Computer
Connections
August ’03

by Lloyd Prezant

Lloyd Prezant is a NYC computer consultant who
buys and sells recent
used Mac computers and
their peripherals. Call him
at (718) 548-1623.

July ’03 Edition

June ’03 Edition

May ’03 Edition

Apple’s price drops
Apple has lowered the price of its computers and associated peripherals to educational customers from 5-15%. Education faculty, students and staff, including K-12 teachers, can now buy most Apple products for their use at the institutional price. Buy the G5 now!!!

Intuit is soliciting
Intuit is soliciting beta testers for their next version of QuickBooks for the Mac. This version supports OS 9 and OS X users. It helps if you are already using Intuits software now. Those who are using QuickBooks New User Edition and QuickBooks 4.0 are wanted. Beta testing starts in the middle of the summer. If you are chosen, you will be notified in the beginning of August. Hurry and apply at: www.intuit.com.

Sonnet speeds your Mac
Sonnet Technologies Inc. has added the Encore/ST G4 to its line of G4 CPU upgrade products. This card gives G4 processor Macs with AGP graphics: a 1.4 GHz processor, 2 MB of DDR L3 backside cache and the ability to auto sense bus speed and run at 100 or 133 MHz. Compatible with OS X and all previous operating systems and software, this card needs no drivers or software to operate. The rest of the Encore/ST G4 card line is still available. Speeds of 800 MHz, 1.0 GHz and 1.2 GHz can upgrade your 733, 800 and 867 MHz Mac AGP G4 computers. The 1.4 GHz card will sell for $599 street price. A G4 Cube installation kit will be out soon at $59.95. I advise you get a Mac repair shop to upgrade your G4 Cube! www.sonnettech.com.

Mozilla flying with Thunderbird
Mozilla.org announces the premier release of Mozilla Thunderbird. This is their standalone e-mail client that updates Mozilla mail. It is cross platform and uses the XUL user interface language. Typical users of this are now using Mozilla Phoenix (Web browser) as their main browser. You can: add user face extensions for specific features and enhancements, customize toolbars and download extensions from the Mozilla Web site as well as themes to change the look of the e-mail program. On-line help features tips, tricks and FAQ's (frequently asked questions). Mozilla Phoenix, a.k.a. Firebird, is currently at version 6.0 (May '03). This new update redesigns the preferences window and has limited OS X support (as does Phoenix). For pricing and more info: www.mozilla.org

Apple networks safer
Apple is distributing their new security update that improves the security of server and client systems that are running Mac OS 10.2.6. This update changes how the new account security is handled. A "disabled" password is added to a new account that is created by the Workgroup managers. When the account is saved for the first time, an enabled password is added. This way, the new account won't be accessed by unauthorized people. Download the 1 MB file from the Apple Web site: http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html? artnum=120235 (Whew!).

WineXT - I'll drink with that
WineXT is a recent wine cellar management program that lets wine lovers organize their libations in OS X. It can record important parameters: smell, taste, sight and quality. A connection to Jaguar's Address Book lets you keep track of suppliers and wineries. The interface is tabbed for operational ease as you: classify the wine, record details about your wine drinking experiences, apply scores and ratings and print out reports. The possibilities are endless! If $50 is not too much to organize your wine collection, visit: www.wine-software.net/winext.shtml.

Virtix zooms & pans
Virtix Inc. has released Virtix Zoom and Pan 3.0 to go with Apple's iMovie application. This is a new version of their 2.0 plug-in for iMovie that now works with iMovie 2 and 3 in OS 9 and OS X. With 3.0 you can specify: an XY position, angle parameter, and magnification factor at the beginning and end of a clip. It moves at 60 fields per second giving you fluid motion working through sub-pixel interpolation. This helps to eliminate jitter. All this while you do the basics: pan across, zoom into and rotate around high-res still images and moving clips. There is support for transparency in imported images and Witness protection (blur an area) along with Spotlight (area highlight). A real deal at $34.99. Upgrade from v.2.0 for free by using your old download codes! www.virtix.com.

MCE drive burns you
MCE Technologies LLC now has a 24x internal CD-R/RW drive that can be installed in the following legacy (already?) Mac models: Bondi Blue and fruit-colored iMacs and tray loading iMacs running at 233, 266, and 333 MHZ (sometimes named Rev. A-D models). User-installable, detailed instructions for removal and installation are supplied as well as software for burning data and audio CD's. It is compatible with iTunes and disc burning with the Finder. Using the standard 700 and 650 MB CD-R discs you can burn at up to 24x, read at up to 24x and using CD-RW you can burn at up to 10x speed. Compatible with OS 9 or OS X, it is bootable and ships with Roxio's Toast Lite software (is Toast Dark available?). The drive is priced at $179. MCE offers a list certified MCE upgrade centers that will gladly take your cash to install the drive professionally. All this and more at the MCE Web site: www.mcetech.com.