New PowerBooks: Still Waiting

NOTE: This Miscellaneous Ramblings column originally appeared on MacOpinion on April 23, 1999. It is republished here by permission of the author and MacOpinion.

Well, the Lombard introduction predicted by some for the NAB Conference in Las Vegas this week did not materialize. QuickTime 4 was released in a public beta there.

However, MacFixit reports that Apple has extended its PowerBook promotion until May 30, which would seem to indicate that we won't be seeing Lombard until June. Others are still saying that Lombard will roll out at the WWDC which begins on May 10th, or even earlier. Word as I write this is that Mac OS 8.6, which was assumed to be the holdup, has gone Golden Master, which means its finished. Reportedly, production of Lombard in Taiwan is up and running, but we're still in wait-and-see mode.

On a recent conference call with financial analysts, Apple's chief financial officer, Fred Anderson, remarked, "I would also have to say with candor that we had weaker performance with PowerBooks. I'd say there has been some potential deferring of buying . . . by PowerBook customers who are speculating about future products.''

Meanwhile, the good news is that the great deals on G3 Series II 'Books keep on rolling. The price point of Lombard is expected to shoot back up to where the Wall Streets were when they first came out last May, so if you're looking for power at a great price, the opportunity is now.

In fact, if you want to buy ten or more 300 MHz PowerBook G3 Series IIs, and you're an education customer, Apple will reportedly sell you a batch for $1999 each while supplies last. This is the same unit that is currently list-priced at $2879. If your institution qualifies and is interested, contact Paul Musegade at Apple (612-941-9062).

The specs are:

• PowerBook G-3/300 (#M7310LL/A)
• 300 MHz.
• 1 MB Backside cache
• 64 MB RAM
• 8 GB Hard Drive
• 10Base-T Ethernet
• 56K modem
• 14.1" TFT.

Before we move along, MacInTouch reports that the PowerBook G3 Series Floppy Drive has been discontinued. Lombard will have a new expansion bay form factor, and presumably no floppy will be offered. Lombard's are expected to retain the PCI connector in one of the bays to facilitate connectivity with devices like Magma's PCI breakout boxes.

Mac Service and Owner's Manuals Available for Free Download

If you are interested in communing with the guts of your PowerBook, whether to just install some more RAM, or to fix a glitch, a service manual is a wonderful reference to have at your fingertips.

Apple has posted service manuals for every Mac product made back to the Mac Plus in PDF format at the first URL that appears below. I can't vouch for the strict accuracy of that comprehensive claim, but there are a lot of manuals there. If you want a complete manual, download the largest file of four typically listed for each product, because only the largest file contains the "take apart" instructions which are not included in the smaller manuals.

ftp://ftp.info.euro.apple.com/Apple.Support.Area/Misc/Service/servicemanuals/

If you have purchased a used PowerBook and the owner's manual is missing, you can also download one of those at:

ftp://manuals.info.apple.com/Apple_Support_Area/Manuals/

All the manuals are in Adobe Acrobat PDF format.

More on Blazing PowerBooks (not 5300s either)

The PowerBook Zone recently published an update to their extensive coverage of the Flaming PowerBook G3 Series issue, related to a batch of bad capacitors that were responsible for a few very hot (literally) G3 Series machines. "Apple quickly got the problem under control," says the PowerBook Zone, but one of their readers has reported that her two-day-old 'Book, purchased from Outpost, just went up in smoke.

She notes that it is possible that this machine has been sitting at Outpost.com for a long time and was part of the bad batch, or perhaps it was an isolated rogue unit. As the PowerBook Zone reported earlier, only a handful of the hundreds of thousands of G3 'Books built have manifested this problem, so there is no cause for general alarm.

It's also interesting that the G3 Series has generally avoided the "Incendiary PowerBook" innuendo that has plagued the poor PowerBook 5300 since one early production 5300's LiIon battery caught fire in an Apple lab, initiating a recall. No consumer 5300s ever caught fire and all of the suspect LiIon batteries were replaced with NiMH units. Apple has not recalled the G3 Series.

iCab Update

As I noted last week, I've been testing the latest 1.4 beta build of the iCab Browser, and over the past week it has proved nearly rock-solid, with only one crash (a complete lockup while loading images on Apple's website). With preview 1.4, iCab now has software that can essentially be used a main browser, and I look forward eagerly to the next beta update and the release build. The more I use iCab, the more I like it, and this is going to be a great browser alternative to Netscape and Explorer. There are still some issues with form rendering, and I've found the odd page that simply refuses to load with iCab. I also still want to see a text-only save-as option. But my iCab wish list is shrinking.

Exotic Software Department - Musashi

No, it's not some new Japanese seafood dish - it's a POP3 email client.

Many Mac-users were disappointed when Apple discontinued development of Claris Emailer last year. I was sorry as well to see a popular Mac application abandoned, even though my own preference was and is for Eudora Light for its Zen-like minimalist simplicity and its stability and speed.

However, Eudora Light has one glaring deficiency - it does not support multiple email accounts. Its big brother, Eudora Pro does, but I find Pro too ponderous and laden with features that I never use - too much like Outlook Express. My workaround is to run multiple, mildly hacked copies of Eudora Light, but a single application that retained Eudora Light's smallness and nimbleness, but offered multiple account support would be a more elegant solution.

I may have found it in Musashi, a new, shareware POP3 email client program for the Macintosh written by Mamoru Misono of Japan. I find Far Eastern software typically tends to be both stable and innovative, and my brief encounter with Musashi indicates that it fits that description.

Musashi is multi-user/multi-account compatible email client that is light and fast, supports drag & drop, background message sending and receiving, and templates.

Actually, there are two Musashis. Musashi 2.3.4 is the original program in its latest iteration, while Musashi Version 3.x adds support for hierarchical folders, remote mail and other advanced email features.

Musashi 2.3.4 specs:

• Sends mail by SMTP and receiving mail by POP3. (MacTCP or OpenTransport is required)
• Manage mails with multiple mail boxes.
• Multi-user compatibility. (Each user can cinfigure their own personal environment.)
• Multi-account compatibility.
• Mail box sharing. ( Personal mail boxes can be shared with other users.)
• Drag & Drop compatibility - moving mail, saving file, clipping text and so on.
• Attachment and extraction of BinHex encoded documents.
• Attachment and extraction of MIME Base 64 encoded documents.
• Attachment and extraction of uuencoded documents.
• Background mail sending and receiving.
• Templates.
• Custom resources
• Imports external messages and address book.

Musashi is a shareware. The Musashi 2.3.4 limited time demo lasts 30 days. If you want to use the program after the expiration, please register and pay for shareware fee ($30) so as to get registration code which defeats the expiry.

Musashi 3.06 Features include:

• All of the above, plus:
• Send attachments with Base64 (including AppleDouble and AppleSingle), BinHex and uuencode.
• Extract attachments with Base64 (including AppleDouble and AppleSingle), BinHex and uuencode.
• Hierarchical structured address book.
• Multiple signatures.
• Filter
• Multi-language fonts.
• Import external messages with plug-in functions.
• Import external address book with plug-in functions.
• Export messages with plug-in functions.
• Export address book with plug-in functions.
• Customize icons and window colors with module.

The Musashi 3.06 demo lasts 40 days, after which you must pay the shareware fee of $33 to get registration code. If you are a registered user of Musashi 2.x and wish to upgrade Musashi 3.x, you can re-register with an upgrade fee of $9.

Mamoru Misono says he will continue to release (bug-fix and minor-update) and support Musashi 2.x so you users can choose not to upgrade to version 3.x and continue to use version 2.x. He will fix bugs of Musashi 2.x but plans no new features, which will be concentrated in Musashi 3.x.

You can download either version of Musashi for trial evaluation here.

Newer Technology Cuts PowerBook Upgrade Prices

Newer Technology has joined other makers of G3 upgrades in dropping prices on its G3 upgrades, including NUpowr G3 PowerBook 1400 and PowerBook 2400 upgrade cards. The 1400 models, in speeds of 233 and 250 MHz, now cost $349 and $465 respectively. The 240 MHz upgrade for the 2400 now costs $365.

The lower-cost 233 MHz upgrade has 512K of backside cache while the 250 MHz version features 1 MB of backside cache. Newer Technology claims that the PowerBook 1400 upgrade is so simple anyone can perform it in about 5 minutes.

All PowerBooks since the 5300 series use a 64-bit CPU (603e or G3). The PowerBook 1400 employs a 64-bit CPU but only has a 32-bit cache and system memory bus. The 1400's 32-bit bus represents a significant performance bottleneck. Every time the CPU in a PowerBook 1400 wants data it must access the bus twice in order to obtain 64-bits of data. A NUpowr G3 card works around this bottleneck by virtue of the Level 2 backside cache. Every time a "cache hit" occurs it travels through a 64-bit bus in the processor itself, just like on newer PowerBooks. Due to the size of our backside cache (1 MB) in the 250 MHz NUpowr Card it can outperform the (original) PowerBook G3 250 on a number of tasks.

The Apple (original) PowerBook G3/250 earns a MacBench CPU score of 746 while the G3/250-upgraded 1400 turns in an impressive 875. The reason is the amount of backside cache. The Apple PowerBook (original) G3 uses 512K while the NUpowr G3 250 comes with 1MB.

To their credit, Newer Technology acknowledges that an upgraded 1400 will not be the complete equal of a PowerBook G3, noting that the latter has an video subsection which provides superb video performance, as well as a performance oriented hard drive and a larger LCD screen. The 1400 is also limited to 64MB of RAM , compared with the (original) PowerBook G3's maximum of 144MB. However, the upgrade is intended for people who have already made an investment in a PowerBook 1400.

The 240 MHz/512K cache G3 Upgrades for the PowerBook 2400 are much more difficult to install, because unlike the 1400, the IBM-built 2400 is difficult to take apart. Newer Technology "strongly" suggests that you get a trained service technician to install the 2400 upgrade, or alternatively that you use their own $99 installation service, available from many mail-order and web based resellers, and includes a 2-way shipping carton.

A Radical Solution for Scratched G3 Series PowerBooks

Sandor W. Sklar of Stanford University has come up with a radical solution for "fixing" scratches on the all-too-easily damaged "rubber"-coated centre sections of the PowerBook G3 Series case. He got rid of the "rubber" by dissolving it with nail polish remover, leaving the bare alloy material uncovered.

Actually, Jason O'Grady of O'Grady's PowerPage did much the same thing with his PowerBook G3 several months ago, and then used a small power tool to etch simulated "engine turning" texture into the bare metal.

Whether you think it's attractive is a matter of taste. I rather like the appearance, but I'm not a fan of the tactile sensation of touching bare metal, especially light alloys.

Anyway, you can have a look at the results in the many photos posted on Sandy's Web page.

Pre-Owned PowerBook Deals

SmallDog Electronics has a few used, in-house refurbished PowerBook 3400s available this week.

PowerBook 3400c 180/16/1.3gb/33.6/10BaseT/CD, $1,079
PowerBook 3400c180/48/1.3gb/33.6/10BaseT/CD, $1,129
PowerBook 3400c 240/16/2GB/12xCD/Ether/33.6, $1,249
PowerBook 3400c200/112/2gb/12xCD/Ether/33.6 (marred case), $1,299
PowerBook 3400c 200/48/2gb/6xCD/Ether/33.6 , $1,229
PowerBook 3400c 200/80/2gb/6xCD/Ether/33.6, $1,259
PowerBook 3400c 200/16/2gb/6xCD/Ether/33.6, $1,179
PowerBook 3400c 200/16/2gb/12xCD/Ether/33.6, $1,199
PowerBook 3400c 240/48/4GB/12xCD/Ether/33.6, $1,329
PowerBook 3400c 240/48/3GB/12xCD/Ether/33.6 , $1,299

And the Apple Store is listing a couple of refurbished G3 Series PowerBooks

PowerBook G3 233/32/2GB/20xCD/No Floppy/Enet/56K/14.1 TFT, $1,699
PowerBook G3 266/64/4GB/20xCD/No Floppy/Enet/56K/14.1 TFT, $2,199