RAndY's RumOR RaG February 1994 COREL VENTURA Ventura Publisher has been slipping behind, especially in the last couple of years. When they shifted from GEM to Windows, it seemed like they didn't understand what Windows was all about. Last year, Corel bought the company in a move I would characterize as brilliant. This can only be a good thing for both products. As mentioned last month, when Corel 5 is introduced later this year Ventura Publisher will be integrated with the drawing package. Corel Ventura 4.2 is not a large step forward. It appears that they have corrected some of the problems of the previous version and packaged it with a ton of fonts and clipart. This new version does load much faster than before, but look for the big changes to come when it's released with a new CorelDraw package. The choice is yours as to whether to upgrade now. I'm sure something better is around the corner. --------------- NEWS IN YER FACE Borland has lifted restrictions on developers wishing to use Borland language tools to create applications which compete with Borland products. --------------- Alpha testers continue to doubt that Microsoft can meet performance criteria for Chicago by the scheduled ship date. The target is to operate with the same hardware specs as Windows 3.1. --------------- Cyrix has agreed to quit using an advertising logo that parodies Intel's logo. --------------- I just went out and got my mail, and seeing a copy of Computer Retail Week, was anxious to dig in and see what is new. I started reading and the news seemed rather old. I checked out the front page and it was dated November 15, 1993. Guess the pony was tired. And these are the people they want to put in charge of health care? --------------- Look for IBM to drop the MCA bus on desktop machines and use it only on servers. They have realized that the bus has little value in the average desktop machine and will use MCA's advantages in the server market. Cry me a river. . . --------------- Lexmark will soon begin shipping a laser printer that is based on Microsoft's At Work software. Jointly developed with Microsoft, it will have a bi-directional interface for communicating with Windows and result in reduced printing times. It's rated at 10 ppm for 300 dpi and 8 ppm for 600 dpi. Look for a list price less than $1600. --------------- WFW UPDATE Well, I've had a little more time to work with Windows for Workgroups 3.11 as reviewed last month. I've only got 8 megs of memory and that just doesn't cut it. I can't use the 32-bit file access and I've found that it makes an incredible difference. I've installed this Windows on a 486-50 VLB with 16 megs of memory. This thing really snaps when you can get the 32-bit file access working on a VLB machine. (The reason I can't do it is that you either have to have no swap file, or a permanent one. On a DoubleSpaced drive you can't have a permanent swap file and I don't have enough memory to go without a swap file.) But if you've got the hardware, this is a version of Windows that will really fly. Don't waste your time if you've just got 4 megs, though. --------------- DIAMOND VIPER Back several months ago when I was looking to buy a VLB video card, I had to choose between the Diamond Stealth Pro and the Viper. I chose the Pro based upon price constraints. So far it has been an admiralable performer. I've recently had the opportunity to work with a Viper and it is HOT. Instead of using an S3 chip, it uses a Weitek coprocessor. Wanna make Windows really fly? The Viper will do the trick. It comes with 2 megs of VRAM so you can do lots of colors at high resolutions. Of course, being a local bus card you're moving at the speed of the processor so all of this adds up to one screaming video card. It doesn't make my Pro look sick, but there is a definite difference. Don't expect much if you're using just DOS, with the exception of CAD. DOS performance is nothing exceptional. To be honest, the difference between the two cards is not real noticeable until you start working with applications like CorelDraw. The screen redraws with the Viper snap much faster than the Pro. The same goes for PageMaker and most other mainstream applications. Another advantage the Viper has is that when you switch resolutions or use more colors, performance is not significantly degraded. Using WinBench, performance in 65K color mode is only slightly slower than the Stealth Pro VLB in 256 color mode. The price for this performance does not come cheap. Expect to pay close to $500. --------------- MAUI WOWIE OK, that headline speaks volumes about my "old days". Anyway, the topic is a new sound card from Turtle Beach called MAUI. The MAUI can serve as a stand-alone sound card or be used with an existing sound card. If you've got a regular FM-synthesis card, you can plug the output of your card into the input of the MAUI and use them both. If you have one of the newer wavetable cards, there is a special connection on the MAUI to let you interconnect them. The MAUI has 128 sampled instruments. That means you don't get something that sounds like a piano - you get a real piano. There are two SIMM sockets on the board which let you add any combination of 256K, 1M, or 4M SIMMs. Then, in addition to the 256K the card comes with, you can sample any sound, load it into the card, and use it as a voice. That means you can take the sound of a burp, for example, and be able to play music using the burp instead of a piano. The possibilities are incredible. There is a connection for hooking up to an external MIDI device, such as a keyboard. Extensive diagnostics are also included which seem to check everything possible with the board. Installation is easy, although I had to select a different interrupt from the default. Windows installation is a snap with the included software. You do have to edit your MIDI Mapper, but it's easy and the book tells you how to do it. Also included is a special version of Turtle Beach's Wave program which gives you extensive control over WAV files. A DOS program which executes upon system boot up checks the MAUI card and loads its operating system. This procedure takes 15- 20 seconds. How does it sound? Excellent!!! I'm used to my PAS16 and its FM sounds (run through my stereo with JBL speakers). They sound amateurish in comparison to the MAUI. The horn sounds are a little weak, as are the saxophone and electric guitar patches. The piano samples are pretty good as are the strings. Drums sound great as do the various organ sounds. DOS games or Windows, it doesn't matter. The MAUI is an excellent investment and will bring much more enjoyment to your computer experience. --------------- DR DOS VS MICROSOFT The DOS wars will be heating up again when Novell releases DR DOS 7, expected to ship by February. Included will be both the DOS operating system and Personal NetWare, Novell's enhanced peer-to- peer network. A common install routine will install stand-alone Personal NetWare and common documentation. Personal NetWare includes low- end networking functions such as the ability to share files, printers, and CD-ROMs and networked applications such as electronic mail and databases. Integration with NetWare 2.x, 3.x, and 4.x is better than NetWare Lite because there is a common Universal NetWare Client and common interface with big NetWare. Microsoft has noted this forthcoming DOS by releasing a document which identifies points of comparison between MS-DOS and Windows for Workgroups. They also point out DR DOS 7's lack of compatibility with Windows' enhanced mode. In other network/Novell news, Novell has released an upgrade CD to registered NetWare 4 owners. A new client for DOS/Windows is included along with utilities providing a migration path between LAN Manager and previous NetWare versions. --------------- OS/2 NEWS IBM is denying that OS/2 2.2 exists but the fact is that it has entered beta testing. Improvements include the ability to reliably operate in 4-8 MB of RAM as opposed to the current 8-12 MB, new security hooks which will allow developers to product security tools, new mouse and screen pointer technology for easier screen navigation, some version of a Win32 API, asynchronous input queues. Version 2.2 will be DOS 6 compatible. Look for this new version to debut possibly as early as late June. In other OS/2 news, WordPerfect has released a maintenance upgrade to their OS/2 version of WordPerfect which gives users a REXX launcher and fixes some bugs. WordPerfect 6 for OS/2 is basically finished, but will not be released. OS/2 word processor development will cease for the moment. According to WordPerfect, the projected return on their OS/2 product "just wasn't there." WordPerfect will continue to support OS/2 as a server in their Office and Message Server, however. Programmers have been reassigned to working on a Chicago (Windows 4) project. --------------- ON THE SOAPBOX AGAIN It's time for me to rant and rave about a few things that have been happening in the computer biz. I've about had my fill of vaporware. There are three products I have had customers asking for lately, products that have been advertised since November in the major end-user magazines. Reviewers in these magazines have done reviews and sung the praised of these products yet neither you nor I can buy them - anywhere. As I finish this issue, these products are all available. Now, let's name some names. Earlier in this issue, I did a review on Turtle Beach's MAUI card. The card works well and seems to be a great product. The MAUI has been advertised in both industry and consumer magazines since at least November, yet I had to do some fast talking to get one from a major supplier - after watching the projected ship date slip on numerous occasions. The three major computer magazines have all done glowing reviews on Microsoft's Excel 5.0. We're told it's a wonderful program and you'll find a review later in this issue (I finally got my dealer demo). Yet I just checked with a major software supplier and the projected ship date is still at least a week away (as I write this). How can a magazine reviewer do a review before the software has been released? You've surely seen the ads for NEC's new triple-spin CD-ROM drives. PC Mag and the others have done short reviews praising these new CD drives. Have you seen them on the shelf yet? I have a customer that's been waiting for over a month for one of these. After watching the ship date slip gradually it looked like we were going to get one. Nope, the expected ship date is now the end of February. (As I write this, my supplier got a few in but widespread distribution is still scheduled for the end of February.) Advertising things that aren't available has always been a problem in the computer biz. It is not uncommon for magazine reviewers to get pre-release copies of new products nor is it uncommon for release dates to slip. But I think things have gotten out of hand. These companies' mouths are writing checks their production can't cash. Enough is enough... --------------- WINSTONE 94 PC Magazine has a new suite of benchmarks out. PC Bench is a series of DOS-based tests which have been rewritten to give a better representation of a system's performance. The same goes for WinBench for the Windows tests. The real news here is a series of Windows-based tests called Winstone 94. This thing is so huge it comes on CD-ROM. The program installs a run-time version of several popular programs and puts them through a series of tests, depending upon the application. Applications tested include Microsoft Access, Word for Windows, 1-2-3, PageMaker, Claris FileMaker Pro, CorelDraw, Excel, Works for Windows, Paradox for Windows, PowerPoint, Quattro Pro for Windows, and WordPerfect for Windows. Each application is installed, tested, then deleted before the next application is installed. All of this takes a while, but if you're comparing different machines - or you want to know how yours performs compared to computers reviewed in the magazine - it is a useful effort. These are real-world tasks using real-world software. Winstone 94 is the sole Microsoft-certified benchmark for the testing of industry-standard PCs running Windows-based applications. Lest you think you can get this disk and rip off the manufacturers of these programs, they appear to be limited in functionality. I suppose you could run them to get a feel for how a program works before buying it. The CD also contains the aforementioned WinBench and PC Bench. You can get one for free by writing to PC Labs and asking for one. --------------- QUAKE UPDATE A lot of computer firms were located in the area of the LA quake. Packard Bell moved from its quake-damaged headquarters to a temporary office in West Lake Village. Most of their inventory was located outside the quake zone. MicroAge was located less than two miles from the epicenter and had water pumping from burst sprinkler pipes. Hard drive manufacturer Micropolis suffered water damage from broken pipes and had to close their technical support department. Large distributors like Ingram Micro (located outside the quake zone) and Merisel (built on shock-absorbing rollers) fared better through the ordeal. --------------- SHOOTOUT ON CD-ROM I just happened to see a piece of software that's been out for a little while - but I was quite impressed with the technology. Mad Dog McCree is a CD-based (DOS) game which is a shoot-out set in the Old West. Instead of dealing with cartoon characters, you have full-screen video with actors who do a decent job of directing the action. When a bad guy appears on the screen it's your job to gun him down - but be careful you don't shoot one of the good guys. The acting is quite good and as the game progresses, the bad guys start coming fast and furious. What impressed me is how well the game is done. The video is smooth and if you shoot the bad guy he falls and dies - if you don't shoot him he shoots you. It's something you really have to see. Now don't jump on my case about the violent content of the game - this is a game - it's not real. Concern yourself with real violence, the root cause of which is not poverty or discrimination, but a lack of morality and values - and taking people's guns away will do nothing to solve the problem. --------------- SPINNING WHEEL TIMES 3 I finally got my hands on a NEC 3Xi CD-ROM drive. I've sold a number of double-spin drives from several manufacturers. The Toshiba 3401 is a real mover and I prefer the NEC CDR-84 overall. So how fast is this new triple-spin drive. Well, you still don't want to run software directly from the CD. Some programs are noticeable faster compared to a double-spin, others seem about the same. PhotoCD images load faster but other things are about the same. My feeling is that it has to do with the software you're using. I've heard that current software is not optimized for triple-spin drives but that changes are in the works which will show triple-spin drives significantly faster. NEC has done a couple of things with the design of these drives which make your computing experience more pleasant. The downfall of the NEC double-spin drive was that you had to hold the door open with one hand and insert the CD caddy with the other. With the 3Xi, you roll the door down and it stays latched down while you insert the caddy. To eject the CD, just open the door and it ejects like a piece of toast. The front of the drive has buttons like an audio CD player so you can play audio CDs without software. Just insert the CD and press the buttons to play music and select tracks - you can even have the CD repeat. Diagnostics are included in ROM which allow you to check the drive's internals when you power up. The price on these triple- spin drives is less than the double-spins were when they were introduced. Expect a street price in the low five hundreds. --------------- EXCEL 5 I just got my copy and haven't had much of a chance to put it through its paces. These days my spreadsheet needs are pretty simple. They've gone to the tabbed worksheet idea first used by Quattro Pro. They've now got a Formula Wizard which helps you build formulas along with several add-ins. I know this isn't much of a review, but what can you say about a product that has been consistently excellent? If you're a current Excel user you'll want to upgrade for sure. I'm surprised that Microsoft did not produce a bloated pig with this release. Generally new releases consume more hard drive space and run slower, but the performance of Excel 5 seem to be the same as with Version 4. This is the spreadsheet by which all others are judged. ================================= DISCLAIMER RAndY's RumOR RaG is published on a monthly basis by AINSWORTH COMPUTER SERVICES and is available on various local BBS's, GEnie, and America Online as well as in Modem News. In case anyone cares, RAndY's RumOR RaG is produced on a 486- 50 with 8 megs of memory, Diamond Stealth Pro VESA VLB (1 MB), 105 MB Toshiba IDE hard drive, Teac 1.2 MB and 1.44 MB floppies, Pro Audio Spectrum 16 running a Hitachi 3750 CD ROM drive, Sceptre SVGA display, Microsoft mouse, WordPerfect for Windows and transmitted through a US Robotics HST Dual Standard modem. Opinions expressed are those of the author. Comments should be addressed to Ainsworth Computer Services on GEnie, America Online, phone, analog mail, or whatever method makes you feel good. AINSWORTH COMPUTER SERVICES 605 W. Wishkah Aberdeen, WA 98520-6031 (206) 533-6647 GEnie Address: RAG America Online: RumOR RaG