jsc@ucbvax.ARPA (James Steven Carrington) (01/24/85)
At today's Apple shareholder meeting, Steve Jobs and John Sculley announced offically a number of the products that have been rumored about for some time. First, they announced that the Lisa is going to be renamed the "Macintosh XL" (xtra large), apparently to capitalize on the Mac's popularity. Second, they announced the AppleTalk LAN, which can connect up to 32 devices (Macs, XL, laser printer, file server) in a serial net. The 'node' for each Mac will cost $50. It's supposed to be available in March. They also announced a couple of accessories meant to be used with AppleTalk: the $6995 LaserWriter, which looked very nice -- better than HP LaserJet quality -- and the FileServer (20-40meg versions). I think it runs around $3500. It won't be out till the 2nd half of '85. Everything else is supposed to be out in March. Other Goodies: AppleLine -- Mac to IBM mainframe software AppleTalk PC Card -- card for IBM PC that lets it hook up to AppleTalk (fall) PC Net -- Mac to IBM PC Net software (fall) Lotus Jazz is due out in April. Andy Hertzfeld's "Switcher" program, that allows you to keep up to 4 applications in memory at once (on a 512) id due out in May. That's pretty much it as far as new stuff goes. From Job's comments, we may have to wait until next year's meeting to see a Turbo-Mac -- and it won't be color. By the way, if you ever have a chance to go to one of Apple's meetings, you should. They're pretty flashy, with good audio-visual shows, lots of energy. Not exactly how I pictured corporate meetings before... -- James Steven Carrington Cal Berkeley jsc@berkeley.arpa ucbvax!jsc