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Vol. 2, Issue 03 (c)1996 GKM Journals Mar. 1997
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This month's GrapeVine was acquired from segments of
information and articles published in selected computer and
electronics industry trade publications in addition to
several online sources. The information contained within is
comprised mostly of factual information, editorial comments,
and some hearsay from the industry in general.
Each month, we will try to focus on items of interest related
to the computer/electronics industries as they become news-
worthy, and hopefully, the GrapeVine' will be both in-
formative and entertaining to our readers.
////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
Topical Index:
- 01. Internet on the air
- 02. Samsung set to acquire the financially troubled AST
- 03. Last call to buy cheap memory
- 04. White House may back off on encryption issue
- 05. DEC is adding tons of memory
- 06. Microsoft can make Web site construction easier
- 07. Something new from Intel for enterprise servers
- 08. Ohio lottery looses gamble on software
- 09. Western Digital to give CD-ROM drives a boost
- 10. Compaq and Mitsubishi team up on LCD development
- 11. IBM and Kodak working on digital picture project
- 12. Resellers complain that Windows OSR2 is crawling with bugs
- 13. 7 seems to be Corel's lucky number
- 14. Symantec offers fix for Office 97 woes
- 15. 1-Gigabit DRAM chip now possible
- 16. TI donates $7 million to Rice University
- 17. Cyber-Cash and Cyber-Checks
- 18. Picture-in-Picture TV on your PC
- 19. Manage E-mail and faxes with your PC turned off
- 20. Solid-state lithium-polymer rechargeable batteries debut
- 21. Al Gore's dream comes true
- 22. A whole new concept of the cordless phone
- 23. Microsoft Wolfpack still in captivity
- 24. Uniden and others ready their E-mail phones
- 25. Hitachi & TI offer MMX-based notebooks
- 26. The Year 2000 could be very expensive
- 27. Quad-speed microprocessors revisited
- 28. Video voice-mail possible with Intel's new answering machine
- 29. Rockwell and Motorola reach agreement on 56-Kbit/s modem
- 30. Pentium II and beyond
- 31. Kodak digital camera supports USB standard
- 32. IBM engaged in talks with software vendors over security
- 33. Hard drives that talk
- 34. New life for the old passive LCD screen
- 35. European Union ready to abolish semiconductor duties
- 36. Cyrix unveiled Media GX chip
- 37. Space-saving touch-screen monitor
- 38. Apple claims world's fastest laptop
- 39. The Bottom Line... Another look at cable modems
////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
/// INTERNET ON THE AIR ///
One new vendor in the emerging wireless Internet access arena
is confident of its potential market share in spite of some
well established competition.
Metricom Inc., Los Gatos, California, is seeking resellers for
its Ricochet system based on a wireless modem, which transfers
data through a network of radio transceivers located in various
metropolitan areas. Ricochet's Internet content and E-mail are
accessed through a Netscape browser.
Among Metricom's competitors are Teledesic Corp., whose board
members include Microsoft chairman Bill Gates and Craig McCraw,
founder of McCraw Cellular Communications Inc. Other competitors
are exploring the cellular digital packet (CDPD) approach to the
service.
Metricom however, has service up and running in Seattle, the
San Francisco Bay area, and Washington, D.C. with pricing for
the service at approximately $30 per month with a $12.50 per
month equipment rental fee added.
The present Ricochet data transfer rate runs between 14.4- and
28.8-Kbits/s
/// SAMSUNG MAY ACQUIRE AST ///
AST Research Inc. may be looking to Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd.
to offer some financial relief to keep its corporate head above
water.
Korean-based Samsung is reported to have offered $469 million
to buy-out the remaining shares of the 17 year old AST Research
Inc. Samsung currently owns 49 percent of the company.
AST first went into business as a PC board manufacturer and
provided boards for the original IBM PC. AST's first computer
was produced 11 years ago.
The proposed buy-out came on the same day that AST posted its
1996 fiscal year loss at $417.7 million.
/// MEMORY PRICES ABOUT TO RISE ///
In an effort to boost memory-chip prices, foreign chip makers
have cut back on production. The resulting shortages will most
likely affect the prices of new computers and memory upgrades in
the very near future, according to industry sources.
The chip makers claim that the selling price of DRAM chips is
less than the manufacturing cost, and have either had to cut
back on production capacities or put off investments into new
facilities or expansion of existing plants.
Original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) were buying memory
chips at about $3 per megabyte this past January as compared to
$20 per megabyte in January of 1995.
A trade article from Boston said that three South Korean DRAM
chip manufacturers control about 35 percent of the memory market
alone... namely: LG Semicon, Hyundai Corp., and Samsung Ltd.
/// WHITE HOUSE MAY WAFFLE ON ENCRYPTION ISSUE ///
Some reports last month indicate that the Clinton White House
may be backing off slightly from the December regulations passed
down to restrict the exportation of encrypted products.
Many sources in the security industry maintain that the
regulations are still too restrictive in that the mandatory
"key recovery" system demanded by the administration would
remain in effect to allow government agents the keys to break
the vendors's and users encrypted information and confidential
files.
An administration official stated that the new policy will now
allow the exportation of encryption of any length as long as
the exporting party hands over the key recovery to the U.S.
government.
One vendor however, may have found favor from the administration
as it claims it was given the go-ahead by the Dept. of Commerce
to export a 128-bit key-length version of its product. But it
was not clear whether this specific occurrence is an indication
that the government is backing off from its restrictive policy.
/// DEC IS GOING HEAVY ON MEMORY ///
The recently announced Prioris line of network servers from
Digital Equipment Corp. is loaded heavy with random access
memory (RAM).
From a call placed to DEC's "800" number, I found that the
Prioris XL 6000 comes equipped with a 200-MHz Pentium Pro
processor that is backed up with 512-Mbytes of RAM. I was also
informed that the Prioris MX 6200 unit will ship with the 200-
MHz Intel chip, but the memory on board is increased to 1-Gbyte
of RAM.
For those of us who were so proud to have upgraded our home PC
to a whopping 16-Mbytes of memory, the new DEC units pull us
back down to Earth for a little reality check.
The Prioris series will support either Fast-Page or EDO RAM with
prices set at $2,500 for the XL 6000 and $3,500 for the MX 6200.
/// MICROSOFT TAKES WOES OUT OF WEB SITE CREATION ///
Active Service Pages from Microsoft Corp. can ease the complex
task of creating an interactive Web site.
Anyone who faces the burdensome chore of creating a Web page
that contains dynamic content (content changed and run in real-
time) may find relief in the MS-Active Service Pages solution.
With ASP, you don't have to learn some new scripting language to
get started. Microsoft has made things easier by allowing you
to run a form of Visual Basic to develop interactive content on
your Web server. The MS-VScript architecture is transparent and
compatible with either Netscape or Microsoft browsers and will
translate all the output to HTML (hypertext markup language).
If that isn't enough to turn on any would-be Webmaster, just
wait until you hear the best part... It's FREE! Active Service
Pages can be downloaded from the Microsoft Web site at:
[www.microsoft.com/iis/]
/// SOMETHING NEW FROM INTEL ///
Intel Corp. disclosed plans last month to run samples of a new
chip designed to enhance enterprise server operations.
Called the i960RD I/O processor, the chip is to be included in
an Intel technology called I2O architecture, and should boost
system performance somewhere between 50 to 75 percent, according
to an Intel representative. A new Pentium motherboard to be
built by Micronics Computer Inc., Freemont, California, will be
the first device to incorporate the I2O platform.
I2O provides a powerful new I/O (input/output) subsystem that
permits many system I/O functions to be performed by the I2O
processor rather than the host system processor. Intel sources
said that this will help eliminate bottlenecks and improve
overall system efficiency.
Where many of today's Internet and intranet servers use two
microprocessors to handle the workload, the i960RD chip will
allow for systems to increase their processing power tenfold by
installing four Pentium Pro chips on one motherboard.
Pricing to equipment makers for the i960RD is relatively low.
One trade publication noted the cost at only $79.95 in lots of
10,000.
/// LOTTERY COMMISSION LOOSES GAMBLE ON SOFTWARE ///
A press release from Columbus, Ohio revealed that the Ohio
Lottery Commission is at odds with the Software Publishing
Association to the tune of $187,000.
The SPA discovered that the state lottery commission had
committed acts of piracy by copying and implementing software
applications without paying for them.
The allegations state that Ohio Lottery employees copied soft-
ware applications produced by Corel, Borland, and the Soft-
ware Publishing Company. The charges apparently resulted after
an Ohio Lottery employee divulged the information to the SPA
back in September, 1996.
Calculations by the SPA resulted in the $187,000 figure, which
represents the amount the lottery commission would have paid if
the software programs were legally purchased. A state lottery
official said that the commission will take steps to insure
that software piracy will not occur again.
The press release defined a software pirate as "anyone who buys
software, places it on a computer and then transfers the
software to another computer."
/// WESTERN DIGITAL TO GIVE CD-ROM DRIVES A BOOST ///
A data-management technology is being developed at Western
Digital Corp. that could improve CD-ROM drive performance in
computer systems significantly.
Industry sources have very little to report for now other than
the technique is known only as "SDX," which stands for (storage
data acceleration), and that it caches CD-ROM data to the
computer's hard drive. A joint press release from Western
Digital and Sanyo Information Systems, which will outline the
details of SDX, is expected in the very near future.
In addition to Sanyo, Western Digital received support from
Toshiba, Samsung, Matsushita-Kotobuki, SGS-Thomson, Motorola,
and Acer. Many CD-ROM drive manufacturers however, say they
will not implement SDX technology out of fear that it would
make it too difficult for them to differentiate between their
products which either do or do not have the new data-management
capability.
/// MORE PROGRESS IN AM-LCD DESIGNS ///
Compaq Computer Corp. and Mitsubishi Electric Corp. have agreed
to co-develop active-matrix liquid crystal display (AM-LCD)
panels for PC desktop monitors.
Somewhat ahead of schedule, Compaq is already producing a 15
inch AM-LCD color monitor for a part of its high-end Presario
computer line. In accord with their agreement, new and larger
high-resolution displays will be developed by the two companies
for the investment and financial markets.
/// IBM & KODAK PARTNERS IN DIGITAL PIX PROJECT ///
IBM Corp. and Eastman Kodak Co. are jointly building a Web-
based processing and distribution system to transmit digital
high-quality images over the Internet.
According to their plans, the two companies would provide value-
added resellers (VARs) with the architecture to develop new
applications to take advantage of the emerging market for
digitized photographic images over the Internet.
IBM is scheduled to start beta testing this month on a version
of its "Digital Library," which manages digital images stored
in "FlashPix" format. Meanwhile, Kodak intends to use the
technology as a back-end for end users who want to order photos
on the Internet. Digital Library currently runs on and is
limited to a proprietary environment called AIX. But, a later
version slated to be released during the second half of this
year will be Windows NT compliant, according to an IBM source.
The next-generation of IBM Aptiva computers will have "Live Pix"
imaging software licensed from Live Picture Inc., Scotts Valley,
California.
Kodak also unveiled a portion of it's Web-based strategy at the
Photo Marketing Conference held in New Orleans last month. A
company official said that the adoption of FlashPix technology
could alleviate the current Internet bandwidth problems through
use of its high-level compression capability.
The FlashPix image format will determine the exact size of the
data file needed for each transmission. A recipient that has a
FlashPix reader can receive a high-resolution image with only a
fraction of the data required by other transmission formats.
One computer trade magazine set the following scenario for
photo processing and delivery:
If a customer with a 35-mm camera has a roll of film to be
processed, he could take it to a Wall Mart store, and later go
to a Web-site to preview the photos, and even edit them as to
size and cropping, as desired. Then after selecting the prints
he or she wants processed, they can be ordered as glossy prints
through the mail or they can be downloaded.
/// WINDOWS OSR2 IS CRAWLING WITH BUGS ///
The OEM Service Release 2 (OSR2) is just crawling with bugs!
At least that is the general consensus among resellers who have
had to deal with the October, 1996 release of the Windows 95
operating system. One reseller said that his headaches with
OSR2 include problems such as the corruption of file allocation
tables and the destruction of hard drives.
Microsoft Corp. has been kept busy by posting technical notes
about the problems on its Web-site, but that has not curtailed
the avalanche of dealer complaints. Undaunted by all this, the
company is moving ahead with Windows 97, code named Memphis,
and is hoping to unleash that monster on the public sometime
this year.
/// COREL PACKAGE IS QUITE A BUNDLE ///
Corel Corp.'s WordPerfect Suite 7 and Office Professional 7
have bundled a new technology called "Corel Barista" into their
applications that have the Internet programmer in mind.
The new Office software suites allow the user to publish to the
popular Java Internet language from their core applications... ie
WordPerfect 7, Quattro Pro 7, and Presentations 7. Corel Office
Professional 7 also includes the CorelDRAW 6 graphics module.
/// SYMANTEK OFFERS CURE FOR MS-OFFICE 97 WOES ///
The unique data file structure of Microsoft's Office 97 platform
is not compatible with previous anti-virus software, and that is
a dangerous situation due to the fact that there are currently
about 210 documented MS-Word macro viruses.
But help is on the way from Symantek Corp. in the form of a new
anti-virus program that will support the new Microsoft data file
formats. Visual Basic 5.0 macro language was used by Symantek
to create the upgrade product, which will be available for free
to current customers from Norton AntiVirus (Symantek) by March
3 on the Symantek Web site.
Another good thing about the Symantek Office 97 anti-virus soft-
ware is that it will support all current Symantek anti-virus
architectures compatible with DOS, Windows 3.x, Windows 95,
Windows NT, Macintosh, and NetWare.
/// 1-GIGABIT DRAM UNDER DEVELOPMENT ///
Three leading semiconductor makers are pooling their efforts to
develop a 1-Gigabit dynamic RAM (DRAM) chip.
Engineers at Hitachi, Mitsubishi, and Texas Instruments are
sharing the cost in the co-development of the advanced memory
technology. Analysts agree that the three IC manufacturers are
wise to share the risks and expenses of the project within an
industry that has shown a 40 percent decline in business over
the past year.
All three companies have agreed to co-develop the "cell" archi-
tecture for the 1-Gb DRAM as well as the production methods
required to manufacture the end product. The consortium did
not announce a time-table or schedule for volume production.
There are few chip makers today that are producing a 64-Megabit
DRAM, let alone one of 1-Gbyte capacity. If the Hitachi/TI/
Mitsubishi trio are successful, they will certainly gain the
bragging rights [and] the biggest market share of the new
memory chip.
/// TI INVESTS IN HIGHER EDUCATION ///
As a member of the growing league of electronics manufacturers
who believe that their future lies in today's college students,
Texas Instruments Inc. has donated $7 million to Rice University
to pay for a new engineering facility where the focus of study
will be in the field of digital signal processor (DSP) research.
The new addition at Rice University will be called the Texas
Instruments Wing of the Anne and Charles Duncan Hall.
/// CYBER-CASH AND CYBER-CHECKS ///
CyberCash Inc. has announced its PayNow product, which permits
merchants to accept online payment via check.
PayNow allows customers to set up an "Electronic Wallet" as a
link to their conventional checking accounts. Free software is
available for downloading from the CyberCash Web-site.
When the customer has entered his or her password, a direct
purchase can be made from a merchant's Web-site, and the charges
will appear on the usual monthly statement. CyberCash customers
can also make payments on existing accounts through the PayNow
system.
More information can be obtained about the PayNow system by
logging onto CyberCash's Web-site at: http://www.cybercash.com
/// PIX-IN-PIX TV ON A PC ///
The luxury of picture-in-picture television viewing is now
available for your PC screen.
A company called Antec has produced a TV tuner add-on card that
will allow full-screen TV viewing on a PC with the added feature
of a 16 channel picture-in-picture enhancement.
The "TeleViewer Plus" from Antec has Hotkeys that allow the user
to switch between PC and TV modes, and also permit swapping of
audio and video. You can listen to your favorite TV program
while completing various computer tasks, or you can listen and
view any of the 181 cable channels received by the TV tuner. 16
small TV images can be displayed at any time to let you pre-
view those channels.
Antec announced the selling price of the TeleViewer Plus as
$249. A lesser model, which sells for $199, but does not
include the picture-in-picture capability is also available.
/// MANAGE E-MAIL AND FAXES WITH YOUR PC TURNED OFF ///
If you are like me, I just don't like to leave my computer
turned on while I am away from the house for long periods of
time... especially when thunder storms are approaching or other
known circumstances taking place that might interrupt the steady
flow of power to my PC and modem.
But this course of action leaves a lot to be desired if you
need to keep track of your e-mail and faxes while absent from
that trusty old PC.
IBM Corp. thinks they have the solution in a new line of comm-
unications devices ranging in price from $199 to $399, depending
on the scope of operation desired.
The lower priced unit, the FaxCentral provides a combination of
LCD and LED indicators to display caller-ID and fax notification
while left un-attended. It can store the faxes in memory and
allows the user to either upload them to a PC or access them
from a remote PC.
The mid-priced ComCentral model includes all of the above high-
lights with the additional feature of voice-mail access. The
ComCentral carries a price tag of $309. At the top of the line,
IBM offers the ComCentral 33.6, which as indicated, boosts the
modem speed to 33.6-Kbit/s, and sells for $399.
/// SOLID-STATE LITHIUM-POLYMER BATTERIES DEBUT ///
Sample runs of its new solid state lithium-polymer rechargeable
batteries have been scheduled for this spring by Lithium
Technology Corp., Detroit, Michigan.
The new rechargeable batteries are designed for use in notebook
computers and other portable electronic devices, and according
to a recent trade report, they have the potential to power a
standard notebook PC for up to eight hours before requiring a
charge. The cost of the solid-state batteries is expected to be
somewhat less than that of nickel-cadmium batteries designed
for the same purpose.
/// AL GORE'S DREAM COMES TRUE ///
Vice President Al Gore's desire to hook-up the entire country
to the Internet is about to come true... but not in the U.S.
A press release from Taipai, Taiwan last month said that the
country of Singapore is ready to test its national network,
which is designed to link ALL homes with Internet service by
1999.
This spring will mark the beginning of trial service for the
Singapore One Network, which will eventually furnish the entire
country with home shopping, e-mail, electronic commerce, video-
conferencing, etc. over a high-speed backbone system.
Singapore has requested and received investments totaling $100
million from 14 different companies, including Hewlett-Packard,
Motorola, IBM, Microsoft, and Oracle Corp. The chief governing
body for communications in Singapore, the National Computer Board
(NCB), dictates the policies of information technology, and
along with other government agencies, will also provide funding
and technical support for the Internet project.
The plans call for the Singapore One system to run on an ATM
(asynchronous transfer mode) network at speeds up to 155,000-
Kbits/second. In the future, Singapore intends to install a
fiber-optic network.
The initial trial run will link about 240 homes sometime in
April. 5,000 homes are expected to be included in the network
by the end of this year.
/// WIRELESS LOCAL PHONE SERVICE ///
AT&T Corp. could lend a whole new meaning to the term, "cordless
phone."
New technologies that could offer wireless local telephone
service are being studied by AT&T and other service providers
across the country that would bypass the plain old telephone
(POT) lines in local communities.
A new cordless phone, which could be used in the home, in an
automobile, or just carried while walking or shopping, much the
same as a cellular phone is used today, is in the planning
stages. Cost to the consumer for the new technology would be
just slightly more than the current rates for a conventional
telephone, according to business analysts.
Yet to be tested, and possibly a few years down the road, the
wireless local phone service is also being examined by other
major telcos such as MCI Communications and the PCS consortium
comprised of Sprint Corp., Tele-Communications Corp., Comcast
Corp., and Cox Communications.
/// MS-WOLFPACK HELD CAPTIVE ///
Microsoft Corp.'s Wolfpack NT clustering software package has
received another setback.
According to one trade publication, the software that was first
to be released during the 1st quarter of 1997, then rescheduled
for the 1st half of the year, has suffered yet another delay.
The Redmond, Washington-based software company has unofficially
targeted the month of June for the release of Wolfpack, but at
least one source is saying that it will be sometime this summer
before the product is ready.
Some resellers have expressed their doubts as to the overall
quality of Wolfpack when and if it is released. One of those
unimpressed vendors is NCR Corp., who plans to continue with
its own Windows NT clustering software.
/// E-MAIL TELEPHONES READY TO DEBUT ///
Integrated computer-telephone devices will hit the market by
mid-year, according to business analysts last month.
Covering the gap between computer data and telephone technology,
several equipment manufacturers have taken the wraps off their
E-mail phones.
Uniden America Corp. has already signed a distribution agreement
with Ingram Micro Inc., and is presently negotiating with D&H
Distributing to market the Axis Telephone Internet Appliance,
which should go on sale there in April.
The first Axis product will allow E-mail access via the Inter-
net, and carry a selling price of approximately $399. At the
same time, Northern Telecom's Multimedia Communications division
is working closely with Sun Microsystems Inc. to develop their
PowerTouch 400 phone that will have Java-powered processors on
board. Northern apparently is targeting the corporate end
user by adding browsing capabilities along with its E-mail
features.
Sources within the distribution channel however, indicate the
acceptance of the computer-phone concept is moving slower than
anticipated.
/// HITACHI & TI OFFER MMX-BASED NOTEBOOKS ///
Last month, both Hitachi PC Corp. and Texas Instruments Inc.
rolled out their Pentium MMX-based notebook computers.
Hitachi went into production of its Pentium 166-MHz/MMX-powered
notebooks to enhance its present Pentium-based line-up, which
include 133-MHz, 150-MHz, and 166-MHz units.
The new Hitach notebooks come equipped with 12.1 inch thin-film
transistor (TFT) color displays, 16-Mbits of RAM, 8-speed CD-
ROM drive, 33.6-Kbit/s cellular modem, and up to a 2.1-Gbyte
hard drive. Selling prices range from $4,299 to $5,199.
The MMX notebook offerings from TI are included in the Travel-
Mate 6100 series, also powered by the Intel Pentium MMX-based
processor of the 166-MHz variety.
Both the model 6160 and 6160 NT TravelMate Pcs come with a full
32-Mbits of RAM, 2.1-Gbyte hard drive, 10-speed CD-ROM drive,
12.1 inch TFT display, and a 33.6-Kbit/s digital simultaneous
voice and data (DSVD) modem.
The operating system is where the two models differ. The 6160
is shipped with the Windows 95 O/S, while the 6160 NT is loaded
with Windows NT, and can operate as a full-blown NT workstation.
/// VENDORS BEGIN TO TALLY YEAR 2000 COST ///
Resellers and systems integrators across the country are looking
to take advantage of the impending "Year 2000" problem.
The notorious computer glitch built into millions of older
personal computers, workstations, servers and main-frames due
to lack of foresight by early designers will hit with an impact
of $100 billion or more, according to industry sources.
Early BIOS and CMOS chips were designed to accommodate only a
two digit code representing the current year. So... along
about mid-night on December 31, 1999, those older machines are
going to think it is the year 1900. Much of the software out
there will also not be able to compensate for the number glitch
either.
The vendors who are ahead of the game are saying that about
$11.4 billion will be spent on software fixes alone. Analysts
are forecasting that the Fortune 500 companies will each be hit
with recovery costs running as much as $100 million.
/// QUAD-SPEED PROCESSORS ///
A company based in Chatsworth, California, Plasma Materials
Technologies has developed a microprocessor chip production
process that will allow chip makers to build CPU chips that
will perform four times faster than present-day chips.
The breakthrough process allows instructions to be sent four
times faster within the CPU chip.
/// VIDEO ANSWERING MACHINE FROM INTEL ///
A new answering machine went into production at Intel Corp.
that allows callers to leave video messages that can include
graphics.
The ProShare Conferencing Plus, as it's called, may have a niche
in the medical field, where doctors and staff members could
exchange x-ray and other photos during non-working hours or to
and from medical facilities in different time zones, as
indicated by a recent story in the Computer Reseller News.
/// ROCKWELL & MOTOROLA REACH AGREEMENT ///
56-Kbit/s modems are expected to ship from Motorola Inc. this
month, according to a press release from last month.
Rockwell Semiconductor Systems has apparently agreed to license
its 56-Kbit/s modem technology, known as K56Flex, to Motorola
after some heated legal battles over the past few months.
/// PENTIUM II AND BEYOND ///
What could become a rather intricate product transition is about
to take place within Intel Corp. as major changes will take
place with the introduction of the Pentium II processor, also
code named "Klamath."
Scheduled to launch in May, the Pentium II is designed mainly
for desktop systems and computers that will not demand more than
two processors. Farther down the road, Intel will produce the
"Deschutes" version, which is scalable to perform in larger
systems containing up to four processors. Intel sources are
saying that Deschutes may debut by the end of this year, and
should yield clock speeds of 300-MHz.
Look for noticeable price cuts on all the older Pentiums and
Pentium Pros by Intel to make way for the Pentium II, which is
expected to sell to OEM volume accounts for about $750 each.
/// KODAK DIGITAL CAMERA SUPPORTS USB ///
The Eastman Kodak Co. has introduced a new digital video camera
that supports the emerging Universal Serial Bus (USB) standard.
The DVC 300 camera will offer "hot" plug-and-play features and
a fast 12-Mbits/s data transfer rate under USB, which is said
to be 6 times faster than through standard parallel connections
and 12 times faster than through a serial port.
Still and full video images are formed on a 640x480 color
charge-coupled device within the DVC 300, which will be priced
in the $200 range. Kodak sources have indicated that the new
camera will go on sale during the second quarter of this year.
/// ENCRYPTION TALKS BETWEEN IBM/MS/NETSCAPE ///
An IBM source disclosed last month that his company is engaged
in talks with major software vendors, Microsoft Corp. and Net-
scape Communications Corp. to specify just how IBM's Cryptolope
technology may be used. The software companies are looking for
ways to protect Web-based copyrights.
The Cryptolope security technology allows data and multimedia
information to be scrambled on the sender's terminal and then
unscrambled on the terminal of the designated receiver, if he
or she has paid for it or has otherwise been given permission
to receive the information.
Because it would be difficult for Web site publishers to make
sure that copyrighted material would not be just downloaded or
captured directly from the Internet without authorization, the
three companies are striving to come up with a copyright
management solution.
/// HAS YOUR HARD DRIVE TALKED TO YOU LATELY? ///
When you think of an Early Detection and Warning System (EDWS),
it may bring to mind something to do with weather forecasting
or defense of the nation's air-space. But such is not the case
with the EDWS architecture from Cutting Edge Technology Inc.,
Laguna Hills, Calif.
The company features what it calls "the talking hard drive,"
which monitors conditions such as air-flow, heat, power supply
voltage, fan speed, and vibration to detect hard drive problems
before a failure would occur or valuable data is lost.
Areas where high-risk data is stored by end-users such as
accounting firms, financial institutions, medical offices, and
various levels of corporate structure could take advantage of
the EDWS concept, as stated by one Cutting Edge official.
For $69, you can buy a single-user card that can be installed
in a PC. High-end users will be looking at an investment of
from $100 to $500 to protect their computer network, depending
on the complexity and sophistication of their systems.
EDWS can draw attention to a problem by flashing an LED warning
light, sounding an audible alarm, dialing out on a modem to
notify a technician of the problem, or send a pre-recorded
message to the technician or someone in charge. If nobody
responds to correct the situation, EDWS will then shut down the
drive before any data is lost or further damage has been done
to the hard drive itself.
/// NEW LIFE FOR PASSIVE LCD SCREENS ///
The new HiQVision and HiQPro multimedia accelerators from Chips
and Technologies Inc. offer improved quality for passive matrix
LCD flat-panel displays.
The company's HiQ technology will possibly bring down the cost
of flat-panel displays by overcoming some of the faults of the
lower-priced passive variants of color LCD screens. Lower
refresh rate, slow response, and shimmering are common faults
that needed to be addressed in order to give the passive LCD
screens more user appeal.
Although more costly at present, active-matrix LCD (AM-LCD)
color displays render better performance than their passive
counterparts because they employ transistors at each pixel,
instead of resistors.
By introducing the HiQ technology into passive displays, 16.7
million colors can be displayed without the common performance
deficiencies known to the lower-priced displays. And, if the
quality produced through the HiQ graphics accelerators is as
high as C&T officials are expecting, we may soon enjoy large-
screen color flat-panel displays for the desktop PC at much
lower prices than anticipated.
Chips and Technologies will produce the HiQVision multimedia
accelerator, which is designed to serve the portable and desktop
PC markets, and the HiQPro version for more enhanced multimedia
tasks.
/// EUROPEAN UNION READY TO DEAL ///
From Washington... Apparently the European Union (EU) is about
ready to close a deal to abolish its semiconductor duties before
the year 2000 deadline it had previously set.
U.S. officials expect the move to clear the way for the
acceptance of the EU into the World Semiconductor Council, which
has scheduled its first meeting in Hawaii next month.
The EU will be joined by the U.S. and Japan at the meeting, and
according to business sources, the European Electronic Component
Manufacturers Association (EECA) may be also invited to the
inaugural session of the council.
/// CYRIX UNVEILED MEDIA GX CHIP ///
Cyrix Corp. unveiled its MediaGX microprocessor last month in
a move that company officials hope will position them as a
major supplier for the next generation of low-cost Pcs.
According to an industry spokesman, Cyrix will now be able to
match Intel processors, but with more integration and at a lower
price. That price and performance combination evidently caught
the attention of Compaq Computer, who has agreed to use the GX
in the new line of Presario 2100 computers.
The MediaGX architecture mates a P-133 6x86 core module and
floating point unit with an integrated memory controller,
making secondary cache unnecessary. A companion core logic
chip (Cx5510) functions as a PCI-ISA bridge and Sound Blaster-
compatible audio synthesizer.
By the end of this year, Cyrix officials plan to have GX chips
in production that operate at clock speeds ranging from 120-MHz
to 200-MHz, all the while, preparing the way for its M2 core
processors, which will contain a floating point unit and the
MMX (Multimedia Extensions) instruction set.
The 120-MHz MediaGX will sell wholesale at $79, and the 133-MHz
version will be priced at $99 wholesale. Both microprocessors
will be packaged with the Cx5510 core logic chip.
/// SPACE-SAVING TOUCH-SCREEN MONITOR ///
Active-matrix LCD technology has been integrated into the touch-
screen monitor market with a new product from MicroTouch Systems
Inc.
The TruePoint SpaceSaver color monitor employs a 10.4" AM-LCD
capacitive touch screen bundled into a package that measures
only 1.36" deep x 8" high x 11.25" wide. Mounting position is
compatible for most any situation with the TruePoint, which can
be hung on a wall or placed on a desk or counter top.
Any application that requires a space-saving touch-screen
monitor, such as point-of-sale, advertising, and industrial
duties, could be filled by the TruePoint, according to one
trade report.
/// APPLE CLAIMS WORLD'S FASTEST LAPTOP ///
As featured on MS-NBC's Technology News, Sat. March 1, Apple
Computer has what appears to be the world's fastest laptop PC.
The PowerBook 3400 is being produced with PowerPC processors
ranging in speed from 100-MHz to 240-MHz. The 240-MHz version
does appear to have beaten the fastest Intel-based laptops,
which could be sparked by 200- and 233-MHz chips, but as
reported in last month's GrapeVine, heat dissipation problems
may curtail their further use within the small confines of a
laptop PC.
Apple's PowerBook 3400 not only can be purchased with a fast
microprocessor, but CD-ROM options of speeds up to 12X are a
compliment to the full-screen/full-motion video capabilities of
the 3400. The extra power and speed can be taken advantage of
with modern software applications such as the PowerSecretary
speech recognition program, which converts the spoken word into
text, while the user speaks at a moderate speed and in complete
sentences.
The sound produced by the 3400's four built-in speakers is very
impressive for a laptop, but all this technology comes at a
price. Depending on options, a PowerBook 3400 could cost from
$5,000 to $6,500.
/////////////////\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\
/// The Bottom Line \\\
/////////////////\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\
/// ANOTHER LOOK AT CABLE MODEMS ///
With greater demand for high-speed access to the Internet, the
cable modem appears to be an appetizing approach to supplying
the masses with almost limitless bandwidth to communicate with
and download from the World Wide Web.
The cable modem can in fact, deliver cyber-services at trans-
mission rates hundreds of times faster than a conventional 28.8
or 33.6-Kbit/s modem by connecting directly to the coaxial cable
from a cable service provider. After trial service to thousands
of homes across the U.S., the cable modem concept looks like it
is ready to take off. But is it?
Several obstacles to this new architecture still exist however.
In the forefront, there is a need to adopt some standards or
maybe just narrow down the existing standards a bit. Then there
is the problem of upgrading the infrastructure of many of the
existing cable plants to an acceptable level. Next, some way
must be found to overcome the growing distrust by the general
public of the cable companies themselves. An obvious factor to
consider is the cost of the cable modem itself, which currently
holds a price tag in the $500 range. Even if you had the choice
not to rent one from the cable provider, the cost of a direct
purchase would be detrimental to the average user. This situation
may see some relief next year if the new integrated chips promised
by the semiconductor manufacturers come into play. Reports of
these new developments indicate that cable modem prices would fall
to the $200 to $300 range.
But then you come back to the bandwidth problem. You can have
the fastest modem in the world, but if the source provider,
network node, or the backbone server from which you are trying
to download from has become a bottle-neck, then you are not
going to realize the macho-speed that you expected from the
cable modem. A look at the situation that has befallen America
Online shows what can happen when you run out of bandwidth.
It is like driving on a six-lane highway... you can move along
at 65-mph until rush hour occurs or someone causes a traffic
back-up due to a breakdown or a crash. There is a consensus
of opinion among some industry analysts that the entire Internet
is headed for a major bandwidth traffic pile-up in the not too
distant future.
The telephone companies also hope to counter the cable modem
trend with their newer DSL (digital subscriber lines) and ADSL
(asynchronous DSL) technologies. But the best of those systems
will only support 10-Mbits/second as compared to the 40-Mbits/s
offered by the cable modem. ADSL would still offer a notable
improvement in speed over convectional modems however, and
provide the service at a much lower cost than a cable modem hook
up.
Amati Communications Corp., Mountain View, California, has
introduced the Overture 4 ADSL modem that can transmit up to
160-Kbits/s upstream and 4-Mbits/s downstream of Internet data.
The company also makes an Overture 8 version that will carry
video and data over standard twisted-pair lines at 8-Mbits
per second, but no costs were available for either of these new
speedsters when this edition of the GrapeVine was compiled.
In the Canton, Ohio area, Time Warner Communications is asking
for $40 per month for the cable modem service in addition to a
sizable installation fee. IF that $40 per month would include
the basic cable TV service, two movie channels, and the cable
modem service, they might just find themselves with more new
subscribers than they even thought possible. You can bet your
browser that I would be among them.
Gary Miller