News Common PC Linux Mac CUCUG
The April 17 gathering will be one of our split SIG meetings. The Linux SIGwill be engaged by John Ross in some Java programming. The PC and MacintoshSIGs will conduct open forum Question and Answer Sessions. If you have anyproblems, this will be the meeting to have them addressed.
We welcome any kind of input or feedback from members. Run across aninteresting item or tidbit on the net? Just send the link to the editor.Have an article or review you'd like to submit? Send it in. Have a comment?Email any officer you like. Involvement is the driving force of any usergroup. Welcome to the group.
Microsoft Works 7.0 (retail box)
Works 7.0 is home productivity software for your PC. The suite includes a word processor, spreadsheet, database, and calendar. And, Works 7.0 has new, professionally designed templates, and a new tool to help organize common projects. The software is even easier to learn and use, but flexible enough to let more advanced users jump right into what they want to do. Works helps you make professional-looking documents and get tasks done quickly. Keep track of up to 32,000 records with Works Database. Organize and track expenses, home inventories, and collections with Works Spreadsheet. Make planning and managing projects easier with the new My Projects organizer. Get quick access to your schedule, to-do list, and Works tools via the quick-start Task Launcher home page. Street price $46.99.
Microsoft Windows XP Inside Out (Book and CD)
Ed Bott and Carl Siechert have combined their considerable talents for producing user-level documentation in creating Microsoft Windows XP Inside Out. One of the most carefully researched books on Windows XP to date, this large volume has all the information and procedures most everyday users of the operating system will want. With its nicely formatted how-to instructions, detailed documentation of command-line commands, intelligent explanatory text, and broad scope, this book makes a great reference for a family or business that uses Windows XP extensively. Even the illustrations are more helpful than usual, largely because the publisher has gone to the trouble of annotating many of them with pointers and labels. Street price: $31.49.
Microsoft Plus! Digital Media Edition
"At $20, this is a software package perhaps unmatched in terms of bang for the buck if you're really into digital imaging and computer music" - James Coates, Chicago Tribune (January 18, 2003). Pioneering features in Plus! Digital Media Edition like Photo Story offer photo buffs the ability for the first time to tell the story behind their digital pictures with easy-to-create digital photo albums," said Dave Fester, general manager of Microsoft's Windows Digital Media Division. "Packed with cool new innovations like this, Plus! Digital Media Edition takes the photos, music, and home movies in Windows XP to a whole new level. Street price: $19.99.
Apple has rolled out several improvements in its latest system release, MacOS X 10.2.5. Bluetooth support has been added for Nokia 7650 and P800phones, and the Bluetooth Setup Assistant now recognizes some Microsoftmice and keyboards. Also supported are a trio of Canon cameras, and a hostof disc burners. On the networking front, the update fixes issues of DNSlookup, copying files to an SMB volume, Internet Sharing of certain DSL orcable modem connections, .Mac passwords up to 32 characters long, andproblems with LDAPv3 connections timing out. The update also resolves asecurity issue with shared Drop Box folders and problems with internalmodems connecting to certain Scandinavian ISPs.
Of course, the 10.2.5 update includes a grab bag of other enhancements,such as the date being reset to 1969 or 1970 at startup, improved Mailresponsiveness and character encoding in a dozen languages, and fixes toClassic. Lastly, Apple Event traffic between Classic and native Mac OS Xsoftware has been improved. Apple is offering the update in threeconfigurations: a stand-alone 38.2 MB update from Mac OS X 10.2.4,available via Software Update or as a separate download; a downloadable81.9 MB Combo update for any version of Mac OS X 10.2 or later; and as anupdate CD that can be purchased from the online Apple Store for $20 (lookin the Apple Software section). [JLC]
http://www.info.apple.com/kbnum/n25406
http://www.info.apple.com/kbnum/n120210
http://www.info.apple.com/kbnum/n120211
http://store.apple.com/
Apple's widely adopted beta Web browser received an update today to PublicBeta 2. New in this incarnation is the capability to browse multiple pageswithin the same window using a tabbed interface, along with the AutoFillfeatures made popular by Internet Explorer. This release includes a newReset Safari option, which clears the history, cache, cookies, andDownloads window, along with any saved names and passwords, AutoFill text,and Google search entries. Safari Public Beta 2 also improves compatibilitywith Web standards, boosts AppleScript support, imports Netscape andMozilla bookmarks, and is available in English, Japanese, French, andGerman. The update is available via Software Update, or as a 3.7 MBdownload. [JLC]
http://www.apple.com/safari/download/
Apple has released Security Update 2003-03-24 via Software Update and as astand-alone 4.5 MB download. The update fixes a hole that could allowunauthorized remote access to the system via the open-source Samba codethat underlies Mac OS X's built-in Windows File Sharing (available from theSharing preferences pane). Also fixed is a problem with OpenSSL that couldallow RSA private keys to be compromised. Although Windows File Sharing isoff by default, the update is still important, and Apple recommends thatall customers install it. That's easy if you're running Mac OS X 10.2.4 orMac OS X Server 10.2.4, but Apple says those with earlier versions of MacOS X must either update to 10.2.4 or visit the OpenSSL and Samba Web sitesfor additional information on the available fixes, not that we could findany that would help a normal Mac user. Our advice? If you're not runningMac OS X 10.2.4, keep Windows File Sharing turned off. If you are, installthis security update. [ACE]
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=120199
http://www.openssl.org/
http://www.samba.org/
For several months now, many iPod owners have been reporting dramaticdecreases in battery charge that minimize the music player's vaunted10-hour playing ability. Apple last week released iPod 1.2.6 SoftwareUpdate, which more accurately gauges the battery charge so the iPod doesnot shut down prematurely. Apple claims that the update offers longerstandby time for all iPods and increases playback time on scroll-wheelmodels. Separate updaters are available for Mac OS X (5.2 MB), Mac OS 9(6.2 MB), and Windows (12.6 MB). [JLC]
http://www.apple.com/ipod/
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=122014
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=120198
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=120119
Companies like to populate their board of directors with notable industryleaders, but in typical Apple fashion the company has snagged a directorwith more name value than most: former Vice President Al Gore. In makingthe announcement, Steve Jobs cited Gore's experience of "having helped runthe largest organization in the world - the United States Government."Although this is his first private sector board seat, Gore brings more thanjust name recognition to the post: during his 25 years of governmentservice, he was instrumental in helping to fund what became the Internet,he currently serves as a Senior Advisor to Google, and he holds threevisiting university professorships. Gore fills the board seat formerlyoccupied by Larry Ellison, who resigned last year due to schedulingconflicts. Kudos to Apple for having the sense of humor to link to theCrazy Apple Rumors commentary about Gore's election on the Apple Hot Newspage. In a related move, Apple also announced a variety of changes tocorporate governance, including adding independent directors, increasingthe use of independent board committees, and reducing the number ofoutstanding stock options. [JLC]
http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2003/mar/19gore.html
http://www.crazyapplerumors.com/2003_03_16_archive.htm
http://www.apple.com/hotnews/
http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2003/mar/20governance.html
Nearly five years ago, Apple bucked the general computing trend by thinkingdifferent and releasing a gumdrop-shaped machine that reinvigorated thecompany and ushered in a wave of translucent plastics. Last week, Applequietly discontinued the CRT iMac, which has been replaced by the popularflat-screen iMac and the eMac. [JLC]
http://www.apple.com/pr/library/1998/may/6imac.html
There was a question about image formats in the last MacSIG. Someone wantedto know the best format to save an image in for various uses. I told Kevin,I'd write something up about image formats and color. The following is notthe end all of info on the subject. It is just a quick look/see. It is nottotally accurate, but pretty close to the mark. It comes down to this...
JPEG is one of the most common image formats on the web. It is particularlygood for photo images where there is a lot of color and texture change. Itallows millions of colors in the image. It is a "lossie" format. I don'tlike that description, but I haven't seen a better one-word description,yet. What this means is that it is a compressed image and the compressionsystem sacrifices image quality for size. I have been told this happenevery time you open the file. So hypothetically, the image would turn tomush if you opened and closed it enough times. Can't say I have tested thistheory. (Don't plan to, either.)
When you compress an image with JPEG compression you get what I call, 'JPEGWorms,' blurry squiggly distortions of the image. The more the compressionthe bigger and nastier the 'worms.' JPEG images can be RGB or CMYK colors.When I save any JPEG I use the highest quality setting possible. Imagequality is important to me, much more so than hard drive space. Manydigital cameras get around the size problem and possible loss of quality bystoring a large image 17" x 23" at 72 ppi (pixels per inch) They then putabout a 60% (±) compression rate on it and they get an image that takes upabout 196 KB of disc space. The same image saved as an uncompressed TIFFwould be about 5.3 MB. More on TIFFs later.
GIF is one of the next most common image formats on the web. It is good forimages where the colors and textures are simple. Something like a logo orsimple color graphic background would be a good candidate for this format.It only allows for 256 colors or index colors, though. Photo images storedas GIFs tend to show banding when there is a gradient, like light from awindow shining on a wall. It makes for bad color or texture because of thisbanding problem. The same image I was referring to in the paragraph abovewould be 804 KB saved as a GIF.
Now we get to image formats that are not so common on the web...
TIFF is one of the best formats available for those interested in imagequality over image size. TIFF files are large, but you don't lose anyquality. This is what I store my image as. TIFF files can be RGB files,CMYK or Index colors. In many ways, the TIFF file format is the mostflexible file format for images. As mentioned above, the same 21" x 17" x72 ppi image would be 5.3 MB large. There are compression systems for TIFFimages - LZW, JPEG, ZIP. But JPEG we have talked about, LZW is notsupported by all image and graphic applications, and ZIP is an archivalmethod and might not be importable or exportable to other applications.
PICT is Apple's image format and so is not completely cross-platformfriendly. It is a good method of storing images, but it might not work wellin all applications. Files can be index, RGB or CMYK color. There areseveral levels of JPEG compression available for PICT files. And the testfile I have been referring to above would be 2.8 MB large.
EPS files are great files in the graphics field. But they are problematicwhen it comes to applications recognizing them and/or handling the info inthem correctly. Evidently, there are many different variations of EPS. Andnot all applications recognize every version.. My experience with Photoshopis pretty hit and miss. Certain applications like Freehand and Illustrator,which are designed to work with Photoshop, can export EPS file thatPhotoshop has no problem with. Some other apps. can't export an EPS thatPhotoshop will recognize at all. Quite often any font that is in an EPSrequires the the system opening up the EPS have the font installed for theimage to be displayed properly. There are other potential hassles involvedwith EPS files as well. But, when the apps. can produce the correct EPSfile, the graphic can be much better and potentially sizable with less lossof image quality. When it works, it can work VERY well, but when it fails,it can be very spectacular.
So, a file 17" x 21" x 72 dpi would be...
- 196 KB as a JPEG,
- 804 KB as a GIF,
- 5.3 MB as a TIFF,
- 2.8 MB as PICT and
- 7.2 MB as a Photoshop EPS.
Any file, PICT, TIFF or whatever, becomes a JPEG with all it's hassles whenyou apply JPEG compression to it. RGB is a Red, Green and Blue color schemeused in all projected color - film, monitors, etc. CMYK is a 4-colorscheme (cyan, magenta, yellow, black) used in printing color documents; itis a reflective color scheme. You tend to not be able to get the realbright, pure colors in a CMYK color scheme.
That's all I could think of at this time. Hope it is of interest.
More than 20,000 websites have been hacked since the war on Iraq beganaccording to one security firm.
UK security firm F-Secure has seen a dramatic rise in the number of hackattacks since the conflict started last week.
In the first few days of the conflict there was a flurry of attempts toaccess vulnerabilities on websites such as that of the US Navy.
Defacements from pro-Islamic hacking groups suggested that it was thebeginning of a new era of cyber hacking.
Peace campaigners
Now it seems that the hackers are getting closer to sensitive targets withboth the Whitehouse and Number 10 websites suffering attacks over theweekend according to F-Secure.
"More and more people are joining in the fray," said General Manager ofF-Secure Jason Holloway.
"The majority of the messages are still anti-war," he added.
Qatar-based TV station Al-Jazeera has reported that a denial-of-serviceattack could have been conducted on its website.
The attack has not been confirmed and could just be due to a large weightof traffic. Al-Jazeera has now launched an English-language version of itswebsite which has also suffered outages.
This conflict has seen a new breed of hacktivist, in the shape of pro-peacecampaigners who have been joining pro-Islamic hackers and pro-Americangroups in expressing their grievances online.
Political tensions around the globe are often mirrored in cyberspace.
Increased tensions in the Middle East and between Pakistan and India haveall been used by so-called hacktivists to launch web defacements and denialof service attacks.
Three Iraq war-related computer viruses, including the Ganda worm, havealso been spotted by F-Secure, although the damage done by these has beenlimited.
A possible glitch with a new processor has thrown a wrench into Intel'splans to bring out new silicon for high-performance chips fortop-of-the-line PCs.
Intel delivered a new chipset on schedule Monday but delayed a matchingPentium 4 processor at the last minute, leaving a raft of upcoming PCswithout a processor, at least for a while.
The chipmaker had planned to deliver both its new 875P chipset and a new3GHz Pentium 4 processor, paving the way for a number of new desktop andworkstation models from PC makers including Dell Computer, Hewlett-Packardand Gateway.
Currently, the 3GHz Pentium 4 is the only chip that supports the faster800MHz bus delivered by the 875P chipset. PC makers could offer computerswith the 857P and existing 533MHz-bus Pentium 4 chips, but they are highlyunlikely to do so.
The possibility of a problem with the 3GHz Pentium 4, discovered at thelast minute, forced the company to delay the chip late Sunday. Duringtests, Intel found "anomalies" with the new chips and decided not todeliver any more of them to PC manufacturers.
Intel has "seen some anomalies, and we're going to put (the 3GHz Pentium 4)on ship hold, temporarily," said George Alfs, a company spokesman. "We'reinvestigating (the problem) and hope to be shipping soon."
These issues do not affect current chips, such as the 3.06GHz Pentium 4with a 533MHz bus that has been shipping since November, he said.
PC makers have inventory of the new 3GHz chip, but it is unlikely any ofthe chips have gotten to end customers yet. Intel is still talking with PCmakers about what to do with the 3GHz chips that are in the field.
Launches of complicated new processors, chipsets and other chips aresubject to delays, but problems associated with Pentium 4 chips have beenfairly rare. Intel postponed the introduction of the original Pentium 4 byabout a month because of a minor chipset bug. The last holdup that Intelfaced for a major desktop processor launch came during an intenseclock-speed battle with chip rival Advanced Micro Devices, when Intelannounced and then recalled its 1.13GHz Pentium III.
AMD has had its share of delays as well. The most recent pushed out theintroduction of the Athlon 64, the company's next generation of desktopprocessors, until September.
Aiming for the high end
Although desktop PC prices continue to fall, themarket for top-of-the-line PCs is active. The 875P chipset, code-namedCanterwood, will become the new nervous system for such desktops, whichtypically are priced at $1,500 and higher.
A chipset routes data between the processor and various PC parts, such asRAM or the hard drive. Boosting the performance of a chipset improves theperformance of a PC.
As previously reported, the 875P is the first of two new Intel desktop PCchipsets coming out this spring that are designed to enhance PCs with Intelchips.
The 875P starts that transition by offering PCs a faster 800MHz bus, fastermemory and an increased maximum hard-drive capacity. Intel said the chipsetwill provide a significant increase in performance, compared with currentproducts.
But the 875P will also be known for what it does not include. The chipsetis Intel's first product in about six months for high-end PCs that does notinclude Rambus RDRAM. Instead, the 875P includes dual-channel support for400MHz double data rate SDRAM, or DDR400.
"There was a situation where Intel's DDR platform had not been at the levelof competing platforms," said Dean McCarron, chief analyst at MercuryResearch. "This allows Intel to have an offering for every performancelevel. It represents a significant improvement in input-output capability"for PCs.
Like Via Technologies or Silicon Integrated Systems, which also offerchipsets for Intel processors, Intel chose DDR400. Intel passed over thealternative, Rambus' RDRAM technology, because it wanted to serve thewidest portion of the PC market possible, an Intel representative said. Atone time, Intel backed RDRAM and expected the memory to proliferate in thePC market. But this has not occurred, due to factors such as a higherprice.
Another feature specific to the 875P is called Performance AccelerationTechnology (PAT), which increases the speed at which data moves between theprocessor and memory.
The 875P will also pack AGP (accelerated graphics port) 8X, which connectsthe graphics chip to the processor; and Serial ATA, a faster and relativelynew way to connect a hard drive to the rest of the computer.
But one of its most popular features will likely be an option that allowsPC makers to add a technology called RAID (redundant array of inexpensivedisks). RAID allows two hard drives to pool their storage capacity,turning, say, a pair of 120GB drives into a single storage vessel thatequals 240GB. RAID also can be used as a safety net to back up data.
PC makers already are planning models based on the technology. Gateway thisweek had planned to launch the 700XL, a new desktop model that will utilizeRAID to provide 400GB of storage capacity, using two 200GB drives.
The desktop will also incorporate the new 3GHz Pentium 4, 1GB of DDR400RAM, a DVD burner, a CD burner, ATI Technologies' latest Radeon 9800G Prographics card and an 18-inch flat-panel display. It will sell for $3,499. Aless expensive model without RAID, the 700X, was also in the works.
Dell, which has also planned to launch a new Dimension 8300 desktop withthe 3GHz Pentium 4 and the 875P, expects to include a RAID setup at a laterdate. The company chose to use an add-in card for RAID, and it is stilltesting that configuration for bugs, a company representative said.
Dell will take orders on the Dimension 8300 desktop while it investigatesthe processor issue, a company spokesperson said. "We're still looking intothe scope of the issue and how it's going to impact us," he said.
Gateway is also looking into the issue, a spokesperson for the companysaid.
Should a long delay result, PC makers could still use the 875P chipset.Pairing the chipset with current 533MHz bus Pentium 4 chips would stillproduce some performance gains for future desktops, McCarron said.
"They could easily go with current bus frequency processors until 800MHzbus parts become available," he said. "Though, unless it's a major flaw, Ican't imagine it it'll mess up any (PC makers') production plans."
HP, meanwhile, announced a new xw4100 workstation model featuring the newPentium 4. The desktop, designed for tasks such as computer-aided design,will offer customers higher performance than previous HP workstationmodels, the company said. The machine, due out in May, will start at $799for a bare-bones system with a basic graphics card. When beefed up for 3Dgraphics duties, it will cost $2,500.
On the horizon
Despite the possibility of delays in the launch of the newdesktops, Intel views the 875P chipset as the start of a transition thatwill spawn a new generation of PCs.
A second chipset, dubbed Springdale, will include many of the same featuresas the 875P when it is released in May. Springdale will cost less and beavailable in more configurations, making it the choice for bulk of theIntel processor desktop PC market.
The most popular Springdale version is likely to offer the 800MHz bus aswell as Intel's current 533MHz and 400MHz bus speeds. It should alsoinclude a built-in graphics chip. The combination of bus speeds andgraphics would allow manufacturers to build a wide range of desktops fromthe same platform.
Intel is also expected, within weeks, to launch a new 3.2GHz Pentium 4 chipas its new flagship desktop processor. The announcement could include pricecuts for older chips.
The company may also add more Pentium 4 processors to its lineup, likely atspeeds of 2.8GHz, 2.6GHz and 2.4GHz. These chips will sport the company'snew 800MHz bus and include Intel's hyperthreading technology for boostingapplication performance.
Aside from providing a wider variety of clock speeds, the chips also couldhelp increase the popularity of hyperthreading. Some PC makers have beenshipping PC and workstation models with the feature turned off by default.The new chips should lead PC makers to tout the technology more actively.
Once it begins shipping, the new 3GHz Pentium 4 chip will sell for $417 inlots of 1,000. The 875P will cost $50 without RAID and $53 with RAID, whenpurchased in lots of 10,000, Intel said.
Microsoft plans to deliver two specialized versions of its Windows operating system software for Advanced Micro Devices' forthcoming 64-bit processors.
In March, Microsoft released both 32-bit and 64-bit versions of Windows Server 2003 to PC manufacturers for Intel chips, including the Xeon and Itanium 2. It also released a 64-bit version of Windows XP for Itanium 2 workstations.
Now the company is doing the same for AMD chips.
Microsoft said Tuesday that it will offer a 64-bit version of Windows Server 2003 for AMD's Opteron server chip. The software giant also intends to release a 64-bit variant of Windows XP for the chipmaker's Athlon 64 processor for desktops and notebooks.
Microsoft and AMD have been working together since at least April 2002. The two companies have since demonstrated prototype versions of the 64-bit server software and other Microsoft applications running on Opteron servers.
But until now the software maker had not officially named the versions of its operating system that would be adapted for AMD chips. Beta versions of the operating systems will be available at midyear, Microsoft said.
Opteron, the first of the two 64-bit chips to debut from AMD, will launch later this month at an event in New York. The Athlon 64 launch in September, AMD has said.
The new chips are designed to offer higher performance than current AMD processors. But their most prominent feature will be 64-bit addressing, a feature that AMD has dubbed x86-64.
The x86-64 technology adds several new instructions to the current x86 processorarchitecture so that it can address 64 bits of data, twice as much as can 32-bitAMD Athlon and Intel Pentium x86-based chips. That increase will letcomputers--mainly servers--access a much larger amount of memory at once,improving performance by reducing the need to seek out data on a hard drive.
The x86-64 format allows AMD chips to support both 32- and 64-bit addressing.
"Charles W. Hancock Jr." writes
> I took the Knopix CD up to the old 98 machine and booted it. It was
> effortless, but it's all in German and I don't speak German well enough
> to understand everything, so how can I make the English version run (if
> possible)?
Since I gave this CD out to everyone who attended the last meeting,and others may have the same question, I'm copying the whole group [UI-PCUG].
The English documentation (viewable from Windows), and the F2 help screen(cheatnotes.txt) covers this. Type:
lang=us
at the boot: prompt.
Hint: with the default German keyboard mapping the = key gives you
something else, so use the ) to get an =.
http://uiarchive.uiuc.edu/mirrors/ftp/ftp.uni-kl.de/pub/linux/knoppix/knoppix-cheatcodes.txt
Hint: Using the default DE-bootimage, SYSLINUX boots with German
keyboard layout. The '=' letter is located at Shift-0 on this
keyboard (just in case you want to change keyboard and language
with lang=us).
Most of the web pages have a language selection menu where EN isEnglish.
The English version is now online at:
ftp://ftp.uni-kl.de/pub/linux/knoppix/KNOPPIX_V3.2-2003-03-21-EN.iso
and should be available in town on UIArchive soon.
(It's a slow download from Germany.)
[Later....]
The files have been changing, and hard to mirror, but there are someEnglish copies now available locally from:
http://uiarchive.uiuc.edu/content/Linux/Distributions/Knoppix/
or
ftp://uiarchive.uiuc.edu/content/Linux/Distributions/Knoppix/index.html
No matter what changes, these locations will list the latest versionswe have on campus at least until next summer.
Once again I find myself checking out the newest SuSE release, and to tellyou the truth, I really enjoy it. My personal computer is running Slackware(yes, I upgraded to 9.0 immediately), and I wouldn't trade it for any otherdistribution in the world, but I've got to say is that SuSE is still at thetop of their game. When you look at all the desktop distros out there suchas Mandrake, Lycoris, and Red Hat, they all really have their endearingfactors, but they all are lacking in one way or another. This is not to saythat SuSE is perfect, because it's not. It has it's irritations just likeany other OS, but they are minimal. More on that later... let's get on withit.
Joe Eckert at SuSE, as always, rushed a copy of their newest Professionalrelease to us. I finished up my work, brewed a fresh pot of coffee, and satdown with our new found treasure. It was just like Christmas. No otherdistro really gets me this excited, except for maybe Slackware :) Hey, I'mthe first guy to check out all the new toys, and I don't miss a chance toplay.
The test machine used is a clone we built with the following specs:
* Abit KG7-RAID mainboard
* AMD Athlon XP 1600+ CPU
* 512MB RAM
* LG 40x CD/RW
* SoundBlaster Live! Platinum 5.1 w/ Live!Drive
* 3Com 905C NIC
* 60GB HDD
* 128MB MSI NVIDIA GeForce4 MX440 AGP Video
* 256MB USB Pen Drive
The nice part about a machine like this is that we usually don't run intotoo many compatibility issues. In a way I prefer this, but it would be niceto have some really interesting parts to test with, but our budget doesn'tpermit it at this time. Donations are welcome :)
Installation
If you've ever installed SuSE Linux before, the installation routine hasnot changed much at all. If you haven't, let me explain the procedurebriefly for you. SuSE has always had a great installer, though it can be abit cumbersome due to the amount of user input it requires... compared toother distros in its class. For instance, Ark Linux requires the end userto answer only a few questions before proceeding. Red Hat and Mandrake ask afew more. Slackware asks more, but is for a more experienced user. SuSEstops at every step of the way and asks about configuration. I'm not reallysaying this is bad, because it isn't, but it's not for the impatient. Thenice part about it is that when setup is complete, you will have a runningsystem that really doesn't require any more setup. Once the OS is up andrunning, you can immediately begin working (or playing, depending on thesituation). The first thing I noticed when the installer started was thatit was using anti-aliased fonts and the Keramik theme. Nice touch! Comparedto their previous versions, this is a welcome change. Most people view thisas purely eye candy, but I tend to think of it differently. I see it asless of a strain on your eyes to read the text presented to you. It alsolooks more appealing to new users. Those of us who have used Linuxextensively have grown somewhat used to looking at jagged fonts over theyears, but to a new user (coming from Windows or Mac), this is an immediateturn off. My hat's off to SuSE for realizing the importance of firstimpressions.
The next thing that stood out, other than flawless hardware detection andmy time zone was actually correct, was that GNOME was not selected bydefault in the software list. Well, what about all my apps that require theGNOME/GTK libraries? No problem. I did a search on some of the librariesnecessary for operation of traditional GNOME/GTK apps and they were allpreselected. Nice touch. This goes a long way with me. For the diehardGNOME users out there, it is still an option. Don't worry. I used to be aGNOME user, but tried KDE 3.1 when it came out and was immediately aconvert. SuSE has always placed more emphasis on the KDE environment, sothis was not surprising at all. I made some custom selections to try andbreak dependencies, and in true SuSE fashion it popped up with a dependencycheck prompt asking me about my choices. It displayed all the dependenciesI was going to break and allowed me to solve them either by removing theoffending package or installing packages to meet the requirements.
The next noticeably improved feature is that... you better sit down forthis because it's huge... YaST (Yet another Setup Tool) actually WORKS!During setup YaST prompts you near the end for online updates through theYOU (YaST Online Update) tool. Usually you either sit there for 20 minuteswhile it times out, or it just simply doesn't work at all. This time itconnected to the Internet, downloaded updates, and prompted me with theselections it found (I think there were only three). One of them wasMicrosoft core TrueType fonts (along with a classic Microsoft licenseagreement)... another nice touch. I installed the updates with no problemat all. YOU also has a new option for automatic updating through YaST.Another fine point I did not overlook.
The graphics card setup was uneventful aside from the fact that it did notdetect the monitor properly. It tried to use the VESA 1024x768 driver andthe actual monitor is a 17" KDS VS7. No big deal here, I just selected mymonitor from the massive list presented and everything was cool as acucumber. According to the installer, I would have to download my ownNVIDIA drivers to enable 3D support. No big surprise. I do this anyway.
First Boot
More eye candy was waiting for the first boot. SuSE has covered theboot/service messages with a nice 3D splash screen complete with a progressbar. For those of us who need to see those boot messages, it tells us thatwe can press F2 to enter verbose mode. I tried it and it worked perfectly.No errors on boot.
It booted straight into KDM, I logged on as madpenguin to view the completeend user experience. When I logged in, I was presented with a traditional,and quite polished, SuSE Linux desktop.
The desktop hasn't changed much in the past couple of releases, and it verysimilar to SuSE's most recent Office Desktop release. It looks to me likethe only thing missing is Crossover Office/Plugin setup. In any case, asidefrom being a classic KDE desktop, SuSE has placed some of the mostimportant icons there to get you going with minimal fuss. One hugeimprovement is that they have finally fixed the K Menu. For those familiarwith SuSE releases of the past, the K (and GNOME) menu was a nightmare tonavigate. Customizing was even worse. The newly redesigned SuSE K Menu isgreatly improved (click on the screenshot below for a closer look at thebasic menu). Everything is organized perfectly and it's easy to find theprogram you need to do the job at hand. No more SuSE menu! That was one ofmy prior complaints with this distro was to please clean up the menusystem. They have done it and done it well.
For those who are inclined to do multimedia production on Linux, I thinkSuSE is well equipped to handle your needs. Though it seems they haveslimmed down their A/V production applications, there is still a good bitto keep you happy. I recommend that the place more emphasis on A/V editingand production apps. SuSE is one of the only distros around that actuallyseems to support them and it would be nice to see more. For now, users willfind traditional apps such as Broadcast2000 (this has been replaced byCinelerra and should be updated), Audacity, Jack, MeterBridge, etc. SLab, amulti-track audio recorder, used to be included and I am kind of sad to seeit go... and I hope it comes back. For those of us who feel the need to dovideo production, MainActor (a commercial application) has been included inthe package. Mainactor allows for video capture/editing similar to Adobe'sPremiere, but missing some of the functionality. It's still a great app tobe rolled into the price of the distro. Once again, hats off to SuSE. I'drather see commercial apps like this rolled in rather than something likeSun's StarOffice. OpenOffice.org works just as well (and as a side note,version 1.0.2 is also included).
Other apps included with this release represent a wide variety of some ofthe best open source software available today, without overdoing it. Somesay minimal is better, and in most cases that may be true... but when SuSEis evaluated, you need to approach it from this standpoint: Most end userswho will be using this distro will want it to work out of the box, and itdoes. Flawlessly. The distro is designed to make the user immediatelyproductive and it does an excellent job.
Performance
System performance is unchanged from what I can tell since the 8.1 release.KDE loads and runs perfectly with no delays launching windows and apps takeminimal time to load. It's not quite as fast as source-based distros, butfor an everyday user, this is completely acceptable behavior. It still runsTONS better than Windows 9x, NT/2000, and XP combined.
Once I installed the current 1.0-4191 video drivers from NVIDIA's site,performance in glxgears was lower than other distros I've used. Forinstance, on Slackware Linux (and also VectorLinux), graphics performancewas about 2500-2600 frames/second using OpenGL. With SuSE Linux 8.2 I amexperiencing frame rates of about 2000-2100 frames/sec. This is anoticeable drop in performance, but again, for most users this will gounnoticed. From my experience with past SuSE releases, this seems to benormal behavior, though I don't really understand why. Maybe if they placesome more attention to 3D/OpenGL gaming performance, SuSE will become thechoice of hard core gamers as well. That might be an interesting targetaudience. Linux is becoming a great gaming platform, in most casesoutperforming Windows in speed and stability, so for SuSE to jump on thisnow would be a serious plus.Conclusion
While it may not be the first choice for veteran Linux users, SuSE Linux8.2 is an excellent choice for people new to the Linux world, as well asindividuals who want an operating system that comes complete witheverything they will ever need. It also is a preferable distro to use foraudio/video content creation due to amount of programs it comes with ofthis nature. There are still others who may be interested in just having asystem that works. In all cases, SuSE does the job very well with minimaleffort.
I am glad that they have fixed a few of the long standing issues that Ihave had with this distro, such as the K menu being completely unreasonablein structure, and the online update feature never working. Both have beensolved with the 8.2 release. With the 2.4.20 kernel, it's pretty up to dateand speeds along at fairly decent speed. Like I said before, source-baseddistros perform better, but for an RPM-based distro, this one is top notch.Well, if Linus Torvalds uses SuSE as his home system (and he does), that'sgood enough for me. Enough said.
All in all, on a scale from 1 to 10, I would give SuSE Linux an even 8.2.It's easy to use, pretty to look at, works very well, and is downrightstable. The only complaint I really can think of through this wholeexperience is that some of the applications didn't work. You would launchthem from the K menu and nothing would happen. Either that or you would seethe feedback indicator blinking and then die. No errors or anything. Theyjust didn't work. I know that the developers would have trouble checkingevery app to make sure that it works the way it should, but it should playa higher priority than what it currently does. This isn't new to the 8.2release, but has been around for as long as I can remember.
Another thing to look into would be to make SMB setup accessible from YaST.There are common UNIX services such as NIS and NFS that can be controlledfrom there, but no SMB. It would be nice to be able to setup and connect toSMB shares, as well as authenticate to Windows domain controllers... allthrough the YaST tool. that's my wish. Considering the target audience ofthe SuSE desktop, this should also be job one. Many people would love to beable to easily connect to Windows networks with ease from Linux.
That's about it. If you'd like to know my thoughts on anything I haven'tmentioned here or may just be planning on making the switch to Linux, feelfree to contact me. I'd love to hear from you and give you a hand. Takecare!
MadPenguin Out >:)
As an additional note to prospective buyers, if you preorder SuSE Linux 8.2any time before April 15th, you will receive a free SuSE T-Shirt. :) Not toobad at all.
Quick Specs:
Setup and installation
* Improved software installation
* Use of various installation sources, also for individual packages
* Online update is possible even before the first login
* Detailed help in the YaST Software Installer and in the Yast Online Update
* SuSEwatcher: automatic information about available update patches
Graphical user interfaces
* KDE 3.1 with clear menu structures
* Protective mechanisms for various configuration possibilities
* Desktop sharing framework (VNC)
* Gnome 2.2 with improved usability and fonts
Office
* OpenOffice.org 1.0.2 with new functions
* Improved integration of OpenOffice.org
* Quick-start function for OpenOffice.org
* Exchange 2000 compatibility for KOrganizer
* New version of the project management tool MrProject
Security
* Encryption of directories and partitions
Internet
* New functions for ISDN and KInternet
Accounting software
* GNUCash with integrated HBCI standard
Mobile computing
* Improved profile manager
* Expanded WLAN support
Phone, fax
* Fax/answerphone functionality for ISDN cards with CAPI support
Multimedia
* Professional video editing with MainActor
* Hard disk recording with Audacity
Graphics
* 3D graphics with Blender
* Kooka, scanning software with OCR, handwriting recognition, and
automatic dictionary integration
New games
* FrozenBubbles
* FooBillard
* Marbles
Documentation and help
* Expanded help system
* 100 pages more documentation, also available on DVD/CD
New versions and professional tools
* Kernel 2.4.20
* XFree86 4.3
* KDE 3.1
* GNOME 2.2
* gcc 3.3
* Sun Java 1.4.1
* Kiosk functions in KDE 3.1 (limitation and handling of
permissions for administrators)
Years ago, when APS Technologies was the dominant hard drive vendor in theMacintosh world, I had a chat with Paul McGraw, one of the co-founders ofthe company, about why APS was starting to sell Macintosh clones. He saidthat since Apple was shipping such large hard drives at the time, hethought the hard drive after-market was going to become significantly lessprofitable. He was probably correct, particularly given the size of drivesin today's Macs. Those of us who don't do video (which happily eats all thedisk space you can throw at it) are unlikely ever to fill them.
But does that mean there's no reason for an external hard drive? Far fromit. For quite some time after I bought my first Power Mac without SCSI, Ilived without one. Not having a large external drive made me uncomfortable,though, and I was surprised how relieved I felt after buying one forsecondary backups (primary backups at the time were going to VXA-1 tape),testing backup software, providing a boot disk for troubleshooting, and soon.
Should you rush right out and buy an external hard drive? It mostly comesdown to whether or not you're the type of person who solves problems,either for yourself or for other people. Plenty of people just use theirMacs, and if something goes wrong, they get help from elsewhere. Thosepeople probably won't use an external drive sufficiently to justify thecost. But for people like me, who are always helping friends and relativeswhen we're not whacking our own systems into shape, an external hard driveis a necessity. Actually, that's a good question for a poll: do youcurrently have an external utility hard drive? Vote on our home page!
Over the last few months, I've been working with what feels like the motherof all external drives - Maxtor's 250 GB Personal Storage 5000. It isn'tjust a big FireWire and USB hard drive, though - it offers OneTouch Backup,which is a physical button on the front of the case that, when pushed,launches the bundled Retrospect Express and backs up your internal harddrive. I reviewed the Maxtor Personal Storage 5000 for Macworld recently;go read that review for details.
http://www.macworld.com/2003/03/reviews/maxtor5000/
http://maxtor.com/en/products/external/personal_storage_5000/
Although I gave the drive a positive write up in Macworld, I criticized theproduct for its default configuration, which actually duplicates thecontents of your Mac's internal hard drive to a folder on the Maxtor drive.That prevents it from being bootable; Mac OS X's System folder and otherimportant support folders must apparently be at the top level of the diskfor it to boot. Maxtor also made a mistake in how they configured theDuplicate action in Retrospect such that files you rename, move, or deleteon your internal hard drive appear multiple times in the duplicate. So,what I'd like to do here is tell you how to reconfigure the Maxtor PersonalStorage 5000 to make it into the ultimate utility drive. Don't worry if youdon't have one of these drives; this approach works equally as well withany large FireWire hard drive and Retrospect Express. These instructionsare specific to Mac OS X, but much of the general advice remains relevantfor Mac OS 9 users who don't already have a utility drive.
http://www.dantz.com/products/mac_express/
A Clean Start
Unlike many external FireWire drives, the Maxtor Personal Storage 5000 doesnot come pre-formatted, forcing you to initialize it in Apple's DiskUtility. That's not a bad thing, though, since I've seen problems onpre-formatted FireWire drives from different manufacturers. Specifically, Icould make a duplicate to the drive using Retrospect Express, but Icouldn't convince that duplicate to boot into Mac OS X. Reformatting andmaking another duplicate eliminated the problem.
As a result, I recommend you initialize any external FireWire drive firstthing, before you start using it. If you want to be really sure that thedrive is clean, click the Options button in Disk Utility's Erase tab andselect "Zero all data" as well.
There's one other decision you may need to make at this point. Will youever want to open your FireWire drive, extract the drive mechanism, andinstall it in your Mac with its contents intact? I haven't found solidinformation on this topic, but some people have had trouble using amechanism connected to the IDE/ATA bus if it was initialized in theFireWire drive enclosure. To be safe, first initialize the drive insideyour Mac, and then put it back in the FireWire case; obviously, this isn'ta possibility for PowerBook or iBook owners, unless you have a friend witha Power Mac that can be used to initialize the drive. I did not do thiswith the Personal Storage 5000, but I did make the extra effort with thebare drives I bought for use with Granite Digital's FireVue FireWire drivebay, which I'm now using for backups and which I'll write more about soon.
http://granitedigital.com/catalog/pg26_firewireidehotswapdrive.htm
Should you partition at this point? Although I used to partitionreligiously, I'm no longer a huge fan of them, and the system I describebelow works well for backing up multiple Macs without partitioning. Unlessyou have a specific reason for partitioning, I wouldn't bother.
Make It Bootable, Make It Useful
Any good utility drive must be bootable, because you may need to use itwhen your Mac's internal hard drive isn't able to start the Mac. Plus, ifyou ever want to reformat your hard disk and restore from backup, a drivethat can boot the Mac simplifies the process significantly. (Otherwise youmust reformat using your Mac OS installation CD-ROM, reinstall the Mac OS,and then restore over the newly installed copy of the operating system.)
There are two ways of making your FireWire utility disk bootable, and whichyou choose depends on the size of the disk and your situation. If you'rethe only person who is likely to use the disk, even if on another person'smachine, the easiest way to make it bootable might be to use RetrospectExpress to make a duplicate of your internal hard disk to the externaldisk. You wouldn't want to do that if other people might be using theexternal drive, or if the duplicate would take up too much of the usefulspace on that disk.
The other alternative is to install clean copies of Mac OS 9 and Mac OS Xon the external disk. You definitely want both, since some troubleshootingtools still run only in Mac OS 9. Plus, you never know what sort of Macyou'll want to use with your utility drive, so having Mac OS 9 availablefor older Macs that have never seen Mac OS X is a good idea. I opted toinstall clean versions of both Mac OS 9 and Mac OS X on the Maxtor PersonalStorage 5000.
Although Apple provides some basic utilities with both versions of the MacOS (Drive Setup and Disk First Aid in Mac OS 9, and Disk Utility in Mac OSX), you should also install any other troubleshooting utilities you mayhave, such as Alsoft's DiskWarrior or Symantec's Norton Utilities (theNorton SystemWorks bundle is a good way to acquire Norton Utilities andRetrospect Express all at once). Also be sure to install Retrospect Expressor whatever other backup software you may use. Remember that this disk willalso hold your backups, so you want to be able to boot from it,reinitialize your internal hard disk, and restore from backup with aminimum of fuss.
http://www.alsoft.com/DiskWarrior/
http://www.symantec.com/nu/nu_mac/
http://www.symantec.com/sabu/sysworks/mac/
Default Retrospect Express Configuration
Let's now look closely at how the Maxtor Personal Storage 5000 configuresRetrospect Express by default, and how you can reconfigure it to meet yourneeds better.
The magic of the Personal Storage 5000's OneTouch button is that when youpress the button, software that's installed on your Mac automaticallylaunches Retrospect Express and executes a Retrospect Express script called"Maxtor OneTouch."
A bit of background: Retrospect Express scripts are nothing likeAppleScript scripts - they're merely an automated way of telling RetrospectExpress exactly what to back up and where to store the results. They comein three basic types: Backup scripts, Duplicate scripts, and Archivescripts. Backup scripts create backup sets, which store multiple versionsof changed files and which only Retrospect Express can read. Duplicatescripts duplicate the selected files or disk to the destination as files inthe Finder, but changed files are overwritten with the current version onsubsequent runs. Archive scripts remove the files from your hard disk oncecopied elsewhere - avoid them unless you're sure of what you're doing.
The default Maxtor OneTouch script is a Duplicate script, so the "backup"you get from using it is actually a duplicate of your hard disk on theMaxtor Personal Storage 5000. That's not terrible, but with a duplicate,you lose access to previous versions of files, so if a file becomescorrupt, you could easily end up with only the corrupt version on yourbackup. True backups store multiple versions of changed files so you canrevert to an earlier version that doesn't have the corruption.
The problems arise in the way Maxtor chose to configure the Duplicatescript. First, they chose to store the duplicate in a folder at the toplevel of the Personal Storage 5000. That decision makes it a bit easier toback up multiple Macs to the same drive (since each would be in its ownfolder), but also makes it so the duplicate cannot boot a Mac in Mac OS X.Mac OS 9 isn't as picky about the location of its System Folder. Although Ihaven't confirmed this, I also worry about permissions confusions duringrestores, if you've backed up multiple Macs to standard files on the samedisk. Still, this is a design decision, and it's not inherently wrong.
What is wrong is the way Maxtor sets the Replace Corresponding Files optionin the Maxtor OneTouch Duplicate script. If you make a backup, and thenmove, rename, or delete a file from your internal hard disk, then performanother backup, you may find the results confusing. Thanks to the ReplaceCorresponding Files option, Retrospect Express won't see the original fileson the duplicate as corresponding, so it won't replace them. In short, youwill end up with the original file and another in the new location, withthe new name, or in the Trash. It's a potential nightmare when the timecomes to restore, since you must sort through and figure out which of thefiles is the correct version.
If you decide to stick with a Duplicate script, you can fix thismisbehavior: Launch Retrospect Express, select the Automate tab, and clickthe Scripts button. Then, double-click the Maxtor OneTouch script to editit, click the Destinations button, and choose Replace Entire Disk from thepop-up menu. Close and save and you won't have to worry about multipleversions of the same files littering your backup.
Better Retrospect Express Configuration
However, I don't recommend you follow the above instructions, because eventhough a Duplicate script may seem the most obvious way to back up for anovice user, it's simply not the best way to back up, period. Good backupsstore multiple versions of changed files, and for good backups, you want touse a Backup script. With just a pinch of cleverness, you can still use theOneTouch button on the Personal Storage 5000 to initiate the backups.
(For those of you who are following along, but don't have a PersonalStorage 5000, never fear, since you can easily initiate a backup inRetrospect Express by creating a "run document" that, when opened, doesexactly the same thing as pressing the OneTouch button. Just choose thescript from Retrospect Express's Run menu and save it to a file from theManual Execution dialog.)
The trick is the name of the script. First, we rename the existing scriptto get it out of the way. Select the Maxtor OneTouch script in the Scriptswindow and from the Scripts menu, choose Rename and call it something like"old Maxtor OneTouch." Now we replace it. Click the New button in theScripts window, and choose Backup when Retrospect Express prompts you for atype of script. Next, Retrospect Express asks you to name the script. Callit "Maxtor OneTouch" (without the quotes, of course). The name is important- if you get it wrong, the OneTouch button won't do anything. When you'redone, Retrospect opens the Backup: Maxtor OneTouch window where youconfigure your script.
Click the Sources button, and in the Volume Selection dialog, select yourinternal hard disk and click OK. Assuming you only want to back up one disk(Retrospect Express would be happy to do more if you have multiplepartitions), click OK to close the Maxtor OneTouch: Sources dialog andreturn to the Backup: Maxtor OneTouch window.
Click the Destinations button next, and in the Backup Set Selection dialog,click the New button to bring up the Backup Set Creation dialog. From theBackup set type pop-up menu, choose File, set a password if you feel it'snecessary, and give your backup set a name in the Name field (I usuallyappend "Backup" to the name of the hard disk I'm backing up). Click the Newbutton, and in the Save dialog that appears, save the backup set on thePersonal Storage 5000, perhaps at the top level or in the main user'sDocuments folder - it doesn't matter. Back in Backup Set Selection dialogagain, select your newly created backup set, click OK, and click OK oncemore in the Maxtor OneTouch: Destinations window.
Back in the Backup: Maxtor OneTouch window, click the Selecting button toopen the Maxtor OneTouch: Selecting dialog. Choose All Files Except CacheFiles from the pop-up menu (there's no reason to back up Web browser cachefiles), and click OK to return to the Backup: Maxtor OneTouch window.
You could, if you wanted, fiddle with the options, but you wantverification and data compression turned on, so the defaults are fine. And,particularly for folks who don't have a Personal Storage 5000, you couldalso set a regular schedule on which Retrospect Express would automaticallyback up your Mac. But if you're going to rely on the OneTouch button,there's less need to do that. Close the Backup: Maxtor OneTouch window, andwhen prompted, save your changes. Quit Retrospect Express.
That's it, and from now on, when you press the OneTouch button, RetrospectExpress launches and executes your Maxtor OneTouch script, backing up yourMac to the Personal Storage 5000. The first time will take a while, ofcourse, but subsequent backups will be much faster, since they don't haveto copy as much data.
Multiple Macs
What if you want to use the 250 GB Personal Storage 5000 to back upmultiple Macs in an office? All you must do is connect the Personal Storage5000 to each Mac in turn, and then run through the process outlined abovefor creating a Maxtor OneTouch script for each machine. It's easiest tocreate a separate backup set for each computer, rather than directing allthe backups into a single backup set. Then, all you must do to initiate abackup is to plug the drive into the Mac and into an electrical outlet,wait for it to mount on the Desktop, and then press the OneTouch button.
Still, there are two issues to consider. First, plugging and unpluggingcables, both FireWire and power, can be a royal pain if you have to rootaround behind desks and look for unused sockets. It might be worth buyingsome extra FireWire cables and Maxtor power adapters so the cables areeasily accessible. Second, the license for the bundled copy of RetrospectExpress is technically only for a single computer, so it's up to you todecide if you're comfortable interpreting the license such that it'sacceptable to use that copy of Retrospect Express with multiple Macs aslong as you use it only with the Maxtor Personal Storage 5000 drive.
Recap
Lest all this seem overwhelming, let's recap what we've done here. Wereinitialized the disk, which is a good idea with any new external drive.Then we made it bootable, either by duplicating the internal hard disk toit, or by installing clean versions of both Mac OS 9 and Mac OS X. We alsoinstalled all troubleshooting and backup utilities so they'd be availablewhen needed. Then we configured Retrospect Express to make good backupsrather than the less-useful duplicates.
Run through these steps with your external FireWire drive, whether or notit's from Maxtor, and you'll be all set the next time trouble comesknocking on your Mac's door.
PayBITS: If Adam's advice helped you set up a utility hard disk in
anticipation of future problems, show your appreciation via PayBITS!
http://www.amazon.com/paypage/P2WAYITPCEXIXO
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IRVINE, CALIFORNIA April 15, 2003. Sonnet Technologies, the worldwideleader in processor upgrade cards for Apple Macintosh computers, announcesthe new Encore/ZIF G4 1.0 GHz model, the fastest processor upgradeavailable for Power Macintosh models with ZIF (Zero Insertion Force)processor sockets. This upgrade utilizes the 745X series of Motorola G4chips, has 256K L2 and 1MB L3 cache, and delivers total processorperformance of up to ten times that of the original systems. The firstshipping version of the new Encore/ZIF G4 1.0 GHz is compatible with BeigeG3 Power Macintosh models. Announcements of additional speeds and furthercompatibility with Blue & White and G4 PCI Graphics systems are expected inthe coming weeks.
The completion of this project required that significant issues in voltage,logic, temperature and other key parameters be resolved. "Sonnet has onceagain overcome obstacles that others thought to be insurmountable," statesRobert Farnsworth, Sonnet’s President and CEO. "Sonnet adds this innovationto our broad support for the Macintosh." The new Encore/ZIF installs inminutes, integrates seamlessly with all software applications, and supportsall operating systems from Mac OS 8.6 through OS X.
"Sonnet is very excited to announce this significant speed bump to theEncore/ZIF line," reports Farnsworth. "The Encore/ZIF will enable an entiregeneration of Macs to attain modern levels of performance."
Availability and Pricing
The Encore/ZIF G4 1.0 GHz model will be shipping soon at the following MSRP:
Encore/ZIF G4 1.0 GHz-1M EG4-1000-1M $699.95
Sonnet's Entry-level Encore/ZIF G3s and G4s Sonnet continues to offer itsentry-level of award-winning Encore/ZIF G4 models, which are compatiblewith all Beige G3s, Blue & White G3 Towers, and PCI Graphics G4 Towers.MSRPs on these models are:
Encore/ZIF G3 500 MHz-1M EG3-500-1M $169.95
Encore/ZIF G4 500 MHz-1M EG4-500-1M $299.95
About Sonnet Technologies, Inc.
Sonnet Technologies, Inc., headquartered in Irvine, California, is theworldwide market share leader in processor upgrade cards, ATA diskcontroller cards, and other enhancement products for Apple Macintosh computers. After Apple Computer, Inc., Sonnet is the largest producer ofPowerPC processor-based products in the computer industry. Founded in1986, Sonnet offers processor upgrades for more Macintosh models than anyother company. To locate an authorized reseller or purchase product, visitthe Sonnet Technologies web site at http://www.sonnettech.com, or callthe company at 1-949-587-3500.
I got there late. Ed Hadley will fill in the first part of the meeting.
----
03-20-03 - The meeting started with the usual intros. Rich Rollins was theEmcee. What follows is a rough review of the nights events.
Joined - Ira Levinston, Anthony Philipp
Visitor - Muni Nakamora (Sorry, if I misspelled your name.)
General News:
Kevin Hisel was running a spyware (Ataware) app trying to clean hiscomputer after having downloaded all sorts of extra crap while downloadingRealplayer so he could watch Bagdad being bombed. RealNetwork adds a lot ofextra software that Kevin didn't want and so he was running Ataware toclean the drive on his laptop. This sparked a general discussion of spywaresoftware, and the problems related to the process.
George Krumins wanted to know when the 'give away' was happening. Kevinsaid during the WinSIG. He then mentioned what the prizes were going to be.
Richard Rollins asked Mike Latinovich to say a few words about the new AMDchip that was supposed to be out now - soon? Mike says "It's not out yet!"(But, it is supposed to be coming any day!) Developers have them, but theyaren't out for the average consumer, yet. But the server version is aboutready for launch. A discussion about what it is supposed to be and doinsued.
John Melby mentioned a 'persistent' rumor that AMD may start manufacturingPPC chips for Apple. A discussion followed about "unsubstantiated rumors." vThere was also a discussion about a totally new line of Athelon64 chips tobe coming out in the near future - a 64 bit processor. They should replacethe old 32 bit line at approx. similar prices. Consumer models are still"pie in the sky" for the time being, though.
There was a discussion about 64 bit stuff. AMD is still waiting forMicrosoft to develop a native 64 bit OS. A Unix version is around, but aWindows version isn't, yet.
Someone mentioned Screensavers.com for a newsfeed RSS service (Rich SiteService). He wants to be able to be obsessive/compulsive about news withoutanyone knowing. He wants something that doesn't require having to go to thesite every half hour. He would prefer a free one if possible.
Apple is supposed to be planning a new 30" Cinema display in the future. AlGore joined the Apple BOD. Apple is discontinuing the original iMac. For awhile Apple still has them available through the educational stores. The17" Powerbooks are finally starting to ship.
There was a discussion of Intel's new Centrino chip for mobileapplications. One of the new members mentioned he had some experience withit and was somewhat impressed, but it has it's flaws, because of 802.11variation limitations. Also, he feels the power conservation hype isn'tthat important. It has a MB of L2 cache. The general consensus was that itwas an interesting step, but there is room for improvement.
Intel is strict about the chip sets that run with it.
There was talk of a new RAM chip - Registered DDR - from Micron. It comesin a 1GB stick. A discussion followed of RAM capacities and capabilitiesand "How big is their stick" comparisons.
George Krumins said that the WinSIG should give away the software he wasdemonstrating that evening.
Emil is going to connect a camera to his computer and play with iPhotosome. George is doing a demo on a database app. (Kevin Hopkins arrives. Seebelow.)
Linux news... SCO is suing IBM. This seems to be a semi-suicidal act. Thereis talk of this being a tactic to get bought.
A bunch of new Unix builds are out. There was a discussion of various Linuxsystems and support for them. Harold says he actually read a license anddecided that if he signed the thing, it could get him fired. It would haveobligated the U of I in ways that aren't kosher. And it gave Red Hat the OKto audit the U of I computer's that run it.
There was a discussion of interesting things that companies are doing -maneuvering against each other and ultimately the customer. Some of thecompanies seem to be doing the things that the creators of Linux weretrying to get away from. (Won't get fooled again...)
New Mac versions of Unix out, Samba has a major bug in it and beware if youare running it.
There were some comments about Knopix and how it could be used to savesdrives and other things...
A new Eudora is out that actually works with OS 10.
Jack Melby discussed some problems with 10.2.4 update: Excessive batterydraining, System clock resetting to yesteryear. A modem problem -instability. These problems have been fixed in the up coming 10.2.5 update.
***************
Break time!
***************
(OK, here's where I came in.)Linux news: SCO is suing IBM for patent infringement, Kris Klindworthtalked about them. He said it is basically thought that they are makingthemselves a nuisance in hopes that IBM will buy them out, just to make theproblem go away.
Red Hat has decided to redo their entire line of products. Harold Ravlintalked disparagingly about Red Hat's service agreement. At his work, they'vedecided to go with SuSE to avoid it.
Kris said, "Lots of interesting things happening with the companies in theLinux community right now."
Mozilla 1.3 is out.
Yellow Dog Linux 3.0 is coming soon.
Samba 2.8 has a big security hole in it. If you're nuts enough to run it onthe net, get the patch.
Jack Melby said that Apple has released its latest version of X11.
Richard Rollins revisited a problem he had been having with Eudora'sinability to run on OS 10.2. He said they have released a new version,Eudora 5.2 beta 5, which now works with OS 10.2.
George Krumins talked about some more Windows patches.
Jack Melby reported that Mac OS 10.2.5 will be out in about three weeks. Healso spoke about some of the bugs in 10.2.4. There is a problem withexcessive battery drain, a problem with the system clock being reset to1969 on dual processor machines when they are not connected to a network,and there is a problem of the OS being unstable on machines using modems toconnect to the net. All of these items are corrected in the 10.2.5 update.
Kevin Hisel gave an update on the Illini tournament basketball score (agame the Illini eventually won).
Richard Rollins spoke in glowing terms about Dazzle, a hardware interfacefor connecting various devices (DVD players, videotape machines, audiosources of various types) to your computer in order to edit them and themoutput them again. The Firewire version costs $275.
Jack Melby talked about the difficulties of recovering material from oldaudio tapes.
Emil Cobb showed iPhoto. He began by importing some pictures he had takenjust before. He pulled them in to his iBook using its USB connection. Justby plugging in his camera, iPhoto recognized its presence and sucked in thephotos.
Emil showed how easy it is to present a slide show of all those photos withmusic added.
Emil said iPhoto likes 256 MB of RAM or the more memory you throw at it. Italso needs a machine capable of 1024 x 768 video resolution. Ed Hadley saidit wouldn't run on his iBook, which was only capable of 800 x 600resolution. Kevin Hopkins asked Emil about which OS iPhoto would run on.Emil said it is an exclusively OS X application.
Emil then made a photo album of just his new photos. He showed how to get information on each photo and how to add notes of your own to that picture.He then talked about importing and exporting photos and the different fileformats that were available.
During Emil's discussion of iPhoto's ability to mail out pictures, JackMelby said that if you choose to mail a photo, iPhoto reduces the file sizeto something rational. iPhoto will let you choose which mail program you'slike to use.
There was a discussion about picture quality and file format and how itchanges over each generation of copying. Ed Hadley had a lot to say on thissubject, in particular as it related to TIFF versus JPEG manipulation.
Emil talked about menues at the bottom of the iPhoto window.
Emil talked about iPhotos editing features. Although not the greatest, theyare very serviceable. He showed the Red Eye tool, the retouch tool, and afew others. He showed some photos that he'd printed out, which sparkedquestions about his printer, its resolution, and the paper he used to printout on. Emil has an inexpensive Epson 777 printer, capable of 1440 x 2880dpi, that he got from the U of I's Micro Order Center. He gets his inkcartridges from http://www.printpal.com .
Emil then burned a CD with his photos on it. iPhoto will only burn in itsown format, so you can view them a home DVD machine.
Emil then demonstrated how to use Image Capture to read a Smart Media card.
You can add music and captions to your photos with iPhoto.
Harold Ravlin noted that if you take high resolution pictures, it can takea long time to write the picture to your card. So if your expecting to takea rapid series of pictures, Emil said you'd better have two cameras.
Jack Melby: Jack began by announcing that new Samba and new Airportsoftware had been released by Apple. He said tab browsing will be availablein a new version of Safari in about a week.
Jack reported that a reliable source has rumored that three new 2.3 GHzPowerMacs will be ready by July. He said there is also a persistent rumorthat AMD will be adding PowerPC chips to their line.
Jack also said that the World Wide Developers Conference date has beenchanges. It is believed developers attending this conference will leavewith OS 10.3 in hand. "Panther's" official release date is September.
Turning to the next MacSIG, Jack said that the program slot is currentlyopen.
He then went on to talk about a new version of iChat, with full videoconferencing, an Office compatible version of iWorks, and some informationabout Keynote.
Rich Hall: Treasurer Richard Hall gave his usual, exemplary Incomereport.
Kris Klindworth: Kris reported that there would be a change in the formatof the Linux SIG. The meeting will now begin at 6:15 PM. There will be ahalf an hour demonstration and fifteen minutes of Questions and Answers.There will be a presentation every other month.
Next month, John Ross will be doing Java programming.
Touching on Linux news, Kris said this had been a good public relationsmonth.
Kevin Hopkins: Kevin reported that we currently have 38 members. Two newmembers joined at the last meeting. Emil said he had the paperwork andwould get it to Kevin.
Kevin Hisel: Kevin reported that we are almost out of prizes, provided bythe Microsoft Mindshare program.
Kevin commented that the wireless set up we now have at the meetings is oneof the best things the club has ever done.
Emil Cobb: Emil reported that we had 23 members in attendance at the lastmeeting.
Richard Rollins: Richard said he enjoyed the last meeting. He was luckyenough to win Front Page. He said Jim Saxon won Alpha 5, and he couldn'tremember who won the golf game.
Richard said Emil did a great job on his iPhoto demo. Emil said it isn'tvery powerful in its cleanup and editing features, but it is very good atwhat it does do. He also noted that there is a freeware program that willallow Toast to burn a PhotoCD from iPhoto.
Next month, the PC SIG is open so they will have a Question and AnswerSession. The Mac SIG will do a Q & A as well. Jack said he would bring anew CD of OS X stuff.
Meetings are held the third Thursday of each month at 7:00 p.m. at theIllinois Technology Center. The Center is located at 7101 Tomaras Ave inSavoy. To get to the Illinois Technology Center from Champaign or Urbana,take Neil Street (Rt 45) south. Setting the trip meter in your car to zeroat the McDonalds on the corner of Kirby/Florida and Neil in Champaign, youonly go 2.4 miles south. Windsor will be at the one mile mark. Curtis willbe at the two mile mark. Go past the Paradise Inn/Best Western motel to thenext street, Tomaras Ave. on the west (right) side. Tomaras is at the 2.4mile mark. Turn west (right) on Tomaras Ave. The parking lot entrance isimmediately on the south (left) side of Tomaras Ave. Enter the building bythe front door under the three flags facing Rt 45. A map can be found onthe CUCUG website at Membership dues for individuals are $20 annually; prorated to $10 at midyear. Our monthly newsletter, the Status Register, is delivered by email. Allrecent editions are available on our WWW site. To initiate a user groupexchange, just send us your newsletter or contact our editor via email. Asa matter of CUCUG policy, an exchange partner will be dropped after threemonths of no contact. For further information, please attend the next meeting as our guest, orcontact one of our officers (all at area code 217): Visit our web site at http://www.cucug.org/, or join in our online forums at http://www.cucug.org/starship/index.php . President/WinSIG: Richard Rollins 469-2616 Vice-President: Emil Cobb 398-0149 e-cobb@uiuc.edu Secretary/Editor: Kevin Hopkins 356-5026 kh2@uiuc.edu Treasurer: Richard Hall 344-8687 rjhall1@uiuc.edu Corp.Agent/Web.Mr: Kevin Hisel 352-1002 Mac SIG Chairman: John Melby 352-3638 jbmelby@johnmelby.com Linux SIG Chairman: Kris Klindworth 239-0097 kris.klindworth@Carle.com
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