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June 6, 1998
News
- Lots of free stuff to give away this week, including a 56K
modem, voice recognition software, games and more.
- Microsoft introduced Service Pack 1 for Internet Explorer 4.0
for Windows 95, but unfortunately, they’re still forcing you to download the whole
browser instead of just an upgrade file. At about 15 or 20 Mbytes for a full download,
that’s going to take a while. The web site promises they’re going to offer a
patch-only file sometime soon that will upgrade your existing IE 4.01 installation to 4.01
SP1, but it’s not clear when that the patch is going to be available. The Service
Pack incorporates no new features, apparently, but includes a number of bug fixes users
found in IE 4.01, including some year 2000 compatibility problems.
- The Federal Trade Commission released a fairly scathing
report this week on the lack of privacy protection on the Internet. The report noted that
a large percentage of the commercial web sites that it checked routinely sold personal
information about individuals who had come to their site without ever informing the people
they were going to do so. It also noted that only about 14% of the sites had any type of
privacy policy and even less offered clearly-stated policies that explained what the site
would do with any personal information it collected. The report is particularly
problematic for the fledgling Internet industry because it shows that self-policing
efforts that the industry pledged it would do have failed miserably. In addition, the
governmental agency is calling for strict controls that would prohibit collecting any
information from children without direct parental approval. The report apparently also
recommends the government abandon its "hands-off" policy and stipulate rules and
regulations regarding what Internet sites can and cannot do with personal information.
- Sprint made lots of headlines this week when it announced a
new network it’s developing which it claims will let it offer businesses and
consumers the ability to talk on the phone, send faxes and access the Internet on a single
line, simultaneously. In addition, this Integrated On-Demand Network, or ION, as the
company calls it, will offer web access speeds of 100 times faster than today’s
modems. Interestingly, while Sprint didn’t explain exactly how all of this is going
to work, they did say that users will be charged per packet, which means it will sent or
received. This is very different than today’s time-metered systems and it means that,
for example, watching a high-bandwidth video stream on the net will cost more than sending
and receiving tiny e-mail or viewing simple web pages. Unfortunately, we probably
won’t be seeing this service until late 1999.
- Several companies plan to offer new lower-cost notebooks in
the next week or so in the never-ending spiral of diminishing prices. Most of the Pentium
II-based notebooks, for example, will be priced under $3,000 and one from Acer will even
be under $2,000. Compaq will be adding five new models to its Presario line, including the
$1,599 Presario 1230 which features a 233 MHz Cyrix MediaGX. In the middle range of the
line will be the $2,100 and $2,400 models based on AMD’s K6 chip. At the top end of
the range, around the $3,000 price point will be the Presario 1655, which features a 266
MHz mobile Pentium II and a 13.3" active matrix screen. Acer’s new Extensa 700
line includes several Pentium II-based machines, including the Extensa 710DX, which offers
a 233 MHz Pentium II, 2.1 GB drive and 12.1" display for $1,999. Toshiba will also be
adding to its notebook lineup with the Satellite 330 and Satellite 335, both of which
feature 266 MHz mobile Pentium MMX processors. The units will include a 12.1"
display, 32 MB of RAM and a 4 GB drive. The price for a unit with a dual-scan screen is
$2,199 and with an active matrix screen it’s $2,499.
- In other Toshiba news, the company also announced a new line
of digital cameras. The $699 PDR-M1 is a 1.5 megapixel camera with a 2x digital zoom and
the $399 PDR-5 offers a resolution of 640 x 480. The PDR-5 attaches to a notebook computer
by flipping open and sliding into a PC card slot.
- Looking to pump your older Power Mac or Mac clone up to G3
speeds? Well, former Mac clone vendor MacTell has released a series of revised G3 upgrade
cards that work with many existing Power Macs. Starting at $549, the PowerJolt G3 offers a
233 MHz G3 processor and 512K of L2 cache that runs at 125 MHz, or half the
processor’s speed. The $849 PowerJolt G3 Pro includes a 250 MHz processor and 1 MB of
L2 cache that also runs at half the processor’s speed. At the high end, the $1,795
model includes a 300 MHz processor and 1 MB of L2 cache that runs at the full 300 MHz
speed of the processor.
- Iomega this week announced price reductions on their Jaz2 2GB
removable cartridge drives from $649 down to $499 for external models and from $549 to
$499 for internal models. 2 GB cartridge prices were also reduced from $169 to $125 for
individual cartridges and $99/cartridge if purchased in a three pack.
- Lots of new graphics software was released this week.
Macromedia announced that the final shipping version of their $299 Fireworks package is
now available for Windows and Mac users. The program is specifically designed to create
and optimize graphics for the web. Adobe is working on a competitive product called
ImageReady that will also be available for both the Mac and Windows later this summer for
$199. A new beta version that works with Adobe Photoshop 5.0 is now available to download
and try. In addition, Microsoft announced the final release of Liquid Motion 1.0, their
$149 animation software package for Windows. Liquid Motion lets you create animations for
web sites or any other type of document. You can download and try the full version of the
software for 45 days in a new option they call Try & Buy. Finally, the venerable
Harvard Graphics is available in a new version called, appropriately enough Harvard
Graphics 98. The new version of the $395 presentation package includes updates to work
with Windows 95, 98 and NT 4.0, Year 2000 compatibility, improved charting and graphing
functions and more.
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