February 2006

February 2006
President Hm: (905) 263-4167 Solina
Jim Foster Email: [email protected]
Apple Ambassador Hm: (905) 983-9205 Orono
Bruce Cameron Email: [email protected]
Treasurer Hm: 905-404-0405 Oshawa
John Kettle Email : [email protected]
Publicity Director and Jolly Good Fellow
Jim Danabie
Logistics Email: [email protected]
C. Greaves
Secretary Email: [email protected]
Stan Wild
Macintosh Users East [MaUsE]
eMail: [email protected]
208 Winona Avenue, Oshawa, Ontario, L1G 3H5
Submissions from MaUsE Club members, although rarer than
living, breathing mastodons, are always welcome. Send them
to me either at: <[email protected]> if they are
just text messages or at <[email protected]> if there are
files or pictures attached. I have never refused a submission
yet. Thereʼs always room for another piece on ANY Mac-related topic and Iʼll make room if there isnʼt. I would like your
submissions. But I wonʼt beg.
Apple, Macintosh, and the Apple logo are trademarks of Apple Computer, Inc., registered in the U.S. and other countries.
The MaUsE (Macintosh Users East) is an independent user
group and has not been authorized, sponsored, or otherwise
approved by Apple Computer, Inc.
The next meeting
will be held at the
new Whitby Public
Library in Whitby,
Ontario, at 7:30 on
Feb. 22, 2005
!!!!!!!!
Henry Street
New Whitby
Public
Library
King Street
Free Parking
DoubleClick
DoubleClick on the web at:
www.mause.ca
DoubleClick Editor
Michael Shaw
Hm: (905) 576-2097 Oshawa
Email: [email protected]
[email protected]
[email protected]
Notice
The MaUsE Meeting in February will be held
on the 22nd at 7:30 P.M. in Whitby, Ontario, at
the New Whitby Public Library on the corner of
Henry Street and Dundas Street (Highway #2).
Henry Street is four streets west of the four
corners in Whitby and FREE parking is available
after 6:00 P.M. just south of the nearby Scotia
Bank. Be there or be square.
(Highway #2)
Please feel free to contact any of the following individuals if you have comments or questions relating to Macintosh Users East or Macintosh computing in general.
What you are looking at is the February 2006 edition of the
DoubleClick monthly newsletter from the Macintosh Users
East, (MaUsE), a motley collection of old and new Mac users
who reside in Southern Ontario with a motley collection of
old and new Macintosh computers. What more do you need
to know ? Oh, yes. This newsletter is created more or less
single-handed by Michael Shaw, DoubleClick Editor, on his
Sonnet-powered personal PCI Macs. He uses mostly a Power Macintosh 9600/800, a PowerTower Pro 500, and a pair
of wonderful antique Daystar Genesis MP 800+ Macintosh
clones. The rest of the DoubleClick support staff are a white
1 GHz G4 iBook and a 5 megapixel Kodak DX7590, used
for all pictures. Back issues of the DoubleClick can be downloaded from the <www.mause.ca> website for a laugh.
Scotia
Bank
Center Street
Dundas Street West
Executive Contact List
Ten Years Ago: 1996
The PowerTower Pro 225
Irma and I bought our first Macintosh computer about
ten years ago. It was, unfortunately, nothing like the computer pictured here. It was a 75-MHz Macintosh Performa
6200CD with 8 Megs of RAM and no way to add any expansion cards.
If I had known in 1996 what I know now, the Tsunami-based
PCI PowerTower Pro 225 MacClone, made by PowerComputing, would have been
what I really would have wanted. Back then this PCI Mac clone was the fastest singleprocessor personal computer in the world. (Strangely enough, except for my nearly
new G4 iBook, every computer I now own and use was built about ten years ago, in
1996. This newsletter is created on my two antique PCI desktop Macs, the Daystar
Genesis MP 800+ and my PPC 9600).
Because of my very positive experiences with PCI Macintosh clones, particularly the
Daystar Genesis models, I have kept my eyes open for cheap PCI Starmax, UMAX,
and PowerComputing clones. Last year I was offered another old PCI MacClone, a
1996 PowerComputing PowerTower Pro 225 for $1.00 by one of the fellows I work
with and I jumped on it. It is still performing flawlessly (with a Sonnet 500 MHz G3
processor transplant) and is used every day for surfing the web and doing emails.
system to other companies just in time to prevent them
from bringing the G3 to market before Apple Computers could.
Early in the summer of 1996, Power Computing Corporation, the first vendor of personalized Mac-compatible clone systems and the original Mac OS licensee,
announced PowerTower Pro, a new line of high-performance Mac OS systems that outperformed all Intelbased Pentium and Pentium Pro systems running Microsoft’s Windows 95 as well as all existing Mac OS
systems. The introduction of the PowerTower Pro line
marked the worldwide debut of the new PowerPC 604e
microprocessor featuring breakthrough performance
and clock speeds of up to 225 (MHz), making the PowerTower Pro the fastest personal computer available.
PowerComputing brought out systems powered by the
new chips before Apple could and eclipsed the highend Mac professional models. The PowerTower Pro
line were the machines that really worried Apple and
perhaps sealed the fate of Power Computing and Mac
cloning in general. It was just too much of a good thing
and Apple was reluctant to share the market with companies capable of building faster Macintosh computers than Apple could. By 1996 Power Computing was
consistently beating Apple to market with faster, lower
cost machines that garnered rave reviews from the Mac
press. The PowerTower Pro line, which joined Power
Computing’s then-current family of high-end systems,
PowerTower, were available at speeds of 225, 200, 180
MHz and featured increased expandability with six PCI
slots, a total of 9 expansion (6 front accessible) bays,
1 MB of Level 2 Cache, an 8X CD-ROM as well as
the highest performing PCI graphics accelerator on the
market. With these features, the PowerTower Pro offered more options than any other Mac OS system and
took better advantage of the new PowerPC 604e processors speed and flexibility. Though nothing special in
terms of esthetics, the PowerTower Pro machines were
basic, powerful and flexible work horses, aimed right at
the high-end market where Apple’s biggest profit margins were.
Apple eventually came to the conclusion (or realization) that Power Computing was much more interested
in taking market share away from Apple than in expanding the market in general. Apple killed off cloning
just as it was about to really take off, putting an end to
what it felt was largely an embarassing and parasitic
relationship. Apple ended the licensing of its operating
The PowerTower Pros were the first models to sport
the 604e PPC processor. The 604e was the faster successor to the 604 and had twice as much L1 cache as
the 604. To take advantage of the faster processor a
1MB L2 cache was included with the PowerComputing machines. Apple shipped their models at the time
with 512k L2 cache, half as much. The PowerTower
Pro machines shipped with 16MB of RAM. When users installed memory modules in pairs, the interleaved
memory capability increased memory performance by
up to 5 percent, thus allowing users to run more applications faster.
The PowerTower Pro also included internal fast SCSI
at 10MB/second. Moreover, graphics performance was
further improved since all PowerTower Pro systems included the IMS Twin Turbo 128-bit graphics card with
8 MB of VRAM and a fast 2 Gigabyte 7200 RPM AV
capable hard drive. Many Macintosh models of the time
shipped with only two MB of VRAM, upgradable to
four, or shipped with the lack-lustre 4 MB Mach64 video cards. Some of the higher end Apple systems shipped
with the 8 MB ixMicro Ultimate Rez which turned out
to be such a disaster that the ixMicro company went out
of business when they failed.
Although the 604e-powered PowerTower
Pro used the same Tsunami motherboard
as the 604-powered 9500 it outperformed
the Macintosh PPC 9500 models by a
more than hefty margin. (See the graphs at
right).
With the increased speed and graphics capabilities, the PowerTower Pro was ideal
for processor-intensive tasks such as the
handling of large files, running graphics
applications and performing complex calculations within scientific applications.
Power Computing offered options such
as Ultra SCSI/RAID solutions and AV
capabilities designed with these processor intensive tasks in mind. Many of the
other wonderful Macintosh clones from
the same era used variants of the PPC 9500
Tsunami motherboard as well but when
Apple pulled the plug on clone production
they all ceased production so the companies that produced the fastest Macs in the world simply stopped building and selling computers.
Looking back on it now its easy to say that Apple made the right call. If the power of clones had
gone on much longer Apple Computers would have become simply a software company, like
Microsoft, creating operating systems for other companies’ hardware.
Enhancements to the PowerPC 604e over its predecessor 604 include:
• Size of instruction and data caches have been doubled
• Higher clock frequencies with increased bus divider ratios
• A new performance enhancing feature which supports misaligned little endian accesses for certain operating environments
• A built-in performance monitor.
• First page out time as fast as 6 seconds
• True Adobe Postscript 3TM
• Maximum duty cycle up to 85,000 pages per month
• Brilliant Professional Colour
• Best printer for the environment - solid ink is virtually waste-free.
• 2 print quality options to choose from (Fast and Enhanced)
MicroImage Plus Bargains
1676 Heathside Crescent, Pickering, Ontario, Canada L1V 5V6
Tel: (905) 831-0699 Fax: (905) 831-7585 email: [email protected]
Providing Apple computer solutions in Durham and the GTA for over 17
years.
January Inventory Clearance
For more information on Xerox Solid Ink printers call or email MicroImage Plus or visit the
following web site:
http://www.office.xerox.com/perl-bin/product.
pl?product=8500_8550
•Demo Items
•Demo Macally PodFM ...$25.00 (Listen to your iPod or any portable CD
player with a mini audio out jack through your car radio system or FM stereo
system at home.)
•Demo 1GB iPod Shuffle with clip case...$120.00 (In excellent condition
with all original packaging, less then 1 year old)
•New items – only a limited number of each available at these
prices.
For more information on these products, quotes on any Apple product or
Macally iceCam (USB web camera)...$32.00
hundreds of items to support your Mac send a reply to this email or call Janet
Kingston DataTraveler II 512 MB Flash Drive (read up to 11 MB/sec,
at (905) 831-0699.
write 7 MB/sec) ... $53.00
Griffin EarJams (enhanced comfort and sound for any earbud headThese “January Specials” from Janet
phones)...$14.00
Prosoft Picture Rescue for OSX (digital picture rescue, don’t risk losing
& Rennie Barlow at MicroImage Plus
those special yearbook photos)... $15.00
•Open Box Item
Xerox Phaser 8500/N Solid Ink Network ColourPrinter ...$949.00 (Used to
print about 100 sheets before being traded in for Phaser 8550 Duplex printer,
11 months onsite warranty left, regular price $1,199 — $250 savings)
• Up to 24 ppm print speed for both black & colour
• 128 MB of Memory
• 600 MHz processor
are here in the February issue because
they were submitted to the DoubleClick too late to appear in the January
issue. Check with Janet for updated
specials and availability.
JUST A ‘SEC’
Almost every issue of DoubleClick contains a special message addressed to
readers of the newsletter who are not yet members of Macintosh Users East
inviting them to join the club and share in some of the additional benefits that
membership brings.
One benefit that I personally have found to be of great value is that the
club has a number of members who are technically far better informed on
computers (techies) than I am, and who I can call when I need advice on my
Mac. Some of the MaUsE techies whom I have found are always willing to
offer help and advice are, in first name alphabetical order,’ Aaron Vegh, Bruce
Cameron, Chris Greaves, Hugh Amos, and Jim Foster, good friends all.
As a MaUsE member you too can tap into their knowledge prior to the
start of our regular members meetings (from 6.30-7.30 p.m.) each month
when several of our ‘techies’ make their expertise readily available to members; That is just one of the many valuable ‘fringe’ benefits of membership in
MaUsE. Are you a member yet?
Yes, there are other techies in the club, you know who you are - share your
expertise with other members, it’s a great way to contribute to the health and
growth of your club.
The other day I was talking to a long time friend. A ‘Mac’ man from way
back, and he was waxing enthusiastic about ‘pod casts;’ not being an ‘iPoddie’ I have no real knowledge of these, but it occurs to me that some of you
probably know all about them.
SO! Here’s my suggestion: write a short article about them, tell us what your
favorite ‘casts’ are, and send it to Michael Shaw for inclusion in the next
DoubleClick,’ Michael will be most pleased to hear from you and you will be
doing what club membership is all about, sharing knowledge!
Just a ‘sec’ is an occasional short column that will appear in ‘DoubleClick’
from time to time. It is written by MaUsE secretary Stan - The Wild Man of
Whitby.
FREE STUFF!
O.K., Here’s the deal, I have an external 56k modem in working condition, that I will give, free of charge, to the first person who calls me and
arranges to come and pick it up from my home in Whitby.
The details are:
ZOOM 56K USB Fax Modem complete with cables, installation disk
and reference guide.
Phone Stan at (905) 430-4562
Regards and thanks,
Stan
WANTED: Your Submissions to the DoubleClick !
As you may have noticed from our MaUsE meetings, it seems that every
month its the same people who present the programs. And, likewise, it
seems that the same people contribute regularly to the DoubleClick. I’m
sure that there are entire areas of Macintosh expertise among our membership that are being neglected because of this.
You are all bright, mature, articulate people. Please accept this invitation to submit something of interest to the DoubleClick.
PowerMac G4 (QuickSilver) Overclocking
On the underside of the Mac’s processor daughter-card
is a set of four resistors marked R1, R3, R5 and R7, respectively. Connected to two of them are circuit-making jumpers. According to information published on the
internet, un-soldering the jumpers and re-applying them
to different resistors changes the clock speed on the processor by adjusting the board’s clock multiplier. Just like
old B&W G3, the processor speed of the QuickSilver
G4 is a product of the internal bus speed, 133 MHz, and
a multiplier established by the chart below.
Years ago Irma and I bought a 350 MHz Blue &
White G3 tower. One of the nicest features of the
Macintosh 350 G3 towers was that the 350 had exactly the same processor as the 400 and 450 MHz
models. In fact, the processor speed on all these
models could be controlled (within reason) by rearranging the jumpers on a little block located on
the motherboard right beside the processor. With As you can see from the chart, in theory adjusting the
the internal bus set to run at 100 MHz the jump- jumpers provides for a wide range of clock speeds
ers were designed to set the processor to run at from the same processor: 733MHz, 800MHz, 867MHz,
a multiple of the bus speed: multiplying the 100
MHz bus speed by 3.5, 4, 4.5 or 5 times produced
processor speeds of 350, 400, 450, or 500 MHz.
My own 350 MHz B&W has been running at 450
MHz since I got it without any stability problems.
I tried to run it at 500 MHz briefly but experienced
startup problems and random freezing so I put it
back down to 450 MHz. Since then, no problems.
Its possible to speed up the processor on just
about every Mac ever made. Its best to do this
with older models because it does void the warranty. This article describes how to increase the clock
speed of a 867 MHz Power Macintosh G4 (Quick Silver). This information is no confirmation of stable operation. Please note that any modifications you make to
your Macintosh are made at your own risk.
933MHz, 1.0GHz and 1.067GHz. That said, there’s a
degree of diminishing returns here. The more extreme
the speedup of the processor, the more likely you are
to run into problems with overheating and instability.
With the G3 tower I boosted the processor speed from
350 to 450 MHZ by means of a simple and reversible
procedure that anyone can perform. Because soldering
is involved, the QuickSilver overclocking is a delicate
procedure that requires a steady hand or the processor
card can be damaged or ruined.
It’s in the nature of processors that one part can run at
various speeds. No matter how stringently the manufacturing process is controlled there will always be minute
variations in “identical” processor chips that will affect
their stability at various frequencies. Its reasonable to
expect that processor makers test each chip at all speeds
and then rate and sell it at the highest speed at which
it will run completely without overheating or malfunctions. Thats the idea, anyway. In fact it has been my experience that computer companies routinely downgrade
their processors to a speed well below their potential in
order to ensure that users will never experience processor problems with instability, crashing and freezing.
Maybe I was just lucky to get a B&W tower with a 350
MHz processor that would run without malfunction at
450 MHz. If you are lucky enough to get a G4 QuickSilver with a 867 MHz processor that is completely happy running at 1GHz or more then the speed boost, if it
works out for you, is a free performance boost.
January MaUsE Meeting Report
As you can tell from the pictures, the February meeting was a lot of fun. Jim Foster and Chris Greaves
ran the raffle and the prizes included the several copies of NTI Dragon Burn and SWA to FLA Converter reviewed in last month’s DoubleClick. John Kettle gave a very gratifying Treasurers Report
and I appealed to the membership to return items borrowed from the MaUsE Lending Library. Jim
Foster gave a wonderful report about his visit to San Francisco for Macworld 2006 earlier in the month
and demonstrated
some
of
the features of Google Earth. Chris Greaves
brought in a very entertaining and informative multimedia presentation he had created that explained
and demonstrated how to tint picture transparencies
green and red and set them up superimposed so that
they could create the illusion of depth when viewed
through his “3D” glasses. We all had a lot of fun
with viewing his 3D demo in 3D.
The main presentation for the evening was a fascinating introduction to web page design presented
by Aaron Vegh that turned into much more. It included a presentation on understanding network
IP addresses, the mechanics of the internet, blogs
and Blogger, and how to use the iWeb program
with and without a Dot Mac account to design and
publish pages to the internet painlessly. The whole
procedure was almost magical in its ease and simplicity because Aaron knew what he was doing and
because he was using a Macintosh PowerBook to
do the presentation. Hopefully we will be able to
induce Aaron to give a more advanced presentation
now that we have some basic understanding of the
procedures involved.
Enhancer from AKVIS
This is going to be different. I’m going to write up a review of this AKVIS
Enhancer program and Irma will do the presentation at the February Meeting. A copy donated by AKVIS will be offered as one of our raffle prizes.
One of the recent software offerings from AKVIS is a plug-in for the Adobe
Photoshop application (and others) called AKVIS Enhancer. For this article
I have chosen to have the Enhancer installer put the Enhancer plug-in into
my Photoshop Elements 3 Plug-ins Folder.
AKVIS Enhancer is an image enhancement software for revealing details
on a picture. Enhancer allows detecting details from underexposed, overexposed and mid tone areas of a photo. The tool is useful in cases when a photo lacks detail. For
example, when a picture has been taken with the background overexposed and consequently the
foreground is hardly discernible, which is especially annoying when you take a picture of a person;
or when a photo lacks dramatic effect due to vagueness of the scene. If you try to reveal details in
highlighted or overshadowed areas using exposure correction (for example, Levels) you run the risk
of spoiling the parts of the image that you want to leave unchanged.
The idea behind Enhancer is entirely different: AKVIS Enhancer brings out details by intensifying
color transition. This means that Enhancer strengthens the difference between adjacent pixels having
different color gradations and therefore allows revealing not
only details in the shadow but even details in the overexposed
and mid tone areas. Earlier it was possible (and such image
enhancement programs exist) to achieve the same result by
manipulating with 2-4 shots of the same scene. AKVIS Enhancer does it all out of one shot thanks to the advanced algorithm of photo correction.
AKVIS Enhancer is not a stand-alone application that you can
use all by itself to edit your images. AKVIS Enhancer is just
a plug-in for other applications you may already have. The
Enhancer installer puts the AKVIS software into your Plugins Folder so it becomes available only when the application
is running. It integrates into your image processing programs
adding new features. The plug-in is compatible with many
programs that rely on plug-ins to expand their capabilities,
like Adobe Photoshop, Jasc Paint Shop Pro, Photoshop Elements, Corel Photo-Paint, etc.
• Step 1. Open an image in a photo editor. In other words, launch your
image editing program and from the File Menu select Open and then
select an image from your hard drive. (For this article I have launched
Photoshop Elements 3 and elected to demonstrate Enhancer on a fuzzy
picture of Chris Greaves as he appeared during a video conference call
from last-month’s MaUsE executive meeting).
• Step 2. Call on the AKVIS Enhancer plugin. To find this effect select
the command line: Filter - AKVIS - Enhancer in Adobe Photoshop; the
menu item Effects - Plugins- AKVIS - Enhancer if you work with Jasc
Paint Shop Pro; or Effects - AKVIS - Enhancer if you use Corel PHOTOPAINT. The Enhancer plugin works exactly the
same in every application it works with. It sits in
the Adobe application Plug-ins Folder doing nothing until called upon.
• Step 3. You will see the AKVIS Enhancer window like the one
to the right. Wait a bit as the program processes the original photo
at default parameter values. You can switch between the original
photo and the result (Before/After buttons).
• Step 4. Adjust the values for Shadows, Highlights, Level of Detail and Lightness.
The Shadows parameter allows details to be revealed in the underexposed parts of the image. The values vary between 0 and 100.
As the parameter value increases, the dark parts of the image get
lighter and the level of detail in these parts increases. But it does not
cause loss of details in the light areas.
The Highlights parameter allows details to be revealed in the light
areas of the image. The values vary between 0 and 100. When you
move the slider to the right, the parameter value increases, the light
parts of the image get darker and the level of detail in these parts
increases. If you set a high value for this parameter it can cause
loss of middle tones on some images that result in the loss of their
volume.
The Level of Detail parameter defines the amount of details detected. It accepts values between 0 and 15 with the default value of
5. The higher the parameter value, the sharper the color transition
and the more detail is visible. On underexposed images the high
value of this parameter may cause noise.
Enhancer, have a look at the images provided in the on-line tutorials to see what this
The Lightness parameter allows to change the overall lightness of
the image - to make it darker or lighter. It accepts values between 0 and 100. By de- software can do for you, and then download a copy to try out on your own Mac. If you
fault it is set to 50. As you move the slider to the right, the image gets lighter; as you download a copy you can try it out for a while for FREE before you decide to buy.
move the slider to the left - it gets darker.
Step 5. When the correction process is over, press the button to apply the result or the
button to close the program window without applying the result.
You may not be able to appreciate how well this AKVIS Enhancer software works
from the one example I have shown here. The genius of this software is that it does so
much to improve your images in just one step. What you are looking at is a series of
screenshots imported into a .PDF and then flattened for viewing, but the actual images
are more revealing than these copies. If you get out to the February MaUsE Meeting
you will get a chance to win a copy of Enhancer in the raffle and you will get a chance
to see the plug-in in use. If you can’t wait, then do a search on the internet for AKVIS
They Get You “Buy The Ink”
One of the first things you learn after you buy a printer is that the printer is relatively
inexpensive, but when you start to print a lot of stuff, the printer’s manufacturer gets
you ‘BUY THE INK.”
Recently I acquired a used printer from another member of MaUsE and he told me
that he buys replacement ink cartridges online from a company called ‘77 Colors’ at a
lower cost than one would pay at your local office supply or computer store. Depending on the model some of these cartridges are new, (not ones that have been recycled),
while others are ‘re-manufactured.’ All are shipped by mail direct to your door. The
77 Colors prices include prepaid mailing. I decided to do comparison pricing on a
couple of popular brands and see what the savings are on each type of cartridge. The
price sources I have used for comparison are Staples / Business Depot‘s Canadian
published prices versus 77 Colors. All prices are in US dollars. For a quick comparison I have given a ‘ball park’ estimate of the 77 Colors price in Canadian dollars (in
parentheses) by adding 20% exchange to the US price.
The 77 Colors site <www.77colors.com> is easy to use. You select
the name of the printer manufacturer and this takes you to a list of
that manufacturer’s printer model numbers. When you click on a particular model it will take you to a list of the cartridges for that model
and show you the pricing options and whether its is a ‘new’ or a
‘remanufactured’ cartridge. As an alternative, once you have clicked
on the manufacturer’s name, if you know the cartridge number you
want, you can simply scroll down and click on that cartridge number
and again get a list of cartridge types, prices and options. In doing my
research I found that 77 colors does not carry 100% of all manufacturers cartridges. In some cases they simply offer a refill kit. There
are a number of other companies on the web who offer similar pricing and availability to that offered by 77 Colors.Staples / Business
depot does not offer their own brand of equivalent cartridges for all
models. For example, above, The HP cartridges quoted above are
Hewlett Packard’s own brand.
Is it worth buying on line to save a few dollars? If you do a lot of
printing it can be. My suggestion to you is to do your own on-line
comparison on the particular brand of cartridges that you use and
base your decision on that information. (Staples/Business Depot‘s
web site is <www.Staples.ca>) I can tell you that I found the lower
price of Epson black ink cartridges (44120) purchased from 77 Colours a worthwhile
saving. Some of my friends take their used cartridges to a local vendor (in Oshawa
Centre) and have them refilled. Is a refilled cartridge as good as a ‘new’ cartridge?
Opinions vary! Perhaps I should say ‘caveat emptor’ both about buying cartridges online and having used cartridges refilled; or, as my dear old dad would have said, “you
pays your money and you takes your chances“.
Final comments. 77 Colors offers a free on-line newsletter that you can sign up to
receive; it is sent direct to you twice a month via e-mail and, in almost every issue that
I have seen, they have ‘special offers’ and additional discounts. Remember, the printer
manufacturers do not get rich on the price of the printer: they get their real profit from
you milliliter by milliliter ‘buy the ink’.
Stan Wild, Secretary, MaUsE
Mac Mini in the Windows
World
by Jim Foster
My daughter and grandchildren live just a short distance up the road
from us in the country. Oldest grandson Dallas is a frequent visitor to
our home. He recently got a taste of an iChat AV video chat between
myself and fellow MaUsEr Chris Greaves, and seemed quite taken
by the opportunity to both see and hear the other party as well as seeing his own antics reflected in the little self-portrait that is part of the
iChat session window.
I thought the kids might enjoy having the ability to carry on iChat sessions between their house and “Granny’s house”, so I bought them a
low mileage Mac Mini as a Christmas present, complete with equally
low mileage iSight camera. Apple targets this unit at people who already own a Windows PC, so I thought that this might make an excellent real world test of Apple’s strategy.
The family computing workstation is located in their kitchen, on a
counter just under the microwave oven, with the Dell tower computer
located in a cupboard just under that counter. Inspection suggested
that there was ample free space left in that cupboard to locate the Mac Mini without
having to remove the Dell. The Dell had been equipped with a PS2 keyboard and a
USB mouse, for the Dell tower had provisions for both types of connectors. The Mac
Mini, of course, comes with USB ports only. The solution to retain the keyboard was
a PS/2 to USB adapter, which I got via ebay for $7.38 Cdn., shipping included.
The kids use Sympatico as their ISP and had their DSL Modem connected directly to
their Windows PC. In switching the DSL Modem over to the Mac Mini, it was therefore necessary to dig out their original PPPoE settings and key those into the Mac’s
Network Preferences panel. Once that was done, though, everything was in order and
it was just a matter of setting up User Accounts for everyone in the house and we had
the Mac equivalent of the original Dell Windows PC up and running.
Oh, and the iSight camera was a bit of a problem in that the assortment of camera
mounts which came with it did not include anything that worked very well with the
Dell monitor. The goal is to locate the camera as close as possible to the centre top
edge of the monitor. One
of the included mounts
was magnetic. Using
it to mount the camera
to the underside of the
microwave over located
just above the computer
workstation seemed the
best alternative except
that it caused the camera image to be upside
down. Fate smiled on
me, though, as it was
just about this time that I came across a software utility called iGlasses which has a
setting to flip the iSight camera image upside down. Bingo ... the image was right side
up again! iGlasses shareware fee: $9.49 Cdn.
The USB printer was easy to disconnect from the Dell
and attach to the Mac Mini - it did not even need any
driver software to work with the Mac Mini. Everyone
happy, right?!?! Well, despite the fact that we had verified Apple’s claim that it is a breeze to set up a Mac
Mini to replace an existing PC, using the original PC’s
monitor and other peripherals, we were not exactly
ready for the response ...
“Thanks, Jimbo, but how do we now get back to the
Windows PC whenever we need to do that?”
“Ummm ... hmmm ... I’ll have to get back to you on
that.”, says I.
So, what the family REALLY seems to need is the ability to run EITHER the Mac Mini OR the Dell Windows
PC, but not necessarily both at the same time, and to do
so without having to disconnect and reconnect a whole
bunch of cables. Well, that shouldn’t be all that hard,
should it? Enter a device known as a KVM switch. The
“KVM” is an acronym for “Keyboard-Video-Mouse”
and it implies that one wants to use a single keyboard,
monitor, and mouse but in a way that they can all be
switched easily between two or more computer units
without having to physically disconnect and reconnect
cables. I won’t go into all of the reasons why people
might want to do this, but suffice it to say that this
seemed to be what was going to be needed in our case.
One of the things which made our particular situation
interesting was that we wanted to find a KVM switch
which could handle both a PC and a Mac, rather than all
PC’s or all Mac’s. This has mostly to do with the issue
of PS2 versus USB connections for the mouse and keyboard, as luckily both the Dell PC and Mac Mini come
with hardware that supports a VGA monitor connector.
Yet another issue is the need to be able to print documents from the USB ink-jet printer regardless of the
computer being using. So we needed to look for a
KVM switch that would redirect the printer signal at
the same time as it switched the keyboard, monitor, and
mouse. Similarly, it would be nice if things like audio
input and audio output could also be switched between
the two computers at the same time as everything else.
We located a 2-Port KVM switch by a company called
TRENDnet, model TK-210K. This tidy little unit not
only handles the KVM switch but at the same time can
handle both audio in and audio out switching. It also has
provisions for up to two USB peripheral devices, such
as a printer and a scanner, and takes care of switching
those devices between the two computers. The idea is
that ALL of these circuit switches can be accomplished
by simply pushing a single button on the face of the
KVM switch. Button 1 connects to the Mac, button 2
connects to the Windows PC. The KVM switch was
a little more expensive than I had hoped. $81.97 Cdn.
plus a bill for $13.53 at the Post Office when the item
arrived brought this item to $95.50. This price included
all the cables needed, which is important since this kind
of setup basically triples the number of cables involved
and cables are not always included with the basic KVM
unit. We found that the cupboard which now housed
both the Windows PC and the Mac Mini still had sufficient room left over to also house the KVM switch. This
picture at right shows everything in place.
The KVM switch we chose is designed for PS/2 keyboard and mouse. I tried using a USB to PS/2 adapter on
the original USB mouse, but found that it did not work.
I therefore sought out a very simple replacement PS/2
mouse (don’t even bother trying to find one of these at
the big box stores - just head to Bestbyte in Whitby!) for
under $10 and it worked fine. The last “signal” which
needs to be accommodated when dealing with two computers instead of just one is the Internet signal. For our
purposes, we felt that the simplest approach was to add
a basic 4-port wired Router in-between the DSL Modem and the computers. The PPPoE settings normally
set in each computer are instead set in the Router, and
then the Router assigns individual IP addresses to each
computer using the DHCP scheme.
A suitable no-name but new Router was obtained from
a Canadian ebay vendor for $35.84 Cdn. The transition
from having the Mac Mini simply replace the Windows
PC to having it coexist with the Dell therefore involved
adding (i) a suitable KVM switch, (ii) a Router, (iii) a
lot more cables, which in my case came with the KVM
switch but in other cases might have to be purchased
separately, and (iv) a PS/2 mouse. The photographs
accompanying this article show that the result is not a
very pretty installation ... the cables in the cupboard are
quite the “bowl of spaghetti” - and I rather think that we
may need to bore a few ventilation holes into the side
and/or back of the cupboard to keep the two computers
from overheating, but they do confirm that the process
works and works very well.
Here’s what the system looks like with the Mac and Windows operating systems,
respectively, booting up.
One piece of information which I learned too late to incorporate into this particular
scenario is that the Belkin firm makes a KVM device specifically designed for mating
a Mac Mini with a Windows PC. Their device is called the Flip, model # F1DM102U,
and is designed to fit directly under a Mac Mini. It has a suggested retail price of
$99.99 U.S., was a huge hit at Macworld San Francisco in January, ‘06, and is out of
stock in most places I looked as part of researching this article.
The only unexpected issue I seem to have encountered with the finished setup is that
I had thought that it would be possible to have both computers booted up and to then
switch back and forth between the two computers just by pressing the appropriate
switch on the front of the KVM device. What I have found is that I can sometimes
make this kind of “hot” or “live” switch between the Windows PC and the Mac Mini,
but I can’t make it go back the other way in a “live” setting.
The process which DOES work very well is to only run one computer at a time. If you
only boot up the Macintosh, the KVM switch will sense it starting up and will make
sure that all of the hardware devices are connected to the Mac as it boots up. When
you are finished with the Mac and want to use the Windows PC, you just Shut Down
the Mac and THEN you Start Up the Dell. As it boots up, the KVM switch again
seems to sense what it is supposed to do and all the hardware devices automatically
are connected to the Windows PC as it boots up.
This approach has so far not presented a problem to the family, but only time will tell
with this group. They are not the kind of family that spends hours and hours at the
computer every night, anyway. My guess, though, is that now that we have everybody
happy in the knowledge that they can have their Mac and eat their Dell as well, I expect to find in several months that no one uses the Windows PC any more!!
Recently, grandson Dallas initiated a text chat with me over iChat AV. I asked him if
he would like to do this using a video chat window. His answer, I should probably not
have surprised, was along the lines of, “No, Jimbo, I’m playing my massively interactive Internet role-playing game and the iChat video window will block out too much
of the playing field, so let’s just use text while I battle my next competitor!”
Perhaps I should have invested all the money it took to build this “dual-boot” system
into a bigger monitor instead!
Jim Foster
Notice to
DoubleClick Readers
Who Are NOT
MaUsE Members
If you are living in or near the Durham
Region of Southern Ontario and using
a Macintosh computer and are not yet
a member of MaUsE you can use the
information found on the second page of
this newsletter to get meeting info and to
get in touch with a member of our executive to find out how to join.
If you just want to attend a few of our
monthly meetings please feel free to
join us on the fourth Wednesday of the
month. Meetings are open to the public
and admission is free but eligibility for
winning swell raffle prizes and receiving
technical assistance are available only to
club members.
Other privileges of membership include
the right to borrow from the MaUsE
Club Library and to submit articles for
publication in this excellent newsletter.
MaUsE Library Books
Now Available
If you have borrowed from the
MaUsE Library please return
the items you borrowed so other
MaUsErs can have a chance to
use them.
We have:
• Take Control of OSX Tiger
• iPod & iTunes Hacks
• PDF Hacks
• Keynote 2 for Mac
• Desktop & Portable Systems
• Access by Design
• The Non-Designers Webbook
• PayPal Hacks
• Macintosh Revelations
• Mac OS 8.6 Book
• Mac OSX 10.4 Tiger
• Mac OSX Helpline
Email Michael Shaw if you want something
brought to the February Meeting.
Advertise in the
DoubleClick
WANTED: Articles written by MaUsE
Members about any Macintosh-related
hardware or software product. Reviews
of programs or personal upgrade
experiences appreciated. Rants and
opinions welcome. Send them to the
DoubleClick at
<[email protected]>
NOTICE: If you have any service you
wish to provide to other MaUsE
members you can place a FREE ad in
the December 2005 edition of the
DoubleClick.
February Exec Meeting
This month we held the Exec Meeting at the home of John Kettle. Hugh Amos, the Two Jimmies (Foster & Danabie), Bruce “fresh from Cuba” Cameron, Michael Shaw, Aaron Vegh,
and Stan Wild attended. We received the Treasurers Report from John and discussed the topics and presenters for the next few meetings. For the February meeting it was decided that
Marcel Dufresne would tell us about one of his favourite websites, Irma Shaw would give
a demonstration of AKVIS Enhancer, a neat plug-in
for Photoshop, and Aaron Vegh would continue on
with the presentation on web-page creation he began
at the January Meeting. We also discussed topics for
later meetings and the possible formation of one or
more Special Interest Groups, within the membership, for MaUsE members who share a common interest in some particular aspect of computing. More
of that will be explained at the February meeting.
Having a software sale at the March Meeting was
also discussed and more information will be made
available at the February Meeting and in the March
DoubleClick.
March is Spring Cleaning
Month
You can have more room on your too cluttered bookshelf and the opportunity to do some good for
your fellow MaUsE members and the Club by donating your old software.
Because of the rapid release of new Mac operating systems we ALL have software collecting dust on
shelves somewhere. Eventually these older versions of programs we have upgraded or replaced will
be thrown in the garbage. While many Members have moved on to Jaguar, Panther, Tiger and are
eagerly anticipating Puma, Lion or Polecat, other MaUsE members are still using OS8, OS9 or OSX.
These members can still make use of your old software. The March 22nd MaUsE Swap Meet will
take place during the regular March MaUsE Meeting and be an opportunity for MaUsE Members to
bring in older software to sell (or donate to the Club to help us raise money to help cover Club expenses). It will also be an opportunity for other Members to buy older versions of the programs they
can still use.
Email: << [email protected] >> for more information or just bring your old software to
the March Meeting.
Remember: Usable Macintosh software should NOT go into landfill sites. Do your part for ecology
by donating your old software to the MaUsE Swap Meet on March 22nd.