floppy Drive
125MB 15ms IDE Hard Drive 64K cache
2 Serial, 1 Parallel, sr' 1 Game Ports
32-bit Tseng 4000 SVGA 1MB SVGA card
14" Non-int. SVGA Monitor
Focus 2001 Enhanced Keyboard
19n Tower Case w/ 200% Power Supply
Two year Parts Iilr Labour Warranty

eI

Intel 386SX 20MHz CPU

2MB memory expandable to 8MB

3.5e 1.44MB internal floppy drive

60MB IDE Hard Dove
8.5" backlit LCD VGA screen
32 gray scales
8.5ex I I "x2", 6,2 lbs
Includes MS DOS 5.0FastLynx- Free carrying casewith each purcha

Intra NB-320S 38 SX-20MHX Notebook

KiCKS 486DX-33 u.:~p-' $2$65,00eLease 884.95/month

KiCKS 486DX2-50 ='W~'"' $2$95.00 I

893,55/month

KiCKS 486DX-50 a~

SI0 3.79/month

$2,8 7 9,00 I

- Lease $78 71/moath '-

M "~,

{60rLeRAM rtk256K Cachefor 486DX-50 Model)

$2,199.QQ

Intel 386SX-20MHz CPU

2MB memory expandable to 5MB
3,5: 1.44MB internal floppy drive
60MB IDE hard drive
8.5n Backlit LCD VGA screen
16 gray scales
8.66ex I I "x2. I ", 6.8 Ibs
Includes MS DOS 5.0
Free carrying case with each purchase

OPTIONS:
256K Cache Irtemory
$50,00
32-bit S-3 Graphics Accelerator 1MB $215,00
3 2-bit HD/FD IDE Dik Controller c a l l
32-bit Ethernet Adaptor
caII
Note: All KiCKS 486Local Busmo herboardare upyadable
Iiom 486DX-33 to 486DX2-50 or 486DX50

. mP

Specificatlonsr

*Lease $$2.46/mottth
with 25MHz CPU
add $100.00

Unbeat ble Bubble et Sunle

Cannon BuhbMet ILI-10eX
e 360x360 dpi
' 83 cps letter quality
e Parallel interface
e 80 columm print width
' Emulations:
IBM X24E
Cannon BJ-130e
e 30sheet Auto Sheet Feeder

hfEC Silent NriteI MOdel 95

Adobe Postscript power made perfect.
- Genuine Adobe Postscript Level II
- HP Laser Jet III PCL5 Compatible
Automatic Emulation Switching to Laserjet
- MS DOS 8 VYindows Compatible
- 6 page per minute, 35 scalable Adobe fonts
- 300x300dpi with Sharp Edge Technology for improved quality
,.- Parallel/Serial/Appletalk with automatic switching
- 250 sheet ietter cassette S hutit-in to-envelop tender .
-2M8-memory expandable to 5MB
u-

IP

-389-.Q6"-.
-.~

with every notebook purchase for only

n

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g S~~ g QQ
'
4

,'

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AIl~ ~

pn~ ~ f~ ~

>~

~ y.

Prices maychangewithout notice.

PleasecaII for availability andthe latest pricing.

g :'

' All lease rate are base

on 36 month lease OAC; please askour salesrep. for more details.

The intd InsttreLogois s ~

of i nter Gnpotntton.

"

. v i.~

';

"

'+

"

'

'

'

trv

..'A.' Vancouver Branch: ~~

Main Office:
UAlt g5 4300 Kirlgsway
$237 West Broadway
BUrnaby, B.C. VSH 1Z8
Va r lcoIJver, B.C. VGH 168
Fax: (604)438-7088
Fax:(604) 738-288]

phona:(So4)4se-soee

. KICKS:COMPUTER,.SYSTEMS INC

'

ch:
,a.
Surr e y Bran
creative Electronics- inc 'I ..

-.;- '

=.
Fax: ( 604)582-0463 -:.

ph o ne:(so4pse-sees

Mori-Fri 9:30am-6:00PM Sat;10:00am-5:00PM

Sunday 8 Holiday Closed

Mon, Tues,Sat:9:30-5:30
Wed-Fri:9:30-9:00
Sunday: 12:00-5:OO,

30

T HE COMPUTER
PAPER JUNE '92

Features:
AMD 386SX-25 CPU
2MB (70ns) RAM, Expandable to 8MB
1.2MB 5.25" or 1.44MB 3.5" Floppy Drive
52MB 17ms IDE Hard Drive
I: I Interleave IDE HD/FD Controller
2 Serial, I Parallel, gt I Game Ports
16-bit VGA card 256KB
14" VGA Monitor (640x48Q, .411mm dp)
Chicony Enhanced Keyboard
13" Tower Case w/ 200W Power Supply

Features:
True Intel 386DX-25 CPU
2MB (70ns) RAM, Expandable to 8MB
IAMB 5.25" or 1.44MB 3,5" Floppy Drive
82MB 17ms IDE Hard Drive
I: I Interleave IDE HD/FD Contmller
2 Serial, I Parallel, th I Game Ports
Trident 9000 SVGA card 512MB
14" SVGA Monitor (1024x768,.31mm dp)
Focus 2001 Enhanced Keyboard
13" Tower Case w/200W Power Supply

$1,059.00

$1,299.QO

* Lease $39.70/month

2 YEAR
WARRANTY

Featurust
True Intel 386DX-33 CPU

64K Cache, 128K optional for $15

4MB (70ns) RAM, Expandable to 32MB
1.2MB 525" or 1.44MB 3.5" Floppy Drive
105MB 19ms IDE Hard Drive
I: I Interleave IDE HD/FD Controller
2 Serial, I Parallel, 8t I Game Ports
Trident 8900C SVGA card I MB
14" SVGA Monitor (1024x768,.28mm dp)
Focus 2001 EnhancedKeyboard
Desktop AT Case w/200W Power Supply

$1,559.00

* Lease $48.70/moath

Upgrade tn 4MB memory for only $84A)O

mora!

a Lease $5850/month

Upgrade tn 4MS memory for only $54.(IO morn!

Optional AMD 40MHx CPU for only $15 mere!

Pg
SYSTEM UPGRADES tl!c OPTIONS
Features:
True Intel 486DX-33 CPU
64K Cache,
256K optionalfor$50.00
4MB (70ns) RAM, Expandable to 32MB
1.2MB 5.25" or 1.44MB 3.5" Floppy Drive
105MB 19ms IDE Hard Drive
I: I Interleave IDE HD/FD Controller
2 Serial, I Parallel, Ec I Game Ports
Trident 8900C SVGA card I MB
14" SVGA Monitor (1024x768,.28mm dp)
Focus 2001 Enhanced Keyboard
Desktop AT Case w/ 200W Power Supply

Additional 5.25" 1.2MB floppy drive

$69.00
Additional 3.5" I 44MB floppy drive
$59.00
Microsoft DOS 5.0 (OEM)
$49.00
Microsoft Windows 3.1 (OEh4)
$65.00
Digital Research DR DOS 6.0 (OEM)
$59.00
Cardinal
2400bpsinternal modem (OEM) $59.00
Cardinal 9600 S/R int. Fax-Modem, BitFax $99.00
Legend Serial Mouse (800dpi)
$ 19,00
Zoom 9600 S/R int. Fax-Modem w/ WinFax $159.00

Features:
True Intel 486DX-50 CPU
128K internal Cache memory
256K extennl Cache memory
4MB (60ns) RAM, Expandable to 32MB
1.2MB 5.25" or 1.44MB 3.5" Floppy Drive
125MB 15ms IDE Hard Drive
I: I Interleave IDE HD/FD Controller
2 Serial, I Parallel, dc I Game Ports
Trident 8900C Hi-Color SVGA card I MB
14" Non-int. SVGA Monitor (1024x768,28mm dp)
Focus 2001 Enhanced Keyboard
19" Tower Case w/ 200W Power Supply

$1,949.00

CKS CLEARANCE CORNER

$2,799.00

Lease $73.00/month

g~
~~

* Lease $100.90/month

Logitcch SerialMouse Man w/ Windows3.0 $95.00

Mictosooft BusMouse w/ Windows3.0
$119.00
-Ci t izen
GSXI3Q24-pin printer,
color upgmdable$289.00
Citizen GSXI40+24-pin ptr,color upgtadable $339.00
Viewsonic 5+ Non-int. SVGA Monitor,.26dp $559.00
mwdnb/e tat&e qunrratyInst, nII hrund new)
:,u~

~,".g

Upgrade to 4$6DXZMMHz CPU for only

$3391

~9u .:PP~:

KiCKS BBS UPDATES

VIDEO GRAPHICS ADAFIORS SP%X1AL

KiCKS Computerpmudly announcesiis newaadimpmved KiCKS

BBS system.Nowwith two newlines, we areableto offcr carclieais
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"Made lrl USA '--:w-:-,=m:-.,
,.',, v~ v A 3 )is, IMP 24'.--'~.;:,.
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" -

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ATI VGAWonder XL 1MB, 32K colors (OEM)

ATI Vantage 1MB VRAM with mouse (OEM)
ATI Graphics Ultra 1MB VRAM with mouse(OENI)
Cyclone XG S-3 Windows Accelerator 1MB VRAm

$179.00
$365.00
$489.00
$299.00

Some ofthenewfeanaasoar BBSwill offer mctudes:' Larger Fiks Area

' up-aHtate videosadprbaer drivws
Eqaipmua Spccigcatkms
/ HD Drive T
a CD-ROM whbaver I 5,0QOates
Adart Amatmudcdaasappty>
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Is

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fnhe tnstaltatke!!!

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Emphasis isbeing phced inthe tcchnical aadsalesinquiry mass,We

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32

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THE COMPUTERPAPER JUNE '92

i in e I '

33

Canon enginesare used in by farthe

largest number of laser printers.

Q Csof I4%ahsnght
o matter which laser printer you
buy, you are likely to Snd it using
one of only a few different laser
printer engine types. Engines basically handle all the mechanical work of taking paper
into the printer, transferring text and
images onto paper using toner and then
transporting the paper back out of the
printer again.
Laser printers are not largely about electronics. The electronics of the printer' s
control panel, memory handling, intedacing, page description languages (PDLs)
and font handling are generally supplied by
third parties or the manufacturers themselves.
Third parties such as Adobe and
Hewlett-Packard license PDLs and font systems such as PostScript and PCL while manufacturers or their OEMs supply the electronics to interface this software with the
laser printer engine. And there is no manufacturer with a higher prolle in the laser
printer engine market than Canon whose
engines are used in printers Som the likes
of Apple and Hewlett''ackard.
Canon started producing engines back
in 1975 and licensed them to HewlettPackard, Fujitsu, Hitachi and Oki. But it
was the production of the Canon SX used
in the HP LaserJet III and the Apple
LaserWriter NT range that proved the
turning point for Canon. Canon claimed
that it had three times the life of prior
engines,and much improved paper-handling capabilities. The imaging technology
behind the Canon SX offered a recommended monthly throughput of 5,000
pages and a speed of 8ppm.
Shortly after that in an attempt to
lower the cost of its engines with a lower
print speed and offer a smaller "footprint" Canon developed another engine:
the Canon LX. This engine was again based
on a diode laser, used reversal imaging and
offered aspeed of 4ppm. The Srst printer
to be based on it the Canon LB4 was
launched in October 1989.
One noteworthy competitor to Canon is
Ricoh, which has been in the laser printer
business since the early 1980s. Among its
early customers for print engines were the
likes of IBM, HP ( pre-LaserJet), GCC
Technologies, Mannesmann Tally and
Epson. Epson used the engine in its ilhfated
G(P500 one of the company's early
entries into the laser printer market.
Unfortunately, the Ricoh engine at
6ppm was not as fast as its 8 ppm Canon
counterparts and offered a nonstandard
consumables replacement system. Epson
compounded the problem by not bothering to include c;ither PCL or PostScript
emulation modes on the machine and thus.
sales never built to the levels which would
have made it a success for Epson or Ricoh.
Similar problems dogged the early
Ricohbased IBM laser printer ofFerings and
IBM eventually switched to an engine of its

giant Xerox also keeps a hand in the market.

There is no denying, however, Canon's
complete and overall dominance of the
laser printer engine market. Canon engines
are used in by far the largest number of

laser printers sold in both the US and

Europe and they have really set the standards for laser printer development worldwide. When Canon went for a selfwont ained single toner cartridge on its ~ g e per~ u t eprinters, so did the rest of the

Industry. When Canon reduced the size of

its engines (and thus its overall footprint)
in the design of the LB' , so did HP with
t he LaserJet IIP and Apple with t h e
Personal LaserWriter range. Where Canon
leads, everyone else follows....

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labels and forms.
0 U I T Less than 53dba operation makes it a smart
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SPEED / V O LU M E A t l 6 p agesperminuteor1,000
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fast as traditional laser printers.

F L EX I I I L I T Y The Darius LaserFlow emulates

the PCL 4 interface protocol of the LaserJet II with
extensions to handle faster graphics and ensure
compatibility. Built-in connectors for two Laser Jet II
compatible font cartridges allow you to further improve
the presentation of your printed documents. A straightthrough paper path allows the LaserFlow to print on a
broader range of form sizes (single page form max. 33"
length, min. 1.5" length), paper types and thickness than
any sheet-fed laser printer.

own design for its current range of lowest

lasers.
While Canon and Ricoh have been two
of the more intriguing players in the laser
printer engine market over the past
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The Darius LaserFlow will work with any host computer, and is ideally suited for the office network.
The Darius LaserFlow comes with A ONE YEAR WARRANTY,
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onc:s. Major Japanese Brmssuch asKyocera,

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Darius ProFessional and LaserFlow are trademarks of Darius Technology Ltd., Laser)et II is a registered trademark of Hewlett-Packard Company.
The information contained in this advertisement is subject to change without notice.

34

T HE COMPUTER PAPER JUNE '92

In

je

P I in el s
By Gaff N%cehu
right

nk jet printers have come a long way in

DeskJet, DeskJet 500 and PaintJet are the
the past three years largely thanks to
result. These all use ink jet technology to
two companies: Hewlett-Packard and
produce laserguaiity output at a very low
Canon. HP started the ball rolling years ago cost with laser~tyle control and paper hanwith its small but perfectly fonnc,'d ThinkJet
dhng.
ink jc:t printer an interesting little
These printers typically can use the PCL
machine which produced mediocre quality pag e description language employed by
output, but did so quietly and without tak- H P's LaserJet range of laser printers, will
ing up much desk space.
operate with Bitstream font families and, in
O ver the past three years, the inkjet
general, fulfill the role of a being a poor
t echnology HP pioneered in the ThinkJet man's laser. There is a certain irony here,
has grown up and products such as the
as it is also HP which has by far the largest

market share of the laser printer sector.

Meanwhile, Canon also a leading laser
printer manufacturer and supplier of all
the engines for HP's LaserJet pxintersentered the ink jet market last year with its
diminutive and portable BJ-10e BubbleJet
printer. It weighs only four pounds, takes
up little more deskspace than a typical
notebook computer and will emulate either
an IBM ProPrinter or Canon's own BJ-150c;.
The success of this machine recently
spurred Canon to announce plans to
expand BubbleJet ink jet printer production to up to 500,000 units per month within a year from its current 90,000 units.
Canon has conduded a number of OEM
(original equipment manufacturer) deals

with other computer makers such as

Apple to produce BubbleJet printers for
them. Canon reportedly controls over -70
percent of the world's laser printer market
and its major OE M p a r tners for the
BubbleJet printers are Brother Industries,
Fujitsu, and Apple (which uses this technology in its StyleWriter printer).
Canon is not the only producer of
portable ink jet systems. Kodak has for a
number of years marketed the Diconix
portable ink jet printer and this year
announced a 50(4lpi, fouryound DeskJetcompatible ink jet model which runs on
batteries. Kodak has said that it has already
s old more 500,000 of
the machine~ d e
for them by Far East manufacturer Chinon.

Page Description

Languages
By Geo
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Each component can be readily and easily
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Kaiyo S L - 100 Sy s tem is a 80 3 8 6 S X,
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Kcsiyo SL-100 comes with two 3.5" diskette
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8est of all it has a built in VGA port with 512KB
video ram. supporting resolution of 1024x768 16
color and 800x600 256 color graphic mode plus
132 column text mode.
Kaiyo SL-100 System comes with a tastefully
design carrying box ideally for retail display and
attrachon.

Octeit Hippo-II SOMHz 486 motherboard a

real state of the art, using 100% Moto('olo I.C.
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aser printers did not become popular

merely because they allowed paper to
e easily fed a sheet at a time or
because they offered better quality output
than the average dot matrix system. The
real key to the success of laser printer technology lies in the huge advances which have
taken place in the development of page
description languages (PDLs).
It is PDLs which have allowed laser printers to produce near-typeset quality output
and subsequently sell in huge numbers. In
fact, those laser printers which have not provided proper page description languages
(such as Epson's original GQ-5500 and
Citizen's Overture) were not particularly
successfuL These manufacturers found out
the hard way that the idea of a laser printer
is not to emulate a daisywheel or dot matrix
system, but to give users complete control
over both the text and images to appear on
the pxinted page. And for that you need a
proper page description language.
There are two major page description
languages: PCL the Page C o n trol
Language developed byHewlett-Packard for
use in its LaserJet range, and PostScriptAdobe's premier PDL for desktop publishing work, with its fine control of font and
image scaling. For a number of years, these
two page description languages existed happily alongside one another. PCL was the
lewdest language licensed by HP to dozens
of OEM manufacturers who needed their
laser printers to do little more than print in
the Courier typeface and handle the odd bit
of line drawing, while PostScript devices
were left to handle the highwnd DTP and
professional publishing applicationL
In the past two years, however, Adobe
has significantly lowered the price of a
PestScxipt license while HP has been consistently adding to the power of PCL. For
many jobs, there is new little to choose
between a PCLcompatible printer and a
PostScript model both will print graphics,
both will handle scaiable fonts and both are
well-supported by printer drivers in all
major applications.
And the developers of both standards
have been busy txying to satisfy the high and
low ends of the market. At the same time as
Adobe, for example, was lowering the cost
of PostScript licenses it was busy developing
PostScript Level 2-e new, high~nd version
of PostScript which claims the ability to
build raw type characters four to five times
fitster and vastly improves the readaMity of

small type sizes.

':.
"
::.
"
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IIQD OIFIQ I FAQORY

CANlslANOyyIQs WAREHOIISE

Unit 705 . 8,7/F., Prosperity Centre

77 -81 Container PortRoad,Kwai Ch ung,Hong Kong

Unit 333, Cambridge Industrial Centre,

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Tel: (852) 487-9892 Fax: (852I 4814866, 4814876 Telex: 48719 STDCC HX Tel: (604) 273-7886 Fax: (604) 273-7889

This was partially in response to HP's

decision to build scalable versions of the
Times and Helvetica font fiunilies into its
HP LaserJet III machines along with resolution enhancement technology which
largely eliminates the jagged edges you
often see in laseryrinted graphics.

THE COMPUTER
PAPER JUNE '92 35

Celor Printer Engines

Color pxinters don't genexally use the same
xint engines as standard black~dmhfte
r printers. One of the more interesting
to come to light in recent days is the thermal transfer printing engine used by
Shinko in color offerings such as the
OceColor printer. It requires three elements: a thermal print head, an ink sheet,
and paper ortransparent fi
h n.
The thexxnal print head consists of individually addressable styli that correspond to
a single phrel on each raster line. The ink
sheet features an ink coating on one side.
When the ink sheet is heated from behind
by the thermal print head, the ink melts
and is transfexxed to the paper or film. The
paper has no chemical coatxng, although it
is altered to create a smooth finish.
To fixnc6on with the color printer, the
ink sheet is made up of different panels
where each section is coated with a single
color. For a threocolor ink sheet, there are
three sec6ons: cyan, magenta, yellow. Each
color on the ink sheet is used to render the
color separations generated by the internal
PostScript interpreter. These three separa6ons are combined on a page to produce
the final color image. The ink sheet must

maintain uniform contact with the paper or

transparent fihn during the heating process
to ensure that the ink is uniformly transferred. The paper must be accurately positioned for each pass over the thermal print
head to ensure correct alignment of the
color separations. The alignment is known
as registra6on. Halftoning techniques used
by OceColor are supposed to ensure that
registxa6on and paper stretching problems
ax'e minimized*
To obtain a fullwolor image, the ink
sheet is advanced to the first color section
of the ink sheet roll. The complete infoxma6on for that color separation is then printed for the entire page. Then, the ink sheet
is advanced to the next color, and the
paper is backed up. New color information
is then printed over the entire page.
This process continues for a total of
one, three, or four times depending on the
number of colors on the mstalled ink sheet
roll. When using a threewolor ink sheet
roll, black is printed by overlaying all three
colors, which in general produces impressive quality black. With a fourwolor ink
sheet roll, the range of darker colors is
extended in the CMY(K) color palette and
excess ink buildup is minimized.

Kansai Introduces Printer Sharing Solutions

Kansai Electric has introduced a new series
of ultra-high-speed printer buffex's which
allow multiple users to share printers and
plotters. Designed to optimize the output
efiiciency of personal computer and workstation environments, the EDL80, ED~
and ED&SO can be configuredin a variety
of ways dependmg on users' needs.
Each of the bufFers features Dynamic
Memory Access (DMA) architecture on all
input and output ports, enabling them to
achieve bufFering throughput of up to 300
Kbytes per second, which is about 80 times
faster than any buffer on the market today.
The EDB series printer buffers also
offer printer shaxing capaMities through
multiple, configurable input and output
parallel ports. The ED&SO offers three
ports,which can be configured as a maximuxn of two input ports and one output
port. The EDB40 oiFers four ports which

can be configured as either three input

ports and one output porti ox' two input
ports and two output ports. The EDS40
offers five ports for a maximum of four
input ports and one output port or three
input ports and two output ports. Other
configurations are possible.
Kansai aho offers the op6on to connect
the EDB buffer to output devices which
require serial interfaces, such as some plotterL
The EDB bufFers come standard with
1MS of memory and threestandard SIMM
sockets which can each accept memory
modules in 1MB and 4MB inrexaents. The
EDS buffer's memory can be expanded by
as little as 1MB and a maximum of 1RIMSs.
The EDSSO is priced at US$1400, the
EDS40 at $1~ a n d the EDBSO at $1,700.

Contact: Kanaai Baclric, 800-733-3374or

408-377-7082.

HP lettres Neer PaintJet XLSOO Color Ink Jet Printer

SINGAPORE, MAY 7 ( N S ) HewlettPackard has xeleased a new plain-paper

color printer for the business office. The
HP PaintJet XL%0 with HP's color implementation of PCI. 5C printer language carxies a hst price of C$4,SSR.
The printerproduces SOO dotaper4nch
(dpi) resolution on a variety of media types
and axes and features automa6c input/output switching for shnultaneous connec6on
to PCMadntosh, and networked environm ents. O p t ions i n clude a n A d o b e
PostScxipt Levd 2 upgrade kft and HP Jetdirect cards. It also supports automa6c language switching between PCL SC and
PostScxipt. PostScript users can purchase
the PostScript version (listed at C$6,%5) or
a user~stalhbl PostScript upgrade.
The printer enables business, as well as
creative and technical professionals, to
bring color prin6ng capabilities in-house
for presenta6on of graphics, spreadsheets,

color proofing, desktop publishingcomputermded design, and project scheduling.

As the HP PaintJet XLSOO printers are
the first color printers compatible with the
HP IaserJet III family of printers, they provide a transi6on to color printing for business users who currently use the latter.
HP PaintJet famfiy printers use HPdeveloped ink jet technology that creates
text and graphics by laying fine ink droplets
on the page. HP claims to have shipped
more than four million ink jet printers
ance 1984, more than all other ink jet manufacturers combined.
The printer is horizontal with brick-like
angles rather like an earlier model of a
Sharp portable stereo music system extended by speakers on both sides. "It must be an

engineer's (technical) design," quipped a

ress wag at a pre~lease dc:mo held during
's annual Asia Pacific Press Symposium
on Peripherals Technologies held at

A
',

Singapore early Aprid.

HP's marketing presentations held forth

on their strategies to "make: electronic color
pervasive" and on how "HP wBl take color
hardcopy from an hnportant spedalty niche
to an essential part of everyday pxin6ng"
through its ink jet technology, because
"color ts persuasive." E
Contact: Hewlel-Packaxf Canada Ltd., 8877
Soreway Drive, Miaatsaauea, ON L4V f M8
(416) 678-9480.

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36

T HE COMPUTER
PAPER

JUNE'92

User Service Tips

for Laser Printers
bt Chysstaphsr St)sail

LaserJet II is the world's most popular laser

printer (and they don't even make it any
more, having replaced it with the improved
LaserJet HI). Some of the printers that

There are seven main areas in your laser

printer that should receive attention from
the operator. They are:

employ the eight-page-per-minute Canon

1. Registration Assembly/Transfer Guide

2. Transfer Corona Assembly
5. Feed Guide Assembly

SX engine are: Apple LaserWriter II series,

Hewlett-Packard IatserJet series 11 and III,

+MS 800 series, Brother HL-8 series,

Canon LBP 8 series and many more. All

with just as many different sesvice spedfica- laser printers win have similar features, so
tions; so rather than offer a generic artide
this article will still have some useful inforthat could not be spedfic, I have chosen to
mation for everybody. However, if your
focus on the most widely used engine in the
printer does not use the Canon SX engine,
worl d e Canon SX. Approximately 759o I would strongly encourage you to study
of all laser printers use a Canon engine,
your operator'8 manual and/or even better
and the SX engme is by far the dominant
(funds permitting) obtain a service contract
one. In fact, Hewlett-Packard claims that its for your equipment.

ost laser printers are very reliable

machines requiring minimil maintenance, however there are some
things that you the operator (or your inhouse service tech), can do to keep the
machine in optimum working condition
and mmimize service calls. There are many
laser printer engines on the market today

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-Set of IDE/Floppy Cab(es
-IDE Cable
-Dual Floppy Cable

TVM 15" Non-Interlaced Supersync

(1024 x 768, 0.28dp)................$630.00
Legend 14" Non-Interlaced SVGA
(1024 x 768. 0.28dp)................$41 9.00
Legend 14" Interlaced SVGA

Hyundai 14" Inlerlaoed VGA (640 x

48o. o.41
dp)..............................$265.00
AamaZing 14" SVGA Interlaced
(1024 x768, 0.28dp).............$318.00

Qume 14" svGA yn-sync

(1024 x 768, 028dp).............$438.00

Aamazing 14" Mono

vGA..$109.00
Samtron 14" Mono
vGA.....$100.00
Datatrain 14" Mono VGA...$109.00
Datas 14" Mono Tn. ,.......$95.00
Daewoo 12" M~ i' . . ...,$85.00
Gold Star 12" Mono Tll......$95.00

Cleaning Kits-3.5' or 5.25" Head Cleaning Kit

-Mouse Pad
-MFM Cable (set)
Hardware-Screws, Studs, Edge Connectors,
Cables, Rails, Etc...
-30 P(n Simrn Socket-

386SX Mother Board.....489 Sr Up

488DX-25 Mother Board.............
(No CPU)..................$99.00 Sr Up
Tower, DesktopCase with Power
Supp(y......................$60.00 8 Up

(Modify sip psocket.)

101 Keys Tactile Keyboard

386SX Mother board
386DX Motherboard
286-12 Motherboard
286-16 Mother board
Mini, Mid, Tower Case

-Used BIOS

-Crystal Osci((a(or
- 270256, 27c512, 270128 EPROM

-52MBHD
- VGAMonitor
- MS-DOS
- I MB Memory
- Keyboard

Sampo 20" vGA Manner.,$1 680.00

(1024 x 768, 0.28dp).............$345.00

- True-Intel 386 DX-33 CPU

- 386DX 33MHZ Motherboard
(w/84KCACHE), AMI BIOS

41 256-70/80 DRAM...........$1.75
44256-70/80 DRAM...........$6.00
1M x 9-70/80SIMM.........$45.00
256K x9-70/80 SIMM......$15.00
4M x 9-70/80 SIMM.......$206.00

'

200W-250W P.S.

......,.$799.00

special

IDE (/0, AT I/O .........$3.008 Up

Floppy Drive.............$12.00Sr Up
Computer Gaee........ $1000Sr Up

Fax Machine............450.00 a Up
PowerSupply......,.415.008 Up

466DX25 M/B
486DX33 M/8
256K VGA
512K VGA
1MB VGA

-No cash retund

4vo guorranre on otrailablry of advertised ifems.
4(ost items have Srrdtecsauanitlly. Ie Srst come fiat service Stasis

-AS sales are tlnal.

-ASabove pnces are for cosh St carry only.

-No visa or crreaue wil Oe accepted.
-ASbrand new items trave 1 year warranty.
-AS uSed partS er COmpanentS haVe 30 dayS Wananry.

-ASobsoletre 8 damage itemshove no warranty.

If these names look like they came out

of a service technician'8 manual... that'8
because they did. Don't worry, though. I' ll
explain each one so that you will know
where to find them in your SX printer,
what their purpose is, and how to clean and
maintain them properly. Always, make sure
that you turn th e p r i nter off b efore
attempting to clean it.
Open your printer (by depressing the top
cover release button) and gently push the
hinged top cover back until it is at a 90degree angle to the rest of the printer. Now
look straight down inside the body f'rom the
front. You should see a lim~ e e n handlelike piece in the middle of an assembly that
contains a silver roller and a black rubber
roller. This is the transfer area where the
paper is registered so that the print will be
even on the page. The flat silver strip is the
transfer guide. Since paper passes through
the rollers and under the transfer guide,
they need to be cleaned, Use a damp doth
to wipe them (water should be suRdent).
Be sure to lift up the green handle and
wipe the backside of it also. If you have a
vacuum handy it will prove to be veryeffectivefor lifting off dust, toner and paper partides before wiping. As an aside note: 'laser
paper leaves far less paper dust (which is
abrasive and will cause excessive wear after
a higher page count) and producesa slightly sharper image.

2. Transfer Corona Assembly

Right after the transfer guide you will
notice a long narrow recessed box with
diagonal monofilament lines on top of it.
This is the transfer corona assembly. As the
page passes over it the corona wire a hairthin, conductive wire found inside the
assembly releases an electric charge onto
the page that is stronger than the charge
on the photoconductive drum, which at
this point is carrying the printed message.
This stronger charge attracts the toner off
of thedrum and onto the page. The corona
wire does not actually come into physical
contact with the page, just the electrical
charge from the wire does. Therefore it is
very important that the transfer corona
assembly be kept dean and free of anything
that may reduce the amount of charge onto
the page. The wire itself must be dean, but
so should the inner walls of the assembly...
as they reflect the charge and focus it
towards the page.
Carelly wipe the corona wire and the
inner walls with a pep. You will Qnd one
attached to the fuser deaning wand that
comes with your toner cartridge. Weuing
the ~
wi t h isopropyl alcohol will greatly
help to remove the built4lsp toner and dirt.
With the brush end of the green deaning
brush, found in the printer beside the feed
guide assembly, wipe the static teeth. They
are the sharp metal jags found in a row on
the far side of the transfer corona assembly.
Their function is to remove enough static
charge left on the page to prevent it &om

wrapping around the photodecuic drum.

3. Feed Gulsle Assembly

Intel inside ia registered trade mark of intel cor p,

Company trolley

5. Beam to Drum Mirror

6. Primary Corona
7. Ozone Filter

1. RelIstratlon Assembly

wtwl

4. Fusing Assembly

'

sscnrt
I I:terse 7SSSxn
Sre. II:aarnr4laixn
Sea 8 Hoades rtrxed

Following the corona assembly, toward the

back of the printer, you will find a black,
rounded, almost4lat ribbed piece that ends
at the fuser assembly. The feed guide
assembly, as the name suggests, guides the
printed page to the fuser assembly without

dismrbing the unfused toner now dinging

THE COMPUTER
PAPER JUNE '92
to the page. Dirt and toner accumulations
on the feed guide or its rollers can become
fused tothe back of the page. To dean,
simply wipe it with a damp doth.

4. Fusing Assembly
The fusing assembly is a large, rectangularshaped unit with a green felt~overed top
door. It sits inside at the back of the laser
printer. Make certain that the fusing unit
has had a chance to cool down (at least 10
minutes) before handling. Within the fusing assembly are two rollers. The upper
roller is a hollow tube that is coated with
teflon on the outside; this is to prevent
toner from stichng to it (just like your fiying pan). Inside the upper roller is a heat
lamp that isregulated by a thermistor and a
thermoprotector. These two sensors ride on
the upper roller at the front end and are
actually in physical contact with it. They
often are the culprits for scratches and
eventual tearing of the teflon coating.
A little, trick that I use to clean them,
when I'm not actually disassc,mbling the
unit, is to take a dean sheet of paper and
carefully push it down from the top along
the upper roller (front side) and between
the sensors and the roller. Ensure that the
paper is flat, not wrinkled, and move it
around so as to rub against these sensors.
When you pull the paper out, examine how
much dirt is on it. If there appears to be a
lot, repeat this process.
The other culprits for scratches are the
four separation pawls, or daws. They can be
located by pushing the back hinged section
open, toward the back of the printer. These
claws ride along the roller and guide the
paper out to the exit rollers. Dirt and toner
accumulations tend to build up on the end
of the daws, because of the heat from the
fuser, and can dig into the roller. Clean
them with your damp doth. You should be
cleaning the uppc:r roller every time that
you change the EPS cartridge.
The fuser cleaning wand has a felt tip
on one end of the wand. Place this tip on
the teflon roller and stroke it back and
forth a couple of times. This not only cleans
the roller, but oils present in the felt tip
lubricate the roller too.

6. Primary Corona

The primary corona (in the EPS cartridge)

conditions the photoelectric drum by applying a uniform negative charge across the
surface of the drum. Hold the cartridge in
one hand and notice two long shutters on
the top side of the cartridge. Between the
two shutters you will see a long black soft
plastic flap. The primary corona wire is just
underneath this flap. Take the green cleaning brush, found in the printer beside the
transfer guide, and insert the felt end
through the fiap. Slide the brush back and
forth a few times to dean the corona wire.
Be careful not to break the wire. If you have
ever seen a I/4" thick black streak running
down the right side of your page (referred
to as Right Side Streak, or RSS), this is
caused by a weakness in the primary corona
attracting excess toner onto itself which
interferes with the negative charge. Now
here is a plug for recharging your toner cartridges: when your cartridge is recharged
the technician inserts a magnetic strip that
eliminates this problem (if your recharger
doesn't do this, find another one).

S. Beam to Drum llwirror

Remove the EPS cartridge from the top
cover assembly. Near the top of the cover
you will notice a black metal assembly with
a long, narrow, rectangular window. This is
the mirror shutter. Carefully grasp it and
move it to the right and upNrard. Behind
the shutter you can now see the mirror.
This polished mirror reflectsthe laser beam
from the laser scanner assembly to the photoelectric drum. Unless there is condensation, smoke, fingerprints or some other
accumulations, do not touch or mar the
mirror in any way. It may be carefully wiped
with a dean lint&ee wipe, dampened only
with a fiuid approved for a camera lens.

cartridge, resulting in blurred images. It is a

good idea to vacuum the filter when you
clean the rest of the printer, but cleaning
should not be done instead of replacement.
A dean filter can sill be worn outl Ozone
filters may be purchased from most toner
cartridge suppliers or service companies.

multiple laser printers and/or copiers in

a confined area
a very dusty operating environment
printer exhaust port directed at the face
of personnel
poor room ventilation
persons with asthma or bronchial problems working in same area
extremely low relative humidity
Long continuous printing combined with
any of the above.
In addition to health concerns, you
should be aware that excess ozone trapped
in the printer (from not changing the filter) can break down the delicate photoactive layers on the OPC drum in the EPS

There are two types of replacement ozone

filters available. The OEM type, manufactured by Canon, which is what was shipped
with the printer when it was purchased.
They have a honeycomb-like look with
straight~ough air fiow. The alternative is
what looks like a square foam impregnated
Continuedos pago 93

T eUtimate iew
rou More Win ows
MQPc) -;-. ~

7. Ozone Filter
The ozone filter is found in the housing on
the right side near the back, just before the
fan. It is contained in a black plastic case
with a pull-latch door.Just pull the top tab
with afi
n ger or fi
n gernail.The door should
fiip down, exposing a dear plastic tab that
is attached to a black foam-wrapped filter.
Pull it out. Note: if your laser printer was
manufactured prior to 1989, the ozone filter will not be accessible without removing
the main body cover. Call a qualified technidanl Ozone gas is generated during the
printing process and must be filtered
through carbon before entering your
breathing space (it can be toxic and in high
concentrations can cause things like
headaches, nausea, coughing, chest pain,
and even prematureaging of the shn) The
Hewlett-Packard service technician's manual recommends replacement every50,000
ages under normal operating conditions.
he following conditions may necessitate
changing the ozone filter more often:

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Turn your Laptop or Notebook computer into a communications powerhouse.

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I
II

38 T HE COMPUTER PAPER JUNE '92

ROD

L
Product: Accel-.a-Writer LaseNVriter
Upgrade board
Prom: X a nte Corporation, 1400-9264589;
Distrhutsd in Canada by Mike
Watson a Associates Ltd.,
504-925-1141
Price: C S 1557 and up

I E W

Qa 9 Cc

Summary: UpgradeprovkresPostscript, PCL4,

AppleTalk, SCSI and hnprcved
speed and resoluticn to a variety of
printem.

R TM

id you know that is possible

to u p grade a n old
LaserWriter to a printer
that'sfaster and has higher resolutiony Fou could buy one of APPle's
upgrades such as the one that soups
up a IINT to a I/NTX Another possibility i s t h e A ccel-a-Writer
LaserWriterUpgrade, manufactured
by Xante CorPoration. The Accel-eWriter is a LaserWriter upgrade
board that has a RISC chip on it
that promises a four to 20 times performance increase over Motorola
68020- and 68000-based printers.
and PostScript compatibility at up to
four times the resolution.

Figure 1, 600-dpi output from Accel-a-Writer (PhoenixPage).

At $1429 list ($1278 street), the Personal
LaserWriter LS is Apple's lowestwost laser
printer, including neither AppleTalk network connectors nor PostScript capabilities both features added by the Accel~Writer upgrade.
Several memory configurations and
models for various LaserWriters are available, t prices ranging &em C$1567 (for a
800 x 500 model that can be fully upgraded
to 600 dpi later) to C$5261 (for a 600 x 600
model with 16MB RAM). It is also possible
to upgrade a Hewlett-Packard LaserJet H,
Hp, IH or HIp, although the flash ROM
option (mentioned below) is not available
on the Hp and IIIp prmterL
Boards shippmg since mid-March are
the only ones that can accept a new flash
ROM option.

/ P~ '

RECYCLE
YOUR LASER
E5PJIIQhllNENT CARTRIOGES
,SAVE THE
<~.v.~<

EXPERT REIIIANUFACTURING

R TM
Figure 2. 300-dpi output from QMS PS-2200 (Adobe PostScript).

Hash ROM is a type of electrically rcprogrammable memory (so, in effect, it's not
really ROM at all) that acts like ROM in
that it holds its programming when the
computer is powered oK (See' Newsbytes,
this issue, for details on Microsoft's new
support for Intel's flash chips Ed,)
A half~eg of flash ROM costsC$121 at
the time of purchase, or twice thc: price if
ordered later. A one meg flash ROM configuration isC$242, or C$868 if ordered
later. Clearly, it is a better value to purchase
it up &ont.

Installation
The particular unit tested by 7yia Corlpurar
I'oper wascalled the Accel~-Writer IX, and
is spedfically for the LaserWriter LS. It had
12MB of RAM and 1MB of flash ROM and
would retail for $5018 (S2776 without the

flash ROM). Physically, it is a 15.5" x 15" x

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Canon, HP Laser, NEC, Apple,

Brother, QMS, OIivetti, Nang,

aptjg ilahp&s

2" metal box with the same footprint and

color as the LaserWriter. It plugs in c;asily
and requires little time and virtually no
technical prowess to set up. Other models,
such as those for the HNT and LaserWriter

Plus, are internal upgrade boards, but even

so, are very easy to install, with just a few
plugs. These internal boards just snap in
and out. Xante gives you the few tools you
need, plus instructions that lead you by the
hand.
If you make it a habit to never go
"under thehood" of your computer equipment, it shouldn't be difiicult to find a Mac
dealer or user club member to help you
install it in your printer. Believe me, it' s
easy.The company indudes a video tape
showing you how to do it, an antistatic wrist
band even a screwdriver.

Imlsrovod SIsood and ltosolutlon

Reports on CompuServe from users who
have had an Accelw-Writer installed in their
LaserWriters indicate that they are generally quite pleased with the upgrade. What
does thc; Accelw-Writer do for them? One
benefit is speed a result of the unit's AMD
29000 RISC processor. One user with a
LaserWriter Plus reported that a twoyage
PageMaker document with eight downloaded fonts and three TIFF images on the

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39

THE COMPUTER PAPER JUNE '92

front and six on the back used to take over
11 minutes to print. With the AccelmWriter
upgrade with 6MB of RAM (the AccelwWriter accepts up to 16MB of RAM), it
takes just over two minutes to print at
four times the resolutionl
Another benefit of the upgrade is
improved halftone quality. Xante claims
that it is possible to produce 197 gray levels
instead of the 25 obtained with 500 dpi at
an equivalent 60-line screen. This is,
according to the company, the equivalent
of 85(@dpi gray scales provided by the Accela-Writer board. Indeed, the output from it
looks great (see Figures 1 and 2 for a comparison ofunenhanced 5$4lpi output and
Accel&-Writer's 600dpi print).

Advanced aleznory
According to Xante's Verne Royster, an 8.5by ll~ c h page takes 6 MB of memory to
image at the unit's 6(Okapiresolution. The
unit increases the amount of addressable
dots per inch from 90,000 to 560,000.
Royster daims the 8MB board is the most
popular one, for two reasons: unlike the
6MB version, you do not have to discard
low-density RAM when you upgrade an
SMB model to 12 or 16 megabytes. Most
importantly, the SMB (or greater) configurations allow you to use the extra RAM as
virtual memoiy (practically a necessity for
complex pages) or afont cache, where
downloaded fonts are made temporarily
resident, greatly speeding up printing. The
latestboards havean option for fash ROM,
which means thatyou can now download
fonts to the printer and have them stay
there when the printer is turned off. When
a new font that is not resident in the flash
ROM is used, it is downloaded to the fiash
ROM and the least-used common font is
fiushed and replaced.
A SCSI port for connecting a font storage hard disk is also standard. All models
except the LaserWriter Plus upgrade also
indude a parallel port.
Another great feature of the AccelwWriter is its abiTity to support simultaneous
printing from a PC and a Mac through
AppleTalk, serial and Centronics parallel
ports, without switching or extra hookups.
This could be a boon to an office hoping to
share a LaserWriter between two or three
machines.

Few Hassles

"feature" of SmartArt that expects to find a

680s&eeries microprocessor in the printer,
not the Accelw-Writer's RISC processor.
A "Read Me" file on the Mac utilities
disk (the Accel-a-Writer ships with both
Mac and PC utility disks) describes a conflict between SuperLaserSpool and
PageMaker that it daims will be resolved in
the next version of the print spooler.
PostScript Level 1 compatility appears to
be excellent the best we' ve seen from a
clone.
The company's upgrade policy is
admirable. Xante promises that future revisions of the printer's EPROMs will be made
available at no charge to anyone who
requests them. Owners of older models of
Accel-A-Writers can thus obtain the current
EPROMs that support the new virtual memory and (optional, extrawharge) fash ROM
features.The only other problem we had
was an inability to print using the older
Apple LaserWriter 7.0 driver (which Apple
has acknowledged having some problems
with). We had no difficulties once we
upgraded to the newest 7.1.1 driver (included on Apple's System 7 Tune Up 1.1.1

disk).

Some users on CompuServe have

reported occasional problems with manual
printing, although we had no such difiiculties in our tests. Users of the 6MB version
report some PostScript "Limit Check"
errors when printing multiple pages with
scanned TIFF images, daiming error messages if the TIFF file is somewhere after the
first page, yet the page would print okay
when it was first in line.
Apparently, the new EPROMs' virtual
memory support solves this problem. We
did not experience any memory-related difficulties on our review unit.

COMPUTER

THE BREA
IHHOUIH
PAUNEXECllTWE
IS HERE)

1MB RAM/1MB onBoard

FULL 80 x 25 UncsLCDScreen
2 Slots for Shmdard ICCards
Qandard QWERlY Keyboard
Shndard Serhltpamlhl Ports
ExpansionBusfor 3 5' Drive
Advanced80CNA-10MHz CPU
Size: 8.8'D x 4.4'W x 1.0' H
Weight 560g ind batteries

SHARP PC-3000

RDN-BASE
DSORlNNE INCNDED:
Spreadsheet Text Editor Pemonsl InformationManager
MultilingualCapabilities: English, Italian, French,Spanieh,
German, Dutch/Swedish

16 PPI lASERPRINTER.

Prints up to 16pagesper minute

5 Printer Emuhthn includingHP
70DSheet 2nd-Trayavaihbh
Compactdesignsaves space
Serial, Parelhl Interfaces
Powerful, fast hser printerat a greatpricet

Conduslon

I '

I
I

SPECIALBONUS
SHARPJX9700

IS48KI
IISWAYATMCIRIAORNE,,VANCOUVER

The troubles noted above are extremely

minor, and may be easily worked around.
We would recommend an 8MB model (with
1MB fash ROM if you can afford it) over
the 6MB one,in order to take advantage of
the virtual memory and fontwaching opportunities it presents.
Xante's technical support is excellent,
and the Mobile, Alabama4ased company's
to114ree number is accessible from Canada.
The Accele-Writer has far better print quality than the standard LaserWriter and will
cost you less than a new printer.

Conserve our environment and

save 558 at the same time.

yfranks tolnfomex Computers (604488-0696) for

the loan of the LaserWriter LS used in this review.

Use Recharged Toner Cartridges

We found that the unit was not compatible

with Adobe's SmartArt. This is not a Qaw of
the Accel-a-Writer, but rather a dubious

It.

I
8

g 8

Alouette Recharge provides remanufactured and refilled toner

CartridgeS tO LOSer Printer uSerS IIJith SaVingS uP tO60%

D ES K T O P
0

M ED lA
a

100% Money Back Guarantee

"Wetake pride in our service."

II

, SCAl%VING:
Eps, Halhone a Grey scale
formats / ocR many fonts

~I .

I~br~,
Graphics TIFF,

-=

ero
+8'n

and dot matrix print supported

MAC RENTAIS: Mac+, sE/So,MAc ][

I .

'

All cartricges are tested and completely dissembled when recharged.

We alSO reCharge CartridgeS fOr:
Photocoplerg eCanonPersonolCopier
Sharp Z-SerieCopi
s er
PanoSDntCFP820

Lctger prlnIN8
HP Laser Jet I, ll, IIP, III, IIIP. IIID, Illsl

Apple Canon Brother IBM

QMS NEC Fullsu and morel

3496 Cambie Street Tel. 876-5550 / Fax 876-8819

40

W E COMPUTER PAPER JUNE '92

P RO

DU

EVI

Star Micronics
IIIX-24$0 Printer
Product: Star Micronics NX-2480 Printer
From: S tar Micronics America, Inc.,
Phone 800-447-4700 or 212-9888770. Distributed in Canada by
Beamsccpe, 1400-288-5585

Price: US8888 (list)

Have you ever had software stubbornly keep

resetting your printer7
Here's how the NX-2430
eliminates that

Relfng: 4 on a scale 1 lcwest to 4=highest

Reviewed for Newebylee by:
John McCormlck
Summery: An excellent example of a lcw- to
mid-range 24-pin dot-matrix printer
with lots of built-in features.

problem. .

T
Below
Dealer
Cost!

he Star NX-2480 dot matrix printer is

t he latest member o f t h e S t ar
Micronix printer line and shows, if
nothing else, that the 24-pin dot matrix
printer is far from dead, even with today' s
sub41,000 laser pxinters.
A great many business applications
require the dot matrix or even daisy wheel
printer's form4red capabilities, making it
common to have or at least need both an
impact and laser printer in the same office

Cash
&
Carry

(induding home offices).

ININI-GEN PROFESSIONAL GENLOCKS $149.00

Commodore 1084 Colour Monitors
External Disk Drives for ANIQA
Memory upgrades for ANIQA 800
Printers, colour for ANIQA's, 24p
USEDANIQA 2000'S
from

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$249.00
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S 99.00
S399.00
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Meetings

om u e r s

IBM, AM/GA, Printers, Lasers,

Notebooks

Summer
Special
Rent 388fss VGA Color,4MB,105MB,for only$225/monthOAC

Lotus Computers
IBM Compatibles

4 86-33 basic
$1099
386-33 basic
$ 649
3 86sx-25 basic $ 4 9 9
Monitors

OKI Page Printer $799

NEC 2/90 Postscript demo $1600
STAR 2430 designed
forwindows$399
OKI 380 24p111 Best value! $299

Fuji DL3600 24pin Wide, fast $699

Canon B J10EX NEW! $
379
Windows 3.1upgrades
$66

MAGNAVOX VGA demos $299 DR DOS 5.0 clearance $

For nonbusiness users, the dot matrix

printer can meet most needs, but the lowend DM printer is popular even in larger
offices because with the ubiquitous laser
printer available for "quality" printing,
there is less need for a highcnd daisy wheel
printer.
The number of fonts and character sizes
available on this
dot mauix printer ratupass*
es the capabihties of lowcncPlasers, and the
cost per page is less since you need only
feed this printer new ribbons, not toner cartridges and drums.
Something you might never have
thought about is the power question. Laser
printers draw a lot of power just sitting
there idling, enough that I have seen networks brought down by the combined
power surges of several laser printers. This
isn't a common problem, but it does point
out that new technologies are not without
the potential for exciting new problems.
Unpacking and setup ofthe NX-2450
took less than five minutes, although admittedly I am an expert at that sort of thing.
Continuous fanfold paper can be run
over the back or upfrom the bouom, or
you can insert single pages of typing paper
for those hig~uahty letters.
A serial port is opdonal but the evaluation u ni t c a m e w i t h t h e s t a ndard
Centronics parallel port which, along with
everything but the power cord, is located
toward the front of the printer, on the right
side instead of the back panel.
Operator controls are found on the
front of the printer. with status indicator
lights and a complex LCD I'eadollt.
The NX-2430 is about as small as a continuousform printer can get, weighing 14
pounds and measuring only 17 by lS by 6
incheL
Included in the printer's non-volatile
memory are two draft- and nine letterquahty fonts: draft, highmpeed draft, Roman,
Roman Proportional, Sanserif, Sanserif
P roportional,
Cour i e r ,
Couri e r

Proportional,

Pr e stige,

Pr e stige

Proportional, and Script.

Print sizes include Pica (10 characters
per inch), elite (12 cpi), semicondensed

(15 cpi), condensed pica (17.1 cpi), con-

25

densed elite (20 cpi), supercondensed (24

dpi), and proportional spaced print with its

th8 QgllpUt8t StOP8

7-11220 VOYAGEUR WAY,

frlCffMOND, 0 C V 6 X 3 E f

VANCOUVER CALGARY TORON TO

272~ 3
269 90 0 0 42$ - $$-00
Limited quantities on some items. We shipCOD. Out of town buyers please phone or fax. Dealers Welcome.

. .

variable cpi count.

Maximum print speed is rated as being
240 characters per second using semicondenscd size at
qual i ty, but the printer

will crank out even large pica in high~peed

draft quality at a shade over 200 cpL
Epson and IBM printer commands and
character sets are supported.
Conrarsssed
ofspage H

41

THE COMPUTERPAPER JUNE '92

JUNE 1992

Coinputer Paper Edition

NEW ZENITH NOTEBOOK TOP OF CLASS

OFFICE AUTOMATION
"p 110 - 11100 Voyageur Way =-::.
"~~~Richmond, B.C. V6X 3E1'"'".

:"-'-:::~-

k.:.'=--::,-"=, Tel; (604) 276-8898

'

ANO Vancouver-'4190 - 840 Howe Street '.-"=

-: Vancouver, B,C. V6Z 2M1.;:-:..':.--: Tel: (604) 681-6165 '=
-

",

;. '

, .",

"

- -

."-

~~"=

='.
-, ANO Kingsway:,---'-."."'
3571 Kingsway
-:=- Vancouver, B.C. V5R5L9 '.

-. Tel: (604) 432-7077 .. :"='

'~M

~~ 5 '

' "ANOSurrey

='.-'.112A - 12827 - 76th Ave

.-'.::, i Surrey,-B.C. V3W 2V3 ., "~i:.
,=; j:=:>>:: Tel: (604) 594-8682 <~ .,
'p l,",4I~~jB.NQ
U (Fi
'i

v I ,

:A III L's '"

,;-.:;='--'flNO Vancouver Island "'

::.1010 Yates Street
;" Victoria, B.C. V8V 3M6
= - ':=..Tel: {604) 386-2204

'-:=
fP
" .

AN O Kelowna

roces

Tel: {604) 861-8300::::K'

,-~="--,,i~iANO Kamloops:.::;:=.~;
825 Laval Crescent
'-:: Kamloops, B.C. V1Y 8R .~=="Tel: (604) 374-8002 .-'

iT '

cct T; .

ANO E dmonton ~':

z '
. 10301~,.-:r108th St ~t
i
~.",,', Edmonton, AB,TSJ I L7 ~~
,

'

-.-:Mg.:::.=
Tel: (403) 429-4990., +~sI; '

": =
.

"

.'. =- -umt I 2nd Floor..=': "-.-"...".~

'=" 226Esna Prak Drive::.~,:,.
'-

.-

Both Z-Note platforms provide support for an optional $0387SX

numeric math coprocessor which offloads large calculations &om the main
processor.
The usercan installa coprocessor vithoutany tools and boost
overall system performance for math-intensive applications.
Productobsolescence is a realconcern fortoday's notebook
computer purchaser. The Z-Note protects the investment by anticipating
futurerequirements, The Z-Note computers can be expanded by installing
additional data storage, adding a breathtaking 256 colour display or by
updating the bios which is stored in Intel FLASH memory.
The Z-Notefamily offers a choiceofthree levelsofstandard 2.5"
hard disk storage, 60MB, 85MB, and 120MB (the greatest capacity
available in a notebook design). All models of Z-Note come with a 1.44MB
3.5" floppy drive which can be upgraded to a 2.88MB platform, thus
doubling removable storage capacity.
Z-Note's new VGA edgelit screen provides high quality blackmwhite display of text and graphical data. Both 320L and 325L models can
be upgraded to an active-matrix VGA monitor which displays up to 256
coloiifs.
tional docking station.
Zenith Data Systems was the first to offer BIOS stored in Intel
The Z-Noteseriesoffersa choice oftw o i3$6 SL processing
FLASH memory. %m availability of this feature on all Z-Note computers
speeds. The Z-Note 320L utilize a 20MHz i386 SL microprocessor
means that they can be updated periodically to extend their performance,
switchable to 5MHz or OMhz. The Z-Note 325L and 325Lc use a 25MHz compatibility and functionality over time.
microprocessor adjustable to 6.25MHz or )MHz. The performance of the
The Z-Note sets new standards of excellence in the Notebook
325 modelsis furhterenhanced with 64K of cached memory, supported
computer arena. and Zenith continues to lead the pack in pioneering the way
directly from the i386 SL chip.
we lool at Personal Computing.
W ~
' ~
e

anage
m
ent

6 - 2250 Leckie Rd
:;:Kelowna, B.C, VIX 7J8:-.:

Zenith Data Systems (ZDS) captured the BYTE magazine'sBest

of Show at COMDEX/Spring and Windows World shows for its Z-Note
series of notebooks. The product provides a breakthrough for notebooks
by incorporating network capabilities, high performance and features
plus low price. Some of the mies of notebooks had active matrix colour
as well. The notebook was also selected by BYTE editors asBest
System,indicating a trend from desktops to notebooks as the personal
computer of the 90's.
The newZ-Note professional notebook series expands the
portable computing horizons as never before. The Z-Note is the first
notebook family to incorporate Intel i386 SL technology, upgradeability,
and integrated LAN connectivity, all in a sophisticated new ergonomic
design.
The Z-Note models are built around Intel's energy saving i386
SL microprocessor, the first designed specifically for notebook PCs.
ZDS is the industry leader in i386 SL technology, having co-developed
the specification for this highly powerwfficient chip with Intel. The ZNote series marks ZDS' third generation of i386 SL-based products.
All Z-Note models come Operator-Ready, with MS-DOS 5.0 and
Windows 3. I factory installed on the hard drive. In addition, the Z-Note
comes with a Logitech Trackman Portable Mouse, with cursor enhancements, to assure an easy-to-use, easy-to-learn, notebook.
The 5.9-pound notebook computer uses the exclusive "Premier
System" - introduced a year ago when ZDS anPower M
nounced the first computer to use the i386 SL chip. This power saving
system is enhanced in the Z-Note series with a new Lid Rest mode which
allows work in progress to be maintained simply by closing the lid. The
as if there had been no interrupnext time the lid is open, work p
tion. The rest/resume feature ~
the maximum battery life to 10
hours.
The Z-Note's marriage of notebook computing and networking is
a union of two of the hottest trends in the market today. These four new
notebooks have a built-in, ZDS&eioped, high-speed communications
port that's Ethernet compatible. Additionally, Z-Note comes with factoryinstalled client shells for the leading network operating systems (MicrosoR Lan Manager, Novell Netware, Banyan VINES).
With the introduction of the Z-Note family, ZDS is also introducing its proprietary READYDESK port replicator. This optional device
provides a streamlined interface to office peripherals. This approach to
"plug-and-play" is available at a fraction of the cost or size of a tradi-

, -

'

...-Markham, ON L3R 1H3

Tel: (416) 479-1306

ANO Ottawa ' ~~;:'j

~-:.-P 1181 Cecil Avenue '.";;-;:,::-;.'
; " Ottawa, ON KIH 7Z6 ".":,
.=~ Tel: (613) 733-7110

: ~

A UTHORIEED DEALERS OF:

= ~ C ocoa ~~~ k4

AXO Office A u t o mation - Making

F ou r O f f i c e W or k

a '% a

K3

zEMITH D AT A

av a T E a ia

A Bull Company

. . . . A utom a r i cally

42

T HE COMPUTER PAPER )UNE '92

S~

& 15
'% ~

Business Class Series II

ooN

:Fiekige. CiiIfi@j'itiiiii;,'::,'",

Enterprise II 33fsl6 Mnz EISA Cache Systems

; 486 DXE/33MEi'NTEL CPU .."..-::;

Business Class Desktop Case-.' ': '::='.
I 4MB Ram
1.2MB k L44MB Duel Drive=::,-=.::;,-'
i 1Q5MB Hard Drive
16-Bit VGA Adapter vol 5.12K=':.',;;.:
14" SuperVGA Monitor (.28) ~:.:.~
1Q1 Key Enhanced Keyboard..=.:.::.:=-

The ANO Engineers built a dreadnought. The ANO 486 EISA

systems are the fastest and inost powerful members of the new Business
Class Series II computer line. The EISA system follows theANO design
integrity of providing the very best technology for stable platform
designs: AMI 33MHz and 50MHz 486 EISA motherboards, Intel 4$6
CPU, AMI Hi-Flex Bios, AMI ECU, up to 6MB of RAM, l2$K cache
internal, 128K cache external, Canon Dual Floppy Drive, optional AMI
FastDisk SCSI Cache Controller, optional Intel Double Clock CPU, and

"

- '

optional AMI Fast view EISA SVGA Colour Adapter. The system is fully
compatible with DOS, Windows, Novell Netware, Banyan Vines, Uni
Xenix, and OS/2 beta v.2.0. The 486 EISA system is a no-

nonsense platform designed specifically for high perform-

$3,395.00.

OoubhCkxa
e piooooilog ance multitasking and multiuser environments.
Soppori

='-;=

ottst
Spec
i@catt'

Processor
Clock Speed
Main Memory

Cache Memory

Intel 80486 EISA

33MHz
Max. on Board 32MB
Mm. supported 96MB
Mem. Speed/Type 70ns/SIMMS
Conftgurarion 4/8/12! 16/20/24/32
36/48/60/64/72180/84/96 MB
Internal SK (1 ZSK for 50MHz)
External 128K
Direct Mapped. Write Through, One Level
Write Buffer, Zero Wait State

Co-processor
Floppy Interface
BIOS

EISA Slots

ISA Slots

80496 Internal FPU

Intel Double Clack CPU
Intel S2077 Controller
AMi 486 EISA BIOS
Diagnosncs, HD Preparation
Memory Size Detect
PS/2 Mouse Support
EGA/VGA Shadow
(7) 32-bit EISA Slots
Burst Capability
AMI Eisa Configuration Unli ty
(I) 32/8-bit Memory Slot

".I"

.its

Bumriess=:".C l a s s

.:.u
5' ~"g

Oil ~

. is'L~

:".g.="g ~i=i~"-,' i "- ",ii'.

10" Diugottul
Ntcropro cessor

Memory
Cache Netnary
Storage

: Floppy 2.8Mb 3.5"

Option
Interface
Viva t

: i386SL ZQMHz
: Standard 2Mb
; Mm 12Mb
: 64K
: Floppy 1.4Mb 3.5"
: Hard Drive 60Mb

P ort

eyboa
rd

Mouse/K

Integrated LAN
Display Type
Battery Life

: Hard Dnve 120Mb

: lrs erial, Ixparallel
.' Modem slot
: 800x 600 SVGA
: Standard Port
: Ethernet
: 640x4SQ VGA
: 4-10haurs

MSDOS 5.0 with Advanced Power Management

Microsoft Windows 3.1
Microsoft Lan Manager Client Shell
Navel Netware Client Shell
Banyan VINES System Client Shell

OPTIONS AND UPGRADESt

2Mb and 8Mb memory modules
2.88Mb Floppy upgrade
120Mb Hard Disk upgrade
Acnve-matrixColour Display upgrade
Twisted pair and Thin Ethernet Lan Adapters
READFDESK port replicatar

RW VGA Display
Upgradable to
Active-matrix Colour

CCITT edgeli t
Screen

<00
i i3si

Wetrrark Ready

I+

wl Ethernet
Built-in

60MB Hurd Drive

~ upgradable
to 120Mb

Truckntutt Portable

1.441Mb Floppy
*Upgradable
to 2.88Mb

Mouse

KV

READYDESE Port Replicator

~ A~ ~Q

43

THE COMPUTERPAPER JUNE '92

M ARKETPLA C E
) E NTER THE AGE OF COLOU R !

b-SPP
,"

'444'rt VPI
"

Super VGA monitor

1024768 .28DP
Super VGA Controller
with 512K fast video ram,
Expandable to I Meg

Business
C l a s s

Compact Case
Canon can now give you hard co py to match the quality you
see on th e screen, for a lot less than you'd expect. That' s
because the new BJC-800/820 pr ints in brilliant full colo ur up I:-' Turbo Switch
Reset Switch
to 360 dpi. Using four snap-in in k cartridges - black, cya
Keyboard Lock
magenta, and yellow - you get tr ue black and richer shad
':=Ky-And the cost per page is remarksbly low when compared to II'!144';
most oth er colour Printers.
[1

i3

4144

B JC-800 Specifications:

2700.00II,.'..

-170 cps text/standard speed mode

-300 cps text/high speed mode
-360 x 360 max dpi
-Coated paper, transparency, bond, envelopes
-maximum size output on 1 lx17
-parallel interface (SCSI option available)
-Epson LQ compatible
-Windows printer driver included

44

I. I

PIP
)I I.I

'WtclI)I "

i,:,'.~i

P . Sl:.4

Ii lf/j

Software:
Standard Configuration:
306DX40MHs
4Mb Memory, (Expendable)
1.2Mb& 1.4Mb Combo Floppy Drive
105Mb IDE Hard Drive
Sony/Panasonic 600Mb CDROM Drive,
2/Serial, 1/Parallel, Game Port
14" Colour SVGA, 1024 x760 Monitor 2$DP
SVGA Card w/512K
Enhanced 101 keyboard
Two years Parts dc Labour Warranty

$1295,00

4 Page per minute Laser

300x300 DPI standard output
(1200x300 DPI enhanced output)
1.5MB Ram
Parallel, Serial, k Video interface
26 Internal fonts
- 16 bitmapped
- 10 scalable
2 Font card slots
,:"' CaPSL Command level
<~1 Emulations:
- Diablo, Epson
- IBM XL24E

360x360 DPI
83 cps Letter Quality
IR

EPson LQ
BJ-130e
80 column print width
Sheet Feeder optional

CD-ROM Disks:
* Groher Encyctopedm
Zip-Nav (700MB of Shareware)

*[email protected]
White ppiiesLast!
* Pricingmay vary by location

Can on LBPS Plus $1 s795,00

8 Page per minute Laser
300x300 DPI standard output

(1200x300 DPI enhanced output)

g
l

1.5MB Standard Ram (Exp. to 4.5MB)

Parallel, Serial, 8t Video interface
26 Internal fonts
- 16 bitmapped

- 10 scalable
2 Font card slots

CaPSL Command level

Emulations:

- Diablo, Epson LQ
- IBM XL24E
200 sheet feeder bin (Standard)

g
II 2 00 sheet feeder tray (included)

Parallel interface

* MS-DOS Ver 5.0

* Windows V3.1 with Mouse

11 111 I

Canon LBP4 Plus

C a non's award winning
BJ-10ex Personal Printer
Portable, Silent, very AfFordable!

Enhanced CMOS
Setup ClockCalendar

Panasonic CD-Rom
Drive, 680M Bytes

Front Panel
Power Switch

.4

$395.00

MD-5511-V6 Dual
Drive 5.25" and 3,5"
floppy in one single
Disk Drive.

Digital Speed
Display (MHz)

,PI ."'

f'.-,P

C 1 a II

P.:

ol

p ls 1

4ss s,l

A~

PPAP,

IP,PP... P..PP -o+

1.

I 1....4 ,
Q ' s f l + y P~@p

n
a" SUPP+;pS 'pc 4".. ~+P

11".-

-%"

Sl
"444

I'. P"
41'al
P ' IP
're'llgPI1
ItPs! )44
434
Isa
lsaaiai7%IPsl'
)

'o141
'

ATlOHAL SERVlCR 4. SVis

0'

00

240

0
4

J!@3 I I

44

T HE COMPUTER PAPER JUNE '92

To quote the documentation:
Prints multiple pure ASCII or PostScript
files to a PostScript printer with an
attractive (optional) drop shadow.
A u tomatic Booklet Generation l 2-up

for it to become available.

W i t h ASCII f i les, you can truncate
instead of wrap long lines, print optional
line numbers to the left of each line,
select tab sizes, and select which font to

sided output ready to staple/bind into

booklets.
Prints anywhere from one to 64 virtual
pages per physical sheet of paper in
Landscape or Portrait orientation.
H andles up to 255 columns per linegreat for spreadsheets.
C ontrol physical and virtual page headers using macros to determine exactly
what information is printed; determine
the exact format of date displays.
O utput to any DOS device or file specification.
Print multiple copies of each file.
Select a range of pages instead of the
entire document.
Select continuous or manual, one- or

Self&oning allows you to write default

options directly into P4PS.EXE creating any number of customized versions.
I haven't tried every option, but those I
have work as chimed. The hardest part is
worhng out which way to rotate the paper
before you put it back into the printer for
doubleatding. It's available from GEnie and
many bulletin boards, and it's worth a look,

'

(side-hyd
ride), properly collated, I or 2

Printing Utility For

PostScript Printers
Itorriorrrrrd
for NcroabytoebyPaul Zraotror
Rune on: Industry standard PCa
From
ECON~OFT, P.O. Box 181 080,
Aussn, TX 78718-1080, 5124321675, 800467-7590
Price:
Shareware US$49.95 (inedudes printed manual); Postage 810 on intematlcnal orders (free In U.S.).
MasterCard and Visa accepted,
Rating:

includeesfpirafiondate.
3.25 (on a scale of 1=loweat to

&highest)
Summary: P4PS Is a utility that lets ycu do
some fancy things on your Postscript printer,
using plain ASCII text files, lite printing doublesided booklets with four pages per sheet.

ne of the annoying features of a

PostScript printer is that it needs to
have even the simplest ASCII text
file wrapped up in a lump of PostScript
before it can print the text. That's OK if
you' re using your favorite word processor,
but quite often you' re just working at the
DOS prompt, and simply want to print a
copy of your AUTOEXEC.BAT file or similar.
At its simplest, P4PS can be used for this,
but it really shines by converting longer text
files to some fancy PostScript commands
that produce multiple pages per sheet of
paper, arrange pages so you can put the
paper back to do the other side, and so on.

twa s

pilll dilg.

L ayout virtual pages across or down the

physical page; fill pages or start new
physical pages for each file.
Specify physical page margins and the
spread between virtual pages.
Specify what to do when a file is interlocked on a network induding waiting

line.

Ratlygg
PERFORMANCE: 5 ri. It works well, and in
an uncomplicated way providingyou can
work from the command line and don't
need a foolproof menu system.
USEFULNESS: 4. If you need it, it's indispensable. It doesn't take up much room on
the disk but it sure saves a lot of word
processor use.
MANUAL: S. The best part of the manual is
that it's a text file, so you get to uy the program out by printing the manual as a booklet.
AVAILABILITY: 2.5. By mail (above) or
from bulletin boards and similar.

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ou mightnotbeaware that ADI introduced the industry's

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THE COMPUTER
PAPER JUNE '92 45

The Evolving Meanini

of "IIetwork Printer"

NFMkK

NTIL RECENTLY, the term "network printer" referred simply to a

printer which ls used on st network, where the printer is attached to a
print or flic server and all print jobs ssxc routed through the print or
file server. These were typically fast, sturdy laser printers, but ssimiissr in ftmctionmlity' to maple workgroup or slngl~ r I n ner printers.
In the last 12 months, more and more
laser printer vendors have introduced printers or printer aden devices which attach
directly to networks, seemingly making
direct network attachment the defining
characteristic of a network printer. In actuality, direct attachment is a key feature of a
true network printer, but it alone MIs short
of addressing the realmorld user concerns
about network printing. A true network
printer should be designed from the

ground up as a network pxinter.

The promise of network printers is

enticing. First, these printers can lower the
pxindng cost per user because a single, txue
network printer is often able to serve many
more users than a combination of desktop
laser pxinters with a similar total cost. For
users more concerned about perfonnance
than cost, these printers offer much faster
throughput than thc.ir desktop counterparts Second, these printers can be placed
anywhere along the network, dose to users,
rather than remotely located adjacent to a
file or print server. Third, these printers
can offer arange of features normally
found only in expensive specialty printers,
such as duplexing, ll xl7" or high resolution output, offset stackmg and collation. A

THE FIRST
TEN SUBSCRIBERS
IN JUNE WILLRECEIVE
1 FREE MONTH'S ADVERTISING
IN OUR CLASSIFiEDS SECTION

network printer provides these capabiTities

to all connected users.
In order toreap the fullrange of benefits Rom the pxinters, users should carefully
evaluate their computing environment and
printing needs, and then be thorough in
their examination of print solutions.
Following are some issues to consider;

' 7$6- 3 6 6 6
(MODEM
ACCESSLINQ

What Idnd of network topoloules

ere lnstalledy

GET REAL INFORMATION

Network printers typically offer either

Ethernet or Token Ring physical connections. If the user has an Ethexnet network,
the Ixrinter interface should match the
user s network cabling (thick, thin or
10baseT).

FREE ACCESS,FILES SECTION, CLASSIFIEDS

WHAT YOU CAN'TMISS, USEFUL INFORMATION

(Femes,Customs,Ubraries, TV5...), BUSINESSCONNECTION

(Airlines, Restaurants,RealEstates, CityHalls Ref.Numbers...)
HELP ... IS ON THE LINE
(Office) 736-INFO

What kind ol nsrtwork protocol(s)

are used'
The printer's network interface should be
compatible with the user's specific network
protocol. This allows the printer to communicate directly with the network and also
allows the printer to be placed anywhere
along the network backbone as a node on
the network. The most popular network
protocols (NetWare, TCP/IP, Ether Talk
Ceerirsssedotspage 46

JUNE SPECIAL !!

(
I

488DX43 388DX40 3 88SX-28

4 1888

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and DECnet) are becoming widely available on network pimterL

Internal vs. external

network connections't
Several vendors offer external boxes which
convert an Ethernet or Token Ring connection to a parallel or setial connection.
Some of these aden devices also allow for
some degree of compatibTiity with the network protocol, allowing an attached printer to be placed anywhere along the network. Many printer manufacturers bundle
these external boxes with their pxinters in
order to attain the status of "network printer."
These external devices are useful to
connect an installed base of nonwetwork
printers to a network. However, they do
not offer the perfonnance and functionality of a printer that has been designed at
the outset as a network printer. Print data
transmission (I/O ) i s one of the most
severe yet most overlooked bottlenecks in
both printer and network/host performance. With external adapters, the advantage of the network's high bandwidth is
defeated since all print data must pass
through the parallel or serial connection
bottleneck A true network printer establishes a direct connection between the
Ethernet or Token Ring port and the printer's controller. This produces much faster
print times and less network/host down
time by allowing hosts to transmit print
data directly to the printer at true network
speeds.

Should the printer

act as a %le server'7
Network printers are launching a revolution of sorts in that they can replace the
traditional print/file server arrangement
with an intelligent printer that is its own
print server. This special breed of network
printer actively polls the network itself for
print jobs, rather than waiting passively for
a print server to send it a job. These printers manage print queues and provide status
information back to hosts and the network
This approach improves network and host
performance by offioading print server
duties fiom the file server and eliminates
the extra costs of a dedicated print server
and/or print server software on the file
server.

Are there other computers ln need of

a print solution but not on the LAy
A largeand growing number of computing
environments currently have or plan to
have a mix of dissimilar computers PCs,
Macintosh, UNIX workstations, some on
networks and some not. Traditionally, a
separate printer would be purchased for
each type of c omputer or n e twork.
However, printer interface technologies
have advanced in the last 2 years such that
several manufacturers now offer print solutions which allow different computers to be
connected to different printer ports simultaneously.
There are substantial differences
between iwo methods of achieving simultaneous connectivity. The most common
technology is "port switching where the
printer monitors ports to see which is
receiving data. Once the printer determines that an interface is receiving data, an
other ports are rendered inactive while the
active port receives data. This may be
appropriate for very limited printer sharing
across computing platforms where print
requests )rom difFerent hosts will not overlap. This scheme is impractical, however,
as a full print solution across dissimilar
platforms since host computers sending to
an inactive port wiH be tied up while the
active port is being used.
A more versatile solution is one in
which all ports are active at the same time,
not switched. But for this scheme to allow
different hosts to send print jobs simultane-

ously without host computer delays, each

interface must be equipped with its own
large input buffer. Tins allows a host or
network to offload its print data to the
printer even though the printer isreceiving
a printjob over another port.
Another hnportant inter5sce issue to be
aware of is that many network printers
attach to networks by'replacing standard
ports on the printer. T his renders the
printer incapable of connecting to computers not on the main network

What Idnd ofprocesslni speed

will be restulred?
The increased use of graphics in computing has necessitated faster processors for
thc: rasterization of images f'rom raw print
data. Adding multiple users to the equation further increased the need for fast processing. Most network printers offer RISC
processing, but the user should keep in
mind that not all RISC processors are
equally fast just because they are RISC.

Would multiple emulations be used

on the same printer?
Some form of emulation switching is essential in multiuser printing environments
where multiple emulations are used (the
most common are PostScript or compatible
language, PCL and HPGL). There are several ways in which printer manufacturers
can offer emulation switching, with varying
degrees of functionality and flexibility.
Assigning an emulation to a port is a common method of emulation management,
but this will be ineffeciive if multiple emulations will be used over that port (as they
often are over a network port). Some
printer manufacturers include software
with the printer which loads onto the host
and which must bc; configured to match
each application with a specific emulation.
The most flexible emulation management
system, howler, is one which is printer<esident, independent of ports and hosts, and
which does not require host configuration
or additional software.

What kinds of paper handllnl and

duty cycle are restuiredy

Traditional printer considerations such as

duty cycles and input/output capacities
become much more important in network
printing environments simply because of
the greater number of users. Network
printer duty cycles range from 80,000 to
over 70,000 pages per month, and input
capacities range fiom 250 sheets to 1500
sheets. The number of users and the volume of documents produced byeach user
should be taken into account.
Many network printers offer special
paper-handling features to make shared
prindng easier. Some features to look for
include automatic error recovery, offset
stacking, input bin selection fiom the host,
and collation.
As the number of users in a piinting environment grows, so does the range of print
demands made on a printer. Special capabilities such as duplexlng, 600 dpi or ll 'xi%"
output are typically found only in expensive,
spedalty printers. However, several printer
vendors have begun to offer combinations of
these capabffiities, RUowing one networked
printer to be all things to all users.

How many users

should the print solution serve7
There is no one variable which can determine how many users a printer wiH serve.
Users should not be misled by simple specifications such as engine speeds (pages per
minute) . Data throughput, processing
speed, emulation and font management,
intedace management, paper handling and
duty cycle should all work in tandem to
match the user's specific computing environment.
Dldler Gombertis the National Product
Manager of QMS Canada.

THE CQMPUTERPAPER JUNE '92

opment debate. Many feel that this is the
last opportunity for peoples of the Earth to
affect and change governmental policy in
the areas of environment and development
to turn around mistakes of the past.
People working effectively together
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informed of each others' activities, as well
as the activities of their governments.
APC has been instrumental in making
UNCED information easily and cheaply
amilable to over 18,000 people in 94 countries. The ten APC member networks (in
Brazil, Uruguay, Germany, Russia, USA,
England, Nicaragua, Sweden, Australia and
Canada) keep over SO online conferences,
dedicated specifically to UNCED documents and agendas, updated with the latest
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It is the only global computer communications network dedicated speciScally to individuals and organizations workmg for the
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U NCED i s t h e U ni t e d N a t i o n s
Conference on E n vironment and
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Joining the world's leaders will be thousands of citizens Rom every nation participating in both the formal summit process as
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procedures on setting up a personal computer

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This class is designed to give the student a

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APC's Brazilian member n etwork
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With its electronic mail and conferencing
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and others around the world with key deciGmxismd ma page48

TROUBLE WITH DATA EN'FRYT

LET US HELP YOU

the largest United Nations conference in

history and will be the Srst global gathering
speci6cally for the environment since the
Stockholm conference in 1972.
Dubbed the Earth Summit, UNCED will
announce a Rio Declaration that will outline how the countries of the world will balance environmental concerns with development interests for a sustainable future.
Leaders Srom over 100 nations will attend
UNCED to "consider the very suxvival of the
planet," UNCED SecretaryQc;neral Maurice
Strong told journalists at a meeting in

he international Association for

Progressive Communications (APC),
is playing a major role in providing
computer communications services for environmentalists, nongovernmental organizations and citizen activists before, during and
after UNCED, otherwise known as the Earth
Summit.
APC is a worldwide association of ten
regional computer networks which provide

47

4 In continuation with Zegna Electronic Inc.'s committment to computer education we offer an

attractive rental program for our students, as well as discounted pricing on purchases.

,Continuing from the Level 1 course, students

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48

T HE COMPUTER PAPER JUNE '92

Conriraffetpofa paglr47
sion~ e r e attending the conference.
AlterNex is planning to provide workstations at several easily accessible locations
throughout Rio so upc~ e - m inute information can be received and transmitted
condnuouslythroughout the conference.
The APC technical stafF will ensue that the
system is running smoothly for those needing to send faxes and telexes, read electronic conferences, send electronic mail to

home offices and colleagues around the

world, and give input to reports and documents issued from Rio Centre where the
UN delegations are formalizing the Rio
Declaration. The technical staff will also
provide on-site training for those new to
the APC system as well as give workshops to
show how electronic mail and conferencing
services can play a vital role in connecting
environmentalists and other activists all
over the world.

By strategic information gathering and

sharing, which computer technology such
as the APC networks allow, UNCED can
truly be an Earth Summit for all environmenufhsts both present and far away.
Canadians who wish to participate in
UNCED discussions, or any of the other
hundreds of topics, can obtain an account
on Web, the APC network seriring Canada
Over twelve hundred activists and organizations across the country have accounts on

Web, and are actively using the network to

promote social a n d e n v i r onmental
improvements. The cost to a typical user is
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Contact: Web elo NirvCentre, 201 Remend

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Tei (416) 5964212, Fax (416) 596-1374, e-mail

support @web.apc.org.

'

Edle Farvtfellffathe Liaison Director for APC.

"a
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50 T HE COMPUTER PAPER jUNE '92

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T HE COMPUTER
PAPER jUNE '92 5 1
A highly useful feature is the ability to
record a macro of your control panel buttoxx
progranuning. There are 15 built4n print
styles, induding emphasized, sub. and superscript, underlining, italics, and shadow.

What can you nay about a isrlntar?

Well, you can say a lot if it doesn't work
right, but when it runs as smoothly as this
Star Micronix product, about all )sou can do
is admire it.
Print quality is quite good, certainly
good enough forprodudng average quality
business correspondence or to fil in if the
laser is down, and even the draft quality is
good enough for most uses. The selection
of font styles and sizes is quite good and the
noise level is acceptable. I found the script
font (simulates handwriting) to be surprisingly good, but it is best used in moderation for special emphasis.
Have you ever had software that argued
with you about font selection? By that, I
mean the problem that sometimes occurs
when you are trying to print some text in
one mode but the particular program stubbornly keeps resetting your printer. The
NX-2450 eliminates that problem with a
simple press of the Font button during
power up. Locking out software control
leaves you free to pxint in script or whatever
font and size you wish, regardless of what
youx soflwafe wantsto doe
If you hold down three buttons (Font,
Pitch, and Eject/Park) while you turn the

printer on, you can modify the def'ault settings of everything ranging from whether
you have a pxint buffer or use memory to
hold downloaded characters, to the font
and character size that will be set each time
you turn the printer on.
A one-page "User's Guide" printed on
glossy card stock provides a quick reference
to the major features. This mostly deals
with the complex options available via the
f'rout control paneL
An optional 50-sheet automatic sheet
feeder is available. I didn't test this option
or the optional power tractor but I have
found that power tractors are a good
option to have with most printers.
Optional font cartridges and extra
memoxy are also available.

Ratlni
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52 T HE COMPUTER PAPER JUNE '92

HE COMPUTER
you bought three
y ears ago r u n s
just as fast today as the
d ay you took it h o m e
from the store. Yet, like
Circe o f m y t h o l o gy,
modern software, such
as Windows 5.1, turns
your machine into a pig.
T he p r o b le m i s t h e
complexity and overhead of the new GUIs
(graphical user interfaces.) T h i s mo nth I
will tell you many ways
t o speed up your o l d
machine.

s'
N+
7

Windows S.l heralded "multimedia." If

you want yourcomputer to make decentquality sound and.music, you need special
hardware. I will be talking about that, too.
Finally, OS/2 2.0 has arrived. Though
end users are all agog over Windows S.l.
computer programmers are hotly discussing how to use OS/2 for the upcomhtg

generation of applications. Windows is a

waystation on the road to the promised
land of OS/2. No one knows when the
mass migration will occur or if it ever wilL

but for the program developers the move

has already started. If O S/ 2 is in your
future, you will need heav)sduty hardware.

Later, I will tell you how to prepare your

computer forthe OS/2 contingency.

Spoodlng Up Windows 3.1

What can you do to speed up Windows S.IP

1. Windows is a very large program. Throw

RAM at it. Microsoft likes to demonstrate Wmdows in a machine with 21 MB

of RAM (not disk space, RAMi) I would

consider 4 MB the smallest practical size

for running Windows, and 8 MB comfortable. More won't hurt.
2. Windows does an enostnous amount of
behindWoecenes housekeelsing to track

all thosewindows and dicbible controls.

Throw CPU power at it. Upgrade to a SS

MHz 486 CPU.

S. endows exerdses the hard disk merci-

lessly. Get a Isst hard disk that is compatible with the new M-bit Windows
Fastdisk access methodL
4. Get more RAM and hand it over to a
disk cacher to spare the hard disk so

much hard work Use a de&sgger such

as ORG or Norton SD that can move the
Windows files to the prime real estate
near the edge of the disk next to the
root directoiy.
5. Windows spends most of its thne pinti ng dots. When you hit the A k e y ,
en dows has to paint 112 individual dots

on the screen. DOS programs, by contrast, can paint the "A" in a single stroke.
For speed, you need an auxiliary computer especially for painting dots (i.e., a
video card with a "graphics accelerator"). T hen Windows can hand the
graphics accelerator a whole sentence to
paint, and leave it to work away while the
main CPU gets on with something more
important. Because you have two computers instead of one working for you,
and because the processor in the graphics accelerator doing the dot painting,
the screen displays at least Qve times

more quickly.
6. There is a very inexpensive upgrade that
prevents losing characters coming in on
a modem. You replace the 16450 UART
chips on your multi-I/O card with 16550
chips. The 16550s have a IMharacter
buffer to store incoming characters
when Windows is too busy to deal with
them.
So, to make your computer really sing
under Wmdows, you might want to upgrade
your CPU, add more RAM, get a Sister hard
disk and, most of all, get a graphics accelerator board. I villi tell you more about how
to do all this later.

Preparing Wlndouss for Multimedia

The new part of multhnedia is about making noise. There are four basic methods of
maldng souncL
l. Use the PC speaker, pulling the cone in
and out with software. The results sound

like Edison's phonograph.

2. Wavefomta You take digital sainplings

of real-world sound (e.g., speech,

singing, water splashing) and then play
them back This is much the way audio

CDs work Skit models sound like a $5

AM uansistor radio complete with static.
TopofWe4ne 16-bit quality can sound
like a $5000 stereo system. K a r en
Kenworthy, the Windows moderator on

the BIX electronic confererice, taught

Windows to say "Ouch" whenever she
makes an error.
S. FM Synthesizer. You can stick a tiny
music synthesizer inside your computer
to play music. These produce jaunty
electronic sounds ustsally not the natural sounds of expensive studio synthesizers.
4. MIDI. If you are a musician, you might
already own a set of musical instruments
and keyboards that use the MDI computerwontrol interface. The computer
acts like a gloriSed player piano by playing all your MDI instruments for you.
The computer can record your finger
motions as you play the instruments,
then play them back faster, in a different
key or with different timbre settings.
The computer also allows you to edit
your work and build up multi-track compositions.

The Catch
A standard audio CD holds about 45 minutes of music. To store the digital waveforms for 45 minutes of music requires
about 600 MB of hard diskspace. A 600
MB hard disk would cost about $1750. We
would like thousands of hours of recordings on tap. The hard disks to hold this
would cost millions of dolLsrsl
Here are several ways out of this bind.
1. Just record short snippets of sound.
2. Use the other two methods FM synthesis and MDI, which require very little
storage space even for a long piece.
S. Buy special hardware that am compress
and decompress the waveforms on the
fly to squeeze the same information into
a smaller space like Stacker, but for
sound.

4. If you are willing to put up with less than

CKhaudio quality say telephotte quality,
then you can drastically compress the
waveforms. You don't need nearlyas

much space to store them. But even

then a few words of speech will take up
about 64K
5. Don't even attempt to store sounds on a
hard disk Store them on gigantic optical disks, or on CD-ROMs. CD-ROMs
must come preeecorded from the factory. You cannot record your own sounds
onto them.

Sound Card Possibilities

So to prepare for sound, you will likely want
to add a sound card, get a CD-ROM, a bigger hard disk, and possibly indulge in some
MIDI musical instrumentL
You can buy cards such as the 8-bit
SoundBlaster Pro that have all three methods of making sound on a single card. If
you want higher quality 16-bit sound you
need to buy a more expensive card such as
the Pro Audio Spectrum or Turtle Beach
cards.
The Roland LAPC-I is a full-blown 24voice MDI synthesizer on a card that Sts
inside your computer. It simulates over S00
different "instruments" and S5 sound
effects. However, it cannot handle waveforms (e.g., speech). If you want to control
external MIDI instruments as well, you
need the extracost MCB-1 attachment.
The Roland knocked my socks off, but listen withyour own ears before you make
your choice.
Microsoft has proposed a standard for
m ultimedia computers called M P C .
Compliant systems have Skit sampling, a
music synthesizer, MIDI and a CD-ROM
drive that can play audio CDs.
Without fully debugged software drivers,
the sound cards are useless. Make sure you
hear th e h a r d ware w o r king u n d er

Windows, with the programs/games you

plan to use. Stand& one demos don' t
count
CosstissecdossPage 54

T HE COMPUTER PAPER jUNE '92

v2

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CHECKIT V.3.0 (Regular IDE pertormance - 375.3 KB/s)

LEGEND 486DX SUPREME SYSTEM

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256KB Super fast Write-Back Cache RAM
1.2MB 5.25" & 1.44MB 3.5" floppy drive
120MB 14ms IDE Hard drive w/64KB Look ahead Cache
16 bk FD/HD SuperlDE Caching Disk Controller
2 serial, I parallel and I game ports
32-bk Local-BusTseng Lab VGA w/1 MB RAM
101 key tactile keyboard
3-button Hi-Resolution 800DR Serial mouse
Full Size Tower Case w/250W Power Supply
14" Legend Non-interlaced Super VGA monitor
3 Year Umlted Wananty (3 YearsLabour, 2 Years Labour)
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"lhe Intel Inside logo is a trademark ol Intel Corp'

53

54 T HE COMPUTERPAPER JUNE '92

and create a swapfile, it has taken over

about 60 MB ofyour disk
4. It is less forgiving of nonstandard hard- I
ware.
5. Though you can run your old DOS pro- i
grams under OS/2, you are not really
cooking until you buy new OS/2wware
programs.
6. Itcan run your Windows programs. So
OS/2 is even more resource-hungry than
Windows.
Chances are, then, you will first need to
add more RAM and a bigger hard disk
before you can move up to OS/2.Just as
with Windows, you will also want a graphics
accelerator card. Don't even think about
trying to run OS/2 on anything slower than
a full 80586 DX 25 MHx.

Froleariral For OS/2

OS/2 benefits mainly power users. It otfers:
1. The aMity to copy, format and use fioppy disks in the background without slow-

a'

ing down your foreground work

o o

2. Faster disk access, especially for large

e o

files. OS/2 can find files more quickly

than DOS or Windows can.

S. Long filenames, like the Macintosh.
4. The abTiity to smoothly rnn several programs at once without them interfering
with each other and crashing the system.
DES+view and Windows both attempt
this, but neither has the hardware support that OS/2 has to control the interactions.
5. The abiTity to use the full 82Wt power of
the 586/486 CPU. DOS and Windows
rograms usually waste half of each 52it register. Under OS/2 it is much easier to write huge programL Under DOS
or Wmdows, program anddata must be
broken into chunks of 64K or less.

o
0

IJplrada or Start Over?

4I

Ey

'

Sometimes it is best to add equipment to

your existing machine, or replace a few
parts. Other times it is best to sell your
machine as it is, and use the money toward
a complete new machine.
Upgrading may appeal to the recycler in
your soul, but if you replace a part, the old
part will hkely have little value. You probably will end up throwing it away. If you sell
your old machine, and buy new, all the old
parts will find a good home. If you plan
extensive upgrades, it is usually more eco-

Tha Catch
If OS/2 is so wonderfirl, why isn't everyone
using it?
I. It is more complex to install and use.
2. For practical use, it needs at least 8 MB
of RAM, and 16MB forcomfort.
S. OS/2 itself comes on 21 diskettes and
fiuffs up to about 80 MB on your hard
disk By the dme you install extra fonts,

oo

"

,o

1 s

80386DX-25

$ns.oo

Non~che

80386SX-20

80386DX-33

$$95.00
64KCache

$995.00

80386SX-25

80486DX-33
25SK Cache

$87S.OO

$1495.00

SyStem UpgradeS(ADD toSystem Puce)

Addiiransl 12 MB
ar 1.44MBHoppyDave:.. ..... --$65
$115
WD IMB Hant Dist (VC IDE 19ms64KCadre)
M aalor
$0MBHanl Dist(VC IDE 17ms32KCade)
$ 135
N BC 105MBHanl
Dist(VC IDE 19ms64KCadro)
$1 5 0
Quauum105MBHanl Disk (VCIDE 17ms64KCacbe) . . $1$0

-ssss

MsaIN lsseBadaik (Vc sos

isla aso

Mmhu 210MBHardDist(VC IDE lsms 32K )

$525
Samhaa
14"VGAPapererha MomhrrwjOat 256KGml $65
SamhanSC44114' VGAMomler(Qh4N} wjort 2%KCmi.$1$5
SamhaaSC42814' SVGAMomhrr(1024x76$)
$299
w/Tiidcnt IMBcard
Damn 14' SVGAmsrHmrdacedMmihsr (IONX76$, QNp)
$375
w/TndeatIMB card(256 mtem)
Damn 14' SVGAMomha(1024x768, 31 dp)
$275
w/Tiidcnt IMBVGAGad(256 colas)
NBC 3lQX 15' Mrdhsyae
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oAII lassosaranasebasedoa 36sssossrh hase.

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One 12 MB a 1A4MBRoppy
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52 MB HardOidsVCIDE2B ms
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AT I/O Cardssslr~hl, 2 serial
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Monographias
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80387DX-25
80387DX-33
80387DX40
$04$7DX-20

AMI Bios
4MB RAM on Board
64K Cache
1.2 MB or 1A4MB Floppy
52MB Hard Disk (VCIDE)
2 serial, 1 parallel & 1 game
Trident 1MB SVGACard
Darius 14' SVGA monitor

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Desktop Case gs
200 Watts PS
101 Enhanced Keyboard

(All Reland Printers w/2yra warranty)

Pujsese
DI9 24yin, 1$0 cps(2 yrs) .....$295

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2 serial 1 parallel a 1 game
Trident 8900 1MB Card
19' Tower Case 8 200 Watts PS
14' Darius 1024x 768 28 SVGA
Focus 2001 Keyboard

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RAVEN RCD-500
CD-ROM

Pal|Su DL11N %pa, 240 cps (2yrs) ..$340

Pajitsu DL1 100 nr/Color Kit ... .. $375
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spar

Pajimu D13450 24-pin, 240cps,

132 colmnns
(lyr) .............. . ....$515
Moderns
Pejihm DL3450 Colar Kit ......... .$105
ZOOM 24NS inl Modem
wjhacamm . $$5 Rolaml
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Pracdcal Modem?AN
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Roland Rmren246524pin, 192cpa
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Hp
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Gut 164dt 256K VGA Gad.............$50

Trident 512K caid aap. to 1MB....... .$$5
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.

ATI VGA Wonder (512K exp. to 1MB)

Samtrrm14" PaperWhite Momtor ...$135

Samhon 14" SC441 VGA Color Monitar

.. $250
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Dainm 14"SVGA ColmMonitar
........,....$335
(1024x76$ .2$dp)-.
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TVM 3A 14" SVGA LowRadManitar
( 1024x76$, M dp)
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Viewaonic 5 plus14" I%ra Nrm-Interlaced
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T HE COMPUTER
PAPER JUNE'92 5 5
nomical to sell your old machine and buy

afresh. However, price it out for yourself.

Nigthtnxara on Uplrada %troat
Upgrading can be perilous, especially
replacing the motherboard. Here is an
almost worst~ s c enario of what can happen to you. You replace your old 12 MHz
80286 motherboard with abrand new SS
MHz 4&6 motherboard.
Then you discover your cheap multiI/O card cannot quite keep up with the
new CPU, so you end up replacing it, too.
Then your new machine is cranky. It occasionally freezes up, refuses to start on cold
mornings, makes small errors in arithmetic
and spontaneously reboots all by itself. You
wonder if an exordst might be in order.
You suspect the problem might be your
power supply. Experiments confirm your
cheap power supply cannot provide smooth
enough power for the sensitive SS MHz
operation. So you have to replace it with a
higher quahtyone. They you Snd there is
no available model of power supply that will
St your case, so you have to replace the case
as welL
Now you finally get all the hardware
worhng, only to discover that 10fo of your
software no longer works. Programmers
wrote that software long before anyone conceived of aCPU as fastas your new 486.
You have to buy software upgrades.
Then you discover that software of different vintages does not mix welL You now
have to buy upgrades for most of the rest of
your software, to avoid conflicts with the
new software.
Beside your new machine is a pile of old
parts: a motherboard, multi-I/ O card,
power supply, case and software that
nobody wantL A short time ago, they were
part of a desirable, perfectly functioning

'

comp
uter.
If the computer fails in future, with yet

another chapter in the nightmare, there is

no guarantee to protect you. Only allow

computers come with guarantees. The best
you can hope for is an individual component warranty.

Upiradlny your XT to an AT

Attempting to upgrade an XT to an AT is
an even worse nightmare. The power~
ply leads and speaker leads probably will
not St. The new AT cards may be too tall to
St in the case. If you keep your old Xl'disk
controller, it will run three to Sve times
slower than a new AT controller would.
You are much better off selling your old XT
hltact.

On tha Othar Hand

Sometimes you ress do upgxades easily and
safely. It depends partly if you phmned for
upgrades when you Srst bought your computer, and also on just how old your computer is. The newer it is, the more likely

upgrading will go smoothly.

For example,adding RAM or replacing
a new video card rarely causes complicatione. There is no need to buy a new computer to add a second hard disk.
Ask a few knowledgeable people what
they think ofyour upgrade/replacement
plan before you dedde either way.

Addtnxt RAM
RAM is now retailing for under 065 per
megabyte (1,048,5'16 characters). Adc6ng
RAM is the simplest and cheapest method
of putting some oomph hack into an old
machine.
However, there are things to watch out
for. Adding raw RAM does little good.
Vezy few programs know how to use it. It
must be predigested" to turn it into palat-

able XMS (extended) or EMS)'LIM

(expanded) RAM before ordinary programs am make any use of it.
DOS comes with a pair of memor)sxnanagement programs called HIMII~Q S and
Costissscdos Page 56

)
tkiELQIIXEEIRSml
WesternOlglbdSSIIB 16memE
$825
Quenhen120MBlsms IDE ........................-. $410
Western Dlgllel 12QIB 14meSE
$800
Mnxlcr 130MB
16msIDE, .......-........---- $385
Weslem
Digits(Nnxlor212MBlsms IDE ...... SN0
Ouenlmn243IIB1$mo IDE ---- $755

EkENLttll228

IMB/IA4MB . -- - - - - . ...-....---------- $50

PdceeIndudeIrecke//
Plk/EE$PdceeIndudeoeb/ol
Fujteu DL00024pln................................ $275
FslpteuDL118024pln Cedar
$345

FuiileuDL1200w/color ................................-. $440

Okleeer4004ppm
LoserPrinler ........ . . . $739

I'

Mes. - Sst.
10:00em- 7:00pm

3NSXaS
SQHZ.

=
$105
3S5DX-25MHz
......-......................................--- $275
386DX48MHz$4kCache..
.... ..... .. $325
386DX~Hz Cnche

$ 825
48$DX4SNHzCnaho..
. $605
405DX4NIHz SIK Cache
-- - $ 1 07$
-

Surge Suppreeeor
$2000/10 yr.wnrr............... $70
Lagllech34NgonFirst Mouse........................ $55
Logllech
SbuganMoueemenSerial .......... ..,.. $70
Laghech
S.buxrzrMoueemenBue ................. $65
Lagllech
Sbu8rmCangese ...............
..... $00
SoundMneterPFoIluela Cmd
$230
Facue 2001
Tedlo Keyboardw/cover ................. $60
Focus5001Enhanced ..........................-- $09
FuJIIeu
EnhancedKeybosd ............................... $50
OmnikeyNrn Keyboenl............................ $150
Righkrsck
Joyesck ........................................ $55
Windows
3.1 UPGRADE
$70
Windewe
S.IFULLVERSON .
. $0
DOSS.0(OEb$......................... - ....... -- $60
TowerJacket .............
.. . . . . . . --. $25

U LN 38740SX ... . . .............. . , . . . . $145

ULSI 3874SDX -....................-.........-....... $235
CobredoDJ10120MBBeckup....
. $285
CokxadoDJ20 250MBBackup......................... $835
ColoradoFC-10Adapter(4 4MB/min) ....
. $0$
DC21203M 250MB
Tope .....
,..... $30
. .

. .

. .

Rehna

Zoam 2400- lnlemel.. ....................-..--.....-. $70

Zoam2400- External wa
dable ......................... $05
ZoomSend/ReceiveFnxNadem Exl ................ $140
Zollrlx Send/Receive FexNodwnInl. ............. $70
All0600bpeVA2 bioExt wlcable
$410
Aemezlng
14' 28mmDP Interlaced .......... $825
Everdnie/Aemezlng14 Nolrderleoed . $88$
Opsquest15' Non4ntednced2000D .
. $740
Seiko 145014' ~ DP Nrm+Iedeced ........ $775
Ilegnevox N" 1280x1024
. $1740
Trident wl
1MBSVGA72Hz Refresh Nrm-Int . $05
SeeelSI SS
Windows Acaelorelor 1MB .. $84$
ATIXL IMBS mouse ..
....... $225
A h OmpMae
Uern1MS - - - $5 5 0
.

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56 T HE COMPUTERPAPER JUNE '92

EMMS86.%5 to do this. There are
faster, smaller, more capable

Dlsposlna of old llAM

Upgrading RAM can be

memory managers you buy

separately, such as QEMM
and S86MAX. Installing a

memory manager is a black

A NAME YOU CAN

a rt. T h e y can make i t

a ppear as i f y o u h a v e
720,000 bytes or more of
free conventional memory,
even when you cram your RAM with
mouse drivers,etc.

a OEM Keyboard
102 Key, Tactile Feeling,
.Mechanical Keyswitch

RAM comes In three main forms:

SIMMe-miniature: cards holding 256 KB, 1

MB or 4 MB that fit into slanted racks on
the motherboard. These are the easiest to
install
SIPPe-miniature cards holding 256 KB, 1
MB or 4 MB with pins stichng out the bottom that fit into rows of holes on the motherboard. These are tricky to install without
bending the pins.
DRAMs-individual chips holding 256K bits

.OSII '
Ioti]R]E

,<Lco@

a VO Con@oiler
AT I/O

(S2K bytes), 1 Megabit (151K bytes) or 4

megabits (524K bytes). Each chip coughs

IDE
Super IDE
(Acer, Goldstar, WD chipset)

> Video Cards

Mono
VGA (Cirrus Logic),.-"
Super VGA
(3106 Realtek, 077 Oak,
890K Trident)

TEIIIIS
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o

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7170 Warden Ave., Unit 24
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Tel: (416) 946 9660 Fax: (416) 946 9663

out either 1 or 4 bits at a time when

addressed.
It is best to let your retailer install the
RAM for you. He willmake sure you have
the right type and speed. He will take the
proper static precautions and will dean and
treat the contacts. He will need to read
your motherboard manual to set any motherboard switches to configure the new RAM.
Do not handle RAM unless you first
ground yourself with a wrist strap and work
on a static mat. Even tahng RAM out of
the bag to look at it can be enough to
destroy it.
Further, each motherboard only accepts
certain magic combinations of types, speeds
and sixes of RAM. For example, some
machines will not allow 6 MB total RAM,
only 4 or 8.You need the motherboard
manual to find out what the magic combinations arc;.

distressing because you

must discard perfectly
good RAM. For example,
on some machines to go
from 2 MB to 4 MB, you
don't simply add 2 MB. You
have toremove all 2 MB of your
old RAM and replace it with 4 MB of a
different type that allows you to grow
eventually to 8 MB.
Similarly, when you grow from 8 to 16
MB, again you have to throw out all 8 MB of
your old RAM and replace it with 16 MB of
a different type.
Unfortunately you cannot just start off
with the larger type. The computer likes to
have at least four banks of RAM to interleave. If you used the larger type right off,
you would not haveenough banks. With
four hanks, three banks can be "recuperating" while onc: is worhng. If you only had
one bank, the CPU would have to wait
while the bank recuperated after each
memory operation. The full truth is even
more complicated.
Keep your old RAM in a static bag. You,
may be able to sell it to someone upgrading
or building a smaller computer. RAM does
not deteriorate with age, so consider getting used RAM when you upgrade.

Ilaw Much RAM2

It never hurts to have a little extra RAM.

You can always hand over any spare RAM to
your diskcaching program to speed up
hard disk operations.
F or word p r ocessing, one t o t w o
megabytes should suffice. For DES@view,
f our megabytes is comfortable. F o r
Windows S.l four to eight megabytes would
be about right for the average user. For
OS/2, 8 to 16 megabytes would be a comfortable starting point.

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THE COMPUTERPAPER )UNE '92

IDE

How Fastt

60-nanosecond RAM is faster than 80nanosecond RAM. It does not hurt to use
RAM that is a little faster than you need.
However, it does not help, either. Putting
in 60 ns RAM when the motherboard manual specifies 80 ns will not speed your
machine up. The advantageof uing 60 ns
RAM comes when you later recycle the
RAM. If your future machine calls for 60 ns
RAM, you could reuse your old RAM,
where you could not reuse old 80 ns RAM.
For motherboards that give you the option
of configuringdifferent speeds of RAM, use
the Sltest supported type.

Dlak Caching

Giving 512 KB to 2 MB of RAM to a disk-

caching program is your Srst priority in

speeding upa machine. Caching programs
monitor your use of the hard disk, and
attempt to keep the data on hard disk you
use most often in their private 'cache"
(stash). Then when you go to get data ofF
the hard disk, the caching program intervenes, and hands it to you hundreds of
times faster, from its cache.
The most reliable caching program is
Super PC Kwik. Norton Utilities comes
with a fast but to uchy cacher called
NCACHE. DOS comes with a fat, slow
cacher called SMARTDRIV.QS. Windows
5.1 comes with an improved version called
SMARTDRIVXKE
If youdon't have a cacher, you are wasting the money you spend on your RAM.
Get expert help to install your cacher. If
you don't tune it properly, you could be
wasting the lion's share of your computer's
powei'

UIslrasEnl to a 4$6 33MHx

To upgrade your CPU, you must usually

replaceyour whole motherboard, though
you can oftenrecyde your RAM, providing
it is Set enough.
I already warned you of the nightmares
you can expect if the other components of
your computer are not up to snuff.
Replacing a motherboard is quite easy if
you have a tower case where you can access
both sides of the board. Smaller cases are
much more difScult since you have to align
all the spacers without being able to see
them.
25 MHz machines are more robust.
They are not as fussy about power. They
don't put quite so much "strain" on the
other components and software. If you are
considering upgrading a machine of
unknown quality, I suggest going just to 25
MHz. Unfortunately, it is much harder to
Snd 25 MHz motherboardsthan 55.
If youhave premium components, such
as the Turbo Cool power supplies, Everex
multi-I/O, etc., then you will be quite safe
in upgrading to 55 MHz.
I personally would not recommend
going beyond 55 MHz to 40 MHz. Every
time you double the clock speed you
increase the radio emissions inside the case
by four times. The higher the dock speeds,
the tighter the tolerances, and the fussier
and more illcempered the machines.
There are, of course, safe, beautifully
designed and shielded 40 MHz machines.
H owever,
you probably won't find these for
bargain4asement prices.

Clock DouIslari

So rarely
can you have your cake and eat it,
too, but just this once, you can. Intel has
justannounced a new hnd of 4&6 chip. To
the rest of the computer it looks like a plod-

ding, easygoing 25 MHz 486 CPU chip.

However, secretly, inside it is a speed
demon, cranhng along at50 MHz. You get
the best of both worlds.

There are now a sprinkling of motherboards that use this new chip. Eventually
there will be kits to upgrade older motherboar dL

57

There is a standard for IDE, called ATA.

However, until recently few manufacturers
paid any attention to it except Maxtor.
Most older IDE drives are non-standard.
When it comes time to add a second drive,
you may havetrouble. For best chance of
success, your second drive should be the
same brand and family as your first one. It
does not need to be the same model, but it
should have the same electronics, just a different number of heads.
In one infamous case, the owner bought
a second drive with the exact same model
number, it would not work because the vendor changed the design of the interface for
that model part way through its life cycle.
The advantage of sticking with the ATA
standard is it allows you to mix and match
drives from any vendors. Sometimes, by uying several different paddleboard adapters,
you can persuade a mismatched nonstandard pair to cecxist. Often mismatched
pairs work just fine with no spedal tweakllig.

o a

You may find OS/2 does not support

your particular IDE drive. If OS/2 is a big
part of your future, stick with the ATA standard or another type of disk entirely, such
as ESDI or SCSL

6
C

What aratha catchas7

1. These chips are much more expensive
than ordinaiy 55 MHz chips.
2. They give off a lot of heat. Best to use
these in tower cases with lotsof room so
cables don't block the air Sow, and so
convection helps cool the vertically
mounted chip. Choose a premium
power supply with a powerful fan.

S. Thereisno lowest 586 version of the

doubler chip. This is because the 486

has 8K of SRAM cache right inside the
CPU chip, but the 586 does not. The
486 can do quite a bit of work at double
50 MHz speed just using its registers and
the SRAM cache before having to consult the "outside world" ofF the chip at
25 MHz.
Strangely, these clockAoubler machines
at 50 MHz are safer and more reliable than
ordinary 486s at 40 MHz.

Still other vendors quote the unformatted capacity, or indude unusable areas of
the disk to inflate the stated capacity by 10
to 25% the way Soppy disk vendors do.
The computer industry has made no
attempts to se t s t andard m easures.
Technicians vehemently defend each measuring scheme, and explain why each is perfectly honest. It is of lesser importance
which scheme we settle on, yet we need to
legislate soec common measure so we can
comparison shop.
Meanwhile, here is one way to defend
yourself. Before you buy a drive, ask the
vendor for the disk's geometry:

cols

h=heads
s=sectors/track
Then calculate the capacity in megabytes
with this formula:

( c ~h a s ) / 2048

A SINiar,Faatar Hard Disk

Since you already have a hard disk, the natural thing to do is get a second one, bigger
than your Srst, faster that your Srst, but
keep them both. Unfortunately there are
several nasty surprises awaiting you here.

How Sii a Disk?

Since you already have acomputer, you
have a good idea ofhow fastyour storage
needs are increasing. You have seen how
each new version of each program gets fatterand fatter. You have seen how you accumulate program after must-have program.
You may have already installed an onWeSy
compressor like Stacker, and know how well
it works for your mix of files. So, make an
estimate of what you need, and temper that
with what you am afFord.
Don't try to buy ahead more than two
years into the future. By then disk prices
wiH be much lower, and the disks will be
much faster,and most of what you know
about disks now will be obsolete.

Maasurlni Disk Sha

1 megabyte of RAM is 1,048,576 characters
(2 to the 20th power bytes). Hard disk
capacities are also measured in megabytes.
To me, it seems obvious that RAM and hard
disks should be measured the same way.
However, strange as it may seem, only a few
disk manufacturers agree.
There is no legal standard way to measure the size of a hard disk Manufacturers
have invented various misleading ways of

measuring the space.

Most disk vendors quote capacity in

megabytes, but use the short" megabyte of
only 1,000,000 characterL This inflates the
stated capadty by about5%.

E.g.: The Maxtor XTWV60E drive has

1,652 cylinders, 15 heads, and 54 sectors
per track. The capacity in megabytes is
( 1,652 a 15 a 54) / 2 0 4 8 = 645.5 MB.
Maxtor bilh the drive as having 676.8 MB.
This is because Maxtor is quoting in short
megabytes.

Disk Speed
The most important measure of disk speed
is the averageaccesstime. A fast disk might
be 15 milhseconds. A slow disk would be 25
milliseconds. Note: the smaller the number
the better.
Average access time measures how long
the read heads take to hop from one part
of the disk to another.
Another important number is transfer
rate how fast the disk can shovel data
into the computer once the heads get to
the right place. The only way to find this
out is to install the disk in your machine
and try it. Spedfications are overly optimistic. As a rough guide, diives with more
sectors per track will have faster transfer
rates

MFM
If you already have an MFM disk, you will
have trouble Snding a new second disk.
About the largest one you can stSI buy is 80
MB. You might have to switch to another
type of disk That will mean replacing your
controller. It also means you won't be able
to use your old hard disk RLL has suffered
the same fate as MFM.

ESDI
ESDI is fast and it works with so special
t weaking or d e vice drivers, both i n
Windows and OS/2. I nstalling a second
drive is very simple. There's very little that
can go wrong. Because ESDI has a strong
standard, you can mix and match drives
from different vendors.
Now that it works, vendors consider
ESDI old~ hioned. There is still a reasonable selecdon of ESDI drives for sale, but
the numbers are dwindling. There are no
longer drives available below 200 MB.
For now, ESDI is the most hassle-free
r oute, but you might not be a ble to
upgrade in a few years much the way the
owners of MFM drives are stuck now. So,
you might want to consider switching to
SCSI now.

SCSI
For years SCSI boosters have been saying,
"It isn't quite working yet, but just wait, in a
little while, it will be Suatastic."
Guess what. It finally is working.
SCSI had a bigproblem. There was a
standard for how hard disks attached to the
SCSI bus, but no software standard for how
the host adapter hooked into the PC.
Adaptec and Corel have taken the bull by
the horns and created a standard called
ASPL It allows sokware drivers written by
different companies to work together.
Now, after a tenyear wait, it is finally
possible to attach hard disks, tapes, CDROMS, optical disks, WORM drives, printers all from different manufacturers-to
the same SCSI bus. What is even more
remarkable is all the devices and all the
ASPI software that drives them runs simultaneously, c~xisting peacefully. Without
SCSI you would need a slot and controller
for each of thesedevices. Now with a single
slot and a single SCSI host adapter you can
handle all those devicea
Getting your first SCSI drive worhng is
daunting. For example, the Adaptec SCSI
host adapter has 55 esoteric jumpers to set
(or more precisely to leave alone). You
must understand terminators, SCIDS,
LUNS, BIOS extensions, and ASPI controller drivers, ASPI device drivers. SCSI is
not that much more difficult than the other
drive types, just different. However, you
can add a ssceed drive very easSy, mix and
matching any SCSI drives from different
vendors.

DOS and OS/2 do not directly support

SCSI the way they do MFM and ESDL This

implies the ongoing problem of finding

and installing up-at e d r ivers to keep
SCSI worhng in I'uture.
Coat. oa Page $9

58 T HE COMPUTER PAPER JUNE '92

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THE COMPUTER
PAPER JUNE '92 59
csr e xpensive, somewhat fussy, but very

ei'W>jWW~~~h'~,.'t-rW.'
:. :
::>%!
;
;::<'q:.,~~~@+ ::,:::::
"',-:.h
't W~'

fast eod MPressiee

SCSt jS i jke a raCe

ASPI marks a big leap

forward. It will only

O S/2 an d

DOS application pro-

smootharai'sremsito
ing rough edges.

bUt Ver' J.MfaSt and

the I B M 8 5 1 4, which
means ther aatomatically support the ATI

Th Ma r 'aS I o I

y oU

TtroComprarorPaper cov

somewbat fussJx
impressive after

All Computers

many

Car~XPenSiVe,

u ntil v e n dors f i l e

NEW FOR PCs:

ide n t ical, except that

the Ultra has dualP orted ~ M . w h i s h

f jne-tUne jf

oa Mo hamdtr
The 85 cards emu-

features of the 8514.

sively. There are two
k~ %~~~h>
Kp:.W>>x$ ~~;~@~h.t;,a
i~<Q@~~
z~~+"'i
@
This makes such cards
kinds of CD-ROM cheaper than the ATI,
those that fit on a standard SCSI bus, and those that fit on some a n dalmost as fast. However, you cannot
make them work ujdng standard 8514 drilow~st p
If you go for the premium SCSI type,
v e r s. T hus for example, Diamond Stealth
make sure the vendor offers an ASPI driver o w n ers cannot get by with 8514 drivers
so that it can share the SCSI bus with your u n d er Wmdows, while they wait for the new
Wia 5.1 Stealth dxtrjers to be debugged.
other SCSIdevicessuch as hard disk

ropr
ietaryinterface.

Loarnlntl Nore

Graphics Accelerator Soarch

There are several hnds of graphics accelerator boards. The most elaborate (and most
expensive) are the TIGA boards that use
the TI TMS54010 or 54020 chip. These use
a true auxiitaxy graphics c~rocessor that
runs its own programs to draw the screen.
The ATI Vantage and Ultra emulate the
IBM 8514 graphics accelerator, only they
do it much faster. The Macho8 processor in
the ATI is not quite as bright as a TIGA co.
processor, but it is spectahxed for the bull
work of han
endows and OS/2, so it
somedmes even t s the TIGA cards. The
ATI cards have a few extra tricks up their
s leeves that the 8514 does not. T h e

I will be holding a free, day-long course

Saturday, June di0 and and again on

Saturday, June 2'1 on upgrading your PC.

Usually such courses are Mly booked a few
hours after Ttro Corrspsror Paperhits the
streets. Phone 6844529 to reserve your
spot. For 90% of the course thne I answer
questions from the floor. 0
Reedy Green, president of Canadian Mind
Products in Vanctaarer, (604) 684-6526, builds
custom compujters. He also writes custom com-

TORONTO, ONTARIO, MAY 8 (NB)-

puter soltware, primsrityfor ~slit orlsnlea-

Owners of PCs based on 80286 and 80586

processors can now upgrade to 80486 technology with two txpgxade products from All
Computers. The All SX 486 and All DX 486

tions snd cfrarities, snd oNers training and consoling.

both use the Cyrix Cx486 microprocessor.

The All SX 486 replaces the 286 microprocessor with the Cx486. The All DX 486 is
designed to replace a 586 chip. Both devices
are circuit cards smaller than a credit card.
They plug into the microprocessor socket
on the computer's system board. Installing
either of them is a matter of popping out
the original processor and plugging in the
upgrade, which any user can do, said James
MacFarlane, a spokesman for the company.
Such an upgrade will increase chip performance, but critics of processor upgrades
argue that the procedure creates a mismatch between the faster chip and slower
peripherals such as the hard disk, which
were meant to work with the old, slower
processor.
That may be true, MacFarlane said, but
devices such as hard disks can also be
upgraded. "The costof upgrading a computer piece by piece is still cheaper than
buying a new one," he maintains.
All expects many of its upgrade cards
will sell to business users whose PCs are connected to networks, so that their local hard
disks are used very little. In that case, the
speed of the processor is much more important than that of the hard disk, MacFarIane
said.
The All SX 486 is available now, and the
All DX 486 was to be available before the.
end of May. Both have a suggested list price
of $499, with an optional math coprocessor
available for $100 more. Both also come
with the company's Atl Charge 586 memory
management software.
The company is gaining a strong
European presence, MacFarlane noted, particularly in Eastern Europe where newer
PCs were veryyhard to get until recently.
Contact: James MaeFariane, Atl Computers,
418-980%111, fax 418-960-5426.

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THE COMPUTER
PAPER JUNE '92 61

Nantucket/CA
Colnho

Nantucket
Vo Play Key Role

Lights Fire Under Xbase

In CA Database Strategy

LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA, MAY 8

(NB) While the big boys like Borland
and Microsoft were saying the Xbase standard isn't an issue, Computer Assodates'
purchase of Nantucket seems to have tilted
the table. Now the Xbase standard is the
new bandwagon and thebig boys inCluing the workstation world are forced to
admit what was always true anyway: Xbase
is here to stay.
Basically, the database market seems to
be moving in two directions. One is toward
the adoption of an Xbase standard, fueled
by Computer Associates' purchase of
Nantucket, which is providing a threat to
the other database vendors and widening
the Xbaae market. The other direction is
dient/server architecture which ia of paramount interest to the corporate communiChent/server is of interest because it is
more secure and maintains the integxity of
the data in the database. But client/server
is too expensive for small businesses.
When Ashton-Tate was alive, there was a
movement to define an Xbase standard but
Ashton-Tate was trying to say that file format was its own creation. Ashton-Tate was
seen aa a bully threatening verbally and
through the courts other companies who
were making headway in the market using
the format, like Fox Software. Ashton-Tate
was even trying to say the term "dBASE" was
a trademark and threatening no one else
could use it. That was the reason database
industry leader Adam Greene introduced
the unlovely term "xBase" with different
capitalization and gave it to the database

community. Toward the end, Ashton-Tate

did say it would make a "gift" of the .DBF
file format to the world but it was late
enough to inhibit any serious work on a
standard.
Nantucket's daim to fame was it was one
of the first to take Ashton-Tate's stranglehold off the business market. It introduced
Clipper, a database compiler. Clipper could
take dBASE language programs and turn
them mto stand%one programs that didn' t
need the dBASE product to run and that
could be distributed royalty&ee.
Lately, however, the estimation was that
Nantucket was out of the game altogether.
Struggling financially and behind on its
bills, it was predicted to go under any
minute.
But the bounce-back Nantucket has
taken with the Computer Associates'
announcement just reemphasizes the business community's commitment to Xbase.
And it has forced other companies to make
public commitments to Xbase as well.
Microsoft, Borland, Fox Software,
WordTech, Emerald Bay Group, Recital,
a nd D vorak D e velopment h av e a l l
announced they will support the new Xbase
standard formulated by Mark Schnap and
submitted to the XS/Standards Planning
and Requirement Committee (XS/SPARC)
of the American National Standards
Insdtute (ANSI).
Borland's President PhiTippe Kahn was
right when he said that users in the future
won't have to worry what format their data
is in. But that's because it will be in Xbase
format.

Top officials of Computer Associates

International pledged to continue development of Nantucket Corp.'s products, and
said the company will play an important
role in CA's growth in the personal computer market.
CA Chairman and Chief Executive
Charles Wang, and Sanjay Kumar, senior
vice-president for planning, made the comments in an audio teleconference held just
hours after their company announced plans
to acquire Nantucket, the Los Angeles firm
that makes Clipper, a dBAS~ ompatible
database management package for PCs.
Computer Associates "will definitely continue with Clipper development," Wang
said. He said the company will also continue
the Aspen project, a Nantucket effort to
develop objectwxiented database technology for Microsoft's Windows environment.
Computer Associates already sells a
dBASEcompatible Windows database product called dBFast. The company will probably use the best of dBFast and the Aspen
project in future Windows database software, Wang said.
Kumar said Computer Assodates hopes
to five Clipper better connections to CA's
mainframe database software. Computer
Assodates sells several mainframe database
management products, the result of acquisitions in the past few years.
Nantucket will disappear as a separate
company, but its developers are "an integral
part of the acquisition" and will come to
work for Computer Assodates, Wang said.
Nantucket's Los Angelea location close

AUTHORIZEDCANADIAN DISTRIBUTOR OF

ww I w 8

to a CA office in that city will be maintained, the officials said.

Commenting on the recent rash of
acquisitions in the personal computer market Microsoft announced plans to buy
Fox Software just weeks ago, and late last
year Borland International took over dBase
maker Ashton-Tate Wang said major software vendors are coming to see the importance of the dBase standard, or the Xbase
standard as it is often called.
He said the consolidation could benefit
users by putting the resources of larger
companies behind the Xbase products originally developed by small firms.
Computer Associates hopes to close its
purchase of the privately held Nantucket
within a month. The terms of the agreement are not being disdosed.

ISLANDIA, NEW YORK, MAY 7 (NB)-

Micro e

Contact: Bob Gordon, Computer Assodates,

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62 T HE COMPUTER PAPER JUNE '92

Toymaker TurnsTo CAD/CAM Software AT&T To Manufacture In Canada

KWUN T O N G , HON G K O N G , APR 25
(NB) Predsion Moulds Limited (PML), a
subsidiary of U.S. toy manuhcturcr Mattei,
has turned to Unigraphics software from
EDS (Electronic Data Systems) to upgrade
its computermded design and manufacturing (CAD/CAM) systems from a PCAxeed
to workstation4ased environment.
The Unigraphics systems, running on
three Sun Spare 2GX workstations, will
extend PML s capabilities to solid modeling, strrfacing, analysis, threeAimensional
draNng and machining. One workstation

will employ Unigraphics' Graphics

Machining Products to create the toolpath for machine cutting.
After several years
of experience with
less powerful PCbased CAD systems we were
keen

to speed up our design process, said M.K

Chan, director of PML 'Unigraphics is not
only much faster but also provides a CAM
toolpath that is directly linked to our CNC
cutting machines. By automating these
tasks, we expect the whole design process,
from initial drafting to manufacturing, to
be at least 15 percent more efficient than
before, with a comparable rise in the consistency of our
rocedures.'
PML manufactures moulds for Mattel's
Ml range of toys, induding Hot Wheel Cars
and Barbie Doll, at its phmt in Kwon Tong.
The design process 'begins with threedimensional part drawings prepared by
Mattel in the U.S. These are transferred by
modem to PML's workstations where
Unigraphics is used to
create 3-D tool draw
ings and the toolpatb.
L ater,
desi g n
details o n t h e 5 D

manu
facturingp

model can be enlarged,

rotated and shaded to

enable easy viewing. In

addition, the toolpath can be
modified at any time, or
when design changes are
necessary.
Contact: Donald E. Davidson,
El, +852 785 8886.

WA T E R L O O , O N T A R IO , APR 24
(NB) Eight years after the Canadian subsidiary was created, ATtcT Canada has
announced plans for its first manufacturing
in Canada. A plant belonging to NCR
Canada in Waterloo will make drcuit packs
for ATScT's FI'-2000 Lightwave System,
which transmits data and voice signals over
optical Sber.
AT&T acquired NCR last year. The NCR
plant in Waterloo will continue mahng circuits for NCR while adding two shifts on a
drait production hne to produce the parts
for AT8rT. Production is to start late this
yesrI
The move will add about 50 jobs to the
existing stafF of roughly 600 at the Waterloo
plant, A T gc T Canada spokeswoman
Suzanne B e r ma n to l d New s bytes.
Producdon of the sudace~ount technology drcuit packs in Waterloo will supplement
existing production of the pets at an Abc T
factory in Massachusetts, Berman added.
The parts will be distributed globally.
AT8cT said its purchasing of materials
Irom local vendors will also bene6t the local
economy.
Within a year, ATdrT plans to begin
manufacturing circuit packs for two other
transmission products, the DACS II Digital
Access and Crom@Connect System and the
DDM-2000 Network Multiplexer, at the
plant. ATacT also expects to begin research

and development activities in Canada on

Synchronous Optical Network (SONET)
ATacT Network Systems, based in
Morristown, NJ., sells these and other transmission systems in Canada, the United
States, and around the world to telephone
companies and other service providers.
By the end of 199$, the company said,
the Canadian operation will procluce more
than 50,000 circuit packs, valued at $20 milhon, each year.
Contact:Suzanne Barman, ATILT Canada, 416756-5084; Rich Mayer, AT&T Network Syslams,
201406-24%l.

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THE COMPUTER
PAPER JUNE '92 63

Versatile New Color Copier

Introduced By Canon
TOKYO, JAPAN, APR 22 (NB) ~anon has
developeda lowest (about US$6,000) but
powerful color' copier which it daims is the
smallest and most lightweight color copier
in the world. It's also designed to connect
to PCs to print out documents, be a scanner, and a printer of photographs.
Canon's latest copier is designed for the
desktop and prints pages in full color.
Called the BJ copier Pixel JET, it supports
400 dotsper4nch resolution and 256 colors
which Canon claims are "naturaL"
Canon's BJ copier is based on the company's " bubble-jet" t e chnology, a n
advanced ink jet printing method. This
bubblejet technology is already employed
in Canon printers for personal computers,
such as those for Apple's Macintosh and
the NEC PG9801.

Boston Computer 1Mluseum Hosts Virtual Reality Display

Canon's BJ copier can also be connected directly with the Macintosh and the PC9801 through a special interface called
'Intelligent Processing Unit" (IPU). This
inter&ce allows the copier to be used as a
fullwolor printer for the Madntosh and the
PC4801. Snapshots of the screen can also
be printed on this copier. The unit is further designed to be a scanner to input
color picture data into the personal computers. Canon says negative or positive photographic films can be used to print photos.
The size of this copier is 54x 47.6x 21.7
cm, and it weighs 20 kg. It can print postcards to A+size paper. The copying time is
about 96 seconds per paper.
Contact: Canon, 604-278-1481.

BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS, APR 2$

(NB) The Computer Museum is offering
visitors a chance to explore virtual reality.
In what the museum says is the first public
demonstration of virtual reality using networked personal computers, two people at a
time will be able to meet in an imaginary
5-D universe and build an imaginary house.
The demonstration will use personal
computers built around Intel 486 micropr'ocessors
two per person an Ethernet
local area network connection, j oysticks,
control wands, and specially designed helmets that track head movement.
Anna Laurita, a spokeswoman for Intel,
told Newsbytes the system costs about
$25,000 per person. That, she said, is considerably cheaper than a dedicated virtual
reality workstation, which would be more
like $100,000.

Visitors to the exhibit will put on helmets and earphones that create the illusion
of stepping into an artifidal world. They
will use wands to pick up objects and joysticks to move themselves and the object
around. A variety of parts for building imaginary houses
such as walls, different roof
shapes, and so on will be supplied, and
two people will be able to work together in
the virtual universe to build a house.
Liz Armbruster, a spokeswoman for the
museum, said a permanent exhibit will
open this summer, entitled "Tools and
Toys: The Amazing Personal Computer."
Intel and Sense8 Corporation created
the exhibit for the Computer Museum.
Contacts Liz Armbruster, The Computer
Museum, tel
617-426-2600, fax 617%26-2948.

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64 T HE COMPLrrER PAPER JUNE '92

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The software included with the systems

is ALR's version of MS-DOS 5.0; Microsoft
Windows 5.1; and Microsoft Multimedia
Works, an integrated software package
including a talking tutorial, word procesAdvanced Logic Research (ALR), however, sor, spreadsheet and charting database,
says it will be offexing MPC machines to its drawing and telecommunications capaMiFlyer hne of computer systems and plans to ty, Microsoft Bookshelf, a dictionary, encypxice the new computers stgniticantly lower dopedia and atlas; CD-ROM discs containing education, reference, business and
than the competitioex.
MPC systems are IBM or compatible entertainment software; and Multimedia
computers equipped with advanced sound Beethoven, offering music compositions.
Compared to similar MPC units from
capability and compact disc read-only
memoxy drives geared toward the use of Tandy, ALR says its 486SX4ased computer
video, animation, and sound. ALR says the is faster and thousands less than a less powaverage MPC retails
for around US$4,500
erful Tandy unit. Th e Tandy 4088LX,
but it is offerb ased on a
ing its MPC
586DX chip
w ith a n 8 0
MB hard disk
is retail priced
US$2,795.
v
at USES,500
while the ALR
pany is offer4 86SX u n i t
ing two new
with an 80 MB hard disk is only US$5,195,
MPC systems, the Powexftex Flyer 8SX/25
MPC for US$2,795 and the Flyer 82DT
Kevin Roberts of ALR told Newsbytes. A
4SX/25 MPC for US$5,295. Both comput- 200 MB hard disk bxings the 4SX/25 up to
ers offer Super Video Graphics Array
USES,795, which is still significantly less
(SVGA) monitors, with 1024 X 768 resolu- than the Tandy computer, Roberts saicL
tion, ALR said.
Also, the SVGA offered. with the ALR
The 8SX/25 has an Intel 886SX micro- computers is much better for the viewing of
processor running at 25 megahertz (MHz) video, Roberts said. While Tandy and
with 4 megabytes (MB) of random access Compuadd do offer SVGA MPC systems,
memory (RAM) on the motherboard which those systems can only display 16 colors as
can be upgraded to16 MB of RAM, and an
o posed to the '256 colors ofFered by the
SVGA display. Roberts added that the
80 MB hard disk. The 4SX/25 offers an
Intel 486SX microprocessor running at 25 ALR systems offer 1 MB of integrated video
megahertz inan 80 MB hard disk model
random access memory (RAM) while the
and a 200 MB hard disk modeL
Tandy systems only offer half that.
Both systems come with a Pro Audio
The ALR MPC computers come with a
luyear limited waxranty. The company says
Spectrum Plus sound board from Media
optional once and extended warranties
Vision and an internal Sony CDU41 ACD
CD-ROM drive with a &st 840 millisecond are avalabte. ALR says it expects to ship its
(ms) access time. Both also indude a Sash tirst MPC modeh beginning inJune of this

IRVINE, CALIFORNIA, APR 24 (NB)-

With the considexable cost of multimedia

personal computer systems these days,
many users are attempting to add multimedia capability to their existing systems.

read~ m emory (ROM) basic input/output (BIOS) system so the hardware pextphexals which the system can support are easily upgraded via software in the future, ALR
saidL

year.

Contact: Kevin Roberts, Advanced Logic

Research, 714481+770 ext. 496.

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THE COMPUTER
PAPER JUNE '92 65

Russian-US Venture Develops

Handwriting Recognition

The Secret is Outl

essential to the success of pen-based applications. Pen computers allow users to wiite
directly onto a tablet or the screen instead
of using a keyboard. Cursive refers to the
writing where thc: letters are joined together, as when we sign our names. The first
pen-based systems recognized block, or
printed characters. P a r a graph says
Calligrapher is the first writer~dependent
handwriting recognition system to support
other cursive and printed characters.
Boulder, Colorado-based Paragraph
International has the exdusive marketing
rights for all p r oducts developed by
Paragraph JV, a Russian/American joint
venture formed in 1989. Paragraph JV is
headquartered in Moscow.
In October Paragraph International
announced that it had signed a non~dusive agreement with Apple Computer which
calls for the two companies to jointly develop Paragraph's handwriting recognition
technology. The agreement also sets forth
licensing and royalty details.

MOSCOW, RUSSIA/BOULDER, COLORADO, APR 1 5 ( N B ) Paragraph

International, a Russian-American business
venture, has announced that it will join
w ith G O
Co r p o r ation t o de v e l op
Calligrapher, a cursive handwriting product, for GO's pen~ d P e nPoint operating
system.
Under terms of the agreement GO will
be a nonexclusive worldwide distributor
and publisher, marketing Calligrapher in
addition to its own GOWrite. GOWrite is a
replaceable printedccharacter recognition
engine.
Paragraph International said it would
d emonstrate a n
ea r l y v e r s io n o f
Calligrapher for PenPoint on April 16th.
The two companies said that the product
would probably be available for commercial
release later in the year.
A ccording
to
t he
Par a g r a p h
International announcement the iwo companies are worhng with independent software vendors (ISVs) and key customer
accounts to ensure effective integration of
the technology into PenPoint.
The ability of computer operating systems to recognize cursive handwriting is

./

Contact: Michael Reimer, Paragraph

International, 303-443-8777, fax 303-449-2773;
Marcia Mason, GO Corporation, 41 5445-7400.

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I NGTON, A P R 2 5
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'i information.
(NB) Microsoft has
'<'.".s
.,M
I ntel a nnounced
announced that this
"<":
'i'x;.". this week that it had
summer it will intro-'.. = . ='.: .
. '. :s' = - ' ..:.:: cut the price of its
duce its Hash File sysc', ,'.,m
'
Gash chips, which it
tern, which uses Qash;, "..
said until recently
memory to function as
"; ~g Qj ls ' =h sj ~ : '~ "~:
had cost more than
an ordinary disk in a
twice the price of
PC.
conventional memoThe company said
ries and many nmes
the Flash File system
t he cost of h a r d
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applications
f or
embedded systems
and consumer elec-

@~.:: 4~:"
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-

yyt '
",

-+g

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;::."~~i'4j,,::,
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"r<j'~nj~>
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Newsbytes that the

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p r id'S"
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to a wide range of

f~;"".
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sos

v e r sions,

tools.
be done on a Qash
non-volatile, so any
data in memory is not lost when the corn- c h ip are limited, although the number is in
puter is turned off. Hash memory saves and the hundreds of thousands. That will limit
retrieves data much more quickly than read- t h e life of the present flash cards to several
andantes to
ahard orQoppy disk.
years, said MiddleooO. Hash cards require
Microsoft said it has released the specifi- special slots in the PC, so they cannot be
cationsforthe system'smediacontrolstruc- r e t r o -fitted t o y ou r e x isting system.
tures, which will allow other companies to H o w e.ver, the computer can have several
develop systems for reading and writing
s l ots for Sash cards.
data. Hash memory cards can be removed
H ash c ards will also help lengthen batand inserted in computers much like Qoppy t ery time before recharge, since the Sash
disks are, and will work with any PC that
c h i ps draw considerably less power than a
supports the Microsoft Flash File system. h a r d drive. The Hash File system is presentHash cards will be espedally useful in pahn- l y i n beta testing.
top, penAased and other subcompact cornDo not l ook for Sash cards to replace
puter systems where space in the case is at a hard disks yet. Depending on the applican
premium. Using flash memory chips, small tion, desktop computers used for tasks such
computers can utilize as much data storage as graphics, computermded design (CAD)
and other data intensive tasks still require
space as larger units.
Microsoft said it will use Intel's flash c o n siderably more storage capacity than
cards, which presently can store up to 20 t o d a y's fiash cards can provide.

megabytes (MB) of data Like Qoppy and

hard disks, data stored on Gash cards can be Contact: Collins Hemingway, Microsoft, 206erased by the user. Intel claims that by the 8 8 2-8080.
year 2000 it would be probable that flash
cards would be able to store as much as half

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66

T HE COMPUTER
PAPER )UNE'92

IBM Sets Out To Spur

Pen Development

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Intel has announced two software programs

for Windows: Faxability Plus and Faxability
Plus OCR. The company says both applications are designed to run on any industry
standard fax modem.
The company said Faxability Plus offers
WYPIWYF (what you print is what you fax),
allowing the user to transmit faxes from
within a M i cr o soft
Windows application by
using the application's
print c o m m an d t o
obtain laser~uality fax
printing .
I nte l 's
enhancements business
u nit m a nager, D i c k
Gough, said Intel finetuned the Faxability software to more than
20 Sx modems. 'This is the way faxing from
a PC was meant to be," prodaimed Gough.
Faxability Plus can send and receive
faxes, and allows incoming faxes to be
viewed, printed, forwarded or saved. Faxes
can be saved in PCX, DCX and TIFF formats. The program aho indudes zooming
and sizing, rotation, and copying to and
pasting f'rom a clipboard. Faxes can be
pxinted to any Windowampported printer.
FaxabiTity Plus also includes a manual
Send feature, useful for users who travel

and use notebook or laptop computers.

The manual Send option allows the initial
connection to be made using a telephone
handset, then transfer of control to the fisx

software by pressing a "hot key.' The pro-

s i

i s

pany spokeswoman
T are Sexton t o ld

The special%id ThinkPad (Model 2521)

comes with a 20-megahertz 586SX microprocessor, either four or eight megabytes of
memory, an integrated data/fax

modem, an AC/DC adapter, a

nickelwadmium battery, serial
and parallel ports, a connect ion for an optional ~ e r nal S.Mach diskette dxive,
and an e x ternal keyboard port.
The ThinkPad that
becomes g e n erally
available late this year
may be slightly different from the current
version, Sexton said,

depending on cust omer input in t h e

meantime.
IBM customers and

apphcation developers
can order the new system directly from IBM
through the special bid

process, a program for

obtaining computers from
IBM that are not generally available through traditional purchasing
channels. The first systems will be delivered

in July, the company said.

IBM said it has already provided selected

independent software vendors and cust omers with an e a rly version of t h e
ThinkPad for evaluation.
Contact: W. DeanNine, IBM, 91 4442-8408;
Tare Sexton, IBM, 914442-4882.

New For PC: Intel Fax Software for Windows,

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IBM's penkased com-

Newsbytes. There will

be a fee for partidpating in the program,
Sexton said, but it has
been deferred until the
f ourth quarter of t h i s
year. The amount of the
fee was not available.
IBM also announced a spedal bid version of its ThinkPad
penAased computer for customers
and developers who want to start work now
on applications to run on future IBM penbased computers. The ThinkPad is scheduled for general availal ity in the fourth
quarter of this year.
The ThinkPad comes with the PenPoint
operating system, licensed from GO Corp.,
and handwriting recognition technology
developed at IBM's Thomas J. Watson

GIADUA'ISTAKE NOTEl

cash Price 1 077

WH ITE PLAINS, NEW YOR K, APR 20

(NB) Joining in a wave of activity surrounding pen-based computing, IBM has
announced the IBM Pen Developer
Assistance Program and the limited availability of its pen4ased ThinkPad computer. The developers'program is
meant to help IBM customers
and independent software
vendors begin developing
en-based applications,
M said.
The program will
give developers access
to information about

tt I
dl

'

I I 0

gram also provides prefix and suffix support, allowing users to post charges to an
ATasT or Spxint credit card. A reverse video
option provides easier viewing of incoming

fisxes on the monochrome displays of many

laptop/notebook computers.
Intel said Faxability Plus/OCR is the
first fax application that has built4n support
for both optical character recognition
(OCR) and the TWAIN application prograixuning interface (API) for imagecapturing scanners. TWAIN, I n t el's Audrey
Wbitfield told Newsbytes, is a scanner driver
developed jointly by
HP, Kodak, Logitech
and several other
companies.
F axability P l u s
has a suggested list
price of $119, while
FaxabiTity Plus/OCR
is priced at $ 249.
Intel said both would be available in May of
this year.
Intel would prefer if you also run this
software with its new fax/modem boards
which are priced as low as $129 and work
under MS-DOS or MS-Windows.
The new SatisFAXtion products indude
the Modem/400, which runs at up to
14,400 bits/second for $499, and the
Modem/400e, whichgoes inside your computer and lists for $549. The Modem/200, a
9,600 baud product, is $569, and the
Modem/100, an entr)n4evel product with a
data speed of2,400 baud, a fi
tx reception
speed of 4,800 baud, and a fax sending
speed of 9,600 baud, costs$129. All of the
new products support the Communicating
Applications Specification, or CAS, standard, first offered by Intel and DCA.
Contact: Dan Wagner, Intel, SN+29-7585;
Audrey Nhhfhski, Intel Software, 508+29-72it8.

T HE COMPUTER
PAPER jUNE '92 6 7

CPA Awarch Honor Journalists, Including Newrsbytes

NEW YORK, NEW YORK, APR 22
(NS) Newsbytes News Network
h as been honored by t h e
Computer Press Assodation,
winnmg first runner up in
"Best Online Pubhcation."
This is the second time
Newshytes has received
runner<3p status in thut
annual event. Twice
before, N e w sbytes
r eceived t h e top
E
a ward, Best O n l i n e
\
Publication.
The best online publication category had 22 entries,
the largest number in the
CPA awards' 7-year history.
Best Online Publication
went this year t o P r o digy's
Computer Club. Macworld Online also
won runner+up.
Judging this category, Pauline Ores, editor4n~ef of PC Publishing and Presentation,
and To m F a r r e , e d i to r o f ll cs clicr
Management,said of Newsbytes, 'This online
computer service is focussed, to the point
... just what an onhne news service should
be. The content is timely, artides well written, and the reporters and editors have a
real nose for news.
There were an average af 2lh40 submissions for each of the Computer Press
Assodation's 21 categories, the largest number ever submitted for the awards. The ceremony also hasted the largest number of
attendees in its history 140 guests. The
awards, honoring outstanding work by hightechnalogy journalists in 1991, were held at
New York City's Tavern-en-the-Green
Restaurant.
Judges for the 1991 awards induded Bill
Machrone, p u b lishing d i r e ctor, P C
Magaxise; Jerry Sorrell, editor-inchief,
MacWorhbWilliam Bulkeley, staff reporter,
lyic Wall StssetJouisah Esther Dyson, editor
and publisher, Ilelcascl.O Geoff Lewis,
senior editor, BusinessWcch;Stewart Cheifet,
executive producer, Computer Chrosidcr,and
columnistJohn C. Dvorak.
CPA President Galen Gruman and
Robert Adam of Citizen America Corp., the
co-sponsor of the awards and luncheon,
and Hal Glatzer, CPA Awards Chairman,
presented the awards to the winners and

magazine, drculation more than

50,000, while Compters In
Accosting received the
award for best computer
magazine, circulation less
than 50,000. Computer Retail Wcsh
won the award for best computer newspaper, circulation
less than 50,000; PC Wceh for
best cemputer publication,
c irculation m o r e tha n
,;!'
50,000,and Windoua Watcher
newsletter fer best computer
newsletter.
In the various book cate.)'
gories, the awards went to
Compters and So ciety:
Impact/by David O. Arnald

(Best

Non-f i c tion

Computer Book), Get ting

Sooted With the Apple Macintosh
inclding System 7 by Neil Salkind (Best
Introductory How-To Book Systems),
Microsoft Eacel Step by Step (no named
author) (Best Introductory How-To BookSoftware), The Art of Computer Systems
Performance Analysis by Raj Jain (Best
Advanced How-To Book Systems), and
Itcal World PageMaher4i Indstrial Stiength
Techniccs, Wmtows Editios by Jesse Berst
(Best Admmced How-To Book Software).
It was a big day for Berst, whose publication,
WindouuWatcher,also won best newsletter.
British science fiction anther Douglas
Adams received the Best Opinion or
Editorial in Computer Publication award
for his "Under The-Desktop Publishing,
which appeared in MacUscr.In the review
categories, "Introdudng: The PowerBooks
by Russell Ito in MacUserreceived the Best
Hardware Product Review award while
Craig Stinson's PC M a g axie pi ece
"Spreadsheets Begin to Put the User First"
was the winner of Best Software Product
Review.
In the categories relating to generalinterest publications, G. Pascal Zachery sc
Stephen Kreider Voder of Thc Wall Street
Journal received the award Best News Story
in General Interest Publication for their

'Apple, IBM Discuss Swap of Technology."

Elizabeth Corcoran's ScicsA

Pc Americanarticle "Calculating Reality won the Best
Feature in General Interest, Publication
award. The Best News Story in Computer
runners up.
Publication award went to Peter Kraus of
Deborah Branscum was honored as hest Informatics Wceh for his "Akers Memo:
Backlash."
computer columnist fer her m o nthly
colunms in MacWorld,finishing ahead of
The B u s iness R a di o N e t w ork's
runners-up Steven Levy, also of MacWoild,
Computing Successl" was the wmner of the
and Chris O' Malley of PC Soreer.Preston
Best Radio Program award and "ABC News,
Gralla received the award for authoring the PC Tenth Anniversary Show" was judged
best feature in a computer publication. His Best Television Program.
"Online Suicide," appearing in the May
Entries for consideration for the 1992
awards will be accepted by the Computer
1991 issue of PC/Comptig, detailed the
suidde of 4+ear~ld Blair Newman, a PC Press Association in November, 1992.
industry figure who, until shortly before his
The winners will be announced in the
death, had been a prelific contributor to
ColmbiaJoussatismBcoici magazine in the
the WELL (Whole Earth 'Lectronic Link). July&ugust issue.
Shortly before his suicide, Newman erased
hundreds of messages he had posted on the Contact: Holly Padove, Horizon
Cemmunica8ons, 805-488-5955.
WELL.
MacWorQ was judged the best computer

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68 T HE COMPUTER PAPER JUNE '92

PenPoint 0$ Shipping; Products Introduceci

.e U.>

THE PRESIDENT HAS GONE LOONIEI!

For asmiled timeonly, when yfnfpufchaeeAulocAD Release 11-sss forfheeuffseefeff sel fnfoeof only

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ONE LOONIE NIOREI!

Thai'arigfaf! For only one ffoffar more, he will sell youthe following CADDSyefefa

Penllaglc' Numero Is a cross

between a spreadsheet and a word
processor thatallows users to write,
erase,hfghllghg end write on top of
their work to correct it. Handwritten
letters can bebanslsted to computer
characters as thoughthey hadbeen
typed, or translahoncan bedeferred.
Handwriting and translated type can
sfso be mixed and printed together.

SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA, APR 17

(NB) several new pen+ased computing

products wer e i n t r o duced a t G O

Technology's PenPoint Premiere show in
San Francisco.
GO said it is shipping the commerdal
version of PenPoint for the first time.
PenPoint is a 52-bit operating system for

886 or higher microprocessor-based pen

SO, BfNNOW...BEFORE THE PRESIDENT COMES TO HIS SatSESlf

computers and reduced instruction set

computing (RISC) Cased machines.
GO says PenPoint is designed for mobile
computing with the indusion of preemptive multitasking. Pre~mptive multitashng
allows the user immediate accessto information as the user's pen takes priority.
Other tasks the computer might be worhng
on in the background such as handwxifing
processing or communications are preempted until the user's demand is accom-

was Msft 31, Iwl. fat u he anslfmd el@ ee oner fwnoliw. Wcw fssat wcoD. 1 % wnafu visI/MC

plished. GO says xnobile computing users

ECEY386I40 CADD SYSTEM

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4MB RAhf, 12 OR 1.44 FLOPPY, MATH CHIP
IDE CONTROLLER, 40NB HARD DNVE
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VGA VIDEO CARD dc VGAMONO AIONITOR
ENHANCED KEYBOARD, hfOUSE, DOS 5.0
TWO FEARS PARTS drLABOUR WARRAlVTY

THE FOLLOWING 8 STEM UP ES ARE ALSO AVA ABLE

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need instant access to informafion and the

prewmptive multitaskhxg allows them that
access.
Virtual memory is available to users as
well. Defined as designating a portion of
the hard disk as an extension to the random accessmemory (RAM) physically available on the computer, virtual memory
allows the user the aMity to do more with
less. GO says users can use virtmd memory
instead ofadding more RAM and can open
more documents simultaneously or use larger documents than their available RAM
would normally allow.
GO says users don't have to understand
or even see applications, files, or directoxies
but can simply nxove from one page to
another (which moves them transparently
from one application to another ) in the
same way theywould use pen and paper in
a notebook
IBM introduced the ThinkPad and says
the new pen-based computer will ship in
July. It also announced the IBM Pen
Developer Assistance Program for providing
assistance to customers and independent
software vendors (ISVs) to encourage devel-

IK

'V

'.

le'

PenMagic! -~~
'I

S t'

FN~

Pagemap, a feature of Numero, allows

the user to magnify the paper, scale it to fit
on any size screen, or "fold" it so one portion of a page can be compared to another,
PenMagic said.
T he software i s " smart" as w e ll ,
PenMagic said, as the user can write the letter 'T" on the date line and the software
will fill in today's date. Drawing an underline at the bottom of a coluxnn of numbers
will cause Numero to add them, highlighting a group of numbers and dragging the
highlighted portion to a piece of graph
paper will cause Numero to create a graph
using those numbers. More than 70 built~
finandal, statistical, and mathemafical functions are induded, PenMagic said.
The "work paper" can be designed by
the useror a choice can be made Som over
40 already available pieces of paper.
Choices for the design of the paper indude
how many columnar grids per page, select-

ing Rom eight data types, specifying page

layout induding lines, fonts, and graphics.
PenMagic also announced a training
program on Numero for consultants, systems integrators and valu~ddedwesellers
(VARs) wxth copxes of software, reference
materials, and in-depth information for
designers. PenMagic hopes the training
program will help its partners to train new

users. The company is charging $800 for

the course and says more information is

available I'rom the Canadian firm by telephone at 604-988-9982 or by facsimile at
6049884055.
In a d d i t i on , S l a t e C o r p o ration
announced a suite of applications for
PenPoint. The company says it has developed Slate Penapps, an applications development environment; Slate Penbook, electronic book software package; Slate Laplink
Pro for PenPoint, a file transfer utility; Slate
At-Hand, a "pencentric" spreadsheet; Slate
Safetypen Utilities, which provide backup
and password security; and, the Slate DayTimer Pen Scheduler software, a daily planner and notetaker based on the Day-Timer
opment of pen4ased appfications.
staxldard.
The ThinkPad will ship with IBM's verSlate says it has an agreement with GO
sion of the PenPoint OS, IBM said. IBM cus- under which GO will resell Slate's Penapps
tomers and application developexs who
development product. The agreement was
want a ThinkPad for headstart can get one made under a new program called the
through a spedal bid process. IBM says the PenPoint Custom Solutions Alliance. The
spedal bid version of the ThinkPad (Model Custom Solutions Alliance is to encourage
2521) is durable and comes standard with a development for the PenPoint OS. Slate
20 megahertz (MHz) 386SX microproces- says more than 400 companies are developsor, either four or eight megabytes (MB) of ing with the Slate Penapps Developer s
random access memory(RAM), an integratRelease, which has been available since
ed data/fax modem (U.S.wompatible), an
March 1991. However, the commercial
AC/DC adapter, a nickel cadmium battery, release of Penapps 1.0 won't be until July
serial and parallel ports, a diskette drive and at that time will be available from
port for connecting the optional external 5 Slate's Scottsdale, Axizona headquarters.
Grade, a well-known supplier of dataI/ i n c h , 1.44/2.88 MB diskette drive, and
an external keyboard port.
base software said it will provide a developNumerty, a financial work processor" er's toolkit for the building of interfaces
was announced by PenMagic for the between PenPoint and Oracle and IBM
PenPoint OS. Numero starts a nevr category databases. Grade says the toolkit will ofFer
of software for pe n c o mputers, says support for its programmatic interfaces as
PenMagic, because it's a mix between a
well as a version of Structured Query
spreadsheet and a word processor that Language (SQL) NetOrade's dient/sexver
allows users to do tasks on pieces of "work networking software. Oracle says its products for the PenPoint operating system are
paper that look and act much like real
paper in a comxnon sense way. For exam- scheduled for release in the fourth quarter
of this year.
ple, users can write, erase, highlight, and
write on top of their work to correct it.
Handwritten letters can be translated to
Contact:Miller Communicationsfor Photonlca,
computer characters as though they had
tal 415-9824550; 60, tfsl 415458-2075; IBM,
been typed, or translation can be defexrefL 014442-5408; PanMaaio, 604-088-0882; Slate,
Handwrithxg and translated type can also be 802-448-7I O r acle, 41 8-5084117.
mixed and printed together.

THE COMPUTER
PAPER JUNE '92 69

IBM Offers OS/2 2.0

To Windows Users For $79
Newsbytes has leaxned that IBM fs ofFering
its latest version of OS/2 2.0 to owners of
any versionof Windows for C$79.
IBM has set up a toU-free number for
order and information at 1400465-1254
(or local so&ware dealers) and reports are
calls to the number have been brisk. The
company is allowing users of the previous
release (1.5) of OS/2 to upgrade for $1,
and DOS users can have the product for
C$159, IBM said.
The new version of OS/2 2.0 is a graphical user interface (GUI) that meets the
common user access (CUA) guidelines, and
breaks the 640 hlobyte baxxier of DOS, IBM
said. The product will run Windows 5.0
applications.
Between 15 and 50 megabytes (MB) of
hard disk space are required for the OS/2
2.0, IBM support personnel told NewsbyteL
Hardware requirements include 4 MB of
random access memoxy, and a minimum of
a 586SXkased IBM or compatible computer recommended. Allowing OS/2 2.0a full
50 MB of hard disk space is the best option

as it improves pexfonnance, IBM representatives said.

Paul Duncanson, president of the Los
Angeles OS/2 Users Group told Newsbytes
he has seen both Windows 5.1 and Destview
run under OS/2 2.0.Duncanson said IBM
reported over 10,000 defects were idendfied
and coxxected in version 2.0.
Duncanson said there is an estimated
1.9 million lines of additional code in C and
assembly language in the new OS/2. While
there are problemswith the product, such
as incompatibility with some video dxivers,
Duncanson says he is excited about the
product and thinks it will take ofF in the
user community
One tidbic Duncanson says pressing the
Ctrl+Alt+Shift+0 keys (0 not zero) brings
to the screen the names of aU the IBM programmers who worked on OS/2 2.0.
Contest: IBM, 1~ ~
123 4 ; Paul
Duncanson, Los Angeles 0$2 Users Group, tel
805484M32.

(NB) Lotus Development Corp. has

announced the immc:diate avilabiTity of 124 for Home, a product it describes as "the
flrst Lotus spreadsheet spedfically designed
to meet the needs of home computer
users. 1 2-5 for Home has a suggested
retail price of $149.
1-2-5 for Home contains a version of 1-25 tailorc.d for home use and SmartSheets, a
set of 50 customized application templates.
They indude "Statement of Net Worth,
which provides users with a snapshot of
their p r e sent f i n a n cial c o n d i tion;
"Refinancing a Mortgage," which analyzes
the opportunity of rcfinandng a mortgage;
"Year End Tax Plan" which helps calculate
quarterly tax payments andyearwnd tax
planning; and Cofiege Costs, which calculates the estimated total cost of sending
children to coUege and the required yearly
investment to attain that goal

~4~ii~5~

All SySterns InChCding:

IMB RAM InstaUed

IAMB/525' FloppyDist Drive or 1.44MB/35"

I/O w/I Parallel/24aial/i<arne port

New For PC: Lotus 1-2-3 For Home

CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETIS, APR 21

CCS MICROCOMPUTER SYSTEMS

Lotus spokesperson Karen Schiff told

Newsbytes that the version of 144 induded
with the new product, while retaining the
functionality of 14N, has been modified so
it will run on minimal hardware configurations while providing the power considered
appropriate to the home use:r. She said,
'The size of the spreadsheet has been narrowed to 512 columns and 256 rows and
the File Viewer and Auditor features of
other 1 2N MS4)OS versions have not been
included. They were features not considered needed for the average home user,
particularly at the c:xpense of larger equipment."
I-N for Home requires an IBM PC or
Lotuacertified compatible with a minimum
of 512K of RAM, a hard disk and DOS 2.1
or higher.
Contact: Karen SchiN, McGllncey & Paul; 617862M14.

14' High Resolution Monitor TIL

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For moredetails,infor.and updated prices,please callour sales department

Computer and Communication Systems Ltd.

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Phone: 251-3588 FAX: 251-5125

A TECH COMPUTERS
3 09 2 C A M B IE S T R E E T ( A T 1 5T H A V E . )
T EL (6 0 4 ) 8 7 7 - 1 8 1 2 F A X ( 6 0 4 ) 8 7 7 - 2 2 2 3

1 992 JUN E S P E C IA L

Japan: IBM-compatible Pen-input

Computer Debuts

386DX4484K 48MS/128K 486DX40/286K

gtsts
81848
82388

TOKYO, JAPAN, APR 15 (NB) Japan's an electric pen, a tablet, and a main com-

Includes:
True Intel CPU attd AMI BIOS
4MB RAM
1.2 MB AhD 1.44 MB floppy drive

Wacom has developed apen4nput computer which is compatible with an IBM PC/AT,
called the Pen<op model V.
Wacom's latest pen~omputer will be
released this July. It will be sold for 558,000
yen, slightly less than NCR's pen computer.
Wacom's Pen<op computer consists of

FI OW urS eyegOg ZrpVr

puter. The tablet is A4ezed and 1.5 centimeters (cm) thick. It weighs one hlogram

(tg). The tablet is equipped with a TSTN

LCD (hquid crystal display). It supports 16

color gradations and IBM's VGA (video
graphics array).
The main computer box is also A4efzed,
and is 2.5 cm thick It weighs 1.5 kg. A 25
megahertz (MHz) 80586SL processor is
used in the system. It also includes four
megabytes (MB) of RAM, with a maximum
of eight MB. It also comes with a 5.inch
f~1o py disk and a 120 MB 2.5-inch hard
The computer supports both DOS/V
and Windows 5.0. I n t e r estingly, an
Ethc:xnet board and a hx board can also be
equipped as an option.
Wacom's ~
comp u ter is based on
a computer vrhich was jointly developed
with Integrated Technologies in the U.S..
Wacom is a major tablet maker and has
been manufacturing tablets for IBM and

Apple on an OEM (original equipment

manufacturer) basis.
Contact: Wacom, +81~5 8 -1118.

105 MB OUAhHLAil IDE hard drive

Super 16bit 1/0 adapter

2 serial, 1 parsllel, 1 game port
Trident 8900 SVGA card 1024K
Super VGA monitor t1024x768.28mm)
19 Midtower case w/LEO display
200W CSA power supply
101-key enhanced keyboard

ARRIVAL

BULNFEVER
SHIES

Free CliP COPy hOlder

~ Two year parts and labour warranty++

70

TH E COMPUTER PAPER JUNE '92

Affordable Computer 8 Communication Products

386DX-40 cache

AMI Bios
64K cache / expandable to 256K
1MB RAM / expandable to 32MB
1.2MB ar 1.44MBfloppy drive
40MB HD(28msw/SK cache)

Minitower AT case w/200w

1:1 interleave IDE / FD / HD controller

486DX-33 cache

AMI Bios

64K cache expandable to 1MB

4MB RAM / expandable to 32MB

1.2MB or 1.44MBfloppy drive
105MB HD(19ms, w/32K cache)
Minitower AT case w
/200w

101 enhanced keyboard

14inch,,39 dot pitch, SVGA manitor

1:1 interleave IDE / FD / HD controller

2 serial / parollel / game ports
101 enhanced keyboard
14inch, .39 dot pitch, SVGA monitor

Trident 9000 SVGA

card w/512K

Trident 9000 SVGA

card w/512K

2 serial / parallel / game ports

AMI Bios

486DX-50 cache

AMI Bios

256K cache/ expandable to 1MB

4MB ram /expandableto 32MB

1.2MB or 1.44MBfloppy drive

105MB HD(19ms, w/32K cache)
Minitower AT case w/200w
1:1 interleave IDE / FD / HD controller

2 serial / parallel / game parts

i Oi enhanced keyboard
14inch, .39 dat pitch, SVGA monitor

1 MB RAM,VGAcord

s1108

s1688

s2188

386SX-20

386SX-25

386DX-33 cache

AMI Bios

1MB RAM / expandable toSMB

1,2MB or 1,44MB floppydrive
40MB HD(28msw/SK cache)
Desktop AT
case w/200w
1:1 interleaveIDE/ FD / HD controller
2 serial / parallel / game ports
101 enhancedkeyboard
14inch, .39 dot pitch, SVGAmonitor
256K VGAcard w/800x600 resolution

1MB RAM / expandable to 8MB

1.2MB or 1.44MBfloppy drive
40MB HD(28msw/8K cache)
Desktop AT
case w/200w
1:1 interleaveIDE/ FD / HD controller
2 serial / parallel / game ports
101 enhanced keyboard
14inch, .39 dot pitch, SVGA monitor
256K VGA card w/800x600 resolution

AMI Bios

64K cache / expandable to 256K

1MB RAM / expandable to 32MB
1.2MB or 1 44MBfloppy drive
40MB HD(28msw/8K cache)
Minitower AT case w/200w
1:1 interleove IDE / FD / HD controller
2 serial / parallel / game ports

i Oi enhancedkeyboard

14inch, .39 dot pitch, SVGA monitor

Trident 9000 SVGA

card w/512K

088

>988
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3.5 Hoppy Drbie Brcrdret ...................................... $5.00 All Charger ft56k-51$,16Q I0akr7N nrNkifsN)........,........$103.00
Tecze1o2MB5o25{ioppt chve oo ooo
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e4rl rre)..,.............. $140.00

HARDDRIVES

MAXIOR 12QMB
{15ms,Y.C IOE,w/64K) ..................'$414.00
$64 00 Alla{5nkN,Q d , I6la,A N ~ ). . .........$160.00
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wad k 1~ 5 . 2 5~
d ... . ..................$67.00
All Olio (IN, 16
hit huIIsiQU,136r10N elkkzi) ............$505.00 QUANIUM 12QMB
UrS(16ms,Y.C IOE
, w~ ........ $439.00
Mhubishi 1AMS3.5 Iioppyckirrsr ........................ $60.00 SOFNIARE
lEAC 105MB(19|ns,Y.C IOE
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Microsoft Dos
4.01 ............................................ $50.00 Mcahr XQMB (15ms,V.C. IDE,w/32lq ............. $650.00
VbRO CARDS
5.0 ............................................. $78.00 WESIERNDIGITAL8QMB{19rns,Y.C IDE,w/3$) ...... $342.00
Dual graphic(rrenochroire/aolaur) rzrrd.......................$17.00 Microsoft Dos
M
icr
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AarnazlngVga-700(515,16hit,102ki7N, Wry Aazi.) .......$90.00 Oem Dos5.0...................................................$60.00 PAR5
o$50 00 ULlRA 2400BINIERNA4'9600 S/R FAXMODEM$89.00
AarnazingVga.900HC(INPUThig)ickrrw,1%4MreL) ..$139.00 Oem Windows 3.0 ..............
Trident9000{2Rih515, 16Q Ilki7N nekka) ...............$48.00
ULlRA 24QQB
INIERNALMODEM ..................... $M.QO
Trident 8900{2Rik.IN, 16lit, 102ki7Neden) ...................$67.00 1Mb x 9-70/80 SMM ...................------- - - $48 00 OEM DOS
5,0 8 MSWINDOWS 3.1 (w/~) . $139.00
Tndent8900HC{INPk higharkwr,I02ki7N na)............ ..$114.00 4Mbx 9-70ns
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CAqml:

l ee

l d

THE COMPUTER
PAPER JUNE '92 71

Delrina Says
Forms/PenslOCR/Fax To Change Office
TORONTO, ONTARIO, APR 16 (NB) A u sing OCR software.
combination of electronic forms processFina l ly, pen~ e d computers will make
ing, optical character recognition, pen
i t m ore practical to use electronic forms on
computing, and computer fax modems will n o t e book computers in place of paper
change the way ofiices work over the next o n e s. U sing a computer keyboard is not
few years, according to Mark Skapinker,
e a sy in the field, where there may not be a
president of T o r o nto-based Delrin a s u r f ace on which to set the machine. A
Technologies. Skapinker said the four
ma c hine that accepts input from a pen is
. technologies will allow the vast bulk of
mo r e easily held with one hand while writoKce information now handled on paper
i n g with the other.
Skapinker expressed doubts about the
to be dealt with electronically.
Skapinker's company sells two of the
u s e f ulness of pen-based computing for
four technologies he discussed: forms pro- m a i n stream applications. Handwriting
cessing software and facsimile send~ceive r e c ognition technology just is not good
software. The company came close to
e n o ugh yet, he said. But he went on to say
acquiring an American firm that makes
t h a t standard fotms make the job much easoptical character recognition software last i e r , b ecause they are full of "hints." For
Ml, but the deal was called oK He spoke at i n stance, there may be a limited number of
Software World, an exhibition and confer- p o ssible entries in a given space on a form.
ence sponsored by Digital Consulting of
S o , if software can recognize only three letAndover, M a s sachusetts, a t t he
ters o f a word, it can search a database of
Metropolitan Toronto Convention
possible entries to find one that
matches.
Centre.
Skapinker added that
Today, business in the United States
creates 2,200 million documents
the wide acceptance of
each year, Skapinker said, and
stand-alone
f ax
95 percent of these are in
~.
+
machine s a nd of f ax
'
gg
j
boardsforpersonalcompaper form. Of those, the
majority are business forms of
~
>
pu ter s m a k e s o p tical
one hnd or another.
character r e cognition
'~- w
Foims processing software
more accessible because it
-~%
provid e s a way of getting docfor personal computers allows
ument images into the PC
those forms to be created and
,
>
'
filled out on personal computII~
without buying a separate
F<
document scanner. "We all
ers, Skapinker pointed out.
I= / ) g~
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have a scanner in our
recognition will allow
office," he said. "It' s
d ocuments t h a t
called
a
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Q9&E~

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Contact:

WordStar,of Novato, California,have cancelled plans to merge. The companies cited

management issues, accounting problems,
and legal issues in bachng off fiutn a letter
of intent they announced in late March.
Josef Zancowicz, a spokesman for
Dehina, said one of the problems was that
many of D e l r ina's shareholders are
Canadian institutions that own the company's shares within pension funds and other
such investment funds. The rules governing
these funds often specify the percentages of
Canadian and foreign stocks to be held,
he said, and Delrina's merger with
WordStar would have turned the company's stock into a U.S. stock. That
would haveforced many shareholders to sell suddenly, causing them
to face capital gains taxes on the
increase in the stock's vahte, he
said.
There were aho scene legal
complications arising from
merging a Canadian and an
American company listed
o n d i f f e r en t st o c k
exchanges, Zancowicz
added.

companies on management and control

issues. "Who had control in terms of how
this organization would run was cmicult to
resolve," Zancowicz said. He explained that
Delrina is a strong technology company
while WordStar is largely a saPes and marketing organization.
The companieshad presented the deal
as a merger of equals, despite WordStar's
larger size and the fact that the technical
structure of the deal made WordStar the
surviving company. Delrina officials said
earlier that they expected the Delrlna name
to survive at least as part of the merged
firm's new name.
Zancowicz said the roles of both
companies' executives in the
merged organization had largely
been resolved. They had not
announced the planned executive slate, except to say that
Ron Posner, current chief
executive of WordStar,
was to get the top job.
Contacts Josef
Zanoowicz, Oelrlna
Technologies,
41 6441 4616,
fax 41N410333; Krlatin

Finally, there were

'philosophical differ-

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72

T HE COMPUTER
PAPER JUNE '92
0

Try our computer

industry news service
for a month.
If you likeit, pay
only C$30/month.
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you' ll owe us nothing!

Each week, you get one disk or 2 electronic mail transmissions to your mailbox
of choice for a total of 600+ first-hand news reports monthly.
Our free DOS menuing and keyword software lets you read only
the stories of interest to you, or all of them!
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6M Canada To PutParts Catalog On CD-ROM

TORONTO, ONTARIO, APR 15 (NB)General Motors Canada will stop sending
out parts catalogs in 1995 on paper, at
least. The automaker is telling its 1,100
dealers across Canada they will have to
accept the information on compact disk
memory (G)-ROM) or on microfiche.
The new CD-ROM version of the catalog
will save dealers quite a bit of shelf space,
and it is also expected to make it easier to
look up parts. Patti Knight, a spokeswoman
for Bull'HN Information Systems, which will
convert the parts catalog to CD-ROM format for GM Canada, said the old paper catalog consists of eight to 10 volumes that can
take up about eight feet of shelf space.
Besides that, Knight said, finding the
desired part in the paper catalog is something of a black art. "The aMity to reference that information quickly and accurately is a skill that takes quite a lot of time to
develop," she said. With the CD-ROM ver-

sion, dealers will be able to search for parts

by car model, year, and the part of the car
(as in fiont end, rear end, passenger compartment, and so on). When they think
they' ve found what they' re looking for, they
will also be able to see picture of the part
on the computer screen.
The compact disk hardware will work
with powerful personal computers based on
Intel 486 processors. While Bull has been
chosen to put the catalog into CD-ROM
form, GM will be. able to rely on three suppliers Bull, ADP, a n d R e y nolds &
Reynolds for equipment.
The 1994 model year catalog, to be available in September of 1995, will be the first
to be issued in CD-ROM form. Knight said
GM Canada's move is part of a worldwide
GM initiative to replace paper catalogs with
electronic systems.

readily

Contact: Patti Knight, Bull HN, 41 6-479-2855.

Lasermaster Intros
1,000 DPI Printing For Mac, IBM
MINNEAPOLIS, MINNESOTA, APR 14
(NB) Lasermaster Technologies has
introduced Unity 1000, a multiplatform
plainyaper typesetter designed to provide
fast, high-resolution PostScript printing
from Madntosh snd IBMwompatible PCs,
as well as minicomputers and mainframes.
Unity 1000 connects to the user's comuter through LocaITalk, Centronics paralel, or RMM C serial interfaces. The typesetter includes an internal hard disk with
155 Type 1 typefaces already installed, 1,000
by 1,000 dotsper4nch (dpi) TurboRcs quality, SmartSense automatic emulation sensing, an Ethernet expansion port, automatic
port switching, and TurboGray halftone
enhancement technology.
Lasermaster's announcement said the
Unity 1000 supports Type 1, Type 5,
TrueType, and Hewlett-Packard soft font
formats, and is fully compatible with
Apple's System 6.0 or '7.0, DOS, Microsoft

Windows, Unix, OS/2, and other operadng

systems.
Lasermaster first introduced 1,000 dpi
typesetting for PCs in 1989. "The Unity
1000 will follow in our tradition of high
speed, high resolution and morc fonts, and
marks a whole new generation of printing
technology for Lasermaster," said CEO Mcl
Masters.
The TurboGray technology included
with the Unity 1000 is also a new product
from Lasermaster. Lasermaster said
TurboGray improves the appearance of
halftone images by providing increased gray
levels at higher screen frequencies. Users
have both high image resolution to show
fine detail and smooth gray4evel control to
achieve contour-free transitions on images
with gradually changing densities.
Contact: Karen Neset, Lasermaster, 61 2-9418687.

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CHICAGO, ILLIN OIS, APR 14 (NB)Kyocera has introduced the Ecosys aSi, a
light emitting diode (LED) printer it says is
ecologyconscious.
Kyocera representative Harry Savage
told Newsbytes the company does not like
to say the print quality of the aSi rivals
laser printers. However, the new
Ecosys aSi printer doesn't require
cartridge changes (it requires
only toner refills) and as a
result can print for one-fourth
the operating cost of laser
printers, cutting the operation
cost to less than a penny a
printed page compared tothe
5.2 cents per page of typical
laser cartridge printers, Kyocera
said.
The Ecosys aSi model FS-1500A uses a
drum composed of amorphous silicon
(aSi). Savage said the printer's users can
re611 the toner themselves using toner
refills from Kyocera The refills will come in
small, biodegradable containers made of
Kalp, a material that when burned only
releases water vapor and carbon dioxide,
Kyocera representative Steve Petix told
Newsbytes.
Print resolution is 500 by 1200 dots perinch (dpi) and the printer can print up to
10 pages per minute (ppm).
The printer offers optional plug4n compatibility with Ethernet, AppleTalk, and
Token Ring as well as other networks.

Hewlett-Packard III, PCS , H PGI D i ablo

650, IBM Proprinter X24E, and Epson LQ.
850 are some examples of the printer emulations built into the Kyocera. The printer
also incorporates Kyocera's own PostScriptcompatible interpreter (KPDL) and page
description language (Prescribe Il) .
Kyocera also says the printer
offers duplex printing, can handle as many as 1,250 sheets of
paper at once with the addition of two optional 500sheet
d rawers, h a s a 15-b i n
sorter/electronic mailbox, a
power envelope feeder, up to
50 scslable and 87 bit mapped
fonts, two slots for up to four
megabytes capacity, IC cards, and
compatibility with PC, Macintosh,
and Unix workstations.
List price for the FS-1500A is US$2,595
and it is expected to ship in the second
quarter of this year. Kyocera is planning
other printers for introduction in 1992 and
1995 geared more toward the home and
small business market, company representatives said.
Kyocera says it will offer a threeqear or
500,000-copy warranty on the drum and
print head only. A one-year or 500,00&copy
warranty is offered on the printer itself.
Contact: Hany Savage, for Kyocera, tel 9089744648; Steve Petix, Kyocera, tel 908-5608400, fax 908-560-8880.

THE COMPUTER
PAPER JUNE '92 73

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the only thing that keeps

the University of California

from digitizing its entire

undergraduate library collection
is copyright law.
That was the message from Michael
Stonebraker, a professor of computer science at the University of California and a
consultant on database software, at the
SoftwareWorld conference in Toronto.
Stonebrakcr said Joy's Law, a forecast
made byBill Joy of Sun Mlcroaystems in the
mid-1980s, has turned out to be more or
less right. Joy said the power of the fastest
singlewhip microprocessor in any year in
the future,, in millions of instructions-persecond, could be predicted by subtracting
1984 8'om the year and raising two to the
power of the difference. Thus the fastest
chip in 1991 should run at two to the seventh powc:r, or 128, MIPS. In fact, he said,
the figurc was about 70 MIPS, but the order
of magnitude is right.
That is good news for these whose database applications are stretching the power
of currenthardware, Stonebraker said.So is
the arrivalof RAID (redundant array of
inexpensive disks) technology, which makes
possible very fast and highly reliable mass
storage of data.
For those reasons, Stonebraker said,
anyone whose computing power requirements exceed what is currently available by
only one ortwo orders of magnitude can
simply wait for the technology to catch up
in the next couple of years.
A third factor is the disappearance of
dumb terminals, he said. Desktop workstations and pc:rsonal computers are now
cheap enough that there is no reason to settle for a dumb terminal, according to
Stonebraker. and that means much of the
roceaaing involved in an application can
moved to the desktop in a chent~
setup.
But the other side ef the coin is that
over the coming decade databases will
become much bigger than they are today.
The reason, Stonebraker said, will be a
trend to incorporate images, audio, and
other new types of data. These will require
vastly more storage than the simple text
and numeric Selds used today. And even
text will be stored in computer databases in
much larger quantities. For example,
Stoncbfakct said> the only thing that keeps
the University of California Irom digitizing
its entire undergraduate library collection
*

is copyright law."
Stoncbraker said orgaauzations will have
to decentralize their databases, maldng uae
of networks of machines rather than relying
on one central system. He said features of
object~entcd database tc:chnology will be
needed to handle future applicationa.
Those organizations with aging database
systems must some day soon bite the bullet
and update them, he concluded, orthey
will not bc able to cope with future needs.

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74

T HE COMPUTER PAPER JUNE '92

New For PCs:

CA Launches
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Paint

C OMPUrza I.r n

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to create hnages for

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k I'l
desktop publishing,
and multimedia, the company saxd.
The sofitware is the latest in CA's Cxicket
line of graphics software, which includes
Cricket Graph, Cricket Draw, Cricket
Presents, and Cxicket Image. It works with
Clacket Image, which is designed for imageprocessing work
Computer Associates said CA&ricket
Paint may be used for creating images on a
personal computer, or for retouching
images brought in &em other sources.
The software supports obit color and
eight-bit gray-scale processing on any
Windows display with Super VGA resolution, the company said.
Among the features of the new package
are what CA calls modeless tools
whatever
graphics tool is in uae, such as a brush, airbrush, or pen, the same options are useable
in the same way. Userscan open any dialog
box and leave it open as long as they like.
Anti~ asing guards against "jaggies" and
makes lines as smooth a s p ossible.
Advanced painting features include the
aMity to choose any hne weight, to customblend colors, and to control the translucency of the "paint' using the Wacom pressuresensitive tablet.
A variety of brush shapes are availablc:,
CA said, as are techniques such as masking
and unpainting, which allows users to
remove one or more layers of paint.
CAChicket Paint is now in beta testing,
a company spokesman said, and it is scheduled to ship in the second quarter of this
year. The suggested retail price has been
set at $595 (C$6'15 in Canada). Cricket
Image costs Q95 (C$5di9 in Canada), and a
bundle of the two packages will be available

for $N5 ($%95 in Canada).

CentncL Bcb Gordon, ComputerAeecciatea,
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THE COMPUTER
PAPER JUNE '92 75
s

Polaroid Intros Photo Scanner

For Windows

New For PC: Imara Lite Document

Management Software

CHICAGO, ILL I N O IS, APR 21 (NB)Polaroid Corporation, famous for its instant
auneras, introduced a Windows version of
its high~peed CS500 Digital Color Photo
Scanner at the Windows World trade show
in Chicago recently.
The new scanner, dubbed the CSh00i,
allows Windows users to integrate 24-bit
color photographs and other artwork into
Windows graphics and text programs such
as desktop publishing, slide presentations,
and multimedia shows. The rapidly emerging multimedia field combines text, sound,
animation and video. The scanner can handle images up to four inches by six inches

TORONTO, ONTARIO, APR 14 (NB)Imara Research has announced a scaledimage prodown version of its
cessing system. Imara Lite is a single-user
package intended mainly as an "electronic
filing cabinet" for personal computer users
on the move.
Company spokeswoman Erin Hintz told
Newsbytes that Imara expects a large portion of the sales of Imara Lite will be to
portable computer users. The software
allows users to organize files, whether created electronically on the computer, scanned
in, or received by fax, into a structure of
electronic "file folders" the company contends is easier to use than the DOS operating system's structure of eight~haracter file
names and directories.
Imara Lite includes fax send and receive
software as well as image processing and
document management capabiTities, Hintz

sensor technology and bu i l t -in i m a ge

manipulation software, allowing fullwolor
images to be scanned in as little as three
secoilds.
The Photo Scanner makes it possible
for computer usersto regard an image,
whether a computergenerated graphic or a
photograph, as another source of information," said Richard Leslie, director of marketing for Polaroid Electronic Imaging.
The CSb001 Digital Photo Scanner has
a suggested list price of $4,495 and includes
a SCSI (Small Computer System Interface)
interface kit, and Polaroid SprintScan software.

workgroup

in size.

Like Polaroid's Macintosh Iiwompatible

CS-500 Photo Scanner, the CS-500ifor
Windows incorporates proprietary Polaroid

Contact: Phyllis Laorenza, Polaroid Corp., 617577-2000, or 800-225-1 61 8.

said.
Files created usmg other personal computer applications, such as spreadsheets,
word processors, and the like, can be stored
in the same folder with document images
and received faxes. Users can name documents with descriptions of up to 52 characters in length, the company said.
Imara L i t e r u n s u n d e r M i c r o s oft
Windows and, unlike the full Ixnara package, does not require a network or file server. It can work with an optical disk drive,
the company said.The Kofax image board
is also supported, along with various scanners, fax modems, and laser printers.
Due to be available in May, Imara Lite
carries a suggested retail pxice of US$295 or

C$550.
Contact: Erin Hintz, Irnara Research, tel 416581-1740, fax 416-581-1605.

Sun Ships A Microphone With SPARCstations

rative multimedia, since it utilizes the various media, such as audio, video, graphics
and text, to enhance communication and
productivity, not just for individuals but for
all users on the network in the entire comp arly.
Sun describes Multimedia Mail as an
electronic mail application capable of audio
as well. Audio T ool al l ows the user to
rewind, play, and record electronic mail for
use in Multimedia Mail and other applications as well. Sun says more than 50 thirdparty software applications are available for
the SPARCstation that utilize audio.
The customAesigned, diamond-shaped,
miniaturized microphone included with the
SPARCstation is integrated with the Audio
Tool software via ToolTalk, object-based
technology for transparent interapplication
communication,Sun added.

MOUNTAIN VIEW, CALIFORNIA, APR 8

( NB) Sun M i c r o systems C o m p u t e r
Corporation (SMCC), a subsidiary of Sun
Microsystems, says it is committed to offering multimedia capabilities as standard in
its workstations and to prove it, is shipping a
microphone with every SPARCstation.
SMCC says the desktop workstation can
play, record, and receive audio and can
send the audio anywhere on a network at
no extra cost to the user, thanks to the
microphone, built-in speaker, and bundled
software that comes with the SPARCstation.
Sun said its first workstation had a speaker, but last September the company introduced Multimedia Mail and Audio Tool,
b oth of which will run in a Solari~ s t r i b uted computing environment. Bob Pearson,
director of interactive media marketing at
SMCC, said: "We call our approach collabo-

ToolTalk automatically invokes Audio

Tool to allow a user to edit and attach an
audio message as an electronic mail attachment. Sun said third-party developers can
also use Audio Tool and ToolTalk and by
doing so they can save the time it takes to
incorporate audio within their applications.
Mountain View, California-based Sun
Microsystems manufactures and distributes
workstation computers and software in conjunction with a group of subsidiaries it spun
off to handle specific areas of computing
and software development. SMCC is one
such subsidiary.

'DATA
xsa$0
CE4TE
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g/'
RAW

sis i 4EP

OATh

0AT4

Contact: Leiann Lee, Sun Micrcsystems

Computer Corporation, tel 41 5-3364597.

Nlicrografx Ships Picture Publisher 3.0 with Color Scanner

Micrografx has shipped release 5.0 of its
Windows4ased Picture Publisher.
Picture Publisher is a graphics program
designed for the highwnd demands of
photo designers and business users who
want to add visual impact to proposals,
newsletters, documents and presentations.
Picture Publisher 5.0 allows users to
scan color or black~ d m hite photographic
prints, slides and line art using fiatbed or
hand-held scanners. It will also accept
images from stillwamera video capture
devices.
Micrografx says that, as a special promo-

tion good through June 30th, it will indude

a hand-held color scanner, the ColorArtist
from Mustek, at no extra cost. ColorArtist
usually sells as a stand-alone product for

US$599.
Picture Publisher S.O has a suggested list
price of US$795. Existing owners can
upgrade to release S.O without the scanner
for US$99.95. Picture Publisher 5.0 and the
scanner areavailable for $499.95.
Micrografx says that new features in the
upgrade include enhanced masking, an
added text tool, new drawing tools, a color
shield, textures, and a selection of special

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Contact: Katrina Krebs, Micrografx, 21 4<976247.

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effects. You also get special filters such as 5D, emboss, cxystallize, and a graphics pen.
Supported file formats include TIFF, PCX,
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DCS.
The additional tools include an airbrush, texture, paint, and smear. Th e
enhanced masking capability allows you to
rotate, skew, tilt, and distort masks.
Another new feature, Color Shield,
allows the user to select or protect up to
eight separate areas of an image based on
the color selected. The program can also
improve poor~uality photographs, using

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76

T HE COMPUTER
PAPER jUNE '92

Nem desktop stand introduced for BallPoint mouse

Thevlsual Approach toAccounlins

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Microsoft may have introduced its BallPoint

mouse last year primarily for use with
portable computers, but it appears that the
portable pointing device has also been popular with desktop computer users.
The company daims that it has been so
popular with desktop PC users that it felt
compelled to introduce a new "desktop
stand." It is supposed to allow users to
adjust the height and angle of BallPoint to
their personal preference.
Mtcrosoft says that in developing the
stand it looked at how to make the positioning of BallPoint more flexible, to suit a variety of hand sizes and preferences in position.
The result is an ergonomica)ly designed
stand consisting of a solid, flat base and an
arm that rotates on two axes and swivels
along a third axis. The BallPoint mouse
slides onto a chp at the end of the flexible
arm and locks into place. The stand is
entirely user adjustable, allowing you to
position the BallPoint mouse at ahnost any
angleand height forgreater comfort.
The product has apparentlyalready
been commended for its design, having
recently won an honorable mention from
the Northwest Chapter of the Industrial
Designers Society of America (IDSA). The
IDSA awarded an honorable mention to 10
products out of 62 entries in its recent

Biennial Design Competition.

Microsoft claims that the BallPoint
mouse is one of the first devices of its kind
to incorporate a desktop stand that offers
complete positioning flexibility.
The Microsoft BallPoint mouse with
Desktop Stand will be available at major
retail outlets beginning May 25, 1992, with
a suggested rc.tail price of $165.
For users who already own a BallPoint
mouse, the desktop stand will be available
separately by late June, 1992. The stand
alone will sell for $20 through a coupon
offer.
Also new for users of BallPoint, and
included in the BallPoint mouse with
Desktop Stand package, is the Microsoft
Mouse software version 8.2. The new software retains the features of the 8.1 version
such as the aMity to change cursor size
and color as well as several new benefits.
For portable computer users whose
machines have a "sleep" mode, the 8.'2 software offers a utihty that tells BallPoint to
reset itself when the computer resumes
operation. Users of the Microsoft Windows
operating system version 5.1 can now install
both the mouse driver and additional utilities from within Windows. The 8.2 software
a lso supports a m o u s e p o i n ter i n
DOS-based applications running under
Windows.

While you were out...

110-2268 No.5 Road

Richmond, B.C. V6X 2T1
Tel (604) 278-8819
Fax (664) 278-8819

k. importer

Running a good, internal electronic mail

service has long been considered to be a
chore well beyond the means of most small
companies. It was complicated, timewonsuming and offered only limited benefit
unless you have hundreds of employees.
A Windows-based messaging system is
hoping to change all that. Known simply as
'While You Were Outl', it is designed to let
users on a network simply send, receive,

read, print and forward messages to other

users. A full+creen interactive graphic display is used to show how many messagesare
waiting for you.
It further indudes the ability to group
recipients by department, read documentation on-line, get context~nsitive help, sort
and search messages by key fields.
If you need to find out more, call
Andrew Levine at (604) 290-1411.

OSI2 meets object-oriented voice maiI

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Voice mail has become one of the great

technology success stories of the 1990s yet
many users stiH find it infiexible, impersonal, unhelpful and unwieldy. Far too often, a
company installs avoice mail system and lets the voice mail system change the way that company communicates with the public rather than the other way
around.
Enter a ne w O S / 2 - based
product
f r o m U .S . - based
Gateways
Information
Corporation. It i s known as
PhoneOne and is designed to
allow voice mail systems to be easily custoIBlzed.
It allows anyone running a call management system to reconfigure the system

using an object~riented script language, a

database management system for managing
scripts, an audio manager to allow OS/2 to
handle the flow of voice information over
the network and a form manager for handling messages.
Given this range of capaMities, PhoneOne is more fiexible
and more powerful than conventional voice mail systems. It
is already in use for a wide variety of applications including
hotels that wish to automate
much of their concierge service,
telephone companies that are
improving directory assistance services.
For further i n f ormation, c ontact
V ancouver distributor A f K h a n a n d
Associates at(604) 7524626.

ill
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78 T HE COMPUTERPAPER JUNE '92

CorelDRAW 3.0 Adds Many-Functions Time isn't what it used to be

O TTAWA, ONTARIO, MAY 15 (NB) Corel Systems has announced a new release
of its CorelDRAW graphics software that
extends the package with business chart
creation, image editing, and a presentation
capability. CorelDRAW 5.0 will also add
new features to the sofrvtare's original vector4ased drawing module.
"We' ve taken the approach that you can
do everything in graphics in one package,"
said Michael Cowpland, Corel's president
and chief executive, in an interview with
Newsbytes.
In addition to the drawmg module that
gave the package its name, CorelDRAW 5.0
includes three new modules: CorelChart,
CorelPhoto4'aint, and CorelShow.
CorelChart is a data~ v e n charting
module for creating business graphs. The
v endor said it can handle true duee~ e n sional charting and pictographs.
C orelPhoto-Paint is actually ~ o f t ' s
PhotoFinish software, incorporated into
CorelDRAW through an agreement with ZSoft. Its capabilities induding retouching of
images, flexible color control, and the
application of automatic retouching Slters
to scanned images, according to Corel.
Corel has also added a presentation
module called CorelShow, which allows
users to put together desktop presentations
of images created in C orelDRAW or
imported from other software.
CorelDRAW also includes the Mosaic
visual Sle manager, which allows users to
preview graphic Sles in several formats, and
CorelTrace, a tool for converting black~dwhite bit~ p ped images into vector graphics.

The new release supports object linking

and embedding (OLK), a Windows feature
that makes it easier to exchange files

among applications. Besides allowing interaction with other applicadons, Cowpland

said, OLE provides the means for the different modules of CorelDRAW to operate on
their own but with easy exchange of data
among them.
Capabilities added to the flagship
CorelDRAW module indude the al i t y to
edit graphics iu preview form as well as in
wire-frame m o de, u n l i m ited l a yers,
improved precision, and on-screen text
editing, the company said. Other new features in the draw module indude "roH-up
windows" meant to give quicker access to
frequently used features, as well as a variety
of new special effects.
With this release, Corel will begin shipping the CD-ROM version of CorelDRAW
m every package. While each package will
contain aH of the software's functions on
standard diskettes, Cowpland said, the CDROM will provide a di~
lib r ary of more
than 14,000 images, more than 100 animations in Autodesk flic format, and Corel's
complete library of Type 1 fonts, as well as a
set of tutorials.
Cowpland said about 10 percent of shipments of CorelDRAW are now ordered in
CD-ROM format, and he expects that within 12 months a number of major software
vendors will be shipping software on CDROM. "We' re convinced that CDs are the
next standard," he said, "and it's actually
beginning to happen at an exponential rate
even as we speak
CorelDRAW version 5.0 is due to begin
shipping in June, with a suggested retail
price of US$595 or C$695. Registered users
of any previous version will be able to
upgrade for US$149 or C$169.
Contact: Corel, 613-128-8200.

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Back in the Middle Ages, few people had

clocks. The only formal division of time
aune in hourly gongs from distant church
beHs. The Indusuial Revolution changed aH
that. People began chronicling days in
hours, minutes and seconds.
Time management isn't what it used to
be, either. A consulting field since the
1970s, it dreamed up
aH sorts of tim~ving
devices in the 1980s:
faxes, voice mail, car

phones. The result?

People worked harder
under even greater

stress and lost their

leisure time.

Just what are peo-

TgeyeSg

The Japanese proved that in reverse,

Fortino says. For decades their productivity
kept increasing until people were worMng
an average 52 hours a week Finally, productivity reached a threshold in Japan and
started to decline, with higher rates of
stress, job-related iHness and divorce.
To Bnd out what
people are actually
doing, th e c e n ter
conducted research
and sponsored studies at the University
of
Pit t s b u r gh.
Students counted the
hours people stand in
H e.howlong theysit
at traf8c lights, how
often they walk to the
a +

throng
a

management s $t S
management of

time today?
According
to
recent studies, they
a re spending f i v e
years of their lives
waiting in lines, four
years shifting priorities, three years sitting
in meetings, two years
playing telephone tag
and one year searching through dutter.
On average, they are interrupted 75
times a day, sufFer one hour of negative
stress,
take one hour of work home, converse with spouse four minutes, exercise
less than three minutes, play with child two
minutes, consider goals one minute.
By age 4,
children have spent more thne
watching television than talking to their
INtrents, by age 6 enough time to have completed a master's degree.
Where has aH the "quality time" that
technology was supposed to give us gone?
Enter Hfestyle management," a term in
the '90s for using technology to help balance family and personal needs with work,
says Michael Fortino, a frequent lecturer
and consultant to corporate America on
time~
emen t issues.
As Fortino points out, time can't be
managed very well. It tends to march on,
steadily, with or without us.
'There's no such thing as dme management, it's management of details" that
counts, he says. "What do we do? We try to
get ahead, we try to take shortcuts. We walk
past something, we Bgure well take care of
tomorrow, and those things begin to come
badr. to haunt us.
But, he adds, 'If we do something right
once, and change the way we run our day,
then ultimately what we end up with is
more derail Snished with less time."
As a young man, Fortino noticed while
working at a Pittsburgh dothing manuascturer that the factory floor had a sense of
harmony, of piecework in time and motion,
but the business oiRce was disastrous"disorganhed, confusing and inenicient.
His work to improve that operation led
to a career in time management. But, by
the late 1980s, something warn't dichng.
'I didn't believe in my own trade,'
Fortino, 52, said in a recent interview.
'Their workload was simply increasing. No
matter how much more they became organized,theyjust added more work,"
The divorce rate dimbed to 61 percent.
Even 2$yearwlds had heart attacks.
"We talk to our spouses every day but we
taHr. about business and small talk, we don' t
taHr; about goals, dreams or to our children," Fortino said.
Fortino's C e n te r f or Li f e s tyle
Management in San Frandsco is trying to
advise business executives who have the

devils"

time to listen that happy, weHmdjusted

employeesaremore productive.

co P y machine, etc.

For information on
personal time, diaries
were kept and analyzed.
Time Hies When
You' re Not Having
Fun" is the title of
Fortino's talk on how
to apply time-saving

technology rather
t han letting it r u n
one's life to better manage stress, our
health, family, sodal life and recreation as
well as spiritual, intellectual, financial,
career and other personal pursuits.
Fortino is a walking example of his talk,
carrying with him an unassuming but very
high-tech briefcase containing a laptop
computer, a modem for sending and receiving data electronically, a printer, a built- in
fax, plus a cellular telephone and pager
that are tied into the computer.
People will always be busy. But Fortino
distinguishes between "positive stress" aud
"negative stress." Positive stress can be stimulating, productive and rewarding. But
there can be too much of a good thing< and
without organization we eventuaHy reach
the threshold and pass into negative stress.
For example, a pager can be misused so
that people we don't need to talk to can
interrupt us with a squeal in the shower,
amid rush-hour traiKc or at the movies. Or
they can be used to vibrate quietly in our
pocket or leave a message in our computer
for aH but high-priority matters thereby
reducing interruptions while providing the
peace thatwe'llbe reached ifneeded.
Fortino notes pagers aren't just for doctors anymore. Among the 11 million
Americans using them are those awaiting
donor organs, pregnant women, families
with iH or infirm relatives and latchkey children. A Carnation, WA, daisy Isrmer used
one to signal his lead cow to head to the
barn at feeding time.
A business venture of Fortino's makes a
portable personal planner that is complex
and compact: complete with a 51-day
advance "to do list; daily appointment
pages divided into people, places and
things; an Aco-Z Sle for people and subject
contacts; detaHed one-page goals and
"projects" sections; plus room for notes,
credit cards, financial and personal information and a calculator.
Predous minutes for the %fe" we' re aH
supposed to get start adding up "when you
start to combine aH of these tips, saving a
few minutes here, a few there," Fortino
said. "You don't need touse aH of them,
but even a few would help."
That's because quality time doesn't have
to take long. Twenty minutes a day talhng

with one's spouse about goals and dreams

can work wonders. Spending an hour one
night a week reading to one's child can

enrich an entire lifedme.

THE COMPUTER PAPER JUNE '92 79

Second PC Magazine Reliability Survey Published

The older

WA SH ING T O N , DC,

quality,

MAY 15 (NB) The

May 26 issue of P C
Magasine contains the
results of the maga-

surve)r of user satisfac-

tionvor 55 weli4nown
brands of personal
comPuters. PerhaPs

the most surprising

item in the survey is

the general high overall reliabiTity ratings.

Gateway,

ze o s,

C ompuAdd,
Del l ,
Northgate, and Dell all
ranked as highly reli-

g th mail-

Sat>sfacIjonmith the
ne+eNt In4@lisOfhjgh
es
anm~i1 nlnc ~ ~~in
g
F
fag 385 and 485mjeO

~ DIECT DrSK

h i g h-

h i g h-price

companies such as IBM

and Compaq did significantly less well in this

thorn
fOrthe mOdelg bypast
On Ogpu
Soillg anti /$
technology

ping in profits, but

customers still flnd
that highguality line
holding up well in the
reliability r a t i n gs,
along w i t h I BM ,
HewletnPackard, ASI', and Toshiba.
Satisfaction with the newest models of
high-performance PCs using fast 586 and a
486 microprocessors is significantl higher
across the board than for the models based
on older8088/86 and 286 technology.
The top mail order flrms, which were
mentioned above as receiving high reliability ratings, were also high in the number of
customers who said they would purchase
from the same company again, with
Gateway scoring highest in this category.

:;::
"""'-"'' SZS HD

DDM is now able to :'::w.:

trul y affordable:.::@:.:
3.5 H D $ 1 0.00
B OXED BY 10 ; - - disi ettes.
k.: e"'
All our diskettes are:,4ff::.'.:
rmatted and include::
es anduser labels.

scored signiflcantly better than average in all

four ca"go"'".of rehability, buy again, tech
s pp
an e p i r

I::."

except in the area of

overall
rel i a b ility,
where it still scored
average or above.
Toshiba also did
well in the notebook
area, but Zenith Data Systems (Group
Bull), ranked lowest in notebook reliabTiity
n d us erswere generally not at all satisfled
with quality or service from ZDS either in
the notebook or PC line. ZDS came in signiflcnntly lower than average in the "buy
again category.
The entire PC Magnsinesurvey as printed in this issue is very extensive and goes
into a lot of detail about each vendor's ratings, including difFerences between various
microprocessor types and how each ranked.

ANI Bios
INB RAN
52NB Hant Disk
12NB Floppy Drive
VGA CARD
14" Cotrrr VGA Monitor
2 Senal, I Parallel /tr
I Game Port
101 AT Enhanced Keybrrant
CSA Appn?ved 13 "Tower Case
Compucon Nouse

g>Fc4L v.
.

::,~:;',.: 5,25'HD

MlcroSclenos52MB
NSC105MB
Maxtor80 I 120/210MB
4unrdum105 I 120/240MB

$0486DX2-25

ANI Bios 128K Cache

4NB RAN, 8?d6.bit Str?t
105NB Hant Disk
DUAL Floppy Drive
INB SVGA Canf
NON-INT. SVGA Nonitrrr
2 Senal, I Paraget /t'r
I Ganse Port
101 AT Enhanced Keyboanf
CSA Approved 15 "Tower Case
Compucon Mouse

TRUE 4$6DX-50

$2350.gg
N550.gg
AMI Bios 2$6K Cache
4MB RAN, SzI6-bit Slot
12$MB Hard Disk
DUAL Floppy Drive
IMB SVGA Canf
NON-INT. SVGA Motdtor
2 Serial, I Paralel 4 I Game Port
101 AT Enhanced Keyboard
CSA Approved 1$ "Tower Case
Compucon Mouse

Ng / 273/316
/540

I 350I 365
0/495
/680
1789

k 0

'

I
/

$320/415
AAmnaing1024x768.28dpi / NONANT.
18/398
Darius1024x768 28dpi / NON-INT.
20/388
bverbntn1024x768 28dpi I NON-INT.
Ssmlron640x480.41dpi /1024x768/ NON4NT 50/330 I 390
Selko1450'1024x768 25dpi non4n.
Sony1304 1024x768 25dpi non-in.
lVLf3A 1024x768 .28dpi LOW RAD.
TVN 4A+ 1024x768 28dpi non-in. LOW RAD.
TVLLSA 15" 1024x768 28dpi non-in.
Coo
NEC SFGX15" non4n.
50
NIC 4FG 15 70Hz nonrin.
bntnTreln17"DCAi17 1024x768 .31dpi
Nnnao1T FSSoi 1024x768 28 dpi
Selko1T 1750 1024x768 .25dpi
Sony17" 1604 1024x768 .25dpi
30/405
All XL 1MB w/Mouse I Stereo Sound
All ULTRA 1MB VRAM
5
Tseng Lsh original32K /64K Color SVGA Card $210/250

g
F

s i

Novell Lite
2 Sta&ns

$299.00

Csrdlnnl 24/96Fsx/Modem I exl

Cardinal2400 Modem inl. I ext
Zoom96/96 Fax/ModemI sxl.
Prscgcel Perlnherlnl14.4/14.4 Fax/Modem ext
Aceex96/14.4Fsx/M odem ext
IIS Rohogcs9600 Modem ext
CompuconRsg / Hi Res Mouse
LngltachMouse wl Windows
LngffnchM ouse Man ITrnckm an II

Souml bmsaar I Pro.

Thunder boardw/Speakers

125/140
/97
20 I 340
5

56/36

vlstteSZ-10/SSNHs

'2MB Rsm expendable lo SMB

60MB (19ms) Hard Drive
1.44MB Roppy Drive
1-serial, 1-parallel g5 pin)
Keyboard
3Hr. Batisry, 2Hr. Recharge
DR. DOS
6.9ISs

$2398.00

127

75/109
$135/230
$99/169

SS I 350

Colorado120/250 8 inl.

Inlel I Cvrix / ST
20/195/190
35/215/200
I 275/265

80387DX~
80387DX40

ULSI MatIs&o
Special

RavenLaser LP510.5MB/LP5301MB $923/1166

RavenLaser LP1110 11pnm .5MB $ 1 3 9 9
RavenLaser LP1170PS 1l1ppm 2MB $2199
NPLaser IIP+ I IIIP 4ppm .5MB $
1060 / 1 3 85
$2034
HPLaser III Sppm
OlddnlaLaser400 4ppm .5MB $
747
KodakLaser 7008 8ppm 1.5MB $
980
HPDeskJel500/500C.SMB
$520/945
CanonBubbleJetBJ300 /330 300cps $5% /695

cllrlPIov

::'::i'0'iO
,'i?:Ip.'
: :,,~ p 5':mij.---.-

,::,::S/,K'@7f,:::::,',,::;:,';.::.'t~?t

$1999.02

Raven2466 24 pin WIDE 375 cps

Fu ffauDL900/1100/1100C 24 pin 180 rim
F ffnu DL1200/ 1200C24 pin
Fu ffnu
DL3450/3450C WIDE 24 pin288cps
N CLnserll95PSSppm2MB

PHONE: 942%718 FAX: 942-9348

Name

Postal
sig.
DIRECr DISK MARKHINfs, I 307-2540SHAUfsNES
$Y5T.,PTCOQ. ILC V3C-3W4:::::::::
;::::.
:

80386DX-40
$1578.SL

$240 I 350 /435

$258
$360
60/420/670
14
00/445/769

MONEY ORDER 0
MASTERCARD 0

EXPIRY DATE.

rory

PtJiniem.
Raven9102 /9105/9105Color 9 pin 240/ 92 cps $190/220/56

Ihaaha
Sengnla40/89 I 130MB

VISA
0
CARD 0

x $10.00
Add 7% GST
Add 6% PST
,';.'.::,.:,;;;; Shipping & Handling
3.21

'I

Raven2406/2416/241824 pin 240/300 cps

Raven9606 9 pin WIDE 330 cps
Raven2465/2465Q WIDE 192/300cps

EO

::Q.:;:
:3.5'HD

$0486DX-33

PAYMENT METHOD

x $435
x $625

Q:,. 524'DSDD

80386DX-33
$'1528.at

lI

00/o SATISFACllON
GUARANTEE

ck

g/

$1060.//2

S S .ZS .:.~

3.5 DSDD $730

I
80386DX-25

ue to v o l ume :.::.W::
purehasing power::4::,'

:I')I::::~;";:": 524' osDD $4.ss

processorsissignificantly
higheraCrOSS
the bOard

rS
QUALIT.Y DISKETCH
ATAFFORDABLE I'RlCES

5l::::
,

T op r a t ings f o r
technical support, a
category with a wider
range of scores than
m ost o t h ers, went to
Dell, Northgate, Swan,
and
Zeos
International.

TING g

a
0

j0

SX2$ $ 1$2.00
DX2$ $ 172.00
DX33 $1 8 0.00
DX40 $ 230.00

'

'

80

T HE COMPUTER PAPER JUNE '92

Computer Game Helps Urban Planners

AMI Hardwaxe Distributor

Computer professionals can now standardize on an aQ-Ameriam hardware platform
- Ah6 BICS, motherboard, controller caid and now the new EISA video atsd. When
the competition is coming from Mainland China, you may have the only eqtnpment
that actually works. AMI product is the very best you can buy- 100y US. inade.

Enterprise 11
EISA 486/33MHz, 128K cache,Ok.............$1685
'Enttuprise II HSA486/50MHz, 128Kcache,Ok..-..-..-.. 2177
EZ-Hex Base
board,7 ESA slots............ .. .. ..
.. 702
4868X/20MHz CPUcard, nocache,Ok.........................506
386/4DMHz CPU card, 64K cache,
Dk............
........ 843

Pg~ gaby
HSA SVGA
G~Ph~ Ad~

486/33MHz CPUcaid,128K cache,Ok.................... 1264

'486/50MHz CPUcard, 128Kcache,Ok......................1968

Fast Disk ESA SCSI Host Adapter,Ok ..............................737

...$604
. Mark V aBabyScreanter"386/33MHz, 64K Cadte,Dk .

'

Mark V "Baby
Screamer"386/33MHz, 256KCache, Ok....742
Mark V "Baby
Scieamei"386/4OMHz,64K Cade,Dk ........639
Baby Vayager486/33MHz, 64K Cache,0k ................... 1123
Baby Voyager
486/33MHz, 256K Cache,Dk............. 1264
'Super Voyager
486/50MHz, 64K Cache,Ok......,..........,..1685
'Super Voyager486/50MHz, 256KCache,Ok................ 1r61
'I

Mul'

ThesecanbeTarga16m
m
pshbles (Vivid 16),VGAtoTV(Aver
1NO), naiebaok
toTV (PC-judeo) etc,Cali forpeccillattians.
VGA-Aver V GA to TV Genlodu),Overlays .......$507
Vivid 16

Tatl t 16 aam l e,32K aolar grabber .726

Aver 1ON V G k to

- Aver 2NO

Co nverter ..........
.. . ....251

Gabb e, Live video window in Wh 3Il.. 3N

Aver 1NOVN Video output $arAver2NO,VGA toTV ....471

' VGA-Aver-HQOProvides&Video, RGB
..... 87
PC-Video
Box Padret sizeVGA toTV far nateba)ks? ...210
Video Titief S oftware fal' Tlfmg.........
.......,-.-..95

Outp
uts.........

.
,

AMERICAN CIRCUIT BOARD

130-13160Vanier Place, Richmond, BC. V6V 2J2

Fax: (604) 244-7716
TeL (604) 244-7717

100-HYPE-Ah4I

CHICAGO, ILLI N O IS, MAY 6 (N B) Scientists at the University of Chicago are

using computer games to test the abiTities
of new srtificial intelligence software. The
AI software will sit in for the human player
and use SimCity, a compute.r-simulation
game from California-based Maxis, to see
how well it can perform as a human urban
planner in building and operating s city.
In an experiment that will last two years,
Al software developc;d by the University of
Chicago will play the SimCity game on a
Macintosh IIf'x computer, while sdentists
observe the AI software,"s ability to learn
and adapt from its successes and failures as
it performs the role of an urban phnner.
Dr. Kristian Hammond, professor of
computer sciences at the University of
Chicago, said the school selected SimCity
because it is the dosest thing we couM find
to real life for testing artificial intelligence
on a personal computer. Hammond said
traditional computerized games such as
chess have narrowly defined rules and a
limited number of endings. "In SimCity,
there are no right or wrong answers, but an
unending series of dedsh3ns that can lead
to a wide variety of results."
An artificial intelligence program builds
a base of information from data provided to
it, and operates from a set of rules. The
program learns as it operates, adding additional information, which in turn allows it
to make more informed decisions. So fsr,
artificial intelligence is the dosest thing a
computer can offer to the human mind.
Maxis spokesperson Sally Vsndershaf
told Newsbytc:s that the computer displays a
portion of the city somewhat like a map,
showing buildings, roads, sad other features. Other details include items such as
police stations, power lines, parks and

s
sta d iums. The buildings can "grow,"
epending on what decisions are made by
the player. "You can even set fires snd see
their result," said Vandershaf.
The player acts as the mayor of the dty,
fighting crime, unemployment, pollution,
and other problems faced by munidpalities. Perhaps hardest, the "mayor" must balance the budget. The objective is to attract
enough "Sims" (simulated dtizens) for the
dty to grow and prosper.
Two sets of graphics. are availableAncient Cities and Future Cities. Players
can also design their own city using any of
six different sets of architecture, and the
program includes a Terrain Editor to
design maps.
Dr. Charles Martin, cr e a tor of the AI
software to be used in the experiment, said
he looks forward to seeing just how skilled a
SimCity player his software will be. "It's one
thing for a computer to solve a math problem," said Martin. "It's quite another for it
to decide how to put out a fire in a high-rise
building without losing countless lives, or
how to solve traffic problems without running a city government into debt."
SimCity, one of several simulation
games offered by Maxis, is available for IBM
compatible, Amiga, Atari, Commodore,
Nintendo platforms, and Vandershaf said
the company has just released a Microsoft
Windows version. The Windows version,
said Vsndershaf, has s command bar with
five buttons, each able to place a "bookmark at a particular part of the city for
quick return to that part of .the game.
SimCity for Windows supports VGA graphics and multitasking.
Contact: Sally Vsndershaf, Maxis, tel 51 0-2588705, fax 510-2584786; Dr. Kristian Hammond,
University of Chicago, 812-702-1570.

Sale OfIBM Canada's ROLM Business Completed

Helen Canadian
EnterpriseLtd.

5.25" DS/DD

$85

Whit
Soxe
"-. 10 Disks

5.25" DS/HD - '-"''

: -

' '

'

$ 35

3.5" DS/DD

$45

3.5" DS/HD

$ 60

Mininum quatiliy100 boxes, including labels, sleeves, ebs & white box.

Dealerscall forspecial volumeprice

Ottlsts call (N4) 27948

Fax(604)27MON
UNCONDITIONALGUARANTEE
If yotf are not completely satisfied with any purchase from us, f)tftutn it for credit or refund!

TORONTO, ONTARIO, MAY 14 (NB)Norstsn Canada, a subsidiary of the communications services company Norstsn Inc,
of Maple Grove, Minnesota, has complc.ted
the acquisition of IBM Canada's ROLM
marketing and service business.
The business sells and services telecommunications products from ROLM, in
which IBM recently sold its half interest to
the German firm Siemens, its partner in
ROLM for several years.
The sale wis announced in January and
was originally due to be completed by
March. Terms have not been released. IBM
Canada spokesman Stan Didzbalis told
Newsbytes the sale is "consistent with the
restructuring we' re going through." About
140 IBM Canada employees virtually all
who worked with the ROLM products-

have moved to Norstan Canada.

Norstan said the purchase adds an additional 550 customers,with 1,000 installation
sites and 250,000 ports, to its North
American customer base.
Norstan Canada, which officially began
operations April 1, currently has 160
employees and offices in ll cities across
Canada
Under a separate agreement, Norstan
snd IBM Canada have agreed to cooperate
in the marketing of ROLM p r o ducts
throughout Canada. Norstan is working
with IBM Canada to become an IBM business partner for the marketing of certain
IBM voice/data products.
Contact:IBM Canada, 416-474-8900

New For PC: Sible Concordance Software For Windows

H IAWATHA, IO WA, MAY 14 (N B ) Parsons Technology has announced it will
i ntroduce a W i n dows version of i t s
QuickVerse Bible concordance software
this summer.
The company said QuickVerse for
Windows will shi p i n J u ly . P arsons
spokesperson Anne Rawland said the price
for QaickVerse had not been set, but most
of Parsons' biblical software programs sell
for $69, and the company said users could
expect QuickVerse to be priced "consistent
with Parson's history of providing highyerformsnce software at affordable prices."
QuickVerse is a concordance, or a listing of the words in the Bible which, accord-

ing to Rawland, is ideal for such purposes

as sermon or Sunday school lesson preparation, as well as for Bible scholars.
The user types the desired word, and
QuckVerse returns the verses where that
word can be found in the Bible. Like its
older sibling QuickVerse 2.0 for DOS, the
program can scan for partial words, combi-

nations of words, or phrases. QuickVerse

can use Boolean logic for "and" or "or"
searches, and supports wildcard scans.
A wildcard is a character, such as an
asterisk or a question mark, that represents
a character or a string of characterL DOS
uses the asterisk for a string of characters,
and the question mark for a single character. For example, "Qui~" would search for
all words that started with the letters "Qui".
"SM?TH" would search for all 6ve letter
words that started with SM and ended with
TH. Any character, such as "I" or "P in the
middle position, would result in a successful search. Rawlsnd said QuickVerse supports asterisk wildcards, but not the question mark.
Parsons said it plans to demonstrate a
pre-release version of QuickVerse for
Windows at the Christian Booksellers
Association beginning June 28 in Dallas,
TexsL
Contact:Anne Rawland, Parsons Technology,
810405-9626.

THE COMPUTERPAPER JUNE '92 81

CorrectDRAN II - ATICf%ICEJUN .
4 8 6 M b oard H d rive F drive M onitor Printer M odem N e twork... Help
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NONEPROFESSIONALTEAM!!

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, ym)GRAMMlhXr hx C, ASHIIIKEj

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386DX33/40,486SX20
B(DSi, 64k csabe (erp, 256h)
70ns RAM esp, 32/64MB
12 & 1.44MB JAPANESE PD
105 MB 15ms/64K JAPANESE HD
1$' lbrser Case w/IXD
Sedg Baa)( & Game Bx(s
IMB 258 cakr %GA Cmd
1024ay88 2BmmCa)rr Mimttar
101 Enlxsrxxd
l

386Dx-25MHz +:-" " 3863X25MHz

AM HKE
2MB RAM esp 8MB
12 & 1.44MB JAPANESE FD
M MB SK JAPANBBE HD
15' Baby"Ibwer Case w/I
2 SedsaParsi & Game Bxts
16 btt SUf%R VGA Gad
OOU3R VGA Maalar
101 Bhbsreed

w/ CX).NM, SU
ILJIDI
Klf (KS DKQ
'I
II I 'I

AM BIOS,
2MB RAM rsrIL SMB
, 12 ar 1.44MB Jalxxraa PD
., 45/52MB 17ms/64k Jalsamm HD
IS' Baby towxx~
2 Sedsa Busl gr Game Bxds
aakir VGA Gad
VGA Cahrr Marx(ter
101 Enbarxxxl Ke)rbaaxd

e0

486DX2-50/DX-50Mhz

486DX-33

AM BIOS,128k cache (exp 256)

4MB 70/60ns RAM exp. 64MB
1.2 & 1.44MB Japanese FD
130MB 15ms 64K Hard Drive
19" Mdi-Tower w/LED & 200W
2Sedals, Parall & Game Ports
Non-Inter. 1024x768 .28 Monitor
1MB TsengLrxb4000 SVGA Card
Fujitsu/Focus Enh. Keyboard

1. MS-DOS 5.0 $40.00

RAM, AMI BIOS
& 1.44MB Jalxmese FD
WINDOWS 3.1 $55.00 1.2
15ms 64K Haxd Drive
OS/2
v2.0
$19 5.00130MB
19" Midi-Tower w/LED & 200W
~
w/Al i K ih(gib ~ ~

P
AN
AS
O
NICL
IulmediaBUNDLE ~

, Paxall & Game Ports

1024x768 .28 Moxdtor
1MB TsengLab4000 SVGA Caxd
jitsu/Focus Enh. Keyboard

'

EISA486-33MHz
AM BIOS
4MB 60ns RAM exp. 64MB
1.2 & 1.44MB Japanese FD
200/210MB 15ms 64K ESDI HD
23" Full-Tbwer w/LED & 2SOW
2Serlals, Psxnll & Game Ports
1024x768 .25 SEIKO Non-Inter.
1MB All XL.32KC SVGA Caxd
Fujitsu/Focus Enh. Keyboard

TAPES &

AOC335 1024Q'68 .28

Everdata 1024x768 .28
DARIUS 1024x768 .28
;',"'l.:'::;,,: TVM SA L.R 1024x768
DARIUS 1024 Non-Int
Viewsonic6 1024 Non-In.
NEC 3FG Non-Int 15"
SONY 1S04 Non-lnt..2 5
NEC 4PG Non-Int. 15"
NEC 5FG 1280 I T '
IMB TRIDENf caxd
IMB TsengLab4000
IMB Ail XL 32k color
1MB S3 accel~
ATI Ultm VGA CARD

$42
$8 1
$18
$11
$17

386820/25 Exp. SMB

$180
386DX-25 8 Slots Exp. SMB $245
386DXSS/40 Exp. 64MB 8295/330
486SX20/33 Exp. 64MB
4 86DX-33. 64k Exp. 64MB 8 6 7 0
4 86DX2-50 64k Exp64MB
891 0
486DX-50, 64k Exp. 64MB 81080
486-SSEISA msmbosxd
$1450
Per Mega RAM(256.DL4M)
SRAM for Cache Memoxy
LOCAL BUS MBOARD
8COM E
80287-XL
8105

M C) D E M S

S190
Patdot 40-120mb
Panasonic 1180i 9pin
m50
QUANfUM 40MB 19ms
:.,-. Patriot 250MB
Panal123/1124i 24pin $275/$345
Quantum 52MB 19ms
,',,".,, Psrxrot Int. controller
$205 ..., WD. 85MB 17ms
. Epson LK-810 9pln
;:;;,.- Pstrlat Ext. csee
;..: Epson LQ-570/1170
$34 5 / $ 7 40 ,'-';:-';
NEC/Tosh(ha 105MB 15
<.".':.-.',";.=Colorado 40-120MB
'.: Fujitsu DL900 24pin
Fujttsu 105MB 17ms
Colorado 120-250MB
Fujitsu DL1100 24 color
Quantum 105MB 15ms
$370 ~:;-'::;::-Shl DC2(XO 40-12amb
Fujitsu DL1200 24 color
CONNER 120MB 15ms
3M DC2120 120-250Mb
$550
2400b lnt. CanSaal
Fujitsu DLS450
Quantum 120MB 15ms
2400b Ext.ZOOM
811
$369
CONON BJIOeX
Maxtxu 130MB 15ms
9624 S/R EaxMat(Zolrxrx)
81
CONON BJ300/330
Fujitsu 135/210MB
$440/680
9624 S/R FsxMod(Ca~~sB
$1
$1050
Fujitsu
330/660MB
Epson ELP-7000
9800b Modem (amBm4 v.42
$770/1650
OKIDATA 400/830
Fujitsu 1.2G
14.4M Rabotu Int/Ext. V42 8670/$7
REVEN LP530 ( m)
SONY CD-ROM
NoleBook 486DX33 4M,)30MB S4500
1045/1980
HP IIP+/ III
HIFACHI CD-ROM
NoteBook 385DX33 4M. 130MB S3200
NEC Ii 95 PostScrl t
$ 1795
PANASONIC CD-ROM
$499
Nole
k
X25
80MB 2250
80387-SX16
80$87~
80887-DX25
80387-DXSS
80$87-DX40
Dexxa Mouse SB
Ingaech SB mouse

8175
8245

8290
4r25
4r75
Mrna Soft mouse
880
tag(tech mree& Windows 3. 14r1$0
Log)tech Scaner 32
8260
Log(tech SCANER 256
8$70
Axsko/Video AVER1000
$330

898
AVER 1000V
85$0 NEVEU. NHWORKS Wlndaws$.1
OS/2 v.2.0
$199
A ll Sound Card w/Spk
81 6 0
Novell 2.2 (5 users)
4680 ~ h
er 4. 0
8570
Saund Blaster Pxo
4r395
GRAVE Joystick
45 Novell 2.2 (10 users) $ 1 7 00 C++ Sr Whxdaws
8445
AT l/0 aud
812 Novell 2.2 (50 users) 8 2 9 50 Caxel Dxaw 2.0
Novell 3.1 1 (10 usns) $2100 IAMJS 123 R3.1
8480
IDE gr. I/O aud
Novell 3.11 (20 usns) 8 2 980 DBASE 1V
101 Keyboard
$95 Woxd gxr Wlndass
lr$35
Focus 2001 / Fujttsu
855 8 bit AxcNet aud
4rl lo Wardpruthct For Windows 8$20
F ocus2000+/5001
88O/9 0 16 brt AxeNet card
$140 PCsuywtme IV
$135
Focus6000,7000,9000 8 C OME8 brt EthexNet card
$16 0 IrOX PRO ( NEW VEIL) BCOME
Ultxastor 12F ESDl
8210 1 6 bit EtherNet card
N etworhs Remove Ctrl $ 1 6 0 PARADII (NEW VER.) $COME
Ultxastor 12c ESDI lMB

'I

82

T H E COMPUTER PAPER J U NE '92

Lotus Unveils 1-2-3 For DOS Release 2.4

CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSET1'S, MAY 14
(NB) Lotus Development has updated
its twoAimensional spreadsheet package
for DOS. I-M for DOS release 2.4 adds a
handful of-features previously found only in
Lotus' higher-powered spreadsheet packages.
Lotus also said an update to its threedimensional DOS spreadsheet, Lotus 1-2-8
for DOS Release 5.4, will be available this
falL
Among the new features in Release 2.4
are SmartIcons, which provide onewlick
access to frequently used commands. These
first appeared in 1 2-5 for W i n dows.
BacksoIver, a single- or multi~ ble g oal-

seeking tool, has also been added to

Release 2.4 it was already available in
some other versions of 1-2-8. Finally, the
new version sports expanded support for
popular printers.
While the new release adds some featuresfound in the Windows version of 1-23, Larry Roshfeld, the product manager,
said it remains a subset of the %endows version and of Release 5.3 for DOS. Features
found in those versions that are not in 2.4
include threeAimensional spreadsheet
capabiTity, the ability to query and update
external database files, and improved memoiy management, he said.
Roshfeld said Release 2.4 is: "the small

one, the fast one; it's graphical, and it runs

on all PCs."
Lotus said the software is now shipping
and will be widely available during the week
of May 25. International English, French,
and German versions have also begun shipping. Spanish, Swedish, Italian, Dutch,
Danish, Norwegian, and Portuguese versions will be available in 80 to 60 days,
Lotus officials said.
The suite of more than 70 SmartIcons
that ship with the product provides quick
access to worksheet and graphing commands, Lotus said. Examples are:the ability
to put text into bold face or italics, or
underline it; the aMity to sum a row, column, or range ofnumbers; and one-step
printing and graphing. Users can also cre-

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is available to all other licensed 1-2-5,
Microsoft Excel and Quattro Pro users for a
suggested retail price of $150. (Prices in

USf.)

Lotus said it will also ofFer a combined

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DOS Release 2.4 with Freelance Graphics
for DOS 4.0 in June for a suggested retail
price of $229.
Lotus 1-2-8 for DOS Release 8.4, to ship
this fall, will have SmartIcons, additional
memory management capaMities, perform ance enhancements, and new a n d
improved printer drivers, including landscape printing on dot~trix printers.
Contact: Lotus, 61 7%95-1560.

DEC Says New PCs

Are 586-Ready
MAYNARD, MASSACHUSETTS, MAY 13
(NB) Digital Equipment said a new line
of personal computers it announced
recently are the first that can be upgraded
to Intel's P5 or 586 microprocessor when
the new chip appears later this year. The
new DECpc 400ST models use Intel's
Xpress architecture, an upgradeable design
with snap-in processor, memory, video,
disk, and other components.
For now, Digital will sell three models in
the 400ST line, using 486 processors running at 25, 35, and 50 megahertz (MHz).
However, the company said, once Intel
releases the new 586 chip, buyers of the
400ST machines will be able to upgrade
their computers themselves.
All three models are shipping now, said
Digital spokesman Edward Canty. Canty
would not say how soon after the formal
introduction of the 586 chip expected
this faH Digital plans to oKer an upgrade.
Userswill also be able to upgrade memory and other components everything
that aKects the overM speed of the system,
according to DEC by swapping plug-in
boards.
Digital said it is the first company touse
Intel's Xpress upgradeable architecture in a
PC.
All of the 400SI' models come in a deskside tower cabinet with six EISA (Extended
Industry Standard Architecture) expansion
slots, four megabytes (MB) of memory
expandable to 192 MB, five half-height bays
for storage devices such as disk and tape
drives providing for a maximum of 5.4 gigabytes of disk storage, and a 254watt power
Base configurations of the initial three
models, without h ar d d i sks, display
adapters, or monitors, are priced at $8,000
for the 25 MHz model, $5,500for the 33
MHz model, and $4,500 for the 50 MHz
modeL An assortment of hard disk options
are available, said Product Manager Mike
Joyce, ranging in price from $200 to $2,500.
Price tags for the various display options

range from $200 to $2,800. (Prices in US/.)

Contact: Digital Equfpment, 506-4664397.

%E COMPUTER
PAPER jUNE '92 83

Apple says Illew Q00aglra 9$0

Is Faster Than 486/SO PC
The Macintosh Quadra product line
was first introduced last figm as Apple's line
of power computers. The product is geared
toward more complex applications such as
large document management, complex
graphics, video, animation, architectural
ancf engineermg 5D modeling, rendering,
and graphics simulation, Apple said.
The Quadra 950 is a floor-standing
ntodel with ondsosrdSdddt color, highspoed Ethernet networling. sound input
and output, microprocessor4ased caching
and floating point processing. Apple says
the 950 outperformed 55MHz and 50MHz
48~ a sed machines in benchmark tests
CUPERTINO, CALIFORNIA, MAY 18
(NB) Apple says it has introduced a
newer, faster Quadra, the 950, built around
the Motorola 68040 55 megahertz (MHz)
chip. Apple is comparing the new 950 to
IBM compatible 486-based personal computes s at 55 and 50 MHz and says the 950 is
faster.

done by Ingram Laboratory. Jim Reinhart,

manager forApple of M68000 marketing
and applications, said the tests compared
c ross-platform a p p l ications o n t h e
Macintosh Qua>ha 950 and on 486 PCs running Microsoft Windows. Reinhart said the
Macintosh Qmdra 950 ran the applications
up to RO percent fihster than an Advanced
Logic Research (ALR) Business Visa
486/50 PC.
The Motorola 68040 55 MHz chip has
1.2 million transistors and can operate at 29
million instructions per second (MIPS) and
4.6 million floating operations per second

(MFLOPS) at 55 MHz, Apple said.

Motorola said that using the power of

the 68040 the Qmdra 950 scored a 9.7 on
benchmark tests conducted by Ingram
Labs. According to Ingram, the 9.7 score
indicated that the Quadra 950 runs 9.7

'r

times as fisst than the slowest machine tested. Motorola's Hausman told Newsbytes the
slowest machine was the IBM PS/1.
The 950 comes with 8 megabytes of
RAM which can be expanded to 64 MB.
The unit boasts 10 built4n ports for peripherals, five Nubus expansion slots, and support for up to four storage devices such as
hard disk drives. The storage devices are
not included, Apple said.
Like the other Quadras, the 950 offers
Ethernet and Localtalk connections. The
Qaadra 950 is available now for C$10,879
with 8MB and a dr50 MB hard drive. The
950 model is a replacement for the 900,
which Apple expects to phase out, Apple
sources told Newsbytes.
Contact: Apple Canada, 1-41 6-51 3-5787.

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84

T HE COMPUTER PAPER JUNE '92

New For Mac: Adaptec

Personal Laserwriter
NTR Controller

BRUSSELS, BELGIUM, APR 2$ (NB)A daptec has contracted with A p p l e

Computer to design and manutacture the
nextgeneration laser printer controller for
the Apple Personal Laserwriter NTR printex'
Plans call for the controller to use
Advanced Micro Devices' (AMD's) reduced
instruction-set computing (RISC) microprocessor. The controller will also incorporate Adobe's Postscript Level 2 page
descxiption language with autoeensing and
switching technology.
According to Adaptec, the indusion of
Postscript technology will enable the printer to inteHigently process print iles f'rom
Apple Mac and other host systems.

Radius Introduces
Low-Cost Color PivotlLF. Display
SAN JOSE, CALIFORNIA, APR 21 (NB)Hoping to capture more ofthe lower~nd
display market, Radius Inc, has introduced
the Color Pivot/LE, a cheaper version of
the original Radius Color Pivot for the
Macintosh.
The Color Pivot/LE is a 15-inch 256color dual orientation display which rotates
to display a color document in either portrait or landscape orientation. The LE version provides 78 do~er4nch and features
624 by 852 resolution, the same as Apple's
16-inch color display.
Laxxy Herman, spokesman for the com-

pany, told Newsbytes that the company felt

there was a deflnite market for the lowercost Pivot.
The company maintains that, priced at
$1,199, the Pivot/LK represents a considerable cost saving over the $1,549 for the original Color Pivot (and $1,699 for Apple's 16-

inch).
Herman told Newsbytes that the "electronics are different" between the original
Color Pivot and the Color Pivot/LE. "We
basically attempted cost-reducing" the
product, he said.
Ed Colligan, Radius general manager,

We' ve worked closely with Apple to

design and manufacture a product consistent with Apple's reputation for offering
the highest quality printers," explained
Tom Stobier, Adaptec's imaging products'
general manager. 'Our technical expertise
in the controller arena helps Apple achieve
price/perfonnance leadership in today' s
laser pxinter marketplace."
Adaptec is not placing any timescale on
the new controller. The company's deal
with Apple is open~ded, however, sources
dose to Apple suggest that the new controller will be released within the next few
months. Pridng on the unit has not yet
been decided.
Stobier said that, while the controller
will be sold by Adaptec, a considerable
degree of liaison between the company and
Apple is necessaxy to produce such a product. "We work with companies in the early
stages of product development to design
and manufacture controllers that help
them efficiently bring to market leading
pr'ice/performance products," he said.
Contast:
Adaptsc Europe,+$2-2MSZNO.

New For Macintosh:

Artisoft LANtastic

/ lI r

o'

A/4 oooo/faoiwrozA
Zswi<ev

BYTE COMPUTERS

TUCSON, ARIZONA, APR 17 (NB)-

Mahng its frat foray outside of the MS-DOS

realm, Artisoft has announced a new product that will allow Macintosh users to hook
up to their LANtasttc~uipped ofiicemates.
LANtastic for Macintosh vl.0 is the new
product that accomplishes this task
LANtastic for Macintosh is an MS-DOS
based program. It allows for a PC that is
equipped with Ethernet and LocalTalk
cards to act as a gateway between the
M acintosh n e twork w o rl d a n d t h e
LANtastic world. This PC must be dedicated to this function. Artisoft does provide
the Appletalk Interface board that would
be required as a part of the overall package
that it sells.
Once installed, Macintoshes can use

standard Appleshare or System 7 proce-

dures to log mto the dedicated PC s hard

disk. As that PC is also logged into the
LA astic network, all of the other PC's
hard disks are available to the Macintosh
user. File sharing then becomes a simple
matter of detexmmtng comFxtible Sle formats and reading those iles back and forth.
Due to System 7, having a Macintosh read a
PC Sle is easy. For PC users trying to read
Macintosh files there is an additional
required step. They must first copy the file
trom the Macintosh to the gateway PC and
only then does it become visible to them.
Printer sharing is more integrated.
Madntosh users can access any printer that
is anywhere on the network PC users can
do the same.
LANtastic for Macintosh is slated to

begin shipping in the second quarter of

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THE COMPUTER
PAPER JUNE '92 85
scape" display. C onsequently, The
Madntosh products, said: "For Madntosh
users who want to connect to their system's Pivot/LE d oesn't support Mac built-in
video,' he told NewsbyteL
built-in video, get four bits of resolution
Just last week, Newsbytes reported that
and eliminate the need for an interface
Radius, in an effort to gain increased marcard, the original Color Pivot ts the ideal
kc,t penetration within the United States,
choice. H o wever, he added: For those
who want eght4it resolution at 256 colors,
particularly for its Madntosh products, had
expanded its distribution relationship with
the Color Pxvot/LE is the logical ansvrer.
Ingram Micro to indude Radius' full line of
The Color Pivot/LE txrovtdes dual orientation at a lower pxice
the o r i gina Color Madntosh products. Additionally, the comPhot and the
e 6 2 4 by 85R resolution as pany also extended irs distributio agreeApple's Macintosh 16.inch Color Display
ment with Mexisel Inc., to allow that company to distribute all Radius Macintosh and
for S500 less.'
PC products to its U.S. resellers. Previously,
Uxxttke the original Color Pivot, the
Merisel carried just Radius Madntoshbased
Color Pivot/LE must always be used with a
products in Canada aud AustraliL
Radius Color Pivot Interface card. The
In February, Newsbytes reported that
company maintains that Radius Color Pivot
Radius had licensed some of Apple's techInterfaces are available for all NuBus
nology for use in its own Madntosh NubusMadntoshes, the Madntosh LC and LC 11,
based accelerator ~
t " pr o ducts, develand the Madntosh SE/50, for a suggested
oped in a project labeled Satuxa V.
retau price of S590.
According to Herman, the original
Contact:Lany Herman, Radius tnc.,408W4Color Pivot was a "native portrait" display,
1010.
while the Color Pivot/LK is a "native: land-

Apple Backs Mac-To-PowerPC

Cerxversiorx Software From Eche Logic
HOLMDEL, NEW JERSEY, MAY ll
PowerPC architecture may still be on the
drawing board, but Apple has already
signed a cooperative deal with Echo Logilc
to develop pordng software that will allow
the translation of current binary shrinkwrapped Madntosh applications to run on
the new platfoxm.
Binary versions of applications that run
on PowerPGbased Macintosh platform will
be possible in a matter of days, using Echo
Logic's HashPort, so say the companies.
Echo Logic's President Brad Buxnhsm:
This first usc; of FlashPort will accelerate
the availability of current Macintosh applications so that the future PowerPC-based
Macintosh will have a full suite of so8ware
available at product introduction.

PowerPC4xased Macintosh that is competitive with hanrSported code in performance

and size.
Chris Macey, Echo Logic's chief scientist, said: FlashPort can translate any
Macintosh program written in any language, from assenxbler to C> so developers
can continue to work with their current
software development tools.
According to Echo Logic, FlashPort
allows an "experienced software to translate the executable or relocatable object
code version of an application. It is the
translation of the object code which alicws
for the translation of any application written in any language, or combination of languages, f'rom assembler to C. Accordmg to
the company, source code is not requirecL
Echo Logic Inc., based in Hohnhel, New

According to Echo Logic,recent

Jersey, is an ATacT venture company. Its

advances in data flow analysis and compiler

technology is based on advanced compiler

r esearch c onducted a t A T a r T B e ll
Laboratories. The company intends to
license its translation tools to computer
manufacturers and software developers,

(NB) Apple and I B M's p roposed

technology allowal for the development of

FtashPort. The transiatton tool wiR require

~n imal hmnan intervention," clahnePthe

company in a press release, and 'will gener-

gc,466<+'

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86

T HE COMPUTER PAPER JUNE '92

Syquest Distributes Free Utility SCSI Probe

Macintosh will not recoipxize the new cartridge. One way areund this is to restart
S AN JOSE. CAUPORNI A M A ~ 1 5
yeur Macintosh with the new cartridge
the hardware from Syquest but thcyare
(NB) Syquest has signed a licensing
installed in the drive. This will cause
then responsible for putting together
agreement with shareware author
Apple's system sememe te load the driver
,
their own driver software. Each carRobext PoRc under which it has the
that is present en the cartridge, xather than
uidge contains acopy of the proper
,.<y+.
right to distribut his SCSI Probe
the one that is on its hard disk.
,>i;::: "4"
driver for that particular format
utility bearing the Syquest
,:g~+'<,, ""', i'-'.,;
However, restarting a computer like
an its boot sectorL
name.
that is not an acceptable solution. SCSI
.-"::.;.;"@
;.'~"~""-'.~
SCSI Probe has gained
~g.' ,,'
Prebe's advantage is that it esn force the
Madntosh has been started
fame in the Macintosh mar.-S: ,<-:: with
system software to dose dawn the old driver
a particular manufacturket as a handy uuTity to have in
:::.>~: ::~+':
er's seftware driver installed.
and ins~ t h e driver that is en the carconjunction with a Syquest romeo"~(' ' <~:
Apple's system software only looks tridge, thereby alleviating the need te
'
able hard drive. Syquest officials
restart the computer.
a ttheSCSIdrivcronce,on start~. i f
explained the situation to Newsbytes in
Previous versions of SCSI Probe have
.
yeu h ave a removable dxivc outside of
the following manner: Syquest sells the
floppy disk~ d
c h a nge the cartridge to been distributed as shareware on the
p roduct to m an y i n t egrators in t h e
national bulletin boards like GEnie and
one that was foxmatted with a ddferent driMacintosh market. These integrators get
ver, there i s a l i k e lihood that your
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CompuSexve. After this licensing agreement went into ctlect, the author made significant improvements to its functionality
and usabiTity and it is now being offered
free of chaxge by Syquest. The new version,
5.4, is abo being made available on GEnie,
America Onhne, and Syquest's own bulletin
boaxcL In addition, Syquest will ship out a
copy ef the utility on diskette to anyone
whe requestsit fxem them. Syquest oKccrs
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over S00 copies since the new version came
out in late ApriL Additionally, they know
that over 1000 people have downloaded the
software from the various bulletin boards.
CenfaoL Syquesf, 4154284555.

Apple Canada 6ets New President

MAREHAM, ONTARIO, APR N ( N B)Peter Jones, foxmerly vicepresidcnt of sales,
has been appointed president of Apple
Canada He succeedsDavid Rae, who alter
s even years at th e h el m o f A p p l e ' s
Canadian subsidiary is moving to Coloxado
to work for a non~oSt Christian ortptnha
tion.
Jones, who has worked for Apple
Canada for 11 years, vnm take over the job
of president hnmediately, saidJohn Elias, a
spokesman for thecompany. Rae has a
ceuple of commitments remaining, but
will bc moving to Colorado by the end of
June, Elias told Newsbytes.
Jenes has been involved in Apple
Canada's sales and marketing funcnons as
naticmal sales manager, national marketmg
numagcr, and vicepresidcnt of sales.
Rae is to become head of international
operations for the Navigators, a business
and professional Christian ministry oxganizattcnL
A reexganizauon to Socus the company
on four categorie of customers w9l be the
Srst priority forJones.
The restructuring is part of a worldwide

Apple move that creates business units for

the institudenal (large business and gevernIncnt), educauonI consunlcI; olid smaze
medxum business markets.
Jones' eld job at Apple Canada vice
president of sales 'will disappear, to be
replaced by four divisional managers. Apple
Canada's field sales and marketing force
wIII bc divided ameng the four business
units rather than geographically as before.
Jones said he is pleased with Apple's
progress in the huge business market, and
with thc cempany's drive to build market
share. Apple captured 20 percent of the
personal computer market in Canada in
1991 by unit sales, he said, making it the
numbermne vender in the country. Jones
also quoted figures from AC Neiisen, a mark et-research f i r m , gi v i n g Ap p l e ' I
Powerbook notebook computers 35 percent of laptep and notebook computer
sales in Canada in the hst two quarters.
Cenleob Apple Canada Custonter Retalona, 141~1$4787; Jolm ELss, Nalonal Pubtto
Relations for Apple Canada, tel 4104804180,
hx 41 6480-1094.

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lee

THE COMPUTER
PAPER JUNE '92 87

Sun Announces Low-pl'i

cecI Systems

Sunset Releases Development Tools For Solaris 2.0

M OUN T A I N
VIEW, CALIFORNIA,
A PR
27

MOUNTAIN VIEW, CALIFORNIA, APR 15

(NB)~
sof t , the software division of Sun
Microsystems, is focusing on the next generation of graphical user interface (GUI)
products for SPARC stations and Intelbased computers, and says the introduction
of its Solaris 2.0 Master Developer Seriesis
a step in that direction.
The Solaris 2.0 Master Developer Series
is a collection of third~
too l s designed
to help speed the software development
process. Sunsoft said it wants developers to
get a head start so applications will be ready
to run on the Solaris 2.0 operating system
when it ships this summer.
Solaria 2.0 is a 52-bit operating system
that is planned to operate on Intel 586,
486, and higher-based computers as well as
on SPARC workstations. Sunsoft has a program for application developers it calls the
Solarii 2.0 Migration program and the company says over 550 d evelopers have
enrolled. Autodesk, Cadence Design
Systems, and Gain Technology have all
endorsed the new tools and have enrolled
in the Migration program, Sunsok said.
The Master Series Sunsoft is inn odudng
includes compilers for assembly, debugging
and code analysis capabilities for a range of
languages; objectwriented database management tools that allow developers to scale
performance for distributed applications;
and Graphical User Environment (GUE)
software for developers to visually design
and test user interfaces.
Sun has already said it plans to give Intel
and Microsoft arun for their money by
moving into the IBM and compatible market. The company has reduced prices on
Sparcstations and hired developers away
from Apple to work on its nextgeneration
GUI systems. Sunsoft representative Amal
Abed said the SPARC version of the Solaris
2.0 system is expected in June of this year,
with the Intel-based version following 90
days later.

( NB) S u n
Microsystems has
announced a new
color,
re d u c ed
instruction set chip
(RISC) workstation
in its SPARCtation
IPC line that the
company says is the
first priced under
C $8000 f r o m a
major vendor and
priced thousands
of dollars lower
than similar workstations from IBM
or Hewlett-Packard

(HP).

Sun compares
the new C$7,950 IPC workstation with
IBM's entry level workstation, the RS/6000
220, which fully configured retails for
US$9,995, and the HP 9000/710, which
retails for US$14,065. Sun claims the new
IPC is nearly one third the price of a similarly equipped 486/55 IBM compatible personal computer (PC) from Compaq.
Sun says the IPC is compact like the
existing SPARCstation IPC and comesstandard with a mid-range IQnch Sony monitor with 1152 x 900 resolution, 8 megabytes
(MBs) of random accessmemory (RAM),
and a 207 MB internal hard disk drive. The
system runs the Solaris 1.0 operating system; Sun says Solaris 2.0 will be available
later this year.
Sun says it expects the workstation to be
popular with those who run AutoCAD,
O read, dBASE IV , L o t u s 1 -2-5 a n d
WordPerfect, all of which are avulable for
the Unix operating system. Sun says those
users can get PCAevel prices with worksta-

tion performance
with the new IPC.
Sun says it is
r educing o t h e r
p rices a s w e l l ,
including lowering
t he price o f i t s
SPARCstation ELC
entry-level workstation by $1,200 on
its entry level workstation, now priced
a t C$5,500 a n d
offering p rice
reductions it daims
are as high as 28
percent o n
it s
other desktop computing products.
Sun says the
new $7,950 I P C
workstation is available now with another IPX SPARCengine
system expected to be available in June of
this year for C$8,650.
While Sun is the market leader according to Dataquest, a market research ftrm,
the company is still lowering prices.
Compaq, one ofthe companies Sun mentioned that it is competing with, announced
it is abandoning plans to produce a RISCbased computer system and is instead planning to continue building Inte14ased IBM
compatible systems.
This announcement from Compaq is
especially significant with Intel's announcement earlier this year that the 586 chip is
on the horizon and is expected in the Grst
half of this year. The 586 is expected to give
RISC chips serious competition as it is projected by Intel to be capable of 100 million
instructions per second (MIPS).
Contact: Sun Microsystems, tel 4154364564.

r.
s

i"

,'.: s-

-'

s -'.

learn the A-Zof

WordPerhct'
OIIY%9
oIIIIIrday

Jsse13, July24
YourWordPerfect
Authurhlni

TrainingCenhe.

Call66947N
Vancolter, BC

Fax 6844859

Shopping for a productive Graphic Arts/

Electronic Pre-press Design system?
Call Western Imaging's sales professionals for
a provenApple MacintoshQuadra solution.
TheMacintosh Quadra 900canbe configured to operate as a powerful color pre-press workstation that rivalsScitex or Linotype-Hell
systems (at a fraction of the cost).
Western Imaging Systems Inc.provides professional consulting,
systems design/implementation, training and hardware support for
all Appleproducts targeted at the Graphic Arts professional.

Macintosh Quadra 900 high-performance

workstation, offers "blistering speeds"on a
desktop platform designed for professionals.

le
I

I'

88

T HE COMPUTER
PAPER JUNE '92

TO SERVE
YOU

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386DXKO System

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18 Bit SVGAVkteo Card
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16 Bit SVGAVkleo Card
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JCAD Computer Training Centre, (formerly known as

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known for their expertfse and professionalism in
training. The training equipment and applications
used are of the latest technology.
DOS Introduction
Micr o soft Windows Intro
Lotus for Windows
Lotus 2.3,3.1
WordPerfect 5.1
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PageMaker
CorelDraw

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For details call 73M928
GOVERNIIENT FUNDING MAY BE AVAILABLE FOR PARTICIPANTS
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=

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f
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THE COMPUTER
PAPER JUNE '92 &9

Computer Calendar
s

Make YourSofhgara Workfor You!

Get basicto professional levelsof traininginattractive facilities

AMIGA USER GROUP (PaNorAmA), BCIT, Rm 128-1A.

Gwr. Meeilng2ndWed750; Pmgrammws4thWed790. BE
Wagstag,687-1746.

APPLES B.C.
COMPUTER SOCIETY.A UserGroup for
Madntosh,Apple II's andUses. Madntoshmeegngswe the
last Tuesday In eachmonth at the Unitarian ChurchIn
Vancower.
Novice meegngs and spedalinternetmeetings
are heklmidmongLCall Beth Gibson2814882 fcr Infonnarm. Apple 6meegngsgrat Mondayofeach month. Call Al
Grout5214818cr IgyoshlMasuda4874N5 for Informalrm.

ARCHITECTUSERGROUP(Madntosh). Call Sen SchEsr

or KslGill, ByteComputers,738-2181.
ASTUTE-ATARI ST. Meets 1st Toes., 7:S0 Hastings
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ATARI USERSI Vantari, P.O. Box8614 Main Post ONce,
Van., B.C., VSBSYS. all Sutwland 868-1450, Don Hatch
48$4055. Mesh2ndWed.,700, HasgngsComm.Or.,8086
E. Haslngs.
BEAVER VALLEY COMMODORE CLUB, 1st
Tues.,
MonlmseSchod Ubnsy.Call JohnVlnk8674426.
LC. INTERORAPHUSERSGROUP (BCIUO) Quarterly
Meslhg, LC. Hydro
Auditorium, 870 BurnsdStvancower,
ContactMikegamese 66M682for Infamagrm.
B.C. IIEOIONAL USERS GROUPSOCIETY of HewlettPackwdUses. ContactRandyCEI forInfonnalcn 8814048.

LC. UNIX USSIS GROUPDinnerMeelngs. 681W78.

B.C. VAIVMS LocalUsersGroup(BCVAXLUG) mesh on
the secondWednesday ofeach month (exceptJanuary,
AugustandOctober) usually st IXgltal EducationServices,
18110 GambleRoad, Rhhmond, B.C. at 790. PJn. Contact
LenoreWemyss86S4885.

CALL66S47

' Refreshers

DATA PROCESSING MANAGEMENT ASSOCIAhON,

DPMA Internagonaljoint dinnermeeting. Contact Brooker
Allen 6684902 toregistw.

FORTH.BCmeets700, 1st Thurshnonth,RmIA424, BCIT

main bldg.Discusslcns,demosandInfonnagonfcr prognunmlngrapplylng
FORTH(hardware andsoftware).
GREATER VICTORIAPERSONAL COMPUTER USERS'
ASSOCPOBox5808, StsgcnB, VIctodaV8R6S4. General
meelng lastWed.Also,spedalInterest groupmeetings 8828884.

601-889W.
PenderSt. Vancouver

INDEPENDENT COMPUTER CONSULTANTS ASSOCIAhON, Box 820, Sation A, Van., B.C. 682-2747. Fax 8251886.

ITAC BC DinnwMeeting, 8500.1180 Mskdlle St.Van., B.C.

V6E SW1. Ph. 682-2084; fax8884880. Msegngsat Slsnlsy
Park Pavllhn; doorsopenat SSOpm;buffel dinner al 615
pm; guestspeakersat 7$0 pm. 625for members, 640 for
ncnmembers.June18 Multimedia: anoverview andpanel
discussion on Industry opportunities. Place: Benedict's
Ponder SideCafe, 590 pm, ContacL Shirley Frlesm-NIcol,
6824084.

AUTHORIZED NOVELL COURSES

s rs

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It can be as easy as plugging in a telephone to a wall jack, with the latest in printer
sharing technologyj No additional software is required!

NETWARE V.3.11:
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It works with all of the DOS and Windows applications that you are currently using.
Up to 34computers, over a distance of 4,000 feet,can now share one printer (DMP
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Classes run fmm 6- 10 p.m.

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Class Minimums 4 Students

June
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For easy phone registration, call 604-294-987l

PACIFIC DATAWARE EDUCATION CENTERS

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Bachelor of Technology Degree in

Computer Systems (B. Tech.)
This practitioner-oriented degree program is offered as a collaborative effort
between BCIT and the Open Learning Agency's Open University.
The program is designed for:

graduates of BCFPs? year diploma program in Computer Systems

mmputer professionals wishing to acquire recognized formal
qualifications
people who hold degrees in other related disciplines

YOUR FLEET
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ENTIR
E'

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It mmbines an Advanced Diploma Program (ADP) in Software Development

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general education and administrative studies, taken through the Open
Learning Agency. Both the Advanced Diploma Program and university
coursesare offered on a part-time, course-by-course basis.

Admission is strictly seledive and competitive.

For more information, contact: BCIT, 370Q Willingdon Avenue,
Burnaby, B.C., Tel. (604) 434-3304

8IIIISH COLUMBIA INSTITUTE

OF TECHNOLOGY

We continue lo deliver

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THE COMPUTER
PAPER JUNE '92 93
Why Sheuhl You Cenetdev
VCS EduoaEonOenfrwy
Nonuse lxm dx
personsperdassmom
hslruclcnheklInanobvcrkenvtnmmwd
Groupandccrpondodiscountsavalable
Cneenme bahlngalsoavaldde
InsbudkmlnDOS,WcrdPerlecLLobn, Bedfordandmore.
VCS EduoagonConhw
303-1830 Weot Broadway,731-1830.
Standard Ihtelllalollaf

86014$0 Weel Ponder Street,

Vancouum', SC V6C3$2
Tel: (804) 68M648
To register eall: 14004N464$
Inlro toSCOSystemV June RR-2468$5
SCO System
VAdmln I June 25-26 65$5
Xenix
Syslem V Admh SJune 15-1$ 61485
June 6.12 614$6
AddNcnel
oxneesaveleblo uponrequest

PoxPvo 2
IntwmerlatermdAdvancedTrslnlngIn FoxPro 2.
For Intemelcncall:PnmtoData Systems270-7238

June 14-VOICE POWER'82, Mobo Toiento Convengcn

Cenbo, Tonmto,Cnt. Voiceprooesslngbade show. (416)
44$.72R8.

June 8-1 1-MACWORLDEXPO, Toronto. Contad: Milch

Hall Assoc61746HNN, 250 ESRcnSheet, Derlram, MA
02028

JULY 2M~ C ANADA, Canada'snewdoskhp computIng oxposltlon andconference, 1$$6 Metro Convengon
Cenbo, Tonmto,Onlelo, Conhct PCCsnada416688@I34

June &4-LIP & PALEE

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VARDEX, Tonmlo Intemalonsl Cenbe, vdue
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AUGUST $4-OROUPWARE62, San Jose, CJLContacL

The Conference Group, 800-247-0262 or 602481-044$,
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Contact World ExpoCorp., 50$67$6700, 111 SpeenSt
PO Box$107, Framhgham,MA01701-$10T.

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Industry Publlcallons, Inc, 600-2484474 or $144284157,
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Cmnrenlcn Cenbe, LasVegas, Nevada teL SOM22-122$,
fax SflHSMOS, UNSCInvestmentGroup,3$N9 Balenlne
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tools, tuudwareandmcm.SponsoredbyElecbanlc Produds
and Technology
Magazine. 41M24-$100.
June 8-8-IEULTIIIEDIA '62, Metro TorontoConvengon
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VST122,8044224NO.

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ComputerendoNce exhtbNon. Tel (416) 2744060.

Laser Tips ~ p

COMPUTER
INDUSTRY
OVERTHEYEARS
PROJE
CTEDSALES ~

WEAN
E
EXP
ANDING...
WENEED50
PEO
PLE

p . g ~y

with carbon. The airflow is not straight

through, therefore, in my opinion this filter

is much more susceptible to plugging. On

the positive nde, it is cheaper to purchase.
To sum up. with common sense and
regular maintenance you can extend the
life of your printer and prevent unnecessary
problems from occumng. These deaning
steps are not to be done in place of regular
service but as a complement to it. Without
regular cleaning you may need a service call
by a trained technician as often as every
40,000 to50,000 pages. With regular deaning you should easily be able to extend service calls to every 100,000 pages.

1980

19 8 5

19 9 2

1995

We represent:

PrlCSIPSrl'Drmalbee
The most unfortunate aspect of RadiusTV
is its price. At a list price of (42190 (and
requiring a NuBuoerluipped Mac H~ries
computer), the product is considerably
more expenmve than roughly comparable
PC-based products, which tend to cost in
the neighborhood of $1000. Fortunately,

the image quality produced by the product

is superb, and the software INIT that controls the display is compatible with a wide
range of other common Madntosh System
Extensions, although we noted an incompatibilty w i t h Sal i e n t So f t w are's
Diskooubler INlT.
Overall, though, we were very impressed
with RadiusTV. It's a shame that so few
dealers keep demonstration stock on hand.
It's worth cheddng out.

We opened our first store in Vancouver in Late 1982.

Our people have helped us to become the leader in the

p ag ~d

produce fisheye and caricature effects, rain

smears and more. There'seven one that
wraps the image around the faces of a cube.
There are also options to align the
elds" of the video hne, which helps to
compensate for the misalignment that may
occur due to the interlaced nature of a
standard NTSC video.
The actual TV display may be viewed
and controlled from Theatrics or by a simpler desk accessory that allows you to set
the various display options, including size,
position, and of course, the channel and
volume.

We Offerour people:
Promotions from within
Management development
Extensive benefit package
Professional sales training

Gee kraal is a principal with Swpcdor Laser

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$0<%":":::jr' ':': ':: "-')" '4'

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;,,-...,"
...,,,,., In 1991 we continued our exceptional growth and
expandedto31 super stores across Canada. We also
1
Er
created 250 new sales and management positions
throughout the country and achieved our highest sales volume to date.
In 1992 we will undertake our most ambitious expansion program yet as we continue
on our way to becoming the number one Home Electronics Retailer in North America.
If you are a goal oriented, career minded individual with a positive attitute we
invite you to take your first step and join our fast growing computer sales and
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of over$65,0lJO per year.

SENDYOUR RESUME TO: THE FUTURE SHOP 2nd Floor,4680 Kiniswoy

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Apple &Apple logoarereglslemdtrademarkscfAppleComputers

94

T HE COMPUTER PAPER )UNE '92

'Techniques
This issue's cover illustration was created
primarily in Adobe Photoshop, using tools
and techniques also available in PC-based
i mage-retouching programs such a s
Micrografx Picture Publisher, Aldus
PhotoStyler and several other titles.
The Cora/rfxxrrr
Paper logo at the top of
the page was originally created as an objectoriented graphic in Aldus FreeHand. For
this issue, I decided that it would be visually
interesting to float it as a 8-D object over
the background. Iexported the EPS artwork in Adobe Hlustrator format using
Altsys' EPS Exchange. This Illustrator-format EPS file was then imported into
Photoshop 2.01, which converted it into an
anti~ e d b itmap.
This bitmap was then given a S-D "bevelled" look by selecfing various regions and
lightening or darkening them according to
their position (e.g., the uppermght side of
the logo has the brightest highlights; the
lower4eft the darkest shadows.)
I selected these regions with the pen
tool, which is an object~riented drawing
tool virtually identical to that found in
Adobe Illustrator. It allows rounded corners
or diagonal hnes to be selected and manipulated without the "jaggies" that would have
occurred had I used a raster~ented tool
such as the lasso.
I also pasted a marble texture into the
border of the logo for visual interest. Once
the logo wascolored and enhanced to my
satisfaction, I selected p segment of its background (which I had previously filled with
black) and used Photoshop's Select Similar
command to highlight all of the background area. I then used the Invert command to select all those areas that were not
the background (this selected the logo),
and copied it to the clipboard.
The circuit board image was obtained
f rom a C D - ROM e n t i tled People I n
B usiness, p u b l i she d by
Gaze l l e
Technologies (619/69~ 8 0 ) . I opened it
as a separate file. First, I sized and cropped
the image of the drcuit board so that it was
the right size. I then pasted the logo onto
the drcuit board image and positioned it.
The diffused shadow behind the logo
was simple t o c r e a te . I exp l o i t ed
Photoshop's ability to move the selected
area(s) without moving the floating image.
(This obscure trick is accomplished by
holding down the Command and Option
keys while dragging the selected area to a
new destination.) I dragged this selected
area (in the shape of the logo) to a destination about half an inch down and to the left
(different distances would produce different depth effects). I then used the Feather
command with a value of 20 to heavily diffuse the selected area and then used the
Adjust Bxightness command to darken the
area by about 80 percent. This produced a
diffused shadow effect, but also darkened
ortions of the logo, which was now no

366SX
BORDYIELL
Y trOYIER
BA UkPtof
OnlYT.s
' lbe
Hp (19ms
MBRAlll,60MB 44NIB35"
16,VGA
.366SX

<
. pos 5 L
>YiHG CASE

storks

A
M

"" es

megabytes of disk spacel), I saved the final

image as a TIFF.

I i m ported t h e T I F F i n t o A l d u s
FreeHand and added the small type (news,
reviews, titles, etc.) as PostScript type using

Adobe fonts. The flnal image wascolor~

arated directly from FreeHand and output
at 1270 dpi to a Linotronic imageset ter.

Trident 512K 16-bil VGAcard

Lic
ensedAMIBIOS TowerCase
101-key Enhancedkeyboard
105 M B Fujilsu Herd Drive (18ms)
1.2MB -5.25' or 1 44MB- 3.5'

8 5.0 Lotus Ijl/orifs

40exx'
arouse"

WordProcessor,Database

Sprea
dsheet,Communiml'
un/cat/one
GraPhicsPacifage,
Pellcheckei, Thesaurus

8 Users'/Technical Manuals
Customized Conliguralion
3 Years Limited Warranty

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VGA Package A

1024' 768 Resolution

Trident 1MB, 16-bilVGA
Magnavox SuperVGAColour Monitor
14" Monitor w/lilt & swivel
.28Dot Pitch

Motorola 8000M 2 for 1 Sale .....

'398

MOtOrala ClaSSiC(1battery) ..............

INagnavoxHeadstart 2400
POCket MOdem (Batlery/ACPower).................

Motorola Ultra Classic (2batteries)

s

Zoltrix 8/R FAXMODEM

98/24 w/Bitfax

INOterOla DPC 500(1 battery).................

Motorola DPC 888 (2batteries)...............

onger fioating nor selected. I simply pasted

another copy of the logo end positioned it
exactly over the first one.
The laser pxinters and NEC multhnedia
images were scanned, selected and pasted
in a shnilar fashion.
Once the drcuit board, logo, laser printers and multimedia images had all been
assembled in Photoshop (by this time, the
files-ingrogress amounted to nearly 60

Megnevox.39SuperVGAMonitor

MotorolaMicro-TAC LITE(1 battery)....

Fujitsu Pocket Commander(1 battery)

--'498
'868
'1388
'688

Bl'tfax 2.0 for Wlntlows(wINDows 3,1 compatible!)...........

O'I % Ch

Microsoft Mouse & Windows 3.1(JustArrived!).........

Fujitsu DL-900(24-pin)................................................
Fujitsu DL-.1100(24-pin,colour)........................................
Fujitsu DL-1200(24-pin,widecarnage, optionalcolour).

All phones must be activated on Cantel 870-3 yr. Plan OAC

Cash Price / Limited Quantity Proper I.O. required
All phones featureCanadian Warranty

OUT OF TOWN CALL COLLECT!

AMPUS
OMlsUTERS

4A Ch

SEE US
ATLLC. Q E US IN SURREY
2162 WesternParkway,
Vancouver.B.C.V6T1V6 S
HOURS:Mon.to Fri.
9:30am - 5:30pm
Sat. 10:00em-4:00pm

FAX 228-$338

0%C

SA

SEEUSIN KELOWNA

10 7 46 King George
Hwy.
wre y, B.C. V3T2X7
HOURS:Mon.to Fri.
9:30am - 5:30pm
Sal. 10:00em 4:00pm
-

-6-1551 SutherlandAve.
Kelowne, B.C.V1Y5Y7
HOURS:Tues. to Fri.
9:30am - 5:30pm
Sel. 10:00am 4:00pm
-

FAX 584-83$3

FAX 862-8083

58.8080 584 8080 862.3188

CEX486DX

Power System

33MHz
System
Intel 486DX-33 CPU

Intel 80486DX-80 Microprocessor

BK Internal/286K Exlemal Cache
Built-in Malh Co-Processor
AMI 486 BIOS
1.2 or 1.44MB TEAC Floppy Disk Drive
'l20MB IDE Hard Drive
Dock/Calendar with Ialtery Backup

AMI 486 BIOS

IK internal/64K External Cache

IuiN-In Math Co-Processor
105MI Vi e C o il Hard Drive
4MB RANI (exp. to 32MI)
1.2MI or IA4MB Roppy Dmfe
1:1 IDE Conlroller
2 Serksl, 1 ParaNel, 1 Games Ports
Clock/Calendar wNh Boilery Backup
FujNsu Soft Taclle 101 Key Enhanced Keyboard
Trident 89NC SVGA Card wilh 1MI RAM
14 SVGA Colour Monitor, .28mm 1024x768
14' DIAMOND Series Mini-Tower Case
2NW CSA Approved Power Supply
2 Years Paris and Labour Wananty (Carry-In)

CEX386DX

33 or 40MHz System
386DX-33 or 40 CPU
AMI 386 BIOS

64K External Cache

Socket for Malh Co-Processor
105MB Voice Coil Hard Drive
4MI RAM (exp. to 32MI)
1.2MB or lA4MB Floppy Drive
I:1 IDE Controller
2 Serial, 1 Parallel, 1 Games Ports

Fuidsu SoN-Tactile 101 Key Enhanced Keyboard

Trident 89NC SVGA Card with 1MB RAM

14' SVGA Colour Monitor

14' DIAMOND Series MIni-Tower Case
2NW CSA Approved Power Supply

Clock/Calendar wNh BaNery Backup

FujNsu 101 Key Enhanced Keyboard
Trident 89NC SVGA Card wilh 1MI RAM
14' SVGA Colour MonNor, .28mm
14' DIAMOND Series Mini-Tower Case
200W CSA Approved Power Supply

2 Years Parts and Labour Warranty (Carry-In)

00

oo

00

RIKIH

CEX386DX 8( CEX386SX
25MHz Systems

Epson D(810 9pln 180cps.

Epson LQ570 24pin 192cps.. .
.

. . . . . .
Epson Acrion Laser II 6ppm 512K.
.

Raven PR9102 9pin 240cps.

Raven RP9105 9pin Colour Capable.

Raven PR2416 24pln 192cps.

Raven PR2418 24pin 240cps.
Raven PR2465 24pin 192cps 132col.
Raven PR2465Q 24pin 240cps 132col.
Raven PR2466 24pin 300cps 132col.
Raven RP9105/RP2406 Colour Upgrade ICh.
.

269

419
477

, 199
225

419

AMD 386-25 MHz CPU

AMI 386 BIOS
Socket for Math Co-Processor
80MB Voice Coil IDE Hard Drive
1MB RAM (expandable to 8MB)
1.2MB or 1ANMB Floppy Drive
I:I IDE Controller
2 Serial, 1 Parallel, 1 Games Paris
Clock/Calendar with Baltefy Backup
Fujitsu 101 Key Enhanced Keyboard
OAK SVGA Card wilh 512K RAM
14' SVGA Colour Monitor, .28mm
Mini Desktop Case
200W CSA Approved Power Supply

719

Raven LP510 SPPM 300dpl 512K.

Raven LP530 Sppm 300dpl 1024K LaserJet III Comp
Raven IP1110 Ilppm 300dpl 512k.. . . . .
Raven LP1170ps llppm 300dpi 2MB PS.
Raven RP240624 pin 192cps Colour Capable.
OKI OL820 8ppm 300dpl 512k.
OKI OL840 Bppm 300dpi 2MB PS.
NEC Model 90 300dpi 2048K.
NEW Epson EPLBSS Postscript 300dpi
.

Legend Serial Mouse.

Gravh Joyskck.. . . . . . . .
Logitech Trackman Serial/Bus.
Logitech RadloMouse (cordless).
Logltech MouseMan Serial/Bus.
Summasketch 12x12 (w/4button cursor).
Logitech Scanman Rus/256.
OEM Microsoft Mouse. . . . . .
Epson Full-Pa e Colour Scanner (Demo, I only).
.

2 Years Paris and Labour

Warranty (Carry-In)

ATI 24$etc MNP5 Int/Ext

ATI 98$etc External V.42bis.
Cardinal 24$ Internal (Software MNP).
Cardinal 24$ External MNPS.
U.S. Robotics Sportster 2400 External.
U.S. Robotics Courier 144$ Ext. V.42.
U.S, Robotics Courier 14400 Ext. V.32.

s s

1 399' 1 249'

Fuiitsu DexTen Fax (I only).

RavenEax RF-250.
RavenFax RF-260.
RavenFax RF-270.
Fremont Fax 9600 S/R (Demo).
Cardinal Sendfax/2400bps Modem.
.

PROF
ESSIONALNElWORI( SOLUTIONSI amma

.. .

. 899
195
139

. . 780

. 599

..

. 489
119

.. 249
. 389
.. 419

75

. 135

.. . . 195
.. . . 745

. 249/279
.. . 499

. 2 4 99

..

. . .2 6 95

Tricorn 16 St VGA Card IMB.

.. 215
.. 149

Trident 8900C SVGA Card IMB.

ATI XL w/Mouse IMB.
ATI Vantage w/Mouse IMB.
ATI Ultra w/Mouse IMB.
Volante AT6($ Win. Accelerator (S3 Chipset)
V olante ATII I M B .
.

N 0 V E L L.

Oak 16 Bit VGA Card (800x600) 256K.

OEM ATI Wonder KL 1MB.. . . . .

ACCPAC'~~

1.2/144MB TEAC Floppy Drives.

40 MB 23ms IDE Hard Drive.
80MB 18ms Voice Coll IDE Drive.
105MB lsms Voice Coil IDE Drive...
120MB 17ms Voice Coil IDE Drive.
210MB 15ms Voice Coll IDE Drive.

21' IDEK5221 Non-Interlaced 1280x1024

.

.. .

QHKB2ISRI

Complete Communicator.
Zoltrlx 96($/24$ Fax/Modem.
.

Intel Sathfaxrion.

(all modeh .28mm dot pitch, 1024x768. unless spec ryred)

14' V504 Mono VGA .31 640xrif$.
. . . . . 13 9
14' Darius SVGA
14' Darius NorHnt.
14' Aamazing SVGA
.. . . . .3 70
14' Aarmsring SVGA Non-lnt.
14" Legend SVGA.
. . . . . 35 9
14' Legend SVGA Nonint
14' ADI MicroScan 3E N/I 72Hz.
510
15' NEC Muhlsync 3FGX
. . . . . C A LL
15' NEC Multisvnc 4FG.
. . . . . CA L L
IT Datatrain DC617 .3lmm Non-lnt.
.. 1155
17' IDEK 5217 Non-Interiaced 70Hz.
.. . . . 1 3 50

sz

953KI

. . . 79/89
549
219/429

49
. . 115/125

1549
. 2399
329
1589
. 2249
1777
. CALL

.. 119
. 270
.. 475

. 399
.

875

Prices ctnd specNcolions subject to chonge without notice. Prices reflect 2% discount for cash or certNed cheque. Visa and MasterCard accepted (2% Service Charge).

Store Hours:

Mon-Fri 10AM to 6PM

Saturday 10AM to 5PM
Closed Sunday

O ur li

ear

in Vancouver!

Downtown

650 Seymour Street

Vancouver, B.C.
V6B 3K4

Broadway
1041 W. Broadway

Vancouver. B.C.
V6H lE2

(604) 683-1788

(604) 732-1088

FAX: (604) 683-1333

FAX: (604) 733-5130

Edmonton Location: 13222 118 Avenue. Edmonton, AB, T5L 4N4

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