SEWALL@UCONNVM.BITNET (Murph Sewall) (10/28/88)
VAPORWARE
Murphy Sewall
From the November 1988 APPLE PULP
H.U.G.E. Apple Club (E. Hartford) News Letter
$15/year
P.O. Box 18027
East Hartford, CT 06118
Call the "Bit Bucket" (203) 569-8739
Permission granted to copy with the above citation
Apple II - Macintosh Merger?
Apple engineers are said to be within a year of concluding a
top secret project to produce a hybrid of the Macintosh Plus
and IIgs. Code named "Golden Gate," the computer will run
both Apple IIgs (and older Apple II) and Macintosh
software. With an AST 80286 card, the versatile box can run
MS-DOS and OS/2 software as well. - InfoWorld 3 October
New Macs at January MacWorld.
The 16 MHz Macintosh IIx is seen by most observers as a
timid first step into the 68030 era. Soon after the first
of the year, Apple will release several faster Macintoshes.
Anticipated prices for these 68030 machines will start
around $7,000. The lapMac may continue its long history as
a mirage (most recent mentions last April and July's
columns) due to, as yet unresolved, software incompatibility
problems. With hard disk, large internal battery, and
floppy drive the portable Mac is so heavy it may be more
appropriate for power lifters than power users. All the new
Macs as well as 1989 versions of older models should be
shipped with Apple's new Superdrive which reads and writes
MS-DOS's 720K and 1.44 Mbyte formats as well as Apple's 800K
and new 1.4 Mbyte formats. A Superdrive upgrade for older
Macs which requires new ROM as well as drive replacements is
expected, but the price has not been announced.
- InfoWorld 12 and 26 September and PC Week 29 August
NeXt Year.
Steve Job's did announce his NeXt computer last month, but
you won't be able to buy one until the second quarter of
1989, and then only if you have access to the "higher
education market." The machine is nearly the rumored
version described last month. The proposed list price is
$6,500, the 256 Mbyte disk drive is by Canon USA, the gray
scale display resolution is 1,120 by 832, and there are only
three expansion slots. Software will have to be distributed
on magneto-optic disks that are expected to retail as blanks
for $50. The 400 dots per inch Postscript compatible laser
printer will only cost $2,000 because there will be no CPU
in the printer. The print image will be created by the main
processor using the Display Postscript in ROM.
- PC Week 17 October and InfoWorld 17 October
Bargain Basement 68030.
Atari plans to arrive at this Fall's Comdex with a 1-Mbyte
of RAM 68030 color computer running GEM and Imagen's Display
Postscript clone. Applications software is nearly
non-existent, but if Jack Tramiel can get this box on the
market at the proposed list price of $1,995 (including the
color display), the machine could become the Apple II
(hobbyist computer) of this decade. The prototype contains
4 slots, and a removable 44-Mbyte hard disk will be offered
as an option. - InfoWorld 17 October
New Laser Driver.
Phoenix Technologies is working closely with Microsoft and
QMS Inc. to develop laser printers driven by an emulation of
the Graphical Programming Interface (GPI) which is embedded
in the Presentation Manager. QMS, of Mobile, Alabama, hopes
to release a GPI printer by mid-1989 that will offer two to
five times the speed of the Postscript page description
language. Michael Dow, executive vice-president at QMS,
says the firm is developing a monochrome printer expected to
retail at $5,500 and a color laser that may break the
$10,000 barrier ($9,995 no doubt). Meanwhile,
Hewlett-Packard has licensed Adobe's Postscript interpreter
for use in the next generation of HP printers.
- PC Week 17 October and InfoWorld 17 October
Apple Squashes HyperCard Clone.
An MS-DOS Microsoft Windows program with the "look and feel"
of HyperCard apparently has been written by
Brightbill-Roberts and Company. The program is unlikely to
be marketed soon as Apple has made it clear to Microsoft
that selling it would simply make it more difficult to
settle the existing Windows look and feel suit.
- PC Week 3 October
Mac TCP.
In the first quarter of 1989, Apple will begin offering a
complete implementation of the Transmission Control
Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) for the entire Macintosh
line (including the obsolete Mac 512e). The program
supports a throughput of of up to 3 megabits per second
(300K baud) over Ethernet. A site license for the program
will cost $2,500; a commercial license will cost an
additional $2,500. - InfoWorld 3 October
Big Blue's Price Cut Plans.
IBM plans to drive down prices of PS/2 machines dramatically
over the next 18 months in order to forestall competition
from the EISA alliance (see last month's column). Jim
Clifford, IBM's director of investor relations, indicated
that by mid-1990, 80386 machine prices will fall to the
level of the present Model 30 (just over $2,000). Clifford
also was quoted as saying "You'll see the '286 pass the way
of the dodo in the next 12 to 24 months." However,
corporate spokesman Scott Brooks said later "We have no
plans to withdraw or discontinue any of these models at this
time." Which quote sounds more credible?
- PC Week 3 and 10 October
PS/2 Model 70 and 80 Clones.
Amid delays and cancellations of plans to market clones of
IBM's 80286-based models, several vendors, including
American Mitac and Advanced Logic Research, are promising to
bring both 20 and 25 MHz 80386 PS/2 compatibles to the Fall
Comdex show. Analysts say these announcements represent
clone makers' attempts to move into higher margin segments
of the market. - InfoWorld 17 October
Porting Word Perfect to Unix.
Word Perfect 4.2 has recently been introduced for seven
Unix-driven systems including Digital's Ultrix and Sun's Sun
3. By December, versions will be available for IBM's RT PC
under AIX and Motorola's 8000 computer line. Concurrently,
the company will be porting Word Perfect Office to Unix
platforms. Version 5.0, the current MS-DOS version, won't
be available for Unix systems until late 1989, according to
Scott Worthington, director of Unix products.
- PC Week 3 October
Late, Late, Late.
Lotus and Ashton-Tate seem to have fallen into a pattern. A
release date for new software is announced; there are months
of rumors that the date won't be met followed by an
announcement that the product has been delayed. Lotus has
confirmed rumors that Release 3.0 won't arrive in time for
Christmas by announcing a delay until the second quarter of
1989. To soften the blow, Lotus will bundle Funk Software's
Allways add-in that brings Excel-like presentation graphics
to 1-2-3 worksheets with future sales of Release 2.01.
Lotus also hinted at a possible significant upgrade to 2.01
sometime early in '89. Sure enough, Ashton-Tate did not
introduce dBase IV at the end of September (see last month's
column), and industry insiders doubt the program will make
it's latest deadline of October 31. One little dBase IV bug
that should already have been fixed is the boot-up
announcement that you are now using "dBase VI." Even though
OS/2 Extended Edition and Presentation Manager are scheduled
to ship before this column appears in print, IBM
representatives at the Japan Data Show in Tokyo in early
October indicated that neither is likely before December.
Ellen Hancock, IBM's vice president and general manager of
communication systems, says she's optimistic about the 16
MHz Token Ring appearing before the end of the year even
though it wasn't ready for its expected mid-October
announcement. MS-DOS 4.0 will be delayed until mid-November
at the earliest; PC-DOS 4.0 already is shipping with PS/2
systems, but numerous incompatibilities, particularly with
RAM resident utilities, affecting older software remain to
be corrected.
- PC Week 26 September and 3 October and
InfoWorld 26 September and 10 October