@database "ar128.guide" @Node MAIN "Amiga Report Online Magazine #1.28 -- October 8, 1993" @{" Open Magazine " link "menu"} _ ____ ___ ______ _______ _ d# ####b g#00 `N##0" _agN#0P0N# d# d## jN## j##F J## _dN0" " d## .#]## _P ##L jN##F ### g#0" .#]## dE_j## # 0## jF ##F j##F j##' ______ dE_j## .0"""N## d" ##L0 ##F 0## 0## "9##F" .0"""5## .dF' ]## jF ##0 ##F ##F `##k d## .dF' j## .g#_ _j##___g#__ ]N _j##L_ _d##L_ `#Nh___g#N' .g#_ _j##__ """"" """"""""""" " """""" """""" """"""" """"" """""" ###### ###### ###### ###### ###### ######## TM ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## #### ## ## ## #### ## ## ## #### ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ### ###### ## ###### ## ### ## International Online Magazine "Your Weekly Source for Amiga Information." October 8, 1993 No. 1.28 /////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// / Winners Don't Use Drugs / /////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// Copyright © 1993 SkyNet Publications All Rights Reserved A Member Of STR Publishing @endnode @node P2-1 "Where to find Amiga Report" @toc "menu" /// WHERE TO FIND AMIGA REPORT Distribution Sites! -------------------------- Click on the button of the BBS nearest you for information on that system. //////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// / FidoNet Systems / //////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// FREQ the filename "AR.LHA" for the most current issue of Amiga Report! @{" OMAHA AMIGANET " link P2-1-9} ..................................Omaha, Nebraska @{" NOVA BBS " link P2-1-1} .............................Cleveland, Tennessee @{" CLOUD'S CORNER BBS " link P2-1-3} ............................Bremerton, Washington @{" BIOSMATICA BBS " link P2-1-4} .........................................Portugal @{" AMIGA JUNCTION 9 " link P2-1-5} ...................................United Kingdom @{" BITSTREAM BBS " link P2-1-6} ..............................Nelson, New Zealand @{" REALM OF TWILIGHT " link P2-1-7} ..................................Ontario, Canada @{" METNET TRIANGLE " link P2-1-8} ......................Kingston Upon Hull, England @{" AMIGA-NIGHT-SYSTEM " link P2-1-10}.................................Helsinki, Finland @{" RAMSES THE AMIGA FLYING " link P2-1-11}............................................France //////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// / Non-FidoNet Systems / //////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// @{" IN THE MEANTIME " link P2-1-2} ...............................Yakima, Washington @{" FREELAND MAINFRAME " link P2-1-50} ..............................Olympia, Washington @{" LAHO BBS " link P2-1-51} ...............................Seinajoki, Finland @{" FALLING BBS " link P2-1-52} ...........................................Norway @{" COMMAND LINE BBS " link P2-1-53} ..................................Toronto, Canada @{" RENDEZVOUS BBS " link P2-1-54} ......................................New Zealand @{" LEGUANS BYTE CHANNEL " link P2-1-55} ..........................................Germany @{" DEAD FISH BBS " link P2-1-56} ...........................................?????? @{" STINGRAY DATABASE " link P2-1-57} ...........................Muelheim/Ruhr, Germany @endnode Non-AmigaGuide Users: See the end of this document for numbers to each BBS. ___________________________________________________________________________ /// 10/08/93 Amiga Report 1.28 "Your Weekly Source for Amiga Information" -------------------------- · The Editor's Desk · CPU Status Report · New Products · FTP Announcements · Dealer Directory · AR Confidential · The Humor Department · AR Online · A.M.I.G.A. · Emulation Ramblings · Internet Email · More WOCA Reports » Modem Deal of the Year « » Commodore Shareholder Movement Update « » Retina 24-bit Board In-Depth Review « /////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// Amiga Report International Online Magazine "Your Weekly Source for Amiga Information" » FEATURING WEEKLY « Accurate UP-TO-DATE News and Information Current Events, Original Articles, Tips, Rumors, and Information Hardware · Software · Corporate · R & D · Imports /////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// / DELPHI · PORTAL · FIDO · INTERNET · BIX · AMIGANET / /////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// @node P1-1 "From the Editor's Desk" @toc "menu" /// From the Editor's Desk "Saying it like it is!" ---------------------- Remember the friend I mentioned a few weeks ago that was selling out for a PC system? Well, he got it, and he's on the verge of selling his A4000. But he's not completely nuts. Okay, get up off the floor and stop laughing. Here's why... he just bought and installed OS/2 v2.1 on his shiny new Dell Dimension XPS 466V. To quote him, "OS/2 is like AmigaDOS with ten years of improvements by a top-notch design team." Sounds like a winner, huh? So, in short, if you find yourself needing a PC for whatever reason, and you dread dealing with DOS or Windoze, check out OS/2. Okay, let's get back on topic. I didn't mean to bore or scare anybody with PC talk. I just couldn't think of a better way to open this editorial. Well, my netmail problem has been fixed and I can now reply to messages. However, one individual, who shall remain nameless, took the comment that DLG had a bug personally. I got a rather nasty note in netmail saying that it was uncalled for, and that I owed the Amiga community a big apology. I don't think so. As I recall, I said: >A note on Netmail. I have been receiving quite a bit of Netmail through >FidoNet lately. I wanted to let people know that the system I call for >this mail is having trouble with outgoing mail (actually, it's a bug in >DLG I'm told), so I have been unable to respond. Is that a slam on DLG? No. It's the statement of a fact, right? That's what I thought. I _like_ DLG. A lot. So where does casually mentioning the existence of a bug considered slamming? Beats me. But anyway... I heard today that the 3DO is out. Reports have it that Babbages is carrying it. I'm going to have to head over there tomorrow and check it out. I sure hope the CD32 makes it out soon, so people can see that a $400 unit can equal or surpass a $700 machine. IF the thing is marketed properly. IF. Let's all cross our fingers. If it fails, I guess we'll all be buying PC's in a year or so. A lot of people have said to me, "Hey, you put out a really cool magazine! Amiga Report is awesome!" I love hearing that, but without our staff and contributors, we wouldn't be the great magazine that everybody enjoys. I want to take a moment to recognize the people that make Amiga Report possible. Robert Niles, our Technical Editor and AmigaGuide expert does a great job in getting each issue ready in short time, and still finds time to write some really great articles. Chad Freeman has been doing his A.M.I.G.A. column for several months, and it's great. His humor is bizarre, and adds a lot of character to the magazine. Jason Compton and his articles on emulation have been a nice refresher from the steady diet of Amiga-only articles. For the last few weeks, Dan Zerkle has kindly allowed us to reprint his World of Commodore reports that he has been posting on Comp.Sys.Amiga.Announce. And last, but certainly not least, a big thanks to all the people that write the reviews found on Usenet's Comp.Sys.Amiga.Reviews newsgroup that not only take their own time to write fine reviews and make them available on Usenet, but also for allowing us to print them to allow even more people to benefit from their work. In other words, without a great many people, Amiga Report would not be possible. I started it with the desire to bring current news and in- formation to the Amiga community, but a large part of AR's content comes from the Amiga community. A great big thanks to our contributors! Rob @ AR @endnode ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ @node P2-2 "AR Staff" @toc "menu" /// The Amiga Report Staff Dedicated to serving you! ---------------------- Editor ====== Robert Glover Portal: Rob-G Delphi: ROB_G FidoNet: 1:285/11 AmigaNet: 40:200/10 Internet: General Mail: ROB_G@Delphi.com Submissions: Rob-G@cup.portal.com Assistant and Technical Editor ============================== Robert Niles Portal: RNiles Delphi: RNILES FidoNet: 1:3407/104 (Private) Internet: rniles@imtired.itm.com Contributing Correspondents =========================== Jason Compton Chad Freeman Michael Heinz Harv Laser @endnode *************************************************************************** @node P4-1 "Delphi" @toc "menu" /// Delphi: It's Getting Better All The Time! ------------------------------------------ Amiga Report International Online Magazine is available every week in the Amiga SIG on DELPHI. Amiga Report readers are invited to join DELPHI and become a part of the friendly community of Amiga enthusiasts there. SIGNING UP WITH DELPHI ====================== Using a personal computer and modem, members worldwide access DELPHI services via a local phone call JOIN -- DELPHI -------------- Via modem, dial up DELPHI at 1-800-695-4002 then... When connected, press RETURN once or twice and.... At Password: type AMIGAREPORT and press RETURN. DELPHI's best plan is the 20/20 plan. It gives you 20 hours each month for the low price of only $19.95! Additional hours are only $1.50 each! This covers 1200, 2400 and even 9600 connections! For more information, and details on other plans, call DELPHI Member Services at 1-800-695-4005 SPECIAL FEATURES ---------------- · Complete Internet connection -- Telnet, FTP, IRC, Gopher, E-Mail and more! (Internet option is $3/month extra) · SIGs for all types of computers -- Amiga, IBM, Macintosh, Atari, etc. · Large file databases! · SIGs for hobbies, video games, graphics, and more! · Business and World News, Stock Reports, etc. · Grolier's Online Electronic Encyclopedia! · Weekly informal conferences (currently Thursdays at 10 pm EST)! DELPHI - It's getting better all the time! @endnode *************************************************************************** @node P1-2 "CPU Status Report" @toc "menu" /// CPU Status Report Late Breaking Industry-Wide News ----------------- CD-ROM Drive Doubles As Stand-Alone CD Player FREMONT, CALIFORNIA -- Many of the new PCs today include CD-ROM drives. Increasingly though, users do not want to abandon their investments in existing hardware, and as a result, look towards CD-ROM upgrade kits to convert their existing PCs to multimedia machines. Hoping to address those potential users, Media Vision has introduced the Memphis multimedia upgrade system. The Memphis also doubles as a stand-alone audio compact disc player. According to the company, the upgrade system simplifies the installation process and "gives consumers an integrated unit for CD-ROM access." Pre-recorded CDs can also be played while the PC is switched off, or when the Memphis chassis is separated from the PC. A company source told Newsbytes that the Memphis is the result of a number of studies with users and user groups to find out what they liked and disliked about existing upgrade kits. The company found that around 40 percent of users were using the kits for audio CD playing. As a result, Memphis can be used as a stand-alone CD player without the need for the PC to be switched on. Said the source: "The speakers were designed with sound in mind. It sounds like a hi-fi system. You have a CD-quality sound card, why not have audio-quality speakers?" Another result of user feedback is the stylish packaging. The source told Newsbytes, "Memphis has a really striking, modern design. It can double as an audio system as well as playing computer multimedia CDs." For example, in a family room or a student dorm room. It is also intended to be a "less intimidating" unit. The system consists of a chassis with CD audio controls, two detachable speakers, an interface card that installs inside the PC, a variety of pre-recorded CD-ROM titles, and all required cables. Users can either install and configure the interface card themselves, using the company's QuickStart software, or they can have it installed by their local dealer. In announcing the system, Greg Reznick, Media Vision's vice president of marketing, said, "In the past, any multimedia upgrade confronted consumers with a collection of pieces that for many was too complicated, to difficult, and too daunting to face. Media Vision's Memphis system has changed this. Now it is easier, quicker, and more convenient to add multimedia capabilities to a PC." A single cable connects the system's chassis to the computer's back panel. Each speaker is connected via a four-foot cable. The company says that, when space is limited, the speakers can remain attached to the chassis and the entire unit can be placed under the computer monitor. However, better stereo separation is possible with the speakers detached and set upright up to eight feet apart. For stand-alone CD operation, the power cord of the chassis is plugged into any AC socket, without the device needing to be plugged into a PC. The Memphis features high-fidelity 16-bit 44.1 kH stereo sound; a double-speed CD-ROM drive, capable of transferring data at 300 Kb-per-second with 350 millisecond access time; a 20-voice FM synthesizer; a software controllable mixer; game port; and an industry-standard SCSI (Small Computer Systems Interface) CD-ROM controller interface. Built-in MIDI (musical instrument digital interface) support allows control of other MIDI music instruments via the on-board MIDI connectors, or the system can be controlled from an external music keyboard. Memphis comes bundled with two multimedia CD titles: Broderbund Software's Arthur's Teacher Trouble and Compton's Interactive Encyclopedia. The company says that the system is 100 percent compatible with existing multimedia sound standards, including AdLib, Sound Blaster, and Pro Audio 16. It also meets the Multimedia PC Council's requirements for MPC Level 2 compliance and supports Windows 3.1, Windows NT, OS/2 2.1, and NextStep. Memphis is priced at $999, and is expected to become available in the US in mid-October. ------------------------------ IBM Licenses Cellular, Modem Interface MANHASSET, NEW YORK -- Spectrum Information Technologies Inc., won another victory for its patents when IBM said it signed a marketing and licensing agreement with the company. At issue is the Axcell, an interface between cellular phones and the modems on personal computers which allows the modem to work on a wireless call much as it would on a wired call. The Axcell will now be given an IBM ThinkPad Proven tag, which signifies that it meets the product and service standards of IBM. Spectrum already has deals to market ThinkPad peripherals made by Megahertz and Apex Data, which licensed Spectrum's patents. AT&T also has a license for Spectrum technology, covering all its units, including NCR and McCaw Cellular. However, not all players in the market recognize Spectrum's broad patent claims. The company is engaged in a legal battle with Data Race over technology like that of the Axcell, and it's in a legal fight with Microcom concerning error-correction used on wireless lines. Motorola has also not yet licensed Spectrum's patents. Spectrum also recently applied for a patent on a technology which allows cellular operators to distinguish between a voice and data call, which would let them price the two calls differently. Spectrum's stock, which was worth $3 per share a few months ago, has since doubled in price. ------------------------------ Canadian Firm Says Robots See, Understand Surroundings ORILLIA, ONTARIO, CANADA -- A small company based in a town north of Toronto claims its robotics technology offers something no other industrial robots have today: the ability to see and understand the robot's surroundings. Vivek Burhanpurkar, founder and president of Cyberworks Inc., told Newsbytes ultrasonic vision systems in his company's products allow robots to see what is around them and understand the "basic geometry" without having to be programmed to deal with specific surroundings. That means, for instance, that Cyberworks' CyberVac Industrial Cleaning Robot can vacuum a room without having to be set up for the specific room first. It will see where the walls and furniture are, and using built-in expert-system software, will work out an efficient way of cleaning the space, Burhanpurkar said. Cyberworks has just launched that robot and another designed for security and inspection, as well as a set of components that the company plans to sell to others who want to build their own special-purpose robots, he said. The security and inspection robot can spot changes or movements in its environment, Burhanpurkar said, but can also relay video signals to a security guard at one central location. Cyberworks is a 10-employee company that concentrates on research and development and subcontracts much of its manufacturing work, Burhanpurkar said. He said the firm plans to sell its technology to other vendors to build into their own products rather than try to build a wide range of robots itself. The company has been developing its technology for about eight years, Burhanpurkar said. It has sold prototypes of its products, he added, and in the past year has done about C$1 million worth of business in Japan. Cyberworks is just beginning to market its products in North America, Burhanpurkar said. The company recently held a series of demonstrations for potential customers across the United States. ------------------------------ Japan Has Two Million Telecom Users TOKYO, JAPAN -- The number of personal computer-based telecommunication network users has reached two million in Japan, according to the New-media Development Association in Tokyo. Their numbers have increased rapidly over the past two years, and continue to escalate. The association's survey shows 1,957,000 users were online this past June, and this number has apparently topped two million by now. The association also took the survey in 1991. At that time, there were 1,150,000 users, indicating the number has nearly doubled over the past two years. Commercial PC networks with over 10,000 members each have a total of about 1,422,000 users, or 72 percent of all network users in Japan. NEC's PC-VAN holds the top position with 578,000 members. Second is Fujitsu's Nifty-Serve, which has about 500,000 members. They are followed by JALNET, ASCII Net, Nikkei Mix and TeleStar. PC-VAN and Nifty-Serve continue to expand and have added new databases and forums, and have linked with other major networks. For example, Fujitsu has a link with CompuServe. PC-VAN has a link with GEnie and JALNET. These networks are currently seeking ways to interconnect through the Message Handling System standard, which is advocated by the Japanese Ministry of Posts and Telecommunication. ------------------------------ Windows Software Turns A PC Into An Answering Machine, Fax FREMONT, CALIFORNIA -- Bit Software announced Bitfax Professional for Windows, a product that can turn a personal computer (PC) into a data communications terminal, a fax machine, and an answering machine that can also automatically deliver messages to a pager. The product is designed to work with the new modem cards that include data communications, fax, and voice mail capability. Installation of the product is easy, according to Bit Software representatives who said the product is smart enough to identify the port where the modem is located and the type of modem down to the baud rate at which it can transfer data. An animation of a man identified as the "snooper" accompanies the software's intelligent investigation of the hardware to give the user feedback on what is happening. The fax capability has a "green" feature that reduces the blank scan lines in faxes to save paper and reduce fax transmission time. As an answering machine, Bitfax Professional's Voice Manager feature allows users to receive, log, record, play, and store personal messages. Users can create multiple mailboxes, each with a personal greeting, and password protection of individual mailboxes is also available. In addition, an Auto Pager feature can have the computer call a pager after receiving a voice message or fax. Additional features include the ability to retrieve a fax from a touch-tone phone and a toll-saver mode. The fax engine in the new product offers enhancements to the company's former fax product. Users can now drag and drop faxes onto a "Transmit Fax" icon for quick sending, onto a "View Fax" icon for viewing, and onto a "Print Fax" icon for quick printing. A new fax management module allows users to create and assign a folder to each individual or group of faxes. Compression of received faxes and the ability to automatically delete faxes after a specified time period has also been added. Optical character recognition (OCR), for turning faxed documents into text is also included and over 10 languages are supported, the company said. Text and drawing tools offer the ability to add text, images, lines, circles, boxes, and graphics onto faxes. The data communications portion of the product, Bitcom, stores data in a dBASE-compatible phonebook which is also directly compatible with Bitfax Professional. Bitcom offers remote access, automatic redialing, and support for Xmodem, Ymodem, Zmodem, and Kermit data transfer protocols. Users can also create buttons for access to popular online services, such as Compuserve. Bitfax Professional will work with both flatbed and handheld scanners that support the Twain specifications. The product will offer voice mail features with any voice modem that uses the Rockwell or Sierra voice chip set. Company officials were reluctant to list specific modems that meet those criteria, but said most modems with voice support use one of those two chipsets. Bit Software has mentioned a hardware/software bundle, which is the original way the company started distribution of its data communications products, but no specific information was forthcoming on which modem would be used or when the bundle might be available. The product will work with any 386-based or higher IBM compatible personal computer (PC) running Microsoft Windows with at least four megabytes of random access memory (RAM). Bitfax Professional's retail pricing has been set at $129 and the product will be available in October from Bit Software or through the company's retail distribution channels. ------------------------------ Newton Connection Kit For Mac Intro'd CUPERTINO, CALIFORNIA -- Macintosh users with Newton Messagepads can now update their personal digital assistants (PDAs) from the Macintosh and vice versa via the Newton Connection Kit version 1.0. The stand-alone version of the kit is now shipping, Apple Computer said. The Connection Kit allows Messagepad owners to create, view, edit, synchronize, and back up the PDA. "Smart Synchronization" is what Apple calls its technology to update information between the PDA and the Macintosh when the two are connected. The kit has been bundled with the $899 version of the Messagepad that includes the fax/modem since the beginning of September, but this is the first time its been available as a separate product. The kit can create an automatic backup of the Messagepad's information on the Macintosh hard disk, and tracks previously synchronized information which may have been deleted on the Messagepad, automatically storing it in an archive file. In addition, Apple says the kit can be used to update the system on the Newton with downloadable system updates from Apple's on-line sources such as Compuserve, Applelink, or American Online, or to transfer applications to the Newton from the Macintosh. While this is just version 1.0, Apple is already talking about version 2.0, which is expected later this year. Apple was going to call version 2.0 the Newton Connection Kit Pro, but changed the title and said all registered purchasers of the Newton Connection Kit 1.0 will receive a free upgrade to version 2.0. Also, Macworld Boston attendees who received a complementary preview version of the kit are also entitled to both the version 1.0 and 2.0 releases, Apple maintains. Of course, the Connection Kit will also work with the Expertpad, Sharp's Messagepad work-a-like that is also available through retail outlets. Sharp manufacturers the Messagepad for Apple. The kit does not require a fax/modem to connect to the Macintosh, but comes with a cable, software, and a manual, Apple said. A Microsoft Windows version of the Newton Connection Kit is being jointly developed by Apple and Traveling Software of Bothell, Washington. Apple says it was demonstrated at the Boston Macworld show and should be available this fall. Retail pricing is around $149, though users might find lower prices in consumer outlets, Apple said. ------------------------------ Interactive CD Player Wars Begin SAN MATEO, CALIFORNIA -- The Interactive compact disc (CD)-player wars have begun. 3DO reports Matsushita's subsidiary, Panasonic, is placing its Real brand 3DO Interactive Multiplayer in stores beginning this month. Company representatives said Panasonic will not talk numbers, but claims it can have multiplayers in 2,000 retail stores by Christmas. The players connect to a television set, retail for $699.95, and have been dubbed the new video cassette recorders (VCRs) of the 90's. The Real 3DO players come with two CDs - one containing the Electronic Arts game "Crash and Burn," and the other offering information about the system and previews of software titles that will soon be available. Eight titles for the player are expected to be available by the end of October, and a total of 27 titles from 13 companies are projected to be available in time for the holiday season. Sanctuary Woods says it is shipping the first shrink-wrapped title for the 3DO, "Shelley Duvall's It's A Bird's Life," retail priced at $54.95. Panasonic says the titles will range in price from $40 to $60 each. Television advertising campaigns and nation wide mall tours in seven major cities are getting underway to promote the Real players, Panasonic representatives said. Mall tours offer about 15 3DO units set up with games for mall shoppers to visit and play as long as they like. In Los Angeles, Panasonic will offer the only mall tour at two malls on the same weekend, October 16-17. One will be at the Del Amo Mall and the other at the Los Ceritos Mall. Philips has the jump on Panasonic as its Compact Disc Interactive (CD-I) players have been in retail stores since last year. The company has started airing "infomercials" on national television to educate consumers concerning the units. Besides over $150 game and educational titles, the company is offering digital movies on CD beginning this month in a deal with Paramount. Nine movie titles will be offered including Top Gun, Black Rain, Fatal Attraction, and Star Trek VI. Music videos will also be available, Philips representatives said. Philips has also dropped the price of its player down to $499, but the catch is a $250 MPEG Digital Video cartridge (which offers Motion Picture Experts Group decompression) must be added to the CD-I unit in order to play back the compressed movies. Both the Panasonic Real 3DO and the CD-I player boast playback capability of audio CDs and Kodak photo CDs. ------------------------------ Dow Jones Debuts Personal Journal On-Line Service PRINCETON, NEW JERSEY -- Starting with hand-held devices using Microsoft at Work software, Dow Jones is rolling out a new on-line service it calls Personal Journal. The product is aimed at giving customers an on-line, customized view of Dow Jones' news products, including its Wall Street Journal daily and Barrons' weekly newspapers, as well as its newswires. Subscribers can create a "personal profile" of stocks and news subjects of interest, explained spokesman Maggie Logan Landis. The hand-held device would be plugged-in each morning to download both the Journal's "What's News" digest of major stories, and other stories chosen as part of the profile. Entire stories could be read by clicking on a listing. Updates on stories and stock quotes could also be downloaded throughout the day. What may be most interesting about the product is its projected cost. Landis said it will be on the order of the cost of a daily newspaper -- the Wall Street Journal carries a street price of 75 cents. "Absolutely, other products are what we want to do," she added. "We want to go after other handhelds, but also other computing platforms." Microsoft said it will ship the Personal Journal application software with its handheld software. Owners of Microsoft At Work-based handheld devices who want to subscribe will do so through Dow Jones. Personal Journal is the first news publication Microsoft is actively supporting as part of its new operating system. In addition to business coverage, the service also offers scores from major professional sports and college games involving the "Top 25" schools. The target market includes frequent travelers and mobile salespeople. Access will be via a toll-free number. Each day's Wall Street Journal becomes available at 2 am each morning before publication, and the newswire stories are available once they clear the desk. The product's due for release in early 1994. All news sources are owned by Dow Jones. Microsoft is shipping a version of Microsoft At Work fax software with version 3.11 of its Microsoft Windows for Workgroups, allowing PCs with fax hardware to use the Microsoft Mail client interface. Microsoft At Work was announced in June with the support of 70 office machine, communication, and computer companies. Telephones, printers, and copiers, as well as hand- held devices, are targeted by the product. The new Dow Jones product will enter a surprisingly crowded market. In addition to current news profile services like NewsEdge and Individual Inc., there are new entrants like Reality Technologies Inc., of King of Prussia, Pennsylvania. That company announced, in conjunction with Money Magazine, a new personalized news clipping service called Reality's Smart Investor Network by Money Magazine. In addition to sourcing Money, a Time-Warner publication, the new service also offers Dow Jones' wires and publications, investment newsletters and news from the CNBC business news channel. Subscribers choose subjects by company names, industry names or mutual fund names. All stories are downloaded to a hard drive, so any story can be read without going online. Network software costs $49.99, and ships November 1. The service is said to be priced at $6.95 per month, but that is misleading because Reality has other services with their own costs. In addition to the software, there's a flat fee of $9.95 per month for the basic service, which updates a user's portfolio based on current prices of stocks, bonds, and funds. For another $8 per month, investors can get updates on stock and bond research databases as well as historical pricing charges. ------------------------------ ADI To Ship Real-time Video Compression Chips WASHINGTON, DC -- Arlington Heights, Illinois-based Audio DigitalImaging (ADI) has announced that the company's Apogee M-1 Series ASIC (application specific integrated circuit) will be ready by the end of October. The Apogee M-1 is a video compression processor used in video conferencing and computer-based multimedia workstations. Intended for use in high-end video production boards, the Apogee chips offer inexpensive broadcast-quality television processing capabilities for PCs, claims the company. The Apogee chip family are three-volt CMOS (complimentary metal oxide semiconductor) devices. They include MPEG and H.261 (video compression) and support chips, as well as a soon-to-be-released decode-only chip. These chips are intended for board and computer developers rather than end-users, but their availability should mark the beginning of a new generation of professional-quality yet inexpensive video enhancement and manipulation boards. ------------------------------ Supra Buys PSI Integration, Some Jobs To Go ALBANY, OREGON -- Modem marketer Supra Corp., says it has completed the purchase of PSI Integration (PSII), a Campbell, California-based modem manufacturer specializing in Macintosh-based products. Supra spokesperson Sally McMillan told Newsbytes both companies had agreed not to disclose the terms of the purchase. The deal closed on September 30, 1993. McMillan said PSI's 31 employees have all been laid off and are now being interviewed for possible employment by Supra, but some will not be rehired. No decision has been made about possible relocation of the PSII functions. McMillan told Newsbytes PSII manufactured modems for Apple Computer's PowerBook line under the Suprafaxmodem label, with models for data and fax communications at speeds from 4800 bits-per-second (bps) to 14,400 bps. Purchase of PSII gave Supra an entry into the European modem market, since PSII had several modems already certified as meeting European communications standards. Supra was formed in 1985 to manufacture peripherals for the Atari market. With the decline of that market Supra began making modems in 1987 to broaden their product line. They market their high speed modems to the PC and Macintosh marketplace under the Supra label. ------------------------------ First PCMCIA SCSI Card Intro'd From New Media IRVINE, CALIFORNIA -- New Media claims to have introduced the first Personal Computer Memory Card International Association (PCMCIA) Small Computer System Interface (SCSI) adapter card. The Visual Media card allows computers with credit-card sized slots to communicate with a range of SCSI peripherals, including optical scanners, networks, cameras, printers, CD-ROM drives, and tape drives. Those familiar with SCSI adapters will remember that most adapters of this type require configuration via jumpers. However, the Visual Media card comes with an advanced SCSI programming interface (ASPI) as well as Corel SCSI Version 2 software that configures itself. New Media President Carl Perkins said: "With the Visual Media card, our ASPI manager, and Corel SCSI Version 2, you simply plug in your SCSI peripherals and run the install program. The software does the rest, from hunting out the peripherals and selecting the needed device drivers to then modifying the CONFIG.SYS file." The needed device drivers ship on the three 3.5-inch installation disks that come with the Visual Media SCSI Card, which requires the user have both a 3.5-inch drive and a PCMCIA slot on the computer in question. Users also have a choice of three cables with their SCSI Card - a Centronics cable, a DB25 cable, and a SCSI II cable. The card itself is the thin Type 1 form factor, which means it will fit into any industry standard PCMCIA slot. It can sense periods of inactivity, switching into low power mode, and allows users to daisy chain up to seven SCSI peripheral devices. In addition, the company boasts the card offers hot insertion, meaning it can be removed and inserted while the computer is on, also an unusual feature. Corel SCSI Version 2 is a superset of Corel's popular software Corel SCSI Pro and offers automatic loading into Windows or OS/2, universal backup, and support for virtually any SCSI peripheral. In addition, the SCSI interface offers data transfer rates 200 percent faster than parallel port adapters, which are currently the most widely used connection point for adding peripheral devices to portable computers. The Visual Media SCSI Card offers direct memory access (DMA) emulation and can maintain an average sustained data transfer rate of 500 kilobytes per second. The card is also compatible with Windows NT, the Multimedia PC (MPC), and SCSI II standards, the company said. The Visual Media SCSI Card is $399 and is distributed via Merisel and Tech Data as well as by New Media. The company says the SCSI Card comes with a lifetime warranty. Irvine, California-based New Media has also shipped US made integrated circuit (IC) dynamic random access memory (DRAM) cards, a Type 1 Ethernet card, and a PCMCIA modem card. Company officials claim a PCMCIA Sound Card for Windows will be available in the fourth quarter of 1993. ------------------------------ Newton Wireless Messaging Available This Month CUPERTINO, CALIFORNIA -- Apple Computer said the wireless messaging services it boasted of when first announcing the Newton are about to become reality. Users will be able to receive a message the length of the average postcard on their Messagepads from anywhere in the nation and eventually in other countries as well, Apple said. The Apple Wireless Messaging Service delivered by the Bellsouth's paging network subsidiary, Mobilecomm, will become available to Newton users this month. Access to the service is via the Newton Messaging Card, a $229 credit card-sized receiver that inserts into the Personal Computer Memory Card International Association (PCMCIA) slot. The Messaging Card can receive messages whether or not it is inserted into the Newton, meaning it can be picking up transmissions while in a jacket pocket and inserted into the Newton at the users convenience to retrieve the messages. The distance from which a user can receive messages depends on the type of service chosen. There are four service options: local; city-by-city; regional, which allows the choice of a broad geographic area of the US such as the Northeast, Southeast, Midwest, West, or Pacific regions; and national. Services range from a $21.00 a month local service to $83.95 for standard nationwide coverage. International coverage may also become available in areas where Mobilecomm currently operates, including Canada, the Virgin Islands, and Puerto Rico. Rental of a Messaging Card bundled with one of the four coverage options is also a possibility, according to Apple. Users can expect monthly rental fees for the card and service will range from about $35 for standard local coverage to about $99.95 for standard nationwide coverage. The Messaging Card is to become available in retail outlets mid-month and will include specifics on how to activate the Apple Wireless Messaging Service. Like pagers, sources for the messages include an operator, a text messaging keyboard terminal, or a personal computer with a modem and messaging software. The Messaging Card should also work in the Sharp Expertpad, Sharp's Messagepad work-a-like which is now available in retail stores. Sharp manufacturers the Newton Messagepad for Apple Computer. The Newton appears to be a hit. Over 50,000 Messagepads have been sold since the introduction of the unit in early August and Apple says it has sold over 1,500 Newton development systems (NTK) to potential developers for the device worldwide. At the September UK launch of the Messagepad, Alcatel, British Telecom, Deutsche Telekom and GEC Plesse Semiconductors announced support of the Newton platform. Apple said these companies join Ameritech, ARM, Bell South, Cirrus Logic, LSI Logic, Matsushita Electronics, Motorola, Sharp, Siemens/Rolm and US West in the group of companies behind the Newton. ------------------------------ Galacticomm Intros Internet Link WASHINGTON, DC -- Galacticomm has written a new "Quick Start Booklet" for its popular "The Major BBS" professional-grade bulletin board system software. The company has also introduced a new Internet gateway for Major sysops who do not have the option of linking through the Novell MHS link. While a direct Internet link has previously been a rare thing for a home or business-based BBS, it is rapidly becoming one of the most desirable additions to any BBS as evidenced by the recent appearance of Internet links on commercial systems like Compuserve, and GEnie. Galacticomm BBS operators were already able to link with the Internet but only via ties via Novell networks which were already connected to the Internet. Use of the new Major Gateway/Internet Add-on Option allows sysops operating a small BBS to provide full Internet message handling, including access to all Internet newsgroups via the PageSat satellite news feeds. The $250 Internet Gateway Version 1.1 contains all the software necessary to connect to an Internet UUCP host and provides The Major users seamless access to Internet mail and newsgroup functions, automatically encoding and decoding files. The Gateway includes software that splits and recombines files over 50 kilobytes in size. The new gateway supports Novell MHS, but does not require a networked computer and can operate with either one or two computers (a second one is required if the sysop wishes to exchange Internet mail without shutting down). Access to a UUCP (commercial dial-up Internet link) is not provided by Galacticomm -- this is just the gateway software required to handle Internet mail. In a minor, but important change to the documentation, Galacticomm has just unveiled a new Quick Start Booklet which should help those new to The Major get a system up and running more quickly. Basic setup and installation of The Major BBS wasn't particularly difficult, but the new booklet provides a useful shortcut helping new sysops locate the basics which they need to find in the main documentation. Galacticomm has also published a free "Guide to Public Online Services" which lists 810 Galacticomm Major BBS operators complete with the BBS phone number and a brief description of the type of information found on the BBS. Despite the title this is not a "guide" offering information on how to access a BBS, rather it is a listing of US and Canadian Galacticomm boards. The guide is offered through a toll-free number, 800-328-1128. ------------------------------ Apple To Launch New Operating System Monday CUPERTINO, CALIFORNIA -- Applesoft, a division of Apple Computer, has announced it will launch a new operating system on Monday at the company's new research and development facility in Cupertino, California. Apple claims the new operating system will offer capabilities for collaboration, communication, and customization. Company representatives confirmed to Newsbytes that the operating system is for Macintosh only and third party developers already have over 30 products ready for the new system. The conference is open to Apple customers as well as the press and the keynote address will begin at 9 am PDT. Apple's R&D Campus is at 4 Infinite Loop in Cupertino. Keynote speakers include David Nagel, Apple senior vice president and general manager of the Applesoft Division; Kirk Loevner, vice president of the Applesoft Products Group; and Gursharan Sidhu, director of the Collaboration Products Group. An hour-long seminar on how to use the new software will also be offered from 10:45 to 11:45 am, the company added. ------------------------------ World's Smallest Laser-Quality Printer SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA -- Australian distributor IPL Datron is now shipping what it claims is the world's smallest, full-featured laser-quality printer, the Oki OL400e. While effectively working in the same way as a laser printer, the OL400e uses a light emitting diode (LED) array to 'paint' the image onto the drum for printing instead of a laser. The new printer has a 32-bit RISC processor operating at 16MHz. The suggested retail price is AUS$1699 or around US$1100, though street price is expected to be below US$1000. It has a 100-sheet paper tray, 44 built-in fonts and 300 dots/inch graphics. The footprint is 320x360mm (around 13x14") and the height is 160mm or 6 1/2 inches. Oki claims that this is 12 percent smaller than the smallest Hewlett-Packard laser printer. It comes with a five-year warranty on the printhead. "Oki's proprietary LED technology is high quality and offers greater functionality because LED printers have fewer moving parts than normal lasers," said IPL Datron's Jeremy DeSilva. "The fact that many of our competitors also now use LEDs exemplifies the increasing acceptance of this technology as a viable alternative to lasers." ------------------------------ 50,000 Newton Messagepads Sold In Under 2 Months CUPERTINO, CALIFORNIA -- Apple Computer says Newton Messagepad sales prove its success. The company has released figures that 50,000 of the handheld pen-based personal digital assistants (PDAs) have been sold in the US and Europe since the unit's introduction just under two months ago, which makes the Messagepad one of the fastest selling products Apple has ever introduced. These numbers are particularly impressive since Apple was unable to supply more than limited quantities of the Messagepad since its August 2 launch at the Macworld show in Boston, and there have been four versions of the operating system for the unit released to correct problems. Reports were that the thousands of units available at Macworld were gobbled up by hungry Newton fanciers the first day of the show. The latest version of the Newton operating system is now at 1.04 and Apple is upgrading users who bought the Messagepad to later versions free of charge. The Messagepad was only available in New York and Boston until the beginning of September, when Apple released the units nationwide. United Kingdom sales of the Newton just started September 16. Apple resellers told Newsbytes they don't expect to see much profit in sales of the Messagepad itself, but expect to do well on peripherals for the unit. Peripheral items include leather cases, extra memory, the fax modem, and the new Connectivity Connection Kit for the Macintosh. Connectivity, shipped earlier in September, enables information to be synchronized and updated automatically between the Macintosh and the Newton Messagepad when the two are connected. In addition, applications are springing up for the Messagepad. Apple claims it has sold in excess of 1,500 Newton development systems (NTKs) worldwide for application development for the system. Newton developers can make use of the "Smart Synchronization" technology employed by the Connectivity kit, allowing third party Newton applications to have connectivity with the Macintosh desktop environment as well. Apple added that it intends to introduce the Newton Connection Kit for Windows in the near future. Newsbytes talked with Mike Descher, manager of Tarzana, California-based retailer Mac Universe, who says the Messagepads are moving well in his store. Descher said the biggest problem with the unit is people are not used to computer devices that are really "personal." "Our customers buy a Newton, then give it to a friend, but forget to switch it into guest mode," Descher said. The Newton is designed to "learn" the user's handwriting, so when a friend takes it without switching it to the guest mode setting, it begins to learn that person's writing, forgetting the writing of the unit's owner. While Mac Universe has Messagepads in stock, Simi Valley, California-based Candid Computers said they're sold out again and are waiting for a new shipment to arrive. "Sales have been great. Peripheral sales are good, too. Almost everyone who buys a Messagepad buys some peripheral for it. Extra memory is especially popular," said Jeff Billau training manager at Candid. German language Messagepads will be introduced in Germany this fall, Apple representatives told Newsbytes. French and Japanese versions are also in the works. The Messagepad is manufactured for Apple by Sharp Electronics, which also has a work-a-like version called the Expertpad also available in retail outlets. Sharp officials were unavailable to talk about sales figures of the Expertpad by press time. Competition from Zoomer, another PDA from Casio and Tandy is expected this month. However, reports are that while Zoomer offers more functions, its handwriting recognition is slower than the Messagepad. ------------------------------ IBM Launches PowerPC At Australian Unix Conference SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA -- "From palmtops to teraflops" was the all-embracing theme of IBM Australia's formal PowerPC at the Australian Unix Users Group (AUUG) conference in Sydney on Tuesday. Capitalizing on the waterfront location of the Darling Harbor Exhibition Center on Sydney Harbor, IBM hired a cruise vessel dubbed the "Power Boat" to stage a multimedia demonstration of the technology based around the new Power and Power2 processor chips. As with most IT (information technology) matters, POWER turns out to be another acronym, "Performance Optimization With Enhanced RISC (reduced instruction set computer)." New PowerPC systems launched include the Powerstation 25T, Powerstation 25C, Powerserver 25S, and Powerserver 25O, all based around the new PowerPC 601 processor, also soon to be used in Apple Macintoshes. (A story in the latest Australian MacNews magazine says Apple will delay its machine until next year due to problems. Newsbytes was unable to independently confirm this information.) IBM's enhanced Power2 technology adds extra integer and floating point units to the PowerPC architecture, allowing up to eight operations to be performed in a single clock cycle. Among the products launched that incorporate the Power2 technology were the Powerserver 990, the Powerstation 590, and the Powerstation 58H. The 990 and 590 models are classified as supercomputers by the US Department of Commerce, and are thus subject to a special export license. On board the Power Boat, IBM staff demonstrated the new PowerPC systems running pre-release versions of its Macintosh emulation software, Unix, and Wabi, the software that allows Unix systems to run Windows applications directly. ------------------------------ Alpha, Pentium, SPARC To Power Supercomputers NEW DELHI, INDIA -- The Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (CDAC), a Government of India entity, plans to install in its next generation of Params, a range of parallel processing computers developed by CDAC, a choice of processors, including the DEC chip 21064 Alpha AXP, Pentium, and SPARC. While Pentium and SPARC figured in CDAC's plan earlier, the center recently signed a letter of intent with Digital Equipment India Ltd. (DEIL) to acquire Alphas. Over the next two years CDAC plans to design a range of parallel computers which will be built around a combination of the three chips or a set of any one of the three processors. Presently Param comes in two different 64-node versions. Param 8000 is based entirely on transputers while Param 8600 has a i860 processor for superior number crunching. The current models are targeted at high-end scientific applications. With the next generation Param 9000, CDAC is hoping to penetrate the high-end of the commercial markets too. "We may build boards with only Alphas for scientific applications while Pentium and SPARC-based Params would be for the commercial user," explains Vijay Bhatkar, executive director, CDAC. Efforts are also underway at CDAC's software center in Bangalore to make the Param operating system independent. A Unix-compliant kernel would be the key feature of the Param 9000 OS environment. Bhatkar hints that CDAC may offer both Chorus and OSF/1 kernel. It will be sometime before Param 9000s would be ready for delivery. But Bhatkar figures that intermediate systems will be out by mid-1994. There has been little progress in its export activities since CDAC shipped out four machines months ago. However, negotiations are on with some American universities for the sale of current models of Param, discloses Bhatkar. The preceding stories are © 1993 NewsBytes. Reprinted with permission. __________________________________________________ AudCompDemo Available for FTP TITLE AudComp VERSION V1.0 COMPANY Private Developer AUTHOR Dan Charrois Box 75 Legal, Alberta T0G 1L0 Canada Internet: charro@ee.ualberta.ca DESCRIPTION Although there are many routines to compress data files and executables, until now there hasn't been anything specifically designed to compress audio IFF 8SVX files. Standard compression routines for the Amiga typically only get in the neighborhood of a 20-30% improvement in file size. AudComp was designed to improve on this situation. Incorporating a lossy algorithm, it can often compress audio files up to 10 to 20 times smaller than the originals. The user can specify a quality level to allow compression of high quality/low compression to low quality/high compression or anywhere in between. Usually even the high quality compressions are at least twice as small as Fibonacci-Delta encoded files. This is a freely distributable demo version of the software. It is only capable of decompressing files previously compressed with AudComp. To allow you to assess the capabilities of the software, a few sample files, compressed at varying quality levels, are included. Two versions of the executable are included - one for stock 68000 based Amigas, and one for 68020+ CPUs with a numeric co-processor. SPECIAL REQUIREMENTS None HOST NAME Aminet (e.g. ftp.wustl.edu) DIRECTORY /pub/aminet/biz/demo FILE NAMES AudCompDemo10.lha AudCompDemo10.readme PRICE Demo version - free Registered vesion - $15.00 in Canadian funds DISTRIBUTABILITY The demo version of this software is freely distributable. The registered version is Copyright 1993 by Dan Charrois, and may be obtained by sending $15.00 in Canadian funds to the address given earlier. ------------------------------ Phonebill v2.0 Available for FTP TITLE Phonebill VERSION 2.0 AUTHOR Raymond Penners Internet: raymondp@stack.urc.tue.nl Fido: 2:283/410.15 AmigaNet: 39:157/101.15 NLA: 14:105/2.15 DESCRIPTION `Phonebill' is, simply said, a logfile analyser. What it basically does is scan the logfile(s) generated by a terminal program or a mailer, extract all information about calls you have made by using your modem, and store this in its own (short) format. Features: * Requires Kickstart 2.04 or higher. * Supports new 3.0 features (new look menus, ...). * Nice gadtools compliant GUI. * User-definable callrates, supporting rate exceptions for certain days and dates. Handles fees with up to 4 decimals (e.g. $1,2344 dollars per 30 seconds) for extra accuracy. * Supports logfiles generated by: * AmigaUUCP Timelog * JrComm * MagiCall * NComm * TrapDoor * Term (Term action-log and Term call-log) * Terminus * Automatical logfile truncating. * Generates miscellaneous reports: statistics, total costs, etc. * Context-sensitive online help. HOST NAME * aminet * filerequest or download from: The Amiga Workbench (SysOp Robert Udo) +31-(0)5430-24097 (ZyXEL+ 19K2, 24 hours online) FidoNet: 2:283/410.0 AmigaNet: 39:157/101.0 NLA: 14:105/2.0 FILE NAME pbill20.lha (79486 bytes) PRICE Shareware fee of $8 US. ------------------------------ PriMan v1.1 Available for FTP TITLE PriMan, a Task Priority Manager VERSION 1.1 AUTHOR Barry McConnell Internet: bmccnnll@unix1.tcd.ie FidoNet: 2:263/150.2 DESCRIPTION PriMan is an easy-to-use, configurable, Style Guide-compliant utility to monitor the tasks running on your Amiga, and perform some actions on them, in a similar manner to TaskX (amongst others). Major new features since v1.0 include: - Commodities interface. Now you can leave PriMan running in the background and pop it up with a hotkey! - Iconify option, for when you forget that hotkey... - Now closes windows of tasks you kill. - Now accepts arguments from the Shell. - Disables interrupts for far less time when building the task list. FILENAME PriMan11.lha LOCATION Available for FTP from any Aminet site, eg. ftp.luth.se. Also FREQ'able from 2:263/150. If you like, e-mail me and I'll send you it uuencoded. DIRECTORY /pub/aminet/os20/util/ SPECIAL REQUIREMENTS Any Amiga running Release 2 or greater. DISTRIBUTABILITY FreeWare. @endnode ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ @node P1-7 "Online Weekly" @toc "menu" /// ONLINE WEEKLY Amiga Report Online The lines are buzzing! --------------------------------- From FidoNet's Amiga International Echo --------------------------------------- Area: AMIGA Date: 3 Oct 93 21:04:00 From: Jon Peterson (1:383/25.0) To : All Subj: FFish 1000th Anniv Here is the list of donors for the fourth week of the FFish 1000th Anniv thingy. Jon Peterson Matthew L. Schultz Chris Nelson Asha DeVelder Marshall Freedland Jeremy Friesner Michael Phipps Darrin & Lisa Zimmerman (Amiga Un-Sig of Southern Michigan) Eric V. Peterson (muchly appreciate the letter and news) Eric Zimmer Total donations as of 9/18/93 are $185.00. Got a ways to go folks. Please talk this up with all concerned (Amiga users) and pass the word on to your Users Groups. Request everyone PLEASE!!! pass the word at any Users Group meetings you attend. This should be a group effort on behalf of all the Amiga users throughout the world. Please donate whatever you can afford - or even better - what you honestly think FFish's work has been worth to you through the years. Let's make this thing happen. Thanks. ------------------------------ Area: AMIGA Date: 27 Sep 93 20:42:08 From: Zjon Braziel (1:3805/8.6) To : ALL Subj: FAQ - Abbreviations I know that this is slightly offtopic (fogive me please); however, I thought that having a "standard" listing of these available to all would be nice as there have been more than one question concerning them here:::: I've delted quite a bit of the original message so that only the Abrv's remain... * Forwarded from area "WF_ECHO" (WF_ECHO) (local to n.3805): * Forwarded from "SHAREWARE" * Originally by Kent Anderson, 1:382/91 *** FidoNet International Echo SHAREWRE *** Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) List Version 1.1, Revised April 22, 1993 AAMOF As A Matter Of Fact ADN Any Day Now AFAIK As Far As I Know ATSL Along The Same Line AS On Another Subject AWGTHTGTTA? Are We Going To Have To Go Through This Again? BBS Bulletin Board System BCNU Be seeing you .... BNF Big Name Fan BTW By The Way CU See You CUL See You Later CYA Cover Your A** CUL8R See You Later... DIIK Damned If I know EMFBI Excuse me for butting in FITB Fill In The Blank.... FYI For Your Information FUBAR Fouled Up Beyond All Repair FWIW For What Its Worth FYI For Your Information GD&R Grinning, Ducking & Running (usually left at the end of a mean or digging message) GROK As in "I GROK" means thorough understanding. From Heinlein) GIWIST Gee I Wish I'd Said That HHTYAY Happy Holidays to You and Yours IAAL I am a lawyer IANAL I Am Not A Lawyer IC I See IITYWISWYBMAD If I Tell You What It Says, Will You Buy Me A drink IMCO In My Considered Opinion IMHO In My Humble or Honest Opinion IMNSHO In My Not So Humble Opinion IOW In Other Words ISBAB I Should have Bought A Book ITSFWI If The Shoe Fits, Wear It JSNM Just Stark Naked Magic KHYF Know How You Feel L8R Later... LAB&TYD Life's A Bitch & Then You Die. LOL Laughing Out Loud LTNT Long Time, No Type NTYMI Now that you mention it OIC Oh, I See... OOTQ Out of the question OTOH On The Other Hand OTTOMH Off the top of my head PITA Pain In The A** PMJI Pardon my jumping in POV Point Of View PPTSPAHS Please Pass The Salt, Pepper And Hot Sauce...used when I've had to eat crow, my hat, and other unsavory dishes ROTF Rolling On The Floor ROTFL Rolling On The Floor Laughing ROTFLMAO Rolling On The Floor Laughing My A** Off SNAFU Situation Normal, All Fouled Up SOW Speaking of which RSN Real Soon Now RTFM Read The Fine/something Manual SYSOP System Operator TANJ There Ain't No Justice TANSTAAFL There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch TAANSTASQ There ain't no such thing as a stupid question TFTHAOT Thanx For The Help Ahead Of Time...used for a favor requested, or an answer or help that there's no doubt will come, but I want to make sure the person knows I appreciate their taking their time to do it. TPTB The Powers That Be TOBAL There Oughta Be A Law TOBG This Oughta Be Good TTBOMK To The Best Of My Knowledge TTFN Ta Ta For Now TTUL (TTYL) Talk To You Later YGLT You're Gonna Love This ... YKYARW You Know You're A Redneck When== WYSIWYG What You See Is What You Get @endnode ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ @node P4-5 "Amiga Report Mailing List" @toc "menu" /// Amiga Report Mailing List ------------------------- Are you tired of waiting for your local BBS or online service to get Amiga Report each week? Have you been spending more money that you want on long distance phone calls to download it from one of our Distribution Sites? If so, have we got a deal for you! If you have an internet mailing address, you can receive Amiga Report in UUENCODED form each week as soon as the issue is released. To be put on the list, send Email to Amiga-Report-Request@gnu.ai.mit.edu. Your account must be able to handle mail of any size to ensure an intact copy. For example, GEnie has a limit of about 40K per message, and most of our issues are well over that limit. Please do not send general Email to Amiga-Report-Request, only requests for subscription additions or deletions (or if you are not receiving an intact copy). All other correspondence should be directed to the editor at ROB_G@Delphi.COM. Many thanks to Bob Caron for setting this service up for us! P.S.: Please be sure to include your Email address in the text of your request message, it makes adding it to the list much easier. Thanks! ** IMPORTANT NOTICE: PLEASE be certain your host can accept mail over ** 100K! We have had a lot of bouncebacks recently from systems with a ** 100K size limit for incoming mail. If we get a bounceback with your ** address in it, it will be removed from the list immediately. @endnode ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ /// Commodore Shareholder Movement UPDATE! -------------------------------------- Commodore Shareholder Movement Net: MarcR@cup.portal.com Post Office Box 8296 Telephone (215) 487-0440 Philadelphia, PA 19101 Fax (215) 825-3966 September 30, 1993 Dear Commodore Shareholders and Customers: We have measured the response to our original efforts and are satisfied that the general sentiment among Commodore shareholders is consistent with our own. Further, we have found that our goals are consistent with the interests of the dedicated Commodore user-base and the long-range interests of the company; that is, to restore Commodore to its accustomed position of leadership in the industry. Near the beginning of our crusade, several other parties were found to be working toward similar goals. As not to duplicate effort, we continued our separate activities, but coordinated and focused on the areas of our particular strengths. The group which has come to be known as "The Commodore Shareholder Movement" has taken perhaps the most difficult part of the task; that is, getting the message out to all shareholders: Protect your investment; send us your signed proxy ballot. We share your feelings; we have the experience; we have the plan; we need your support. If you know anyone who owns Commodore stock, instruct them as done here. By giving these instructions, we are achieving three objectives: 1. Dramatically increasing our chance for success because every proxy ballot not returned to us is a vote cast in favor of the current situation. 2. Proving that no matter how well-fortified management feels it has become, it can never render shareholders helpless. 3. Demonstrate that Commodore's dedicated customer-base is their greatest resource and should always be treated and utilized as such. We appreciate that our actions reflect the deeply felt sentiments of so many. But, please do not rely on our efforts. The conditions being as they are, we have merely become the vehicle for focusing your frustration into something positive and constructive. Most importantly, spread the word as it is presented here. If you want to play a greater role, I can scarcely instruct you beyond what your own imagination can supply. Keep it positive, and if you need motivation, you might consider referring to "Selling the Dream" by Guy Kawasaki or the historical classic, "The Art of War" by Sun Tzu/Thomas Cleary. Respectively, they are guides to promoting a "cause" and under- standing strategy. They speak directly to the seemingly monumentous task before us, and why I feel so strongly that we can succeed. The proxy ballot is usually written so that you may only choose to vote for the Board of Directors' candidates or refrain from voting. Any write-ins can be disqualified at the discretion of the Board. Therefore, we ask that you sign your proxy ballot without checking off any of the boxes so that we may exercise the vote on your behalf personally at the Shareholder Meeting. Send the signed ballot to: Post Office Box 8296 Philadelphia, PA 19101 Keep a photocopy for your records. Fax communications to (215) 825-3966 or call (215) 487-0440. Thank you. Sincerely, Mike Levin and the Commodore Shareholder Movement ------------------------------ Mission and Obectives for Commodore Proposed by the Commdore Shareholder Movement 9/30/93 This plan outlines the goals towards which the new directors will work once elected to the Board of Commodore International Limited. For clarity, this version follows the abbreviated one-page format. Mission: To restore Commodore to its accustomed position of leadership in the industry by providing audio-visual technologies consistent with the long term interests of the shareholders, dedicated user-base and company. Objectives: I. Provide the best possible products and services. II. Recover and maintain a positive worldwide identity and reputation for innovative product and value. III. Make plans and partnerships for a successful future. Strategies: I. Provide the best possible products and services. A. Focus on product leadership, quality and the ability to produce at the lowest cost. B. Target new and existing markets which are related to strengths in the product; that is: consumer electronics, workstations, education and commercial displays. C. Facilitate product applications and solutions including out-of-the-box utility. II. Recover and maintain a positive worldwide identity and reputation for innovative product and value. A. Consistently attract and develop loyal new customers, dealers and developers to Commodore technology platforms. B. Challenge and redefine the traditional notions of technology's privileges and uses. C. Take advantage of all opportunities to gain product exposure and improve product image. D. Aid Commodore customers, dealers and developers in identifying and exploring their own opportunities. III. Make plans and partnerships for a successful future. A. Incorporate long term vision into the planning and execution of all strategies. B. Protect and foster those assets on which the company's success depends; namely the customers, the engineers, the 3rd party developers and the leadership. C. Explore and forge beneficial partnerships with an eye towards broad future markets. D. Achieve a stock value and market share within two years which surpasses Commodore's 1983 peak. @endnode ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ @node P1-8 "WOCA Report" @toc "menu" /// World of Commodore Amiga Show Report ------------------------------------ By Dan Zerkle (zerkle@cs.ucdavis.edu) Part 8, Interviews on Show Floor This is part 8 of my report from the World of Commodore Amiga show held in Pasadena, California, on September 10th, 11th, and 12th. This section details interviews I conducted at the booths on the show floor. I will continue to post sections until I finish. CORRECTIONS First, a couple notes about my last report. In my report about Anti-Gravity Products' Humanoid, I failed to mention what sort of 3D format this package used. It comes in either LightWave 3D or Imagine format. Neil MacMullen of U.S. Cybernetics writes to let me know that I managed to foul up his e-mail address. His correct address is neil@powerstor.cuc.ab.ca. I apologize for these errors. FARGO ELECTRONICS Fargo Electronics is a new entry into the Amiga marketplace. They had out several of their Primera color printers. These are wax thermal transfer devices that produce output at 203 dots per inch. The printer is fairly small (5.8" x 13.8" x 10.2"), and easily fits on a desk top. It lists for just less than $1000. I had a close look at some printouts. They were very sharp with vibrant color. I was impressed. They had the highest quality color I've seen on a consumer-priced printer. It sure beats ink jets. It gets better. You can get a "Photo-Realistic" upgrade kit which lets the printer use something called "dye sublimation." I'm not familiar with this technique, but it apparently is as good as anything short of commercial devices. You pay for it, though. The refill kit, which gives you the supplies for 25 prints, costs about $90. The kit itself (with supplies for 10 prints) costs about $250. Fargo genuinely seems interested in the Amiga marketplace. To prove it, they've released an Amiga printer driver for their hardware. It's free. Just call the number listed below. The driver requires version 1.3 (or newer) of the operating system and at least two megabytes of memory. Oh, yeah. Fargo's printer also supports the Macintosh and Windows 3.1. UTILITIES UNLIMITED Utilities Unlimited was showing their Emplant emulator system. Well, actually, very few people seemed to be paying attention to the emulator. It was displaying a Macintosh screen. We've all seen that. What actually seemed to be on display was the president of the company, Jim Drew. During the entire show, he was surrounded by a semi-circle of people three deep. I never got close to him. I did manage to talk with one of the other employees (Brian Walz) and pick up a little literature, though. Emplant, of course, is a hardware/software system that lets an Amiga emulate a different kind of computer. For now, it can emulate a color Macintosh as a task. This means that the Mac emulator multitasks with the other Amiga programs. To emulate a Mac, Emplant needs the Macintosh operating system, including the ROMs. Walz explained that updates to the Emplant system are being released steadily. The next update (possibly out by now) will allow stereo sound. Use of the Amiga's parallel and serial ports are coming soon. Emulation of the IBM-PC will come at the end of the year. Walz said that by pre-translating the Intel code as a program is loaded, the Emplant will enable the Amiga's Motorola CPU to run the code as fast as an Intel chip. The Emplant system comes in various configurations, ranging in price from $280 to $400. MIGRAPH Migraph was plugging yet another scanner. This one was the ColorBurst Color Hand Scanner. It can handle a wide variety of color, gray-scale, and monochrome resolutions, from 50 to 400 dots per inch and up to 18 bits per pixel. It can scan a graphic up to 4.13 inches wide. Migraph also sells some software. Migraph OCR is optical character recognition software. It takes an image of text either from a file or directly from a scanner (Migraph, AlfaData or Golden Image) and outputs the text. Migraph Touch-Up is an image-editing program for modifying scanned images. It can import and export several different file formats. The demonstration wasn't all that exciting. The Migraph employee had a collection of colorful pictures (on paper) that looked like they had been clipped from magazines. He ran the sleek, black scanner over a picture, and it appeared on the screen of a nearby Amiga. The colors were fine, and the image didn't show any obvious signs of distortion. I did notice that the scanner had a transparent "window" near the scanning area, so you could see the picture and get a pretty good idea of what part you were scanning. EXPERT SERVICES Expert Services was promoting the Picasso II card of Germany's Village Tronic. Picasso II is a Zorro 2 card which can display one-bit to eight-bit video in resolutions up to 1280x1024, and 24-bit video in resolutions up toe 800x600. Compared to other high-resolution graphics cards, the Picasso II takes a different approach to integrating itself with the rest of the system. Instead of requiring special drivers for each different program, it uses normal Intuition calls. The software adds screen modes (such as PICASSO:800x600) to the standard screen mode preferences requester. Any system-friendly program that uses this requester will already work with the Picasso II. The Picasso II comes with some nice features. It switches back and forth between its signal and the standard Amiga video signal automatically. It has 16-bit color modes in resolutions up to 1024x768. It stores graphics in normal system RAM, so there is no CHIP RAM limitation. It has an on-board blitter for high- speed screen updates. I found the Picasso II displaying ASDG's Art Department Pro. It looked pretty sharp with all that resolution. An employee demonstrated that he could slide screens up and down on the Picasso display, just like you can with the normal Amiga display. He scrolled some text on a high-resolution Workbench screen. It was noticeably faster than the same thing on a standard Amiga display. Quite a lot of the Picasso II literature mentions that it gives you RTG (Retargetable Graphics). Please note that this does not refer to Commodore's RTG. Rather, it just means that programs using Commdodore's ScreenMode requester can work with the Picasso II card. One thing to note with the Picasso II and all high-performance graphics cards: Displaying the output from these devices properly requires a large, fancy monitor. Of course, Expert Services had some wonderful monitors and the pictures looked great. Just remember that if you want to do the same, your new monitor is going to cost much more than your new graphics card. Expect to pay $1400 and up. ADDRESSES Expert Services 7559 Mall Road Florence, KY 40142 PHONE: 606/371-9690 FAX : 606/282-5942 Fargo Electronics, Inc. 7901 Flying Cloud Drive Eden Prairie, MN 55344 PHONE: 800/258-2974 612/941-9470 FAX : 612/941-7836 Migraph, Inc. 32700 Pacific Highway South, #14 Federal Way, WA 98003 PHONE: 800/223-3729 : 206/838-4677 Utilities Unlimited, Inc. 1641 McCulloch Blvd., Suite 25-124 Lake Havasu City, AZ 86403 PHONE: 602/680-9004 (Orders only) : 602/689-9006 (Tech calls) FAX : 602/453-6407 BBS : 602/453-9767 Village Tronic Braunstrasse 14 D-30169 Hanover-Germany PHONE: +49/(0)511/13841 FAX : +49/(0)511/1612606 @endnode ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ /// Review: Retina 24-bit Display Board ------------------------------------ By Michael Heinz (MHEINZ@SOFTSW.SSW.COM) Introduction Until recently, I suffered from a nasty case of graphics envy. By day, I used a high-end UNIX workstation with a 1280x1024 screen and 256 colors. At night, I went home to my old Amiga 3000/16 and sulked. I'm happy to say I don't do that anymore. A few weeks ago I purchased the Retina 24 bit video board and life just hasn't been the same. Not only can I display screens at the same resolution as that UNIX system, I can do it in more colors and faster, to boot! Overview of the Retina Video card · Can generate almost any screen resolution up to 1280x1024 non- interlaced or even higher, if interlaced screens are used. · Support for scrolling screens of up to 2048x2048. · Has three basic display modes: 8 bit (256 colors) 16 bit (65536 colors) and 24 bit (16.8 million colors, also known as "true color".) · Can use software to emulate the ECS and AGA chip sets. · Applications written for the Retina can open Intuition screens with 64K or even 16.8 million colors. The Workbench can be placed into either mode with a single configuration setting. · Can be populated with either 2 or 4 megs of RAM. Equipment used in this review · A3000/16 with 2 megs chip, 4 megs fast. · Mitsubishi Diamond Pro monitor. · Retina/2 meg board. · AmigaDOS 2.1. Installation Installing the card is straight forward. It can be installed in any Amiga with a free Zorro slot, at least three megabytes of memory and a hard disk. It took me five minutes to open my 3000, remove a slot cover and insert the card and attach my monitor. There are no jumpers to set or adjustments to make. You should note that the Retina card does not require a video slot. This means that you can use a Retina card with other video tools, such as the Video Toaster or OpalVision. (Note that I have not tried this, however.) What kind of Monitor to use This board really needs a large SVGA multi-sync monitor. The broader the sync range of the monitor, the more screen modes and resolutions you will be able to use with the Retina. I used a Mitsubishi Diamond Pro SVGA monitor. This monitor supports scanning frequencies between 30 and 58 kilohertz and refresh rates between 50 and 90 hertz. This is fine for a 3000, since the 3000 has VGA output, but owners of other Amiga models may want to consider a Commodore 1960 or similar monitor that supports the standard Amiga 15 kilohertz modes. Retina will also work with a fixed frequency monitor, such as a plain VGA monitor. Even a Commodore 1084 can be used (if you build a VGA to 1084 adapter cable). The limitations of a fixed frequency monitor will prevent you from accessing the higher resolutions (and non-interlaced signals) the Retina can produce, however. Using an A/B switch The Retina hardware does not pass through standard Amiga video signal. This means that programs that absolutely won't run on the Retina (such as bootable games) won't be visible unless you hook your monitor back up to the standard video connector. This is a pain. You could use two monitors (and you might actually prefer this, if you have a lot of desk space) but I recommend you buy a VGA A/B switch. This switch allows you to toggle your monitor between the Retina card and the standard Amiga output. Installing the Software The Retina card comes with 2 disks. The first contains the Retina and RetinaEmu libraries needed to run the card. It also contains a number of utilities and the RetinaEmu program described below. The second disk contains XI Paint, a 24 bit painting package. Both disks use Commodore's Installer to set up the packages on your hard disk. As a bonus, the Retina disk also includes a developers' kit, with autodocs and includes for the Retina libraries. Configuring the System: Configuring the card is also straightforward. Once the software is installed, move or copy the RetinaEmu program from the RetinaSystems drawer to the WBStartup drawer. Double clicking on the RetinaEmu icon creates a window listing the various settings for grabbing programs and redirecting them to the Retina screen, including the number of colors desired and whether to emulate the AGA chip set. Once this program has been configured with your desired settings, rebooting the system will move your Workbench to the Retina's display. If your monitor is truly unusual, other programs exist which allow you to define your monitor's characteristics and even build custom display modes for it. Using Standard Applications with the Retina I tested a number of programs with the Retina card, and I have >never< had a crash that I could blame the Retina for. All the application software I tried worked flawlessly; programs like Terminus, Page Stream 2.2, ProWrite, Notebook and Phasar all ran without a hitch, and usually faster than they did on the native Amiga screen. Those applications that allow the user to select a screen size can be set for a larger than usual screen; programs that don't can be "forced" onto a larger screen by RetinaEmu. Applications that Access the Hardware Directly Programs that write to graphics memory directly are a little harder to work with. For such programs, RetinaEmu offers a "refresh" mode. Setting this mode tells RetinaEmu to write to a standard Amiga screen. This screen is not displayed, but is periodically copied into the Retina display, bringing them into sync. While re-drawing the screen this way is considerably slower than programs that run directly on the Retina, it is quite usable. Using this mode I was able to run a number of graphic intensive programs, such as Lyapanovia and Mandelmania. In addition, I easily ran both DPaint III and the DPaint IV/AGA demo. I was also able to run a number of public domain games. Refresh mode is not an answer to all problems, however. A number of programs and games I ran were not displayed correctly on the Retina at all. Some seemed to be programming the copper chip directly, causing the Retina display to look strange. More importantly, programs that use overlapping screens (such as Digi-Paint and Brilliance) do not work. MacroSystems has indicated that since the Retina uses different video clock frequencies for different screen resolutions, overlapping screens cannot be displayed. Programs that do not work with the Retina can still be used, however, by opening RetinaEmu and marking them as "Amiga" output. Once that is done, the programs will run normally on the native Amiga video. (Now you know why I recommend buying an A/B box.) AGA Support RetinaEmu will emulate the AGA modes up to 256 colors. I tried several programs that claimed to support AGA. Many (such as Lyapanovia and DPaint IV) worked fine, but many of the PD programs I tried aborted or crashed immediately. I do not think this is the fault of the Retina card, since most AGA programs are written for AmigaDOS 3.0, and my system runs AmigaDOS 2.1. Programs that claim to work under both 2.1 and 3.0 ran fine in 256 color mode. It is important to note, however, that AGA emulation is done in software, not hardware. This means that updates to AGA screens were sometimes quite sluggish on my A3000/16. MacroSystems claims, however, that on faster systems the emulation is actually faster than the real AGA chip set. Retina Display & RView Beyond RetinaEmu, the Retina card came with a number of utilities. The first, Retina Display, is a plain vanilla picture viewer, while RView is a straightforward slide-show program. Neither offers any kind of transitions between images, but do offer support for a wide variety of image formats, including IFF (up to 24 bits), PPM, GIF, JPEG and others. RACE Sadly, none of the animation programs I tried worked correctly with the Retina card. This is understandable, since most animation techniques involve bypassing the operating system. To work around this limitation, Retina includes the tools MakeRace and PlayRace. These programs build and play Retina animations in up to 24 bits. While documentation of these tools is sparse, I was able to quickly build a short 640x480 by 256 color animation. When I played it back with PlayRace, it ran at a jaw-dropping 20 frames per second! XI-Paint XI Paint is the 24 bit paint program included with the Retina card. It offers a full range of 24 bit painting tools, and I was able to generate some beautiful composite images with it, buy loading in 24 bit images, adjusting various transparency settings and stamping them down. Great stuff for faking ghost sitings! XI Paint also offers a real-time interface to MacroSystems' VLab video capture board, allowing images to be pulled straight from the VCR to the paint program. All in all, XI Paint offers a good introduction to 24 bit painting. It can be quite slow when performing a complex operation, however, and serious artists will probably wish to purchase TV Paint (described below). Support for 3rd party software The Retina card comes with patches or modules for a number of third party programs, to allow them to work directly with the Retina. Patches are included for AdPro, Real 3d, Image Master, and Image F/X. In addition, the current version of the Emplant emulator supports the Retina, allowing an Amiga user to run 24 bit Macintosh applications such as Adobe Photoshop. Last, but not least, the professional paint program "TV Paint" comes in a Retina version. I downloaded the demo of this program from the MacroSystems support BBS, and I've been looking for my socks ever since. TV Paint offers all the basic paint tools and adds emulation for different kinds of drawing materials (such as a pencil, or pastels). It is also blindingly fast. TV Paint can do jobs in a blink of an eye that would leave you staring at XI Paint's "Please Wait" requester for minutes. All I can say is, if you can afford it, buy it! Developing for the Retina Finally, if you're a programmer type you'll be glad to know that the developer's kit is included with the Retina software. Pragmas, includes and autodocs are provided for the retina library (for straight 24 bit development), the RetinaEmu library (for developing 24 bit applications that use intuition screens and gadgets) and the multipic library (for loading and saving foreign image formats). The retina library does not currently support the new EGS standard for display adapters, but the routines all closely correspond to the normal Amiga calls. Within a week of owning the card I have already developed a number of graphic toys and I'm getting ready to buckle down and write an MPEG package... Conclusion The Retina card does a very solid job of moving the Amiga into the 1990's. While the supplied tools are not as flashy as those announced by other manufacturers, Retina does offer higher resolutions than most of its competitors. (For example, most other boards do not support 24 bit color in 1024x768 mode.) In addition, Retina has been on the market for almost a year now, while some other 24 bit boards are still vaporware. In that time, the software has been upgraded at least four times, and is now quite stable. If you want 24 bit color the Retina card is a solid choice. @endnode *************************************************************************** @node P4-2 "Portal" @toc "menu" /// Portal: A Great Place For Amiga Users -------------------------------------- Portal Communications' Amiga Zone The AFFORDABLE alternative for online Amiga information ------------------------------------------------------- The Portal Online System is the home of acclaimed Amiga Zone, which was formerly on the People/Link System. Plink went out of business in May, 1991 and The Amiga Zone's staff moved to Portal the next day. The Zone has just celebrated its second anniversary on Portal. The Amiga press raves about The Amiga Zone, when compared to its competition. If you live in the San Jose, CA area, then you can dial Portal directly. If you live elsewhere, you can reach Portal through any SprintNet (formerly Telenet) indial anywhere in the USA or through Tymnet from anywhere in North America. If you have an account on another Internet-connected system, you can connect to Portal using the UNIX Telnet programs, from anywhere in the industrialized world. Delphi and BIX users can now Telnet into Portal for a flat $19.95 a month, with *unlimited* use. Some of Portal/Amiga Zone's amazing features include: · Over 1.5 GIGabytes of Amiga-specific files · The *entire* Fred Fish collection of freely distributable software, online. · Fast, Batch Zmodem file transfer protocol. Download up to 100 files at once, of any size, with one command. · Twenty Amiga vendor areas with participants like AmigaWorld, ASDG, Soft-Logik, Black Belt, Apex Publishing, Stylus, Prolific, NES. · 35 "regular" Amiga libraries with thousands of files. Hot new stuff arrives daily. · No upload/download "ratios" EVER. Download as much as you want, as often as you want, and never feel pressued doing it. · Live, interactive nightly chats with Amiga folks whose names you will recognize. Special conferences. Random chance prize contests. Famous Amiga folks aren't the exception on Portal, they're the norm. · Vast Message bases where you can ask questions about *anything* Amiga related and get quick replies from the experts. · Amiga Internet mailing lists for Imagine, DCTV, LightWave, HyperAmi, Director and Landscapes are fed right into the Zone message bases. Read months worth of postings. They don't scroll off, ever! No need to clutter your mailbox with them. · FREE unlimited Internet Email. Your Portal account gets you a mailbox that's connected to the world. Send letters of any length to computer users in the entire industrialized world. No limits. No extra charges. No kidding! · Portal has the Usenet. Thousands of "newsgroups" in which you can read and post articles about virtually any subject you can possibly imagine. Usenet feeds into Portal many times each hour. There are 14 Amiga-specific Usenet newsgroups with hundreds of articles posted every day, including postings by Commodore personnel. Since Usenet is distributed worldwide, your questions and answers can be seen by literally hundreds of thousands of people the same day you post them. · Other Portal SIGs (Special Interest Groups) online for Mac, IBM, Sun, NeXT, UNIX, Science Fiction, Writers, amateur radio, and a graphics SIG with thousands of GIF files to name just a few. ALL Portal SIGs are accessible to ALL Portal customers with NO surcharges ever. · The entire UPI/Clarinet/Newsbytes news hierarchy ($4/month extra) An entire general interest newspaper and computer news magazine. · Portal featues an exciting package of Internet features: IRC, FTP, TELNET, MUDS, LIBS. Free to all Portal customers with your account. Internet Services is a menu driven version of the same kinds of utilities you can also use from your Portal UNIX shell account. · All the files you can FTP. All the chatting you can stand on the IRC. And on IRC (Internet Relay Chat) you can talk live, in real time with Amiga users in the U.K., Europe, Australia, the Far East, 24 hours a day. · Our exclusive PortalX by Steve Tibbett, the graphical "front end" for Portal which will let you automatically click'n'download your waiting email, messages, Usenet groups and binary files! Reply to mail and messages offline using your favorite editor and your replies are sent automatically the next time you log into Portal. (PortalX requires Workbench 2.04 or higher) · And Portal does NOT stick it to high speed modem users. Whether you log in at 1200 or 2400 or 9600 or 14.4K you pay the same low price. How does all that sound? Probably too good to be true. Well, it IS true. Portal Signup or for more information: 408-973-9111 (voice) 9a.m.-5p.m. Mon-Fri, Pacific Time 408-725-0561 (modem 3/12/2400) 24 hours every day 408-973-8091 (modem 9600/14400) 24 hours every day or enter "C PORTAL" from any Sprintnet dial-in in the USA, or enter "portal" from any Tymnet "please log in:" prompt, USA & Canada or telnet to "portal.com" from anywhere. PORTAL'S CURRENT RATES: All prices shown are in U.S. Dollars Total Total Total Total Cost Cost Cost Cost Fee 1 hr. 5 hrs. 10 hrs.30 hrs. Startup Monthly Per Per per per per Fee Fee Hour month month month month $ $ $ $ $ $ $ Portal 19.95 19.95 2400/9600/14.4Kbps, *direct 24 hrs 0.00 19.95 19.95 19.95 19.95 2400/9600bps nonprime Sprint or Tymnet 2.50 22.95 32.45 44.95 94.95 2400/9600bps prime Sprint +% or Tymnet 5.50-10 29.95 69.95 119.95 varies 2400/9600bps non prime # PCPursuit 1.00 20.95 24.95 29.95 49.95 * plus cost of phone call if out of Portal's local dialing area Direct rates also apply to connections made to Portal using the UNIX "telnet" program from an account you may already have on an Internet-connected system. % 9600 bps Sprintnet and Tymnet available in over 300 cities areas + $10 rate prevails at smaller US Cities # PCPursuit is a service of US Sprint. Portal is a PCPursuit "Direct Access Facility" thus connection to Portal with a PCP account is simply a matter of entering C PORTAL,PCP-ID,PCP-PASSWORD at the SprintNet login prompt instead of C PORTAL. Note: Portal Direct 9600/14400 bps service is availble for both USR HST modems, and any V32/V32.bis modems. There are dozens of direct-dial high speed lines into Portal. No busy signals! SprintNet 9600bps service is V.32 modem protocol only. Tymnet 9600bps services is V.32 modem protocol only. Again, Portal does NOT surcharge high speed modem users! Portal subscribers who already have an account on an Internet-capable system elsewhere, can use that system's "telnet" program to connect to Portal for $0.00 an hour. That's right ZERO. From anywhere in the world. If you're in this category, be sure to ask the Portal reps, when you signup, how to login to Portal from your existing Internet account. Call and join today. Tell the friendly Portal Customer Service representative, "The Amiga Zone and Amiga Report sent me!" [Editor's Note: Be sure to tell them that you are an Amiga user, so they can notify the AmigaZone sysops to send their Welcome Letter and other information!] That number again: 408-973-9111. Portal Communications accepts MasterCard, Visa, or you can pre-pay any amount by personal check or money order. The Portal Online System is a trademark of Portal Communications. @endnode *************************************************************************** @node P1-9 "A.M.I.G.A." @toc "menu" /// Another Moronic, Inane and Gratuitous Article --------------------------------------------- by Chad Freeman (cjfst4+@pitt.edu or cjfst4@cislabs.pitt.edu -- Internet) This week I'd like to take some time out from the usual inanity of this column and take a more serious bent. Just kidding! This week's article is the usual bunch of content-free assorted silliness that you skip over every other week. Really, though, you people just don't realize the amount of effort it takes to spew out 500 words or so of absolutely MEANINGLESS drivel every week (last week's article was proof of that)! And that's not all, it has to be useless commentary on the AMIGA, a non-mainstream computer soon to be a major game machine. In order to give you a better impression of the blood, sweat and tears your humble author endures every week to bring you this finely-honed journalistic work, I have decided to inflict you with... A DAY IN THE LIFE OF AN A.M.I.G.A. COLUMNIST An AMIGA columnist begins each day with the first rays of sun shining through his window. Fortunately his window is situated such that the first rays of sun don't show up til around noon. He promptly jumps (ok, well, slowly rolls over a half-hour period) out of bed and, after his morning (well, afternoon) ritual, settles down with his coffee and newspaper. After glancing through the paper for an Amiga-related article and finding none, he flips to the funny pages to see what comic is attempting to be politically correct this week. Your intrepid AMIGA columnist then begins his day, plopping down on the couch to watch whatever channel his random finger-pressings land him on. After about 8 hours of this stimulating activity, he stumbles into the kitchen for his evening meal. This usually consists of something quickly and easily prepared (so as to fit into his tight schedule), such as frozen pizza. Well, ok, almost exclusively frozen pizza. And Pink Swimmingo Kool-Aid. Anyway, after dinner begins the creative period of your author's day, during which he participates in rigorous mind-stimulating exercises in order to formulate the ideas that show up in this article. In other words, he plays Super Nintendo for a few hours. Now mentally primed for work, the author sits down at his computer to search for the germ that will become the weat of his article. Finding none, he proceeds through the various stages of article-writing: panic, despair, denial, acceptance, procrastination. Since these past ten minutes have been a stressful time, your humble writer retires early in order to get plenty of rest for his next day's work. THE END 'Gee,' you're saying, 'that's pretty inane!' OF COURSE IT IS! This is an moronic, inane and gratuitous article, and you don't get a moronic, inane and gratuitous article by being witty, intelligent and effluvient, do you? Of course not! Its like thinking you'll get rich buying Commodore stock! These things just don't happen. But hey, count your blessings. If it weren't for this moronic, inane and gratuitous article, something even MORE moronic, inane and gratuitous would be taking its place. And is it not this fear that keeps our entire societal structure cohesive? Therefore, moronic, inane and gratuitous articles such as this one actually form the glue that holds our fragile relationships together! So, next time you're reading something moronic, inane and/or gratuitous, stand up, put your hand over your heart, and sing loudly to anyone around 'God Bless America' to pay tribute to the wonderful entity called the media which was able to bring you a thing as grand as THIS VERY ARTICLE! Thank you very much, and send all of your cash, major credit cards and first-born children to: The God Bless Moronic, Inane and Gratuitous Articles Fund -32.5 We're Right You're Wrong Blvd. Bible Belt, USA 00432 Until next week! @endnode ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ /// Emulation Ramblings ------------------- By Jason Compton (Jcompton@meltdown.chi.il.us) I'm seeing a recent (well, not THAT recent) trend in emulation, and believe it or not, this one I'm not happy about. The Associated Press, in collaboration with newspapers across the country, are doing their very best to emulate advertisements for IBM and Apple. This isn't something difficult to verify: pick up the business section of a newspaper sometime soon, and there's about a 50% chance there will be something on "computers" in there. Of course, "computer" means it's made by one of the following companies (in order of descending frequency): IBM, Apple, NEC, Compaq, Dell. Is it so wrong or outrageous to want the occasional spot on the latest Amiga, or even the CD32 in a little blurb about CD-ROM? Hell, I'll settle for it being buried in the article! But, no, the AP doesn't seem to acknowledge that the Amiga exists. Normally, I torture myself and read the business section daily, and shake my head in disgust when I see a so-called "computer" article (talking, for example, about the revolutionary multitasking abilities of Windows NT. Ha. Ha. Ha.). This morning, though, I think I've finally had enough. The article "Trend toward computer kiosks changing way consumers shop" gave me a brief glimmer of hope, based on an article I JUST GOT DONE reading! In short, it talks about various uses for computer kiosks (those cute card machines and advance ticket sales), then got to who made them. Who do YOU think? IBM and Apple head the list, with NCR, MicroTouch Systems, and Electronic Data Systems following. Commodore? Didn't they used to make calculators? Amiga? No, I'm sorry, this is not a Spanish article. Allow me to explain why I'm so mad. August's Computer Graphics World (a magazine I was previously unaware of, but I now hold in the highest regards) ran an article entitled "The Amiga: Is it Time You Took a Second Look?" It is a rather nice (and honest) article about the virtues of the Amiga and its graphics capabilities. While Rick Cook, the author, didn't have a whole lot of nice things to say about pre-AGA graphics (although he didn't mind HAM too much), he was thoroughly impressed with AGA machines. To his credit, he kept the article from becoming a Toaster-fest, but as is bound to happen, a good chunk of attention was devoted to it (not to worry: Most people don't even credit the Amiga and the Toaster being related). Now to the point: One of the big applications that Cook points to is the use of the Amiga for video kiosks, and gives some rather upsetting news when compared to the above: A Massachusetts cellular phone company designed a kiosk shaped like one of their products as an informational center for their phones. The price? $1800. The main computer behind it? An Amiga 500. Compare this price to prices above. Granted, it didn't print out greeting cards for anyone, but here comes piece 'o info #2: the president of MindsEye Group, a kiosk-designer in San Diego, claims that Amiga kiosks are 50% cheaper than Mac and 40% cheaper than IBM kiosks. The kicker to all of this? "'Sometimes we have to price it out as if we were doing the project on a PC or Macintosh, otherwise the customer will take a look at how much it would cost and say to themselves, 'They can't do it for that kind of money.' They see the price up front and they get scared.'" Read that one over a couple of times. Shake your head in disgust. Repeat as necessary. I did. We're being told by a kiosk designer that the Amiga is just TOO good at doing what it does for TOO little money? Maybe that's why the Amiga, which in many respects sits in the middle of the price spectrum, just doesn't sell well: IBM's are cost-effective, while Macs make you feel like you're getting a bunch for your money (Can't live without that smiley face...) So what am I saying? First and foremost, the AP needs to get a life. At the very least, it should realize how many thousands of dollars it gives away per week in free plugs for new systems... or are they free? I'll move on: at best, it should wake up and realize that more computers exist than those made by Apple, IBM, and a handful of clone makers. Specifically, realize that the 1200 and 4000 are out and running as wild as Commodore can run them, that the Amiga has been doing what PowerPC hopes to do for years (run cross-platform...I can't think of a better way to run an IBM, Mac, and Amiga operating system than on an Amiga...), and that the CD32 is more important than what Nintendo wants to do in 1997 with Silicon Graphics. Which brings me to my final, most bizarre point: I wonder just how much SGI pays the Indigo Girls to run around advertising their computer. Maybe Commodore should start up a music group. Until next time...remember, I respect the Associated Press and Computer Graphics World, and recognize their copyrights on the above printed material. But I think it's reasonable usage to reprint it. @endnode *************************************************************************** @node P4-3 "Holonet" @toc "menu" /// Holonet: Inexpensive Internet Access ------------------------------------- *** HOLONET *** HoloNet is an easy to use Internet Access BBS. HoloNet is based on custom BBS software which provides an easy to use menu driven interface. HoloNet is ideal for those looking for an easy way to use Internet services. HoloNet does not currently provide UNIX shell access. Services include: o Convenient Access A local call in 850+ cities nationwide. o Online Publications Include USA Today Decisionline, Newsbytes, Datanet Computer News, Eeeekbits, and Boardwatch Magazine. o USENET Averages over 30MB of USENET news per day. The following news readers are available: NN, TIN, and RN. o Internet E-Mail Members have an Internet E-mail address similar to: member@holonet.net o Internet Access Access to telnet, talk, finger, IRC, and FTP. (note: you must comply with the policies of any networks you use) o Single and Multi-player Games Board, card, fantasy, and puzzle games. o Support for Eudora Excellent off-line Macintosh e-mail reader. o UUCP E-mail and USENET feeds Link LAN E-mail systems and BBSes to the Internet. How to try HoloNet for FREE: Telnet: holonet.net Modem: 510-704-1058 (Berkeley, CA) at 1200, 2400, 9600, or 14400 bps. There are free demo numbers nationwide, for an automated response containg a list of access numbers, send e-mail to access@holonet.mailer.net How to get more information: E-mail: info@holonet.net Modem: 510-704-1058 at 1200, 2400, 9600, or 14400bps Voice: 510-704-0160 Fax: 510-704-8019 HoloNet is a service mark of Information Access Technologies, Inc. Copyright © 1992 Information Access Techologies, Inc. All Rights Reserved. @endnode *************************************************************************** /// The InterNet via Email ---------------------- by Robert Niles So far we have talked about how to use FTPmail, and InterNIC's WHOIS program via InterNet email. This time we will talk about ARCHIE, and how those who only have InterNet email access may use it. Archie tracks the contents of over 800 anonymous FTP archive sites. These sites combined contain millions of files...and new files are added every day. Archie is primarily used to search through it's database and return the location and file names depending on what you asked it to search for. Suppose you needed to find a site that has "SnoopDos". Here's how we would go about doing it... First we need to send a message to Archie. There are many archie servers over the world, but the one we will use is archie@archie.rutgers.edu, one of the larger Archie sites (in the USA). On the SUBJECT line we will type the word "path" along with your email address, for example: [path rniles@imtired.itm.com]. This tells Archie where to send the results of it's search. Archie tries to get this from the From: line of the message if no "path" command is given, but I often find that it fails if the "path" command is not there. In the message body, enter "prog" and the string that you want archie to search for...following the example above we will have Archie look for the string "snoopdos". So we enter "prog snoopdos". On last line that you want to enter "quit". This tells Archie that you are done and not to try to process anything below it. Soon you will get a reply via email on the results of your search. Example, sending mail to archie: To: archie@archie.rutgers.edu Subject: path rniles@imtired.itm.com --Message body---------------------------- prog snoopdos quit ------------------------------------------ Archie will return a message to you that looks something like this: --start----------------------------------- From imtired.itm.com!dorm.rutgers.edu!archie-errors Thu, 7Oct93 09:07:46 PDT Received: by imtired.itm.com (V1.16/Amiga) id AA004f5; Thu, 7 Oct 93 09:06:44 PDT Received: by dorm.rutgers.edu (5.59/SMI4.0/RU1.5/3.08) id AA00306; Thu, 7 Oct 93 11:53:19 EDT Message-Id: <9310071553.AA00306@dorm.rutgers.edu> Reply-To: (Archie Server) archie-errors@dorm.rutgers.edu Date: Thu, 7 Oct 93 11:53 -0400 From: (Archie Server) archie-errors@dorm.rutgers.edu To: rniles@imtired.itm.com Subject: archie [prog snoopdos] part 1 of 1 >> path >> path rniles@imtired.itm.com >> prog snoopdos # Search type: sub. Host ftp.wustl.edu (128.252.135.4) Last updated 20:43 2 Oct 1993 Location: /systems/amiga/aminet/util/moni FILE -rw-rw-r-- 37565 bytes 01:00 28 Dec 1992 SnoopDos17.lha FILE -rw-rw-r-- 1097 bytes 01:00 28 Dec 1992 SnoopDos17.readme Location: /systems/amiga/boing/fish/disks/f7/ff725 FILE -rwxr-xr-x 39376 bytes 00:00 7 Oct 1992 SnoopDos.lzh Location: /systems/amiga/boing/utilities/disks/misc FILE -rw-rw-r-- 690 bytes 01:00 6 Feb 1991 SnoopDos-1.2.Readme FILE -rw-rw-r-- 33664 bytes 01:00 6 Feb 1991 SnoopDos-1.2.lzh Host gatekeeper.dec.com (16.1.0.2) Last updated 12:41 2 Oct 1993 Location: /.6/FF_PROGS/MISCUTIL FILE -r-xr-xr-x 34896 bytes 01:00 3 Mar 1992 SNOOPDOS.LZH >> quit --end------------------------------------- You can also add more than one search string on the "prog" line, for example: prog snoopdos term Will search for any ocurrance of "snoopdos" and "term". Another useful command is "compress" which would be placed in the message body. Compress will take the result of the search, compress it with the .Z extention and uuencode it. This is quit useful for those searches in which you know there would be a big return on. Also there is the "help" command. This gives you a full listing of all the commands, and what they are used for. It also will give you a listing of all the archie servers that are available. Well I hope this helps those of you who only have email access. With FTPmail, Whois, and Archie, alot of new doors are opened up to you and hopefully this will make the InterNet a bit more enjoyable. References: FTPMail............Amiga Report 1.26 InterNIC's WHOIS...Amiga Report 1.27 @endnode ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ /// Modem Deal of the Year: LineLink 144e -------------------------------------- With comments from Harv Laser I ordered the LineLink 144e modem from Mac Warehouse on Tuesday this week. They told me it was out of stock and they expected a shipment in soon. This morning (Thursday) half an hour ago it was delivered to my front door. Total cost $99 for the modem plus $3 for Airborne Express overnight shipping. The modem's box was securely packed in a larger outer carton. I was shipped exactly what I ordered and received it in perfect working condition in a very timely manner. mac Warehouse's phone order takers were courteous and did not leave me on hold for long periods of time. The modem itself is a white metal box, not very fancy or pretentious looking, about 6" wide, about 8" deep, about 1.5" tall with five LEDs on the front panel. The rear has the standard RJ11 phone and line jacks, a standard RS-232 female port, a small power switch, and a hole into which one plugs the small AC power adaptor. Included is a 30 page manual, a disk with Mac terminal software, a Mac serial cable, and the AC power brick. I unplugged my old modem, used the same Amiga serial cable I've been using since 1985 to connect the modem, connected the power brick, ran Baud Bandit, dialed in and here I am. All things considered I would rate this purchase as a excellent bargain, and rate Mac Warehouse as an excellent company with whom to do business (I have absolutely no affiliation with them whatsoever and I've NEVER bought anything from them before). I don't know how long they intend to keep selling this modem for $99. At that price it represents an absolutely incredible bargain and if you've been slogging along with a 1200 or 2400bps modem waiting for the price of 14.4K modems to come down to a reasonable level, your wait is now over. Call Mac Warehouse and order one of these. They're at 1-800-255-6227. The modem's order number is BND0249. They take all major credit cards and again, Airborne overnight express is $3 additional. Again, I have NO connection with Mac Warehouse at all except I am now an extremely satisfied customer. Here's yet more information on the modem bargain of the year. Found this text on Usenet in comp.sys.mac.comm where there are some major discussions of this modem going on. See the previous article here.. I bought one of these this week and am ridiculously satisfied with it so far :) Much of the info here is Mac-specific however be advised this modem works just fine on an Amiga as it has a standard RS232 serial port on it. Harv ------------------------------ This revision of the FAQ is minor, and ignores some recent posts. I don't plan to update it any more... my LineLInk arrived today and works fine (except it screeches so horribly I've turned the speaker off in my init string-- "M0"). Anyone want to pick up from here on? [Thanks to *many* posters... sorry for not including credits.] Where to get it: The $99 LineLink 144e fax modem (available from MacWarehouse, tel. 800-255-6227, as part number BND 0249 for $99 plus $3 shipping, external type, suitable for Macintosh, complete with all cables and power supply)... There is no FaxFACTS number for the modem. You probably need to FAX their order line 1-908-905-9279 for more information Availability: The manufacturer told me they ship modems to MacWarehouse every day. What you get: Comes with modem cable, phone cable, powercord, MAcKNOWLEDGE software, and a deal on Compu$erve. It comes with a good cable that does hardware handshake, some communications so ftware which is o.k. but not as good as several public domain packages you can get from various archives, and a manual which is adequate. Who makes it: Technology Concepts at 800-477-3473 The modem is actually made by Prometheus (at least according to the sticker on the bottom of them). Also MacFax is the standard software bundled with Prometheus modems. This Modem appears to be an exact copy of a standard Prometheus modem. Not just "made" but "manufactured" right here in these United States, up Tualatin, Oregon way, by Prometheus Products, Inc. The chipset is a Sierra Semiconductor Corp chipsets. Specs: Data Speeds 300 bps/CCITT v.21 and Bell 1200 bps/CCITT v.22 and Bell 3400 bps/CCITT v.22bis 9600 bps/CCITT v.32 14,400 bps/CCITT v.32bis Data Compression CCITT v.42bis MNP-5 for 3:1 Error Correction CCITT v.42 (LAP-M) MNP-4 Operation Full or half duplex Dialing Rotary or touch-tone compatible Commands Hayes AT commands set Elsewhere on the fax it says "v.42bis and v.42 also automatically include MNP levels 1-5 for backward compatibility with the installed base of MNP modems." In addition, a not-very-knowledgeable person at TCI told me it uses ROMs (rather than, say flash memory). The following is the information obtained via the ATI command from the modem: > ati0: 248 > ati1: 000 > ati2: > ati3: Copyright (c) 1993 SSC, V1.0 - 08/27/93 > ati4: SERIAL * V32BIS * V42BIS * VOICE > ati5: > ati6: DSP Version: V1.20 > MCP Version: V1.2A - 07/07/93, Copyright (c) 1993 SSC In MacWorld, Oct'93, there is an article on High-Speed Fax Modems, Prometheus w as briefly mentioned, but MacWorld didn't have any units available for testing. One important point mentioned in the article is that "it doesn't really matter whose chip set is in your fax modem". The important thing to pay attention to is the chip set version "because there may be differences in the ROMs". Basically, they say to make sure that the lastest version of the ROMs are in the modem. "The combination of an older chip set and default software settings can prevent a fax modem from sending a file over noisy telephone lines". I called Technology Concepts to try to find out what version of the ROMS are in the LineLink. The best the techie could tell me is that it is a BRAND NEW modem and that the ROMs were the newest they have. Physical details: Dimensions: 1.75"x7"x8" plus the power transformer which is 2"x2"x1.5" * The modem has a built-in speaker. * Instead of Receive Data and Send Data lights, it has only an I/O light so you can tell that something is moving but you cannot tell which way. * Front panel lights are AA, CD, OH, IO and MR. Very few status indicator lights (e.g., I/O light rather than separate read and write); the speaker is not so hot; and the case is white plastic. It does have one nice feature: a summary of AT commands on the bottom of the modem, in case you lose the manual. According to the manual, the modem is capable of enabling 550 Hz and 1800 Hz guard tones for CCITT operation. It can also enable UK make/break ratios for pulse dialing. It does not say whether it can properly detect UK or other international dial tones, ringing tones, or busy signals. You can disable detection of dial tone and busy, which should enable you to use the modem. The ring indicator is probably not required also for proper operation. However, you may give up some call progress detection to do so. Manual: * The manual is 28 pages. The manual is too sparse; get the Hayes modem documentation from oak.oakland.edu in /pub/msdos/modem/trm20.zip, find a way to unzip it, and read that documentation instead. Since this is a Hayes-compatible modem, trm20.zip will be appropriate much of the time. [Software information deleted, not relevant to the Amiga - Ed] Performance: Using my Classic, I was able to reliably connect using MacSLIP 1.01 at 38,400 (DTR, CTS and Drop DTR turned on, sample script modified to not look for confirmation of the word "bytes"). NewsWatcher and Eudora work reliably at 38.4K, but Fetch crashes the Mac reliably during transfers at speeds over 2400 baud. I get the CONNECT 19200 message when I log on to the U of MN with SLIP and after several hour long sessions I have not had a single disconnect. I was also able to log on to AOL at 9600. So far (two days heavy use) the LineLink 144e seems quite reliable. My throughput with FETCH was "only" about 4X what my 2400 baud modem did, but that may have been due to my slow MacSE doing the binhex boogie. The modem really seems to perform _very_ well when I use TurboGopher, it is almost as fast as my SE on the ethernet. I ordered 2 and ARA, and so far the performance is outstanding. No connection problems, came with ARA script, and they zip along at 14.4K... My two $99 modems talk to each other just fine. I've been using the LineLink144e for about a week. I manage speeds of 9600 baud or better with FirstClass and Telefinder. I had a problem with a practical perif. 2400 bd modem and AOL because of a noisy line, the linelink 144e takes the same line at 9600 baud with no problems at all. True this is only 9600 bd but thats as fast as AOL will go. Voicemail potential: Well, since the modem is actually made by Prometheus, you can get a clue by looking at their line. They have the Prometheus Ultima Home Office modem, ext 14.4/14.4SR Fax w/V.42 bix & voice (Straight from page 254, MacWorld, Oct'93). On page 218 in the "Star Ratings", it states that is is voice mail. I guess you can use your computer as an answering machine. It should be noted that it got a rating of 2/5 "When it can reliably transmit data at high speeds and the bugs are fixed, this fax modem with voice mail will be worth a second look". Review dated Oct 92. Wierdness: I have a few things hooked up to one outlet (I know, I know, I shouldn't really do this) and when someone turns on the other machine, the power surge (I believe) from turning it on messes up my 144e modem and I have to power cycle it and redial. Technical specs-- AT&V returns: ACTIVE PROFILE: B1 E1 L2 M1 N1 P Q0 V1 W0 X4 Y0 &C0 &D0 &G0 &J0 &K3 &L0 &P0 &Q5 &R0 &S0 &T4 &U0 &X0 \C0 \G0 \Q3 \T000 \V1 \X0 %A000 %D2 %E1 S00:000 S14:AAH S18:000 S21:00H S22:76H S23:17H S25:005 S26:001 S27:49H S36:007 S37:000 S38:020 S46:138 S48:007 S49:010 S50:200 S63:000 S82:128 STORED PROFILE 0: B1 E1 L2 M1 N1 P Q0 V1 W0 X4 Y0 &C0 &D0 &G0 &J0 &K3 &L0 &P0 &Q5 &R0 &S0 &T4 &U0 &X0 \C0 \G0 \Q3 \T000 \V1 \X0 %A000 %D2 %E1 S00:000 S14:AAH S18:000 S21:00H S22:76H S23:17H S25:005 S26:001 S27:49H S36:007 S37:000 S38:020 S46:138 S48:007 S49:010 S50:200 S63:000 S82:128 STORED PROFILE 1: B1 E1 L2 M1 N1 P Q0 V1 W0 X4 Y0 &C0 &D0 &G0 &J0 &K3 &L0 &P0 &Q5 &R0 &S0 &T4 &U0 &X0 \C0 \G0 \Q3 \T000 \V1 \X0 %A000 %D2 %E1 S00:000 S14:AAH S18:000 S21:00H S22:76H S23:07H S25:005 S26:001 S27:49H S36:007 S37:000 S38:020 S46:138 S48:007 S49:010 S50:200 S63:000 S82:128 TELEPHONE NUMBERS: 0= 1= 2= 3= where ACTIVE PROFILE: B1 Bell 103/212A protocol E1 echo on L2 medium volume M1 speaker on until carrier detected N1 when originating, auto line speed starting at DCE speed specified by register S37. When answering, auto line speed regardless of register S37 setting. P Q0 Send responses to host V1 send word responses W0 do not return negotiation progress messages X4 Basic call progress, connection speed and BUSY detection plus DIALTONE detection. Y0 Long space disconnect disabled. &C0 DCD forced on at all times &D0 Modem ignores status of DTR signal. &G0 Disable guard tones. Setting for USA operation. &J0 not functional. Included for compatibility. &K3 RTS/CTS interface signals. Modem uses CTS line to control data from modem. Bidirectional flow control. &L0 Not supported. Command included for compatibility. &P0 Make/Break ratio is 39/61%. Setting for USA and Canada. &Q5 Instructs the modem to make a data connection using the V.42bis standard. To disable V.42bis operation, send the &Q0, &Q3, or &Q6 command, or modify the values of registers S36, S46, and S48. &R0 PC Mode. DTR and RTS signals function normally. &S0 DSR signal active at all times. &T4 Accept a remote modem request for Digital Loopback Test. &U0 Enable trellis coding (V.32 9600 bits/s only). &X0 Command not supported; included for compatibility. &Y0 Use configuration profile 0 after reset or power-up. \C0 No buffer used while establishing a reliable connection. \G0 Turn off port flow control. \Q3 Bidirectional RTS/CTS interface signals. Modem uses CTS line to control data from DTE. DTE uses RTS line to control data from modem. \T000 Inactivity timer. 0 disables the inactivity timer. \V1 Enable MNP responses. \X0 Modem will act on XON/XOFF received from the local DTE, but will not pass XON/XOFF to the remote modem. %A000 %D2 2K dictionary. %E1 Enable auto-retrain at 2400 bits/s when signal quality is poor. No S-registers are documented in the manual. Here are the values returned. S00:000 S02:043 S03:013 S04:010 S05:008 S06:002 S07:040 S08:002 S09:006 S10:014 S11:075 S12:040 S14:AAH S16:00H S18:000 S21:00H S22:76H S23:2DH S25:005 S26:001 S27:49H S36:007 S37:000 S38:020 S46:138 S48:007 S49:010 S50:200 S63:000 S82:128 @endnode *************************************************************************** @node P4-6 "BIX" @toc "menu" /// BIX - Byte Information Exchange Lots of information! ------------------------------- BIX is the premier online service for computing professionals and enthusiasts. While other online services cater to computer novices, BIX is the place for knowledgeable people to go for answers to tough questions. You're likely to find many others in similar situations who can offer advice, give technical assistance, or point you in the right direction. BIX is divided into areas called conferences, each devoted to a particular area of interest. They range from algorithms to windows, from writers to amiga. Conferences are categorized into groups, usually referred to as exchanges, so that you can browse through whatever groups interest you and see a list of the conferences it contains. These are some of the exchanges on BIX: amiga.exchange - the place for Amiga developers and enthusiasts byte - the full text of each issue of BYTE magazine; source code too e.and.l - Entertainment and Leisure; music, pets, games, more ibm.exchange - everything from OS/2 to PC clones mac.exchange - Mac news, support, software, advice professionals - consultants, engineers, financiers gather here programmers - some of the best brains in the business! wix - the Information Exchange for Windows; Windows Magazine online writers.ex - the professional and amateur writer's exchange ************FULL INTERNET ACCESS!************ BIX also features access to the Internet - you can use FTP to transfer files from sites all over the world, telnet to log on to other online services, schools, and research sites, and send Internet mail to millions of people at services like DELPHI, CompuServe, America Online, MCI Mail, and other sites and services. Services like "WHOIS" and "Finger" are also available, with more features on the way (like USENET newsgroups; our newsreader is currently being tested and should be available very soon!) There are no usage fees or special charges for Internet access - it's all part of your BIX subscription. ================================ Rates and Connect Information: ================================ BIX membership costs $13 per month, plus connect time. There are several different ways to connect: SprintNet* $3/hour evenings/weekends $9/hour weekdays Tymnet:** $3/hour evenings/weekends $9/hour weekdays (SprintNet and Tyment rates shown are for 48 contiguous US states only.) Tymnet Canada: $4/hr eves/wkends $9/hour weekdays Tymnet Hawaii: $10/hr eves/wkends $20/hour weekdays Telnet(via Internet): $1/hour, round the clock Direct dial (Boston): $2/hour, round the clock (up to 9600 bps) * SprintNet daytime hours are from 6am to 7pm, M-F, ET. ** Tymnet daytime hours are from 7am to 6pm, M-F, ET. To find your local SprintNet number, call SprintNet at (800) 877-5045, ext. 5. Internationally, call (404) 859-7700. To find a local Tymnet number, call Tymnet at (800) 937-2862. Internationally, call (703) 442-0145. ================ There is no surcharge for 9600 bps access via either telecom carrier. There is no surcharge for up to 10mb of Internet mail per month (sent and received). There will be a charge of $1 per 100,000 bytes thereafter. ================ 20/20 PLAN OPTION (for USA-48 users only): Volume users can choose the 20/20 Advantage Plan, which is $20 per month and includes the first 20 hours of access by any combination of methods from the contiguous United States. Additional use is $1.80 per hour (additional use for telnet access is $1 an hour). The 20/20 Plan's cost is in addition to the $13 monthly fee. INTERNATIONAL USERS: If you wish to connect internationally through Tymnet or SprintNet, please contact your local PTT. BIX accepts prepaid international calls, direct dial, or telnet connections. In order to make a "collect" (not prepaid) call to BIX, your account must be verified before the charges are accepted. When you complete the registration, we'll mail you a BIX Membership Agreement by regular US Mail. Whe you receive it, sign it and return it to us by mail. When we receive it here, we'll authorize your account to make reverse charged calls. If you want to access BIX right away, contact your local PTT to set up a prepaid account. You'll pay your local carrier for your calls to BIX in advance, so there's no waiting period or verfication needed. Or, connect at BIX via telnet to x25.bix.com. SprintNet international calls from most locations are $24 an hour. Tymnet international charges vary, but are generally between $20-$30 an hour. ========================= Billing Information: ========================= You can charge your monthly BIX membership fees to your Visa, Mastercard, Discover, or American Express card. You may have your company invoiced for one or more BIX memberships with a BIX Corporate Account. To do so, send by US Mail or fax a Purchase Order including a Purchase Order number, invoice address, contact person, a phone number where we can reach the contact person, and the company's fax number. Please direct it to the attention of Connie Lopes, who handles corporate accounts. Our fax number is 617-491-6642. Your corporate account will generally be set up within 24 hours. ======================== To Sign Up For BIX: ======================== Dial by modem 1-800-695-4882 or 617-491-5410 * (use 8 data bits, no parity, full duplex) Press a few carriage returns until you see the Login:(enter "bix") prompt, then type bix At the Name? prompt, type bix.amrpt * Users already on the internet can telnet to x25.bix.com instead. At the USERNAME: prompt enter bix, then bix.net at the Name? prompt. Once your account is registered, you can connect the same way, except at the Name? prompt you'll enter your BIXname and then your password. Using the above procedure will allow users in the 48 contiguous United States to take advantage of our special "5 for $5" offer. This offer lets you use up to 5 hours of evening/weekend time on BIX during the current calender month (whatever month you sign up in), for $5. Additional time is $1.80 per hour ($1 per hour for telnet). At the end of the calender month, you will be placed into our standard rate plan, at $13 monthly plus connect charges. You may also join the 20/20 Plan at this time. If you have other questions, please contact BIX Member Services at (800) 695-4775; send a fax to BIX at (617) 491-6642; or send Internet mail to info@bix.com. BIX Member Services hours are 12pm - 11pm, Monday through Friday, ET. @endnode *************************************************************************** @node P3 "Dealer Directory" @toc "menu" /// Dealer Directory Serving our readers! ---------------- Almathera Systems Ltd Challenge House 618 Mitcham Rd Croydon, Surrey CR9 3AU England VOICE: (UK) 081 683 6418 Internet: (Sales) almathera@cix.compulink.co.uk (Technical) jralph@cix.compulink.co.uk Amigability Computers P.O. Box 572 Plantsville, CT 06479 VOICE: 203-276-8175 Internet: amiga@phantm.UUCP BIX: jbasile (Send E-mail to subscribe to our mailing list) Apogee Technologies 1851 University Parkway Sarasota, FL 34243 VOICE: 813-355-6121 Portal: Apogee Internet: Apogee@cup.portal.com Armadillo Brothers 753 East 3300 South Salt Lake City, Utah VOICE: 801-484-2791 GEnie: B.GRAY CLICK! Microcomputer Applications B.V.B.A. Boomsesteenweg 468 B-2610 Wilrijk - Antwerpen Belgium - Europe VOICE: 03 / 828.18.15 FAX: 03 / 828.67.36 USENET: vanhoutv@click.augfl.be FIDO: 2:292/603.9 AmigaNet: 39:120/102.9 Computers International, Inc. 5415 Hixson Pike Chattanooga, TN 37343 VOICE: 615-843-0630 Digital Arts 122 West 6th Street Bloomington, IN 47404 VOICE: (812)330-0124 FAX: (812)330-0126 BIX: msears Finetastic Computers 721 Washington Street Norwood, MA 02062 VOICE: 617-762-4166 BBS: 617-769-3172 Fido: 1:101/322 Portal: FinetasticComputers Internet: FinetasticComputers@cup.portal.com HT Electronics 275 North Mathilda Avenue Sunnyvale, CA 94086 VOICE: 408-737-0900 FAX: 408-245-3109 Portal: HT Electronics Internet: HT Electronics@cup.portal.com Industrial Video, Inc. 1601 North Ridge Rd. Lorain, OH 44055 VOICE: 800-362-6150 216-233-4000 Internet: af741@cleveland.freenet.edu Contact: John Gray MicroSearch 9000 US 59 South, Suite 330 Houston, Texas VOICE: 713-988-2818 FAX: 713-995-4994 Mr. Hardware Computers P.O. Box 148 59 Storey Ave. Central Islip, NY 11722 VOICE: 516-234-8110 FAX: 516-234-8110 A.M.U.G. BBS: 516-234-6046 MusicMart: Media Sound & Vision 71 Wellington Road London, Ontario, Canada VOICE: 519-434-4162 FAX: 519-663-8074 BBS: 519-457-2986 FIDO: 1:221/125 AmigaNet: 40:550/1 MaxNet: 90:204/1 iNET: koops@gaul.csd.uwo.ca PSI Animations 17924 SW Pilkington Road Lake Oswego, OR 97035 VOICE: 503-624-8185 Internet: PSIANIM@agora.rain.com Software Plus Chicago 3100 W Peterson Avenue Chicago, Illinois VOICE: 312-338-6100 (Dealers: To have your name added, please send Email!) @endnode ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ @node P1-15 "AR Confidential" @toc "menu" /// AR Confidential We heard it through the grapevine! --------------- GROWTH DROPS OFF FOR ONLINE SERVICES ==================================== In the past six months, more than 328,000 customers have signed up for on-line computer services, bringing the number of homes reached by major on-line services to 3.9 million, according to a survey by Information & Interactive Services Report, a trade newsletter based in Washington. But the 9.9 percent growth since March puts the current rate considerably below previous annual industry increases, said Gary Arlen, an editor of the newsletter. "This suggests that consumer appetite ... may be sated, and that the next market phase may include increased efforts by providers to lure customers away from one another," Arlen said. Vienna-based America Online Inc. grew most quickly, adding 130,000 users for a total of 350,000, a 59 percent jump. CompuServe Inc., the largest on-line service with 1.4 million users, added 190,000, a jump of 16 percent. Prodigy, which has 950,000 users, lost 5 percent of its customers while Rockville-based GEnie remained at 400,000. FIRED EXECUTIVE SUES APPLE ========================== Albert A. Eisenstat, 63, Apple Computer Inc.'s executive vice president and secretary, was fired last week. He promptly responded by suing Apple and chief executive Michael Spindler, alleging breach of contract, wrongful termination and age discrimination. Eisenstat's suit claims he was forced out because he opposed Spindler's reorganization plans and the repricing of stock options for employees, according to the Associated Press. Spindler replaced Apple chairman John Sculley as chief executive in June. In announcing Eisenstat's departure on Friday, Apple said the suit had no merit. "Al seemed to feel he ought to be employed at Apple indefinitely. Michael felt otherwise and asked him to leave the company immediately," Apple spokeswoman Kate Paisley told Bloomberg Business News. Analysts said the termination suggests continuing turmoil at a company that has been hit by massive losses and the resignation of other key executives in recent months. VIDEO-CONFERENCING REVISITED ============================ The hoopla about video-conferencing may just turn out to be hype, according to a study by Dataquest Inc. About 64 percent of the people responding to a survey by the San Jose market research company said they will have little demand for additional videoconferencing equipment next year. "There is great hope among many technology companies that video- conferencing will be the `killer application' that will accelerate the trend toward multimedia. The results of our survey certainly don't support those hopes," said Dataquest analyst Bruce Ryon. The survey found that while big Fortune 500 companies need large room-type videoconference systems, the majority of businesses find that facsimile, electronic mail and other low-cost communications technologies are adequate. In addition, most businesses said that the benefits of having video on desktop computers are not significant enough to justify the costs of videoconferencing equipment. Copyright 1993 The Washington Post @endnode ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ @node P1-16 "Humor Department" @toc "menu" /// The Humor Department Jokes, Quotes, Insults, Shameless Plugs -------------------- Classified Intelligence? "KAYPRO Computer, have books & discs, don't know how to use. $300/trade for lrg iguana." -- The Sacramento Bee @endnode @node P2-3 "In Closing" @toc "menu" /////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// Amiga Report International Online Magazine October 8, 1993 * YOUR INDEPENDENT NEWS SOURCE * No. 1.28 Copyright © 1993 SkyNet Publications ~ All Rights Reserved /////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// Views, Opinions and Articles presented herein are not necessarily those of the editors and staff of Amiga Report International Online Magazine or of STR Publications. Permission to reprint articles is hereby granted, unless otherwise noted. Reprints must, without exception, include the name of the publication, date, issue number and the author's name. Amiga Report and/or portions therein may not be edited in any way without prior written per- mission. However, translation into a language other than English is accept- ble, provided the original meaning is not altered. Amiga Report may be dis- tributed on privately owned not-for-profit bulletin board systems (fees to cover cost of operation are acceptable), and major online services such as (but not limited to) Delphi and Portal. Distribution on public domain disks is acceptable provided proceeds are only to cover the cost of the disk (e.g. no more than $5 US). Distribution on for-profit magazine cover disks requires written permission from the editor or publisher. Amiga Report is a not-for-profit publication. Amiga Report, at the time of pub- ication, is believed reasonably accurate. Amiga Report, its staff and con- ributors are not and cannot be held responsible for the use or misuse of information contained herein or the results obtained there from. Amiga Report is not affiliated with Commodore-Amiga, Inc., Commodore Business Machines, Ltd., or any other Amiga publication in any way. All items quoted in whole or in part are done so under the Fair Use Provision of the Copy- right Laws of the United States Penal Code. /////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// Only * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * _ _ __ ___ _ * * /\\ |\\ /| || // \ /\\ * * / \\ | \\ /|| ||(< __ / \\ * * /--- \\| \X || || \\_||/--- \\ * * /______________________________\\ * * / \\ * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Makes it possible!! @endnode @node "menu" "Amiga Report Main Menu" @toc "menu" @{" Columns and Features " link P1} News, Reviews, and More! @{" About AMIGA REPORT " link P2} Staff, Copyright information @{" Dealer Directory " link P3} Amiga Dealer Addresses and Numbers @{" Commercial Online Services " link P4} Sign-Up Information @{" FTP Announcements " link P5} New Files Available for FTP @{" AR Distribution Sites " link P2-1} Where to get AMIGA REPORT /////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// Amiga Report International Online Magazine "Your Weekly Source for Amiga Information" » FEATURING WEEKLY « Accurate UP-TO-DATE News and Information Current Events, Original Articles, Tips, Rumors, and Information Hardware · Software · Corporate · R & D · Imports /////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// / @{" DELPHI " link P4-1} · @{" PORTAL " link P4-2} · @{" FIDO " link P2-1} · @{" INTERNET " link P4-5} · @{" BIX " link P4-6} / /////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// @endnode @node P1 "Columns and Features" @toc "menu" @{" From the Editor's Desk " link P1-1} Saying it like it is! @{" CPU Status Report " link P1-2} Computer Products Update @{" CPU Status Report - Amiga " link P1-3} Amiga news @{" Gateway Computer Show " link P1-4} In St. Louis @{" USRobotics Announcement " link P1-5} V.32Terbo avail to European owners @{" Product Announcements " link P1-6} Perfect-link BBS, DiskExpander @{" Online Weekly " link P1-7} The lines are buzzing! @{" WOCA Report " link P1-8} By Dan Zerkle, parts 6 and 7 @{" A.M.I.G.A. " link P1-9} Those *#$@! acronyms! @{" The InterNet via Email " link P1-10} Using InterNIC's WHOIS @{" Federal Inquiry " link P1-11} On privacy programs @{" UseNet Review " link P1-12} Llamatron @{" Aminet hits 5000 files " link P1-13} The history of Aminet @{" Wil Wheaton's Toaster Tour " link P1-14} Touring the Toaster 4000 @{" AR Confidential " link P1-15} We heard it through the grapevine! @{" The Humor Department " link P1-16} Jokes, insults, and shameless plugs @endnode @node P2 "About Amiga Report" @toc "menu" @{" For Starters " link P2-1} Where to get AMIGA REPORT @{" AR Staff " link P2-2} The Editors, and Contributers @{" In Closing " link P2-3} Copyright Information @endnode @node P4 "Commercial Online Services" @toc "menu" @{" Delphi " link P4-1} It's getting better all the time! @{" Portal " link P4-2} A great place for Amiga users... @{" Holonet " link P4-3} Inexpensive Internet Access @{" InterNet " link P4-5} Subscribe to the AR Mailing List @{" BIX " link P4-6} For Serious Programmers and Developers @endnode @node P5 "FTP Announcements" @toc "menu" @{" Assistant v1.0 " link P5-1} Scheduler utility @{" Combat Air Patrol Demo " link P5-2} By Psygnosis @{" GNU Patch v2.1 " link P5-3} Applies patches to the original @{" Home Accountant v1.1 " link P5-4} Home accounting program @{" ARexxGuide v1.0 " link P5-5} AG hypertext guide to ARexx @{" MUIEmail v37.84 " link P5-6} MUI Email inbteface for AmigaUUCP @endnode ----------------------------------------- @node P2-1-1 "NOVA" @toc "menu" * NOVA BBS * Official Amiga Report Distribution Site * Running Starnet BBS * Wayne Stonecipher, Sysop FidoNet 1:362/508 An Amiga Software Distribution Site (ADS) 615-472-9748 USR DS 16.8 24hrs - 7 days Cleveland, Tennessee @endnode ------------------------------------------ @node P2-1-2 "In The MeanTime" @toc "menu" * IN THE MEANTIME BBS * Official Amiga Report Distribution Site * Running AXShell * Robert Niles, Sysop rniles@imtired.itm.com 509-966-3828 Supra V.32bis 24hrs - 7 days Yakima, Washington ******* Notice ******* After 13 September 1993, In The MeanTime will no longer be on FidoNet, thus we will no longer be accepting File REQuests (FREQs). We WILL be still accepting calls and will have the latest edition of Amiga Report online. Downloads to first time callers are still accepted. For the west coast call @{"Cloud's Corner" link P2-1-3} to FREQ the latest edition of Amiga Report. Those who call for the latest edition of Amiga Report, and who do not with to establish an account, log in as guest with the password of "guest". At the prompt type "ARMAG" (without the quotes). @endnode ------------------------------------------ @node P2-1-3 "Cloud's Corner" @toc "menu" * CLOUD'S CORNER BBS * Official Amiga Report Distribution Site Starnet/MebbsNet Support Site West Coast USA * Running Starnet BBS * Larry Cloud, Sysop FidoNet: 1:350/30 Internet: larryc@hebron.connected.com 206-377-4290 USR HST DS 24hrs - 7 days Bremerton, Washington New users can call and get ANY copy of Amiga Report. These are considered "free" downloads, they do not count against any file ratio. The latest issue of Amiga Reports can be Freq'ed (FileREQusted) from here as "AR.LHA", as "AR" or as ARxxx.LHA where xxx is the issue number. For users interested in reading AR, but who do not have access to AmigaGuide, you can freq ARBUL and get the AR in bulletin form. This service is provided for persons who do not have Amigaguide (such as IBM users). Please note that any pictures distributed with the "regular" Amiga Reports archive will NOT be sent with this freq. This file is not available for dial-in users, but you can read bulletin #22 with your capture buffer open and get the same file. @endnode ------------------------------------------ @node P2-1-4 "Biosmatica" @toc "menu" * BIOSMATICA BBS * Official Amiga Report Distribution Site -- Portugal * Running Excelsior/Trapdoor/UUCP * Celso Martinho, Sysop FidoNet 2:361/9 +351-34-382320 V.32bis 24hrs - 7 days @endnode ------------------------------------------ @node P2-1-5 "Amiga Junction 9" @toc "menu" * AMIGA JUNCTION 9 * Official Amiga Report Distribution Site -- United Kingdom * Running DLG Professional * Stephen Anderson, Sysop Internet: user_name@junct9.royle.org Line 1 +44 (0)372 271000 14400 V.32bis/HST Fido 2:253/510 Line 2 +44 (0)372 278000 14400 V.32bis only Fido 2:253/520 Line 3 +44 (0)372 279000 2400 V.42bis/MNP Fido 2:253/530 Sysop Email: sysadmin@junct9.royle.org @endnode ------------------------------------------ @node P2-1-6 "BitStream BBS" @toc "menu" * BITSTREAM BBS * The BBS of the Nelson (NZ) Amiga Users Group Official Amiga Report Distribution Site * Running Xenolink 1.0 Z.3 * Glen Roberts, Sysop FidoNet 3:771/850 +64 3 5485321 Supra V.32bis 24hrs - 7 days Nelson, New Zealand @endnode ------------------------------------------- @node P2-1-7 "Realm of Twilight" @toc "menu" * REALM OF TWILIGHT BBS * Official Amiga Report Distribution Site -- Canada * Running Excelsior! BBS * Thorsten Schiller, Sysop Usenet: realm.tdkcs.waterloo.on.ca UUCP: ...!uunet.ca!tdkcs!realm FIDO: 1:221/202 Fish: 33:33/8 24hrs - 7 days 519-748-9365 (2400 baud) 519-748-9026 (v.32bis) Ontario, Canada Hardware: Amiga 3000, 105 Meg Quantum, 213 Meg Maxtor, 5 megs RAM @endnode ------------------------------------------- @node P2-1-8 "Metnet Triangle" @toc "menu" METNET TRIANGLE SYSTEM Official Amiga Report Distribution Site UK Support for Mebbsnet * Running Mebbsnet and Starnet 1.02a * Jon Witty, Sysop FIDO: 2:252/129.0 24 hrs - 7 days Line 1: 44-482-473871 16.8 DS HST Lines 2-7: 44-482-442251 2400 (6 lines) Line 8: 44-482-491744 2400 Line 9: 44-482-449028 2400 Voice helpline 44-482-491752 (anytime) Fully animated menus + normal menu sets. 500 megs HD - Usual software/messages Most doors online - Many Sigs - AMIGA AND PC SUPPORT Very active userbase and busy conference Precious days and MUD online. AMUL support site. @endnode ------------------------------------------- @node P2-1-9 "Omaha Amiganet" @toc "menu" * OMAHA AMIGANET * Official Amiga Report Distribution Site * Running DLG Professional * Andy Wasserman, Sysop 24 hrs - 7 days FidoNet: 1:285/11 AmigaNet: 40:200/10 Line 1: 402-333-5110 V.32bis Line 2: 402-691-0104 USR DS Omaha, Nebraska @endnode ------------------------------------------ @node P2-1-10 "Amiga-Night-System" @toc "menu" * AMIGA-NIGHT-SYSTEM * Official Amiga Report Distribution Site - Finland * Running DLG Professional * Janne Saarme, Sysop 24 hrs - 7 days InterNet: luumu@fenix.pp.fi FidoNet: 2:220/550.0 +358-0-675840 V.32bis Helsinki, Finland @endnode ------------------------------------------ @node P2-1-11 "Ramses Amiga Flying" @toc "menu" * RAMSES THE AMIGA FLYING * Official Amiga Report Distribution Site -- France * Running DLG Professional * Eric Delord, Sysop Philippe Brand, Co-Sysop Stephane Legrand, Co-Sysop Internet: user.name@ramses.gna.org Fidonet: 2:320/104 +33-1-60037015 USR DS 16.8 +33-1-60037713 V.32bis +33-1-60037716 1200-2400 Ramses The Amiga Flying BBS is an Amiga-dedicated BBS running DLG-Pro on a Amiga 3000, 16MB RAM, 2GB Disk space, 3 lines. We keep a dayly Aminet site mirroring, NetBSD-Amiga complete mirror site from ftp.eunet.ch (main site), Amiga Report, GNU Amiga, Ramses is the SAN/ADS/Amiganet French coordinator. @endnode ------------------------------------------ @node P2-1-50 "Freeland Mainframe" @toc "menu" * FREELAND MAINFRAME * Offical Amiga Report Distribution Site * Running DLG Progessional * John Freeland, SysOp 206-438-1670 Supra 2400zi 206-438-2273 Telebit WorldBlazer(v.32bis) 206-456-6013 Supra v.32bis 24hrs - 7 days Internet - freemf.eskimo.com Olympia, Washington @endnode ------------------------------------------ @node P2-1-51 "LAHO" @toc "menu" * LAHO BBS * Official Amiga Report Distribution Site -- Finland * Running MBBS * Lenni Uitti, SysOp Tero Manninen, SysOp (PC-areas) Juha Mdkinen, SysOp (Amiga-areas) +358-64-414 1516, V.32bis/HST +358-64-414 0400, V.32bis/HST +358-64-414 6800, V.32/HST +358-64-423 1300, V.32 MNP Seindjoki, Finland Our machine is a 386/33 with 20MB of memory, 1GB harddisk and a CD-ROM drive. The BBS software is a Norwegian origin MBBS running in a DesqView windows. We have over 7000 files online (both for the Amiga and PC) + 650MB stuff on the Aminet CD-ROM disk. Every user has an access to download filelist (LAHOFIL.ZIP), list of Finnish 24-hour BBS's (BBSLIST.ZIP or BBSLIST.LHA) and every issue of the Amiga Report Magazine (AR101.LHA-AR1??.LHA) even on their first call. The system has been running since 1989 and is sponsored by the local telephone company, Vaasan Lddnin Puhelin Oy. @endnode ------------------------------------------ @node P2-1-52 "Falling BBS" @toc "menu" * FALLING BBS * Official Amiga Report Distribution Site -- Norway * Running ABBS * Christopher Naas, Sysop +47 69 256117 V.32bis 24hrs - 7 days EMail: naasc@cnaas.adsp.sub.org @endnode ------------------------------------------ @node P2-1-53 "Command Line BBS" @toc "menu" * COMMAND LINE BBS * Official Amiga Report Distribution Site -- Canada Canada's Amiga Graphics & Animation Source * Running AmiExpress BBS * Nick Poliwko, Sysop 416-533-8321 V.32 24hrs - 7 days Toronto, Canada @endnode ------------------------------------------- @node P2-1-54 "Rendezvous BBS" @toc "menu" * RENDEZVOUS BBS * Official Amiga Report Distribution Site - New Zealand New Zealand Excelsior! BBS Support Site * Running Excelsior! Professional BBS * David Dustin, Sysop Internet: postmaster@eclipse.acme.gen.nz +64 6 3566375 Supra V.32bis 24hrs - 7 days Palmerston North, New Zealand @endnode ------------------------------------------- @node P2-1-55 "Leguans Byte Channel" @toc "menu" * LEGUANS BYTE CHANNEL * Official Amiga Report Distribution Site -- Germany * Running EazyBBS V2.11 * Andreas Geist, Sysop Usenet: andreas@lbcmbx.in-berlin.de 24 hrs - 7 days Line 1: 49-30-8110060 USR DS 16.8 Line 2: 49-30-8122442 USR DS 16.8 Login as User: "amiga", Passwd: "report" @endnode ------------------------------------------- @node P2-1-56 "Dead Fish BBS" @toc "menu" * THE DEAD FISH BBS * Official Amiga Report Distribution Site * Running Excelsior * Aaron Wald, Sysop (914) 425-6015 V.32bis Supra 24 Hrs 7 Days Internet: dfbbs.linet.org Amiganet 40:714/14.0 @endnode -------------------------------------------- @node P2-1-57 "Stingray Database BBS" @toc "menu" * STINGRAY DATABASE * Official Amiga Report Distribution Site -- Germany * Running FastCall * Bernd Mienert, Sysop EMail: sysop@sting-db.zer.sub.org.dbp.de +49 208 496807 HST-Dual 24hrs - 7 days Muelheim/Ruhr, Germany @endnode --------------------------------------------