There was nothing particularly exciting from Apple, just some very
good evolutionary products. But that didn't stop the rest of the
industry from innovating.
Upgrade leader Sonnet Technology showed Harmoni, a 500 MHz iMac upgrade that also adds
FireWire, along with a 500 MHz WallStreet upgrade and a clever flash
drive that connects to your USB port.
Epson has taken AirPort to the next level with their forthcoming
AirPort-to-printer solution.
Tekserve, the New York firm that does a lot of Mac repair work,
showed off a "rare Mac artifact" - a beige iMac. The Apple logo on top
was even nicely painted with the familiar old six rainbow colors.
The coolest customized Mac I saw was a blue iBook. The owner
carefully removed the white frosting from the inside of the enclosure
and applied a very nice shade 
of blue. It's a
real eye-catcher and something Apple should consider if they decide to
move away from indigo plus shades ranging from white to graphite.
Fujitsu was showing their DynaMO 2.3 GB magneto-optical drive, which
was neck-and-neck with an Iomega Jaz drive in performance. It's a
clever technology that I hope to cover in more depth.
Another clever storage technology was a USB "flash drive" smaller
than a pack of gum. Sonnet's Piccolo
is plug-and-play and comes in capacities from 32 MB to 256 MB with
projected prices for $100 to $600. Not cheap, and USB isn't fast,
either, but Piccolo is a very cool way to transport data between
machines when a network or removable media drive isn't available.
Contour had their MiniPro Mouse available in a metallic finish that
complements the TiBook nicely.
In the press room, thank goodness for AirPort, which was also
available in other parts of the Expo. The working press was mostly
using PowerBooks and iBooks, with a remarkably high showing for the
PowerBook G4. Comments about the TiBook were mostly positive, but I
heard a few complaints about scratches, the finish wearing off, and
especially limited AirPort range compared with other 'Books.
The TiBook has two small rubber nubs that support the screen in the
closed position. One of them broke off months ago, and the second one
broke on Wednesday. I'm running into the
keyboard-impressions-on-the-screen problem now. Apple tells me my local
dealer may be able to fix this while I wait.
A lot of people at the Expo are already using Mac OS X and were
surprised to hear that I hadn't yet adopted it. Although I have the
hardware, none of the applications I use daily would benefit from X, so
I'm holding off. Version 10.1 looks very promising, but I'm content
with 9.1. I won't change for the sake of change or so I can brag about
running the latest OS; switching to OS X will happen when there's
a practical reason to do so.
Mac OS X is the future of the platform, but just as many of us
are content with older Macs, we may continue to find contentment with
older versions of the Mac OS for some time.
