1998 01 canadian computer wholesaler by The Computer Paper

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JOOO OIIV Oe VO.Llt Oa.l THEINDUST RY ThePriceForPrinciples By Paul Weinberg

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Sheer t e c h no-lovel I had a moment of pure bliss recently, when I stood in front of a computer monitor and controlled objects on the l screen, merely by moving my hands and arms about. I was able to reach out, grab representations of molecules and move them across the computer screen. Talk about an interactive user experience! The venue was a Comdex/Fall press briefing, and IBM Corp. was showing off research that saw voice input combined with movement. Staffresearcher Mark Lucente stood about IO feet in front of a large computer screen with a small camera mounted over it. He called up applications, using voice commands. He was also able to point to specific objects, and say: "Make that bigger," or "Make that blue." (They didn't let me play with the microphone!) A notherexample showed a picture of the M ars landscape. As Lucente walked closer to the screen, he moved deeper into the terrain. Turning right turned the view rightwards, and stepping back took him farther away. IBM says big business like oil and pharmaceutical industries, see applications for the visualization technology as it matures. This is cool stuff. Now I'm all emotionally geared up to sit in front of my PC and move the cursor about with a gesture, or relocate text or graphics with the wave of a fingertip. Alas, this technology won' t be ubiquitous for a few years yet. IBM is just one of a number of companies doing significant studies into future technologies. At the company's Almaden Research Center in San Jose, Calif., researchers are working away at squeezing more data into less storage space. Indeed, the amount of data that can fit into one square inch has been growing at a compound rate of 60 per cent per year. To that end, scientists are experimenting with holographic storage, and even studying the possibility of storing data directly with atoms. For an in-depth examination of storage technologies and markets, see Associate Editor Jeff Evan's feature,"Data Storage Technology Races to Keep Pace With Exploding Demands," page 20. A few years ago, "geek" was something of an insult. Today, self-proclaimed geeks are doing amazing things with technology, and loving it. A little while back, one such young man tried to get to me, by 6

suggesting: "You don't really love technology." "No, no, I DO!" I protested strongly, naming off some of my favorite tech-topics. But the fact is, while I find some technologies to be neat-o cool, others make my eyes glaze over. And isn't it the same with your customers? There are among your clients, those who will get a warm glow at the mere mention of 128MB in their PC. Others are just looking for the most basic word processing/spreadsheet functionality that the PC enables. (See,"The Super-Suites," page 32, for a look at today's power-packed office productivity tools.) But good business is all about giving your customers what they want. For suggestions on keeping the spark warm with your clients, see this issue's Marketing column - "Building Customer Relationships," page 50.) Here a t Cana d i an Com p u ter Wholesaler, we try to bring you insightful, detailed coverage of current and coming technologies that will help you in your business buying and selling decisions. This issue our Lab Test Editors Steve Halinda and Tim Bingham-Wallis take a very close look at 25 different motherboards. Check out page 36, for reviews of these very key components to your systems.

Write Us W e love to hear your feedback on our coverage and suggestions for future topics. For example, the article on software piracy this issue (page 14), was a direct result of a reader E-mailing us his story. What areyour triumphs, concerns or pet peeves?Drop me a line at graceci n etcom.ca, or v i sit ou r We b s ite at http://www.ccwmag.corn. Have a very happy, and profitable New Year. ICCW I

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Publisher David Ritter Associate Publishers Judy Prange Harl Singh Kbalsa Editor Grace Casselman (gracec Onetcom.ca) Associate Editor Jeff Evans (jeff@tcpon.corn) Contributing Writers Graeme Bennett Tim Bingham-Wallis Jazz Bhooi

Douglas Gray Steve Halinda Stephen Ibarakj Monte Kerr

Dan McLean David Tanaka Paul Weinberg Alan Zisman Production Staff Sherly Ho Karin Hartwig Jana Kolar Key AccountManager (East) Tino Wong (tinootcpon.corn)

Key AccountMouager(W est) Jamie Leighton (jamie@tcp.ca) Account Managers Marsha Miller (marsha@tcpon.corn) Frank Houston (fraukOtcpon.corn) Controller Christine McPhie Accounting Farida Aini Circulation Scou Rice Kim Jewison Founders Kent Liqin Chen Li Ding

Canadian Computer Wholesaler is published 12 times a year by Canada Computer Paper Inc. Toronto Office Suite 200- 99 Atlantic Ave. Toronto, Out. Canada M6K 3J8 Teh (416) 535-8404

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Taipei Office Grace Casselman Editor

CCW SUU.EBS BOARD Looking for a product, service or partner? Write tc CCW Bulletin Baaed~, et rOCW@tCp.Coax ho-;~W~:;. or fax: (403) 262-79ggg e r":,, Letters fIg' 'fhie fuC5t@r,'gas '

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PRISCO Tch 886-2-711-4833 Fax: 886-2-741-5110 Internet E-mail address: ccwotcp.ca Web Site: http: //www.ccwmag.corn Subscription applications sad change of sddmss notices must be made in writing to one of the above addresses. Free subscription ro qualified individuals, $1 10 per year for uouqualitied subscribers. Contents ofCanadian Computer Wholesaler subject ro copyright. Material sad advertising designedbyCaudlan Computer Wholesaler in this publication msy uot be reproduced in any.form without per'-' '

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condition, express or implied, that the licensee Voice recognition is HOT also license and pre-install any Microsoft T he speech market i s h eating up. A t Internetbrowser software.. .pending further Comdex/Fall in Las Vegas, three major develorder of (the) court." opers of speech recognition software demonI ,,: The temporary injunction does allow strated new continuous-speech products. I Microsoft to continue to offer to original IBM Corp. is shipping the ViaVoice equipment manufacturers (OEMs) the full Gold continuous speech software (US$149) Windows 95 p r oduct, w h ich i n c ludes which handles both voice-dictation and comMicrosoft suffers legal defeat Microsoft Internet Explorer, as long as each puter-control via voice commands. A voiceover browser OEM has the option of installing the portion enabled version of M i c rosoft's Internet (NB) — Although Microsoft of Windows 95 that does not include Explorer is included, to allow for voice-conInternet Explorer 3.0 or trolled Web browsing. Corp. is putting a positive spin on U.S. District Judge 4.0 files. Currently shipping is D ragon NatThomas Penfield Jackson's W hile i ssuing t h e urallySpeaking, from Newton, Mass.-based ~, Oy~ „ ' temporary injunction that , cease and desist order, Dragon Systems Inc. Supporting continuous p revents Microsoft fr o m ; te)' rvgm'~,,~~„,~'~ „ „,-swn, ~ „ Judge Jackson also sided speech, the company claims users can input .--„-" requiringcomputer makwith Microsoft on o t her up to 160 words per minute through voice, .' ~ ~ , ~ "="- " = -~ .=~.- ~ 'i' , : is s ues, including denying the with 95 per cent accuracy. A version for home ers wh o l i c ense i t s . ' -'=:-";-~ " -= -".„- ' Windows 95 computer Justice Department's request users and small business is priced at US$229. operating software to also to fine the company US$1 A heftier "Deluxe" edition for corporate users accept its Internet Explorer browser, the decimillion a day for violating a is priced at US$695. sion is a clear defeat for the software giant, 1995 antitrust agreement. Belgium-based Lernout & H a uspie according to antitrust lawyers. This is just a temporary injunction Speech Products (L&H) plans to ship Voice In his ruling, Judge Jackson agreed with a gainst Microsoft, but temporary can be a Xpress early this year. The product supports the U.S. Justice Department and said Microsoft l o ng time, especially considering Microsoft's both continuous speech dictation and the abil"shall cease and desist...from the practice of W i n dows 98 had been expected to bundle the ity to control the computer with voice comlicensing the use of any Microsoft personal I n ternet Explorer even more closely with the mands. Microsoft Corp., recently invested computer operating system software...on the o perating system. US$45 million in this company. '

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Qualcomm outraged at espionage charges against employee working in Russia (NB) — Qualcomm Inc. officials said they are charge, but has maintained that he was not and is not a spy. Bliss could face 10 to 20 "shocked and outraged" at Russian officials s p ying. years in prison if he is convicted. "Manycompaniesdoingorplanningtodo who filed espionage charges against its field Qualcomm is under contract with a technician Richard Bliss. The Rostov regional R ussian firm to install a cellular phone system business in the Commonwealth of Independent procurator filed charges against Bliss after the in the Rostov region, officials said. The AP States (CIS) have been in close contact with us FSB — the organization that succeeded the said Bliss was accused of violating a statute and they have shared their grave concern with Soviet KGB — recommended the action. that outlaws "gathering information connect- t his situation," Qualcomm said. "Clearly, the Bliss was taken into custody after he sur- ed to state secrets with the goal of providing it i n ternational business community, whose prodveyed land in southern Russia.The Associated to a f o reign state, foreign organizations or u c t s and technologies benefit the Russian peoPress quoted a spokesperson for the Federal th e ir representatives." pie, are watching this situation unfold and Security Service (FSB) as saying Bliss conU.S. e mbassy officials have claimed that thinking twice about sending their people into fessed to the actions, which make up the B l i ss is not connected to the U.S. government such an uncertain environment."

Hyundai shelves semiconductor plant in Scotland (NB) — Although Korea is on the other side of the world as far as most people in Europe and the U.S.are concerned, the shockwaves from the financialearthquakes that are affecting Asia continue to radiate outwards. Hot on the heels of Samsung nixing its U.K. and Irish expansion plans, comes news that Hyundai has shelved its plans for a US$3.4 billion semiconductor plant in Scotland. The announcement coincides with the financial jitters roaring around Asia, as the South Korean stock market plummeted on rumors that the International MonetaryFund (IMF) US$54 billion bailout — the largest in the history of the IMF — may not be enough to stave off financial disaster. The Hyundai semiconductor plant in Fife, Scotland, was due to employ several thousand people, but plans have been put on hold for at least two years. Donald Dewar, the U.K.'s Scottish secretary, said on TV, as news of the problem broke, that there are worries that the factory may not now open at all.

StorageTek and HP announce agreement StorageTek Corp. has announced a worldwide strategic relationship with HewlettPackard under which HP will manufacture part of StorageTek's TimberWolf family of DLT tape libraries. StorageTek Canada says this agreement, valued at US$105 million in estimated revenue, allows the company to better serve Canadian UNIX and midrange markets by targeting customers through HP Canada's channels. UCNI

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Tenex Data has signed a deal to become the Canadian distributor for StorageTek Canada products. Under this agreement, Tenex Data will be offering the StorageTek STK 97xx DLT libraries and 913x family of disk drives to resellers across Canada. Tenex Data is at: (416) 291-5894.

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Markham, O n t.-based R esults I n t ernational S a l es Automation Systems is selling a quotation management system aimed at computer resellers, called iQuote 5.0. !, The quotation management system is designed to , quickly generate accurate quotations as part of the business process, with tight integration with contact management and accounting functions. The productcreates,manages and closes salesquotations. It automates a company's price book and customer lists to provide instant access to information and increase efficiency, says Results. Including software, configuration, set-up and training, the product starts at about US$20,000. That can also include the customer management piece — currently the Maximizer product. And some of the training can be done remotely, over the Internet, explained Christopher Whittier, manager of business development for Results International. c(6)

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Mississauga, Ont.-based AST Canada Inc. has lowered prices on certain Bravo Desktops and Ascentia notebooks. For example, the Bravo MS 6266 with an Intel Pentium II 266MHz processor with MMX technology, 32MB of RAM, a 4.3GB hard drive, a 24X CD-ROM drive, and a 10/100 Ethernet card, will have a new sugg ested selling price of $2,899 — d o w n approximately 17 per cent. The Bravo LC 5200 with an Intel Pentium 200MHz processor with MMX technology, 32MB of RAM, and a 2GB hard drive will have a new suggested selling price of $1,649 — down about 13 per cent. AST cut the price on the Ascentia M5160 notebook, with an I ntel Pentium 166MHz MMX processor, a 13.3-inch XGA TFT display, 32MB of RAM, a 1.6GB hard drive, a 20X CD-ROM and AST's optional ExpressOne overnight notebook exchange program. It will have a suggested selling price of $5,699 — areduction of approximately $300. See http: //www.astcanada.corn.

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Sure, respecting software licences and copyright is the right thing to do. But what happens when your customers demand illegal software copying, or no deal? It happens. Just ask Kitchener, Ont.'s Stefan Myles about the moral high ground verses profitability. by Paul Weinberg

What do you do when your client insists upon the acceptance of something illegal as part of a contract? In Stefan Myles' case it meant pulling out of the business as fast as possible. A self-described "computer guy," the Kitchener, Ont.-based VAR normally purchasesproductson behalfof a customer and then configures them together as part of a network. For the most parthe does office automation and his target group tends to be not-for-profit organizations and small businesses. "I serve the lower budget end of the market that can't afford the $100 to $200-anhour that some companies charge." In a bit of a departure, Myles says he recently became involved with a major project at an engineering firm — a multi-branch business in southwestern Ontario, which required some networking assistance. As it turned out, because of some difficulty connecting two of the workstations, he began an audit of the entire installed hardware and software in order to avoid any further surprises."I wouldn't have conflicts with video drivers and network cards if I had a list. I could have the answers ahead of time." Immediately, Myles started to notice that all the serial numbers for the operating system and major applications — office

)•

• •

•

suites and vertical applications — were the same. Myles said: "I didn't think this was too unusual, as often software is installed on multiple stations from one set of disks or CDs or a network share, with the boxes and licences leftunopened on a shelf." However, when he asked for the other licence numbers to update the list for the records, it turned that the company was using one copy of each software 14

package in its possession for all of the computersin the network, thereby breaking contractual agreements with vendors that stipulate one licensed copy per machine. "They were very matter-of-fact about it and more annoyed with me, that I couldn't continue on with the installation." As a Microsoft OEM authorized dealer, Myles did not want to jeopardize his legal position and "be a party to a crime." But the contractor's response was that it was entirely his problem. "It was all of a sudden my fault; I had done something wrong. They were telling me I had signed a contract with them that predated my contract with Microsoft." So he withdrew from the situation, and says he lost thousands of dollars in potential work. If the copying issue had not come up, Myles says he might have eventually set up for his client an NT server, E-mail, and multiple Internet access. Subsequently, another reseller took on the job. Sincethen,Myles is much more careful when considering similar projects. He says he intends to be upfront in future contracts about his requirement that the client fully respect software licence agreements. "I am concerned forother resellers. There are a lot more people hanging their shingles out as computer consultants. Do they realize what

•

kind of trouble they can get into, especially in a l a rgescale situation?" Norm Dupuis, anti-piracy marketing manager for MicrosoftCanada says he has the sense that violations of licensing agreements are more likely to occur in smaller organizations

CA N ADIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER January 1998 http/twwwccwmag.corn

which cannot afford an IT department, where a software policy is more likely to be established. In the last three years in Canada, the level of piracy has dropped, but "the actual lost revenue in piracy has gone up," he notes. Lawyer Barry Sookman, a partner with McCarthy Tetrault, in Toronto, said to have better protected himself going into the job, Myles should have had a clause included in his contract that would have indemnified him against being connected with any unforeseen event. Myles has since added this into his contracts. Microsoft's Dupuis is also a member of the Canadian Alliance Against Software Theft (CAAST). CAAST has made some major efforts on the anti-piracy education front (which have been intensified, of late). However, Dupuis says that in 1996 in Canada, 42 out of 100 word processing packages in use were pirated, compared to 27 in the U.S. in the same year. "It is not a question of Americans being more law-abiding," he suggests, but a matter of U.S. groups like the Business Software Alliance reacting with a "more aggressive and vocal" approach towards violators, as well as a greater preponderance towards litigation south of the border. Dupuis is also adamant that there are no exceptions to the requirement at Microsoft that it is one licensed copy per machine, even in scenarios when an individual might be using one PC at work and another at home for his job. "He must pay for two copies." Software vendors like Microsoft in this country have had no difficulty obtaining a judge's permission for a search of a party' s premises if there is a strong belief that illegal copying of their applications is taking place, says Michael Eisen, a Toronto lawyer with Morris/Rose/Ledgett. "The civil search and seizure order is most likely in connection with intellectual property disputes." IttttI Paul 8'einberg ls a Toronto-based journalist who specializes in high-technology reporting. He can be reached at pwei nbg®inrerlog. com.

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T)",', ~~ b'>ie(f Morochovc 8c Asioci itcs 1nc..;>iso bla<nei Ivlicrosoft's del)iy >n g~tech»ofops a»(f the 'pro~ ressivc I"imilies" «ho are h(>yi»g the s) ste>ns f<»,T ) a < vhofe huncli of reaso<>s. <»clil(l>n enter<;iii>l»enL. tl>c i<itro<l<ict<o» ol' tl>c i>ext vc<'stol> ol <ti W»)(f»Ks of)ei'at><i" syitci>>, '< ' q 'gigjjg~ ' ' ~) ~(<'< )vhich hc >>>vs shot<i(l ti>kc I <f) )ii>t'ii c of f)VI) s c )pab>f<ty . '"gt>)<,p' .<!'a+el> ' ug'g)g'«g <)~ +gg''<)< <gp5 '

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Seasonedconsumers,already using a PC forhome office purposes or as an educational device for their children, "have gone through the learning curve and now they are using the technology for other things," says Riversat Markham, Ont.-based IBM. At the moment though, home PC sales are flat. Susan O'Dell, a Mississauga, Ont.-based retail analyst and president of Service Dimensions Inc. suggests that the consumer market is • '"."A"-„ saturated already b ecause all t h e people who need PCs and can afford tc, t hem have p u r r chased them. Some rebound in the home market may be o ccurring now with a slightly improved economy, according to computer industry analyst Darrel Ryce at the Markham, Ont.-based A.C. Nielsen k. Co. of Canada. However, revenue for consumer PC purchases was down by 19 per cent in 1997 compared to 1996, he says, contrasting that trend with the 1993-95 period when entertainment purchases appeared to be "exploding." Some major vendors like Toshiba are abandoning the consumer market entirely and sticking with the more reliable business buyer, adds Ryce. He has noticed that system bundles in the retail channels I

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are containing less software of late, including entertainment items, and are "more hardware-driven. Nevertheless, Microsoft Canada has found that entertainment products continue to be a major draw in the retail channels, according to its survey of software purchasing decisions by about 4,000 consumers in 45 different retail outlets across Canada between April 1996 and April 1997. Forty-three per cent of those interviewed stated they were shoppingforan entertainment or games product,compared to26 per cent seeking business management tools, 19 per cent for home productivity/reference and 17 per cent for children's software (covering both education and entertainment or edutainment). Those are averages — in some stores entertainment is up as high as 70 per cent of the purchases. Microsoft confirms that 81 per cent of the all software buyers are male, compared to 19 per cent who are female. For entertainment alone, it is slightly higher with 87 of the purchases done by males, comparedto 13 percentfor women. Entertainment/games continues to attract a young male demographic, with only 37 per cent of the consumers 35 years or older. In contrast,the average consumer of a business management application is 35 to 54 years of age, which may speak volumesabout which generation has the good jobs these days. Also, women who shop forentertainment/games tend to be 35 years or older. Microsoft's Traynor suggests that men buy for themselves while women are shopping on behalf of someone else,presumably for a younger person. In terms of children's software, the number ofmale purchasers drops to 69 per cent, while women buyers climb up to 31 per cent. Traynor said retailers have to make "the mental leap" to accept the truism in the trade that rapid turnover of products in specific areas on the shelf is more significant over the long haul than short-term profit margins on isolated sales. Such turnover could range from 12 to 24 times for an item in a single year, he suggests. Traynor cites the common problem of retailers running out of stock of popular items as a result of mistaken planning and positioning of software products. In its survey of reasons by consumers for not buying anything, Microsoft Canada found that 48 per cent of shoppers walked out of a store because they could not find what they are looking for, versus 36 per cent who cited dissatisfaction with the pricing, 10 per cent who were just browsing and two who were upset with the service. Patrick Meehan, research director at the Stamford, Conn.-based Gartner Group. Inc. notes that some manufacturers have tried to make PCs more beautiful in order to make them more appealing for a home environment. But this is merely "cosmetic," he says. Meehan suggests that "the box with the monitor has to be broken down" in terms of design and then "splintered" into various application functions before new possibilities can arise. Already, the bits and pieces of this trend are in place, blurring the boundaries between business and non-business use, such as Web TV; handheld computers and digital pagers. IICW I •

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W ith3Eurocommodelseriesiochoosefromandhundredsof I Q P A Q possible configuraaons, Impaq offers something for every need and budget. Eurocom - winner of many accolades including a PC Portables "Best Buy" and Computer Paper's "Editor's Choice" 'l l

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Paul Weinberg is a Toronto-based journalist who specializes in hightechnologyreporting.He can be reached atpweinbglinterlog.corn.

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SCSI drives, very scarce on ie ular cleaktop PCs, are siirndai d on s er ver s (md 'pci.son;II workst»tion' PCs. Typic<illy, ncw hig/ h per'for nliillce hai'cl I.ll Ives

iipp(»il Ill SCSI vcl sioux lii st, ;is h ig h - e n cl

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S TO R A G E D E V I C E S begin to drop, then EIDE versions for the mainstream desktop market are introduced. Quantum Corp. (http:/Iwww quantum.corn), a US$5.3 billion hard drive maker, is also a major innovator in high capacity drives, and Micropolis (http:I/www.micropolis.corn)was an early leader in higher capacity hard drives with its second generation Tomahawk 9.1GB and 18.25GB models. The run-up in hard drive size has been rapid, and according to industry projections, steady. Improvement will be possible for about another 10 or 12 years, until the physical limitaI tions of magnetic media are reached, and other more exotic storage technologies have to be adopted.

New Floppies The traditional 3.5-inch floppy is still almost universal, although the LS 120 floppy format, which has a capacity of 100MB and is backwardscompatible with high-density floppies, is gaining a degree of acceptance from PC makers such as Compaq. Also, Sony and Fujifilm (h ttp: I/www sony. corn,and http:I/wwwfujifilm.corn) have jointly announced the HiFD, a new 3.5inch 200MB floppy system. I I I

I ' l l

lomega: In A Class By Itself Iomega,which for many years was an also-ran in the removable storage media market, trailing behind longtime leader SyQuest, has achieved an amazing reversal of its status in the storage market. With a combination of great products like the Zip and the Jaz cartridge drives, combined with brilliant marketing, Iomega has become the market leader in removable mass storage. At last year's FalVComdex, Iomega maintained its momentum with new products such as its 2GB version of the Jaz drive (backwards compatible with the 1GB version) and the ultra-compact removable Cli k d e v i ce (http:/Iwww iamega. corn).

Solid StateAnd Flash Storage One alternative to hard drives and cartridge .' storage media is storage using memory chips. Quantum is a leader in solid state 'dri ves,' which though much more expensive than a traditional disk drive, are also much higher in performance. Quantum's Rushmore drives have a capacity up to 950MB, which is a lot of mern ory chips on one card. At the lower end, a whole new world of portable, handheld computing is being facilitated by the emergence of flash memory cards, which can be used in digital cameras, notebook and handheld PCs to allow for greater data storage and transferability

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S TO R A G E D E V I C E S

Compact Disk Recordable (CD-R) And DVD

CD-ROM And DVD-ROM Drives

Devices that allow PC end-users to write their own CD-ROM disks have dropped in price to well under $1,000, with blank recordable disks costing less than $10. But ironically, just when this storage medium seemed poised to become quite widespread, the h i gher capacity DVD format has emerged, along w ith a n u mber of competing re-writeable DVD f ormats. T he result i s t h at compatibility issues are up in the air, until the market and the competing c o nsortiums settle w hich format will become standard and compatible. In the meantime, CD-R products such as the Synchrome Technologies(http: //wwwsynchrome.corn) Maestro CD-R 2x6P have reached a high degree of maturity, in terms of ease of installation and use. Compro (http: //www.acscompro.corn) makes a 4X CD duplicator that comes with an internal hard drive and CD reader, as well as the recording drive, and which can be used either as a standalonedevice,orconnected to a PC.

The original single-speed CD-ROM drives had a read speed of 150KB/sec. Current CD-ROM drives have speeds of between eight and 32 times that rate. Down at the 8X end of the spectrum, retail ,, prices range as low as $50. The 24X and 32X speed models still have some margin potential, but CD-ROM drive manufacturers such as ,I Creative Networks Inc. (http: //www.creative.corn) are inthe process of displacing CD-ROM drive capacity in their manufacturing plants, anticipating that 50 per cent of drive products will be in DVD format by the middle of 1998.

Mainframe And Wo rkstation Above the PC level, many of the major server and mainframe-related companies offer high end storage library solutions. These include tape, MO, hard drive array and CD-ROM robot library systems from vendors such as HP and IBM. Traditionally, these systems run under UNIX or some other high-level operating system, but Windows NT storage library solutions are rapidl y b eing d eveloped as w e ll . A c cording t o I B M Co r p . (http: //www.ibm.corn/ storage): "Industry analysts project the open systems (UNIX) storage business to exceed $12.5 billion in revenue by 2000." If you want to see the future of storage on the desktop, the place

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S TO R A G E D E V I C E S vendorssuch asDigitaland Compaq areexpected to grow rapidly in market share, using the new Microsoft clustering technology to support largedatastorage warehouses. New, high-speed technologies such as fibre channel architecture (which allows data transfer within a server at rates of up to 1G-bit/sec.) will become more common, as well as innovations such as Serial Storage Architecture (SSA) which will increase the capacity of multi-server networks.

Wh at's New In Storage?

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There arealways new storage formats being rolled out, in the hope that the market will see their usefulness, and 1997 was particularly rich in new products. The ORB, from Castlewood Systems, (http: //www.castlewoodsystems.corn) is a magneto-resistive drive, which creates 2.16GB disks at a cost of US$199 for the drive and US$29.95 for the disks.

Windows NT And Mass Storage to look is at the high end, where vendors such as StorageTek (http: //wwwstoragetek.corn) offer tape backup systems with over a terabyte (1,000GB gigabytes) of capacity, and transfer rates of up to 144GB/hour. At the high end of the storage market, NT-based solutions from

The Network Is The Hard Drive?

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One of the oddities of Windows NT has been that even as that operating system has made spectacular progress in the server market, there is still not an integrated disk defragmenting utility for NT. The big winner from this lapse is Executive Software Inc. (http: //www.execsoft.corn), whose Diskeeper for NT is a 'must-have' third-party utility for virtually any NT system. Microsoft will include a licensed, stripped down version of Diskeeper (similar to the test version available from Executive Software via download from the Web) in its upcoming release of NT 5.0.

Justwhen the PC isbecoming easierand cheaper to manage in a business environment, an attempt is being made to sell big business on the idea of the Network Computer (NC), typically a diskless computer that will run Java software, or, in emulation, Windows applications. In the case of theNC, the old saying 'the network is the computer' translates into 'the server is your hard drive.' In many cases, the NC's lower cost of ownership will make it attractive for limited ranges of applications, but in other cases, questions of local desktop storage and network bandwidth (not to mention userpreferences for a fullfeatured, fl exible PC) m ay reduce excitement over the NC. DisklessNCs may not very popular, at least initially, due to lack of a local disk. This makes them very dependent on the network.

Best Bets? The volume storage products at the retail level in 1998 may include: • Iomega's entire product line, • hard drives with over 3GB in storage, • flash memory cards for digital cameras, and, • high-speed CD-ROM upgrades (which may include replacement DVD drives). Many other storage products may offer lower-volume but higher margin opportunities (such as MO drives, for applications where the need for durability offsets the higher price) to the reseller who is prepared to research the storage market for its many, varied, and rapidly shifting facets CCW Jeff Evans is Associate Editor of Canadian Computer Wholesaler. He can be reached atj eg@tcpon.corn.

CA N ADIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER January 1998 http//wwwccwmag.corn

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70 >000 tin>cs th;it. iip to 70 tc>ithyte) (1 B) <feel b( I B f(1 il<10 oth(?1 11>ill kci I h:it >s itccol'el" to st'<its( tcs co<1> f? i I'L">(:.iil' c h oi "i<lit>»i(to<is. Si<icl Jer<') Bocl cf , l > »il kct It?" lnilli<1" cl. litt "c systci»s storii»c, Stot»»c Systeins Dt ( i si o n : i t I I 3P I C<irp.. durin » , i

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ol IBM's 2.„?00 ter.Ill<«log)' I' L'.sc>il'chcl's ill'c' dc(otc.cl to stor;tgc->cf;>ted n»; tiers. Aiicl F<T>nfc Elliott. vice-preside»t. v or((I(vicfe i»;>rkct opei",it ic>ns lor IB<M s(or;ir>e s) stcnis cli( <sion. s;«cl 10 I(! 12 pci cciii ol t he co<lip>tli)' s USS7 < I?t ll loll bit) ll>C is <S <11>l'1l? Litt<i? Ie to 'i >util" (.' 1'L'('Cl<L<Cs. (Accorcliii» io in>irke( rcsenich firni Ii>tern i itic>niil D;iti> (:orp.. IB M>1 ts

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cent,;incl ficlcl. A»cl (vh>lc c«p;icity h;» bcci>incic;>s>itr . Costs;»c cr>in> <tir> cl(?(vn. In iis h<r>hest-cnd titpe p i « d ucts. IBM c h i i rns io he selhnu st(?rn>>c nt less (hi<>i?Vte. (> On thc clesl«op I<Lint> IBi'V1 li;is l(<st stitttecl sl?>f?pill~ h;ird clriv'c this, consiclcr ei<>hi hours '

CA N ADIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALERJcnc<a<y 1998

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Both arebacked by Sceptre's unwavenng comm itment lo manufactunng excellence and innovation Both are backed by Sceptre s unwavenncd commitment to product availabil ity.

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Botll ate backed by Sceptre s unv,aveiincg commitment to provide the highest level of cusfomei service Both are members of a family that includes award tvinning products inclucling tfte Sceptre P75A 1 7" CRT monitor: Technical Excetlence Award, ..the most bang for the buck' Canachan Computer Wf~ofesafer, August '97 "

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Both are flagship models in an aimacla of leading edge display products. Reduced to the simplest terms, both are Sceptre

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the platter. This means more bits can be stored in less space, as the heads can better read the signals. Those fields are created by the "write" portion of the head, which passes over the bits on the platter, magnetizing them to I ' I I' r orient in one direction or ''r r I I I r I another, which translates to either a 0 or I — the binary information that the computer needs. The more sensitive GMR heads are needed to d ecode the bits t hat a r e crammed into smaller and smaller spaces. IBM's scientists say the 60 per cent growth rate in storage capacity can only go so far using current materials and technologies. Hence, researchersare experimenting with radicalstorage means. For example, that includes holographic storage. Instead of just recording data on a surface like a hard drive, it uses the entire thickness ofa medium, such as a crystal.The writing is done by crossing two laser beams. According to IBM, holographic storage could store

'I I I . ®

•

Hard Drives Western Digital 1.2GB EIDE 1.6GB EIDE 2.5GB EIDE 3.2GB U-DMA 4.3GB U-DMA 6.4GB U-DMA

CPU's Pent-166Mhz Pent-200Mhz P-200Mhz MMX P-233Mhz MMX P-Pro 180Mhz P-Pro 200Mhz Pent-11233Mhz Pent-11266Mhz Pent-11300Mhz AMD K6-200 MMX AMD K6-233 MMX Cyrix M 11-166 Cyrix M 11-200

CD-ROMS Toshiba, Paoasooic, Cyberdrlve 20X IDE Int. 24X IDE int. All Items in stock, check our web site www.gestools.corn

Video Cards Trident9685 PCI3D+2MB ATI3D Exp. 2MB EDD ATI3D Exp. 2MB SGRAM ATI All in Wonder 4MB EDD ATI 3D Pro Turbo w/4MB SGRAM ATI-Xpert@Play w/4MB SGRAM/AGP ATI-Xpert@Work w/4MB SGRAM/AGP Matrox Millenium II 4MB/8MB Matrox Millenium 4MB WRAM

Motherboards Intel 430VXPCI Chlpset Pent 75-200MHZ w/512Kpb Cache Intel 430TXPCI Chlpset Pent166-233Mhz MMX w/512KpbCache We carryASUS P2L97AGPset w/Intel 440LX

Memory 72-PinEDO 1X32-60 4X32-60 2X32-60 8X32-60 SDRAM

Modems 33.6K int w/voice 55.6K int. w/voice

Sound Cards ESS 1869-3D PnP Creative Labs 16 bit Creative Labs AWE-64

Grace Casselman is Editor of Canadian Computer Wholesaler. She can be reached at gracec®netcom.ca.

IBNI snye: • Year 2000 testing requires an organization to be able to duplicate 30 to 40 per cent of their currerit data. • The costs of storage, including storage management, are four to six times the costs of the hardware, annually. • Storage is a major component of a server, and server buying criteria Includes: reliability, compatibility, affordability, performance, server and support, availability, scalability, manageability and flexibility. '

•

562-802-3644

E QQE l

as much as 12 times the capacity of today's biggest hard drives. Meanwhile, read rates are much quicker as well, and data integrity is greater by this method. IBM ' ll I says holographic recording I II I is "inherently p arallel" ' ll allowing one page to be stored and read at a time, which is appealing for storI ing images. Data transfer rates are reportedly up to one gigabit per second. I Even more futuristic is the concept of storing data with atoms. In 1989, IBM r esearcher D o n Eig l e r gained renown for arranging 35 xenon atoms on a nickel I s urface to spell " I B M ," using a scanning tunneling microscope (STM). According to IBM, the density of such storage is about one million gigabits per square inch. But while such storage is incredibly dense, efficient read/write capabilities are still lacking. The eventual goal of such atomic-level research, said John Best, director, IBM Almaden Research Center and IBM Research Division vice-president for storage, is to "build computational devices out of atoms."But as demands from the market increase, and as research continues, "it will eventually lead us to understanding what we need to do to build computing devices on that kind of scale." By using an atomic force microscope (AFM) and a cantilever in contact with a rotating surface — think vinyl record and needle as an analogy — IBM scientists have recorded densities of 25 gigabits per square inch. Stan Peck, director, end-user research at Toronto-based International Data Corp. (Canada) Ltd., said as users look to store voice, video and space-hungry images, storage needs will only increase."The demand is inexhaustible; it's just a function of price." And he said IBM is "hard-nosed" about turning its research into useful marketable product. "1998 is the year we' re going to require significant more drive space," said Greg Michetti, president of Edmonton-based consulting firm Michetti & Associates Inc., also citing voice and video applications. "2GB hard drives will look pretty small very quickly." "The challenge of data is to cope with the growth and provide access, management, movement and security," said IBM's Elliott. "We' re driven by customer requirements." ICCWI

562-602-3644 Fax 562-602-6404

CA N ADIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER January 1998http/iwwwccwmag.corn

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by David Tanaka ' •

In your six-pound notebook, a 2.5-inch hard drive seems like a light and tidy ' bundle, but if your entire I ~r digital device weighs just a few ounces, you n eed another solution. This is the idea behind a coupleof new storage devices that we' ll be seeing within a few months. One of these is Iomega's Clik drive. Think "honey, I shrunk the Zip drive," and you' ve got the essence of the Clik. For starters, the cartridge measures 2.1 by 1.92 inches, and is less than one-tenth of an inch thick. The 10-gram cartridge will hold 40MB of data. Iomega expects the Clik cartridge will sell at retail for less than US$10 per unit. The drive itself — at least in the form -'++ o Iomega was recently showing — is about the same size 0 as a mini-tape-recorderor cellular phone. It will likely sell for under US$200. Clik should be available at retail by mid-1998. However, the real target for the drives is the OEM market. Iomega hopes to convince manufacturersof cellular phones, personal digital devices and digital cameras, that the Clik is a cost-effective alternative to those still-expensive RAM cards. Compared to $10 for a 40MB Clik cartridge, CompactFlash cards are still around US$100 — and that will buy just the 4MB variety. To my way of thinking, the Clik is a feasible intermediate step for small storage. The drive, embedded into a device like the digital camera, won' t take upmuch space,willoffer40MB of storage percartridge,and an affordable price. I recently had an opportunity to test the Olympus DL500 digital camera. To make sure I had enough storage capacity, Olympus also loaned me three 4MB memory cards. At the camera's highest resolution, the cards would hold just 10 images each. So, after firing off the rough equivalent of a roll of 35mm film, I was stuck. I had to go back to home base and download the images into my '

computerbefore I could start shoot-

device. The M ultiMediaCard is

lom ege Clik

ing again. In a realworld scenario, it' s just not realistic to expect that cons umers w o u l d load up with more that a couple of these pricey cards. However, if a d i g ital camera came with a built-in Clik drive, I couldseeany consumer buying the cartridges in bulk. At US$10 each, the disks are about the same price as a roll of film. Of course, as a mechanical device, the Clik's power consumption will be relatively high, and small as it is, it still requires more physical space on the camera or PDA than a memory card. That' s why the long-term money rests with solid-state storage. And, like everything else in the business, solid-state storage is becoming cheaper with time — and smaller too. SanDisk Corp. has become one of the leading suppliers of memory cards, and has been signing a pile of OEM deals with digital camera and other electronic device manufacturers. Along with the memory cards in the standard Type II and Type III PC Card size, the company also has its CompactFlash line. These devices are about one-quarter the dimensions of a PC Card. Sandisk estimates that by the year 2000, it w i l l h ave a CompactFlash device that will hold 500MB. Audio equipment maker Uher Infomatik GmbH recently announced a tapeless audio recorderthat uses the CompactFlash cards for storage. A 4MB memory card will store about one hour of voice recording, and the voice file can be downloaded into a PC. Uher looks ahead to a time when a user would dictate into the recorder, download the file into a computer, and have the file transcribed into ASCII text using voice-recognition software. SanDisk's latest storage device is the MultiMediaCard, which the company claims is the world's smallest solid-state storage

C A NADIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER January 1998 http/~w c cwmag.cpm

32 mm by 24 mm by 1. 4 mm and weighs less than two grams. Production samples will b e a v ailable m early 1998 with capacities of t wo , f o ur, eight and 1 0 M B. SanDisk es t i mates retail availability some time

in thesecond quarter of 1998. A 20MB version is being developed, and we may see it in 1999. One application of these miniature cards is in the next generation of mobile communications devices, which may have an embedded CPU and an operating system like Windows CE. A database — the telephone directory for example — could be stored on a memory chip. And, as SanDisk points out, in thisemerging era of smart phones, people will have access to all kinds of data, from news headlines to stock quotations to maps to airline schedules. All of this data could be stored on MultiMediaCard devices. The onboard memory would also add new capabilities to the communicator — perhaps as a voice recorder. IL'Nl David Tanakais a Vancouver-basedjournalist and Editor of The Computer Paper. He can be reached at david®tcp. ca.

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Western Canada:

Calgary Office:

Eastern Canada:

Halifax Office:

105-3760JacombsRd., Richmond, BC V6V1Y6 Tel: (604) 279-9908 Fax: (604)279-9902 Toll: 1-800-668-6188

4710-14th Street,N.E., Calgary, ABT2E6L7 Tel: (403) 291-1688 Fax: (403)291-0889 Toll: 1-800-668-3381

245W. BeaverCreekRd., Unit 3, RichmondHill, Ont. Tel: (905) 886-3862 Fax:(905) 886-3090 Toll: 1-800-852-5039

Unit 1, 200Wright Ave., DartmouthN.S.B3B1R6 Tel: (902) 468-9898 Fax:(902) 468-5988 Toll: 1-800-735-0250

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~<y snl iw ;iie tool~ to;> wicler hase nl'usevs nncl pinvicling ii>tcgvatccl func- ',:.' ai>cl over 8 million iiistallecl L>scrs.'I'...~r@ . Ol i>oic. C o i»pL>ici' Ii>tclllgcilec also 1'epni'Le<I. 'Ii) Co>el. ctvvcen oft'icc productivity applications. r~ y ~1>~pa+ ~u>1 )1>,;@~>~„::-- = PcrfectOf lice at lasi I <oun<l an n)<incr vvillin<iscle 'Wh;>t v<e'ic seeing now is i»ore cohesiv~cness ii) tho~sc procl<ict h c h i ncl it. Coiel wi>s able >o i»ove than qui> dial) le Lhe n<in)llci o l

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33 of suite users." co>1SL>ltnnts LGS Gi oup I nc . i n T o r o nto. ;"' eo>»petito>. with less tha» a 10 pev cent sha> "Sin< le ver>dor'1 now h av e Lhe Thc list ol' vencloi < vvho ave churning out oil'ice p>'ocluctr< ity solrt:Coi p ha< e c rit i rc i;inge olr possible tools ui'>re s<ii Les co»>i> >Lies 10 gl'ow. Co>lip'll) tcs like Net<cape wh>ch you may want >0 use. -:.:=.-Lnl<en thcii expertisc in building Internet/intr'n>1i=t tools to ci.entea nev nll vvitl>in theii ow» pioduci ' ' gencrni>o» ol Web- nncl Internet-ei>ablecl oflice piocluctiviiy suites "Ever>bocly >s sort of' coming to Ihe sa»)c place lioi» dillevcnt s i>iic, nll of which cirn plug in j =-'; ancl w rork together ov worl' <==; direct>nns," C<>rr 01)scr) ccl. 'One of the tnost clif l'icul>. thin<'s I'o>' peo-

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befo>c, having tn <io to a .~ ure nut which v,«iy ro «o. IDo you go with a binnd»c<v p ii;icligm ..hunch nl'clilferent vendors to Int e r net/in>canc> product — or clo vou stick Lvith the more established purchase ii>clividual pieces, ':-",:z"vcnclo><s Lvho rile Illicit)et/intra»<'1-ci'>i>hling thc:iv products' Ever'1 ol>e scc:il)s 10 ilgl'cc that Lhc sillglc 130>>11 oi 'access is p rob> > you cai> novv 13<iy one consolid;>ted suite ol pvorlL>cis thaL g hiy' thc l»osl slgllil'rcai>t I<cat»>33 13ciiig ii»plcmentecl by «Il ice pvocluc '

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0 F F I C E P R 0 D U CT I V I TY want to have access to it and be able to work with it. As a result, Web browser-like front ends that provide a single point of access for anything are being incorporated into many office productivity software tools. But interoperability between suites from different vendors is also a growing criterion and it's something that is clearly still evolving. For example, Lotus SmartSuite still can't leverage everyfeature and function of Microsoft Office 97, and vice-versa. So you buy into a vendor's solution when you purchase office productivity software tools. "You have to choose a camp and stay in that camp," Carr said. 'That's not a problem if everyone in your universe is in that same camp. " Intranet layers allow the user to provide a gateway between various products so they can still communicate if you need to, she added. However, there are limits to what can be exchanged. Carr said open document and information containers that provide a neutral format will help address some of these interoperability issues. Using standard communication protocols, like TCP/IP, theoretically can allow any application to access, interpret and use those information containers. "If I can get to you in an unmessed-up way, if you can receive and interpret my data, then who cares what other proprietary things there are within the application itself? It's the point of transfer you' re worried about." Thin clients are also changing the office productivity software tool landscape. These devices make it easier to create virtual companies, provide geographically dispersed access and help companies extend business beyond corporate walls, Carr said. From the point of view of system managers and administrators, thin clients also provide a better means of managing and disbursing office productivity applications. As office productivity software tools increase both in popularity and choices, two important challenges must still be addressed. First, the near overwhelming range of tools contained in many office productivity suites is literally too much of a good thing. Carr agreed, most users don't need all that functionality. "Some of the functions are there simply because they can be. There hasn't been a lot of attention paid to what people really need," she said. The challenge for many vendors may be in trying to figure out how to provide a generic, all-purpose set of tools that can be all things to all people, without making it too difficult to use for people who only want a limited set of functions. Vendors must also build office productivity software tools that work like people do, Carr said, explaining that she still uses a paper day-timer rather than and electronic alternative. "It's (an electronic day-timer) going to have to be easier for me to use than the way I do things now," she said. "I have no desire to invest time in setting up an electronic version which I have on my PC. I have my day-timer with me all the time. I don't have my PC with me all the time." Knowledge management — functions that provide intuitive and intelligent agent features — built into. office productivity software tools are expected to become an important addition to these applications. For example, consider a customer service representative at a bank who is processing a loan application. Using tools linked to a knowledge repository could provide a clearer profile of that client, based on previous information gathered by other bank representatives. An intelligent agent contained in an office productivity application could gather many types of information on clients and conceivably suggest specific questions to raise, based on that person's individual profile. "Knowledge I create as I'm using office productivity tools might somehow get immediately captured, catalogued and stored appropriately," Carr explained. "It means I can be provided with knowledge in context." So what's available today in the space of office productivity suite? Here's a rundown of some of the most popular products:

Lotus

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MiCrOSOft OffiCe 97 Office 97 has been on the market since January. The latest enhancem ent addedto the product are: Internet capabilities: the ability to add hyperlinks into documents and save these as HTML pages. "You can have multiple people working on a particular document at the same time, you don't have to save multiple copies of the document," said Anne McKeon, Microsoft Canada'sproduct manager fordesktop application products. An animated character "Office Assistant," built into Office 97, pops up and guides users through various operations. You can query the

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hrrp/twwwccwmagcom January 1998 CANADIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER 3 3

0 F F I C E P R 0 D U CT I V I TY Office Assistant for help using 'natural' language commands rather than searching through a cryptic list of help items. "We' re doing a lot of work with things like natural language processing. All of that research that gets done in the background brings out the features that you' ll see in Office," McKeon said. "At Microsoft we do an awful lot of usability and real-life testing. We' ll bring people of all levels into our usability labs — people that have never touched a computer before, right up to advanced users." Enhancements to the natural language capabilities of the product will be featured in future release of Once, McKeon said. Microsoft will look to broaden the toolset and, if research indicates a need or demand for a particular feature then "we would definitely incorporate it into the product," she said. In terms of Office 97 and reseller opportunities, these are limited strictly to sales. Most end-users purchase the product through retail or are sold under licensing programs. For more information, visit: http: //www. microsoft.corn.

only going to get more connected. That's a big driving force." What does this trend demand from office productivity tool vendors? According to LeBlanc, vendors like Lotus must embrace Internet standards and be prepared to build tools that can interoperate with other office productivity applications. As with most software, the best opportunities for eSuite resellers are found in the areas of customization and implementation. "There is a distribution side...but knowing today what the margins are in software distribution, it's not the big opportunity," LeBlanc said. "The big opportunity is going to be developing your own Java applets to work within the eSuite workspace framework. Even better is [using] the eSuite DeskPack...to customize and existing eSuite applet." For more information, visit: http:t //www. lotus.corn.

Corel WordPerfect Suite 8

This latest edition, released in May, offers 32-bit applications and beefed-up collaborative capaA lighter-weight and customizable set of productivity applicabilities. In addition to the WordPerfect wordtions, eSuite includes a streamlined set of Java-based applets, processor, Q uattro Pro spreadsheet, a n d Sule. (53 designed to run on a new generation of thin-client hardware pQ Presentations application, the most major addiand browser software. ~,a~e, concalo+ w ~ tion in this new package is CorelCentral, what' s Formerly code-named Kona, eSuite consists of four major describedas a personal information manager. components: WorkPlace, a simplified user interface; nine Java CorelCentral combines calendaring, scheduling, to-do lists, applets, including a wordprocessor, spread sheet, electronic-mail client, ddressbook, contactlog and a card file.W ordPerfectSuite 8 boasts calendarand scheduler; a browser; and, database access tools.The user ter integration with Netscape's Communicator. interface and nine applets are expected to be available in January. Other "bonus" applications included in WordPeifect Suite 8 are: According to Mare LeBlanc, product manager for Lotus Canada • Barista — a Java tool that allows users to publish pages to the Web Ltd., eSuite is not a replacement for the larger SmartSuite office proithout complicated programming; ductivity software. The majority of users often only need one or two • Photo Housel. I — a photo-editing, touch-up effects and special applications of a total suite package, so eSuite offers a stripped down, ffects tool; easier to use set of tools, he said. ersions — archiving software that lets users keep track of docu"What's pulling everybody is the network model," LeBlanc said. ent revisions; "We' re all going towards it. We' re in a connected world now and it' s esktop Application Director — gives one-click access from the Windows 95 taskbar to all the core applications and abilities of Corel W ordPerfect Suite 8;and, • Envoy 7 Viewer — allows users to view any document published to Envoy, whether they have the software used to create it or not. Among the programs offered by Corel to its WordPerfect Suite 8 resellers are: the White Box Program, which allows eligible VARs to bundle Corel VAR/OEM software with computer hardware; and OEM Direct, for large OEMs who bundle at least 500 unites of Corel OEM softwareper month. '"' 'I 1 For more information, visit: http: //www.corel.corn. *

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Claris ClarisWorks Office Claris's ClarisWorks Office is described as slim oflice productivity software designed for small and home offices. It also represents the low-cost end of the office productivity software tool spectrum. Tools provided includea full-featured wordprocessor, spreadsheet,database manager and abasic desktop publisher. Also included are Web page design tools and Internet access software which allows users to launch into the Internet from ClarisWorks Office itself. There are even development tools for creating a Web site. The product is sold through a wide reseller network across the United States an d C a nada. Fo r m o r e i n f o rmation, v i s it: http: //www.claris.corn. ICCW Dan McLeart is o Toronto-based journalist who specializes in hi g h- technok>gv.

CA N A DIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER January 1998 http//wwwccwmag.corn

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y Steve Kalinda and Tim Bingham-Wallis

Perhaps one of the most cruc o m p onents of anycomputer system isthe very foundation that houses all its individual components. Indeed, the role of the motherboard is far more important than most customers realize when purchasing a computer system. While it's true that nearly every system vendor will allow the customer to choose the components they wish to put into their systems, the motherboard is quite often the one aspect of the system which hardly gets a mention. Video cards and hard drives are likely to be specified by the customer, while they often neglect things which could very easily determine theiroverall system performance such as the brand of motherboard and RAM to go along with it.

Why So Important' So why is it that most customers don't specify the motherboards in their systems? The motherboard is a low-level component which very few people understand, let alone realize its importance. It is also a key area where customers lack the required knowledge, more so thanany other system component. Because of this, it would be ideal if effort was made on the part of the vendors and resellers to try and educate the public on this topic. It's very possible that one particular piece of hardware inside a computer is entirely incompatible with another. When this happens, technicians are known t o s pend upwards of several hours trying to isolate the sourceof the problem even before they could begin coming up with a solution. The sad truth is however, that most of these hardwarerelated problems can be traced back to the 36

motherboard itself. Because the motherboard is literally the foundation for all other system components, it is absolutely imperative that the board be designed with great care and impeccable engineering to ensure proper compatibility and overall system stability. Motherboard-related problems were quite common with 486 and early Pentium machines, and while they haven't completely disappeared,they are notascommon today as they once were. But the question remains: are therecertain brands of motherboards which are more reliable than others? The answer is absolutely yes. This is why it's important for system vendors and resellers to make their customers aware of the potential problems associated with buying a cheaper,more generic motherboard. In many cases the customer would only have to spend an additional $50 or $75 more to get a grade-A motherboard which could very easily mean never returning to the place of purchase for servicing.

All Motherhoards Are Not Created Equal Although there may be a resemblance to some degree, no two motherboards will ever be identical. They may have similar looks and the same features, but one particular brand will always differ from another. It used to be that one brand of motherboard would offer a substantial performance increase over another. Those days could very well be over, as we' ve seen from our test results this month. The boards we tested were only a small percentage apart from each other in terms of raw performance, and although it may not seem

C A NADIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER January 1998 httpttwwwccwmag.cpm

like much, it could mean everything to a customer who is knowledgeable and looking to squeeze every last drop of performance out of their system. Even though the performance gap has narrowed considerably, the gap between onboard features and overall board quality is still very much existent. One of the great things about technology is that with the passage of time, nearly everything will get miniaturized at some point or another by some degree. This holds very true for the motherboard industry, where we can see motherboards which contain sound systems built into them, as well as onboard video and SCSI controllers. Depending on the exact models of these onboard components, it could very easily save bothyou and your customers several hundred dollars since these components don' t have to be purchases separately. Some of the boards we tested this month included built-in sound and one even had an onboard dual Ultra-SCSI controller. Purchased on its own, that same SCSI controller can easily cost upwards of $350. The interesting thing, however, is that most of the motherboards we tested with such features cost roughly the same amount. Most power-hungry users aren't really interested in onboard video and sound,but give them the chance to have an onboard dual Ultra-SCSI system and they' ll be all over it. When Intel announced the availability of the 440LX chipset, it wasn't long before the first LX boards were on the market. This was a long-awaited technology for the new Pentium II processors, which were available for a number of months before the LX

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chipset. The 440LX chipset contains two major improvements that were not found on the previous FX design, namely the new AGP slot as well as SDRAM support. As far as performance goes, the LX boards tend to offer anywherefrom fiveto 10 per cent increases over their predecessors. At the time of this writing, the 440BX chipset is already in the works, which will offer, among other things, support for a 100MHz bus, which is currently limited to only 66MHz on the FX and LX boards. Although the Intel says the LX chipset is designed to operate at 66MHz, several of the boards we tested offer bus speeds of 75MHz, 83MHz and even 100MHz, though don'tbe surprised if it doesn't quite work as expected. When you get into bus speeds of 100MHz, you' re going to have to look at buying some newer, faster SDRAM in the order of 7ns or even Sns. That's not even getting into the extra strain placed upon your existing PCI cards. It's also interesting to note that nearly all of theboards we tested provide support for b oth SIMM - a n d D I M M - style R A M . Depending on the system speed, some customers will appreciate not having to spend money on new SDRAM when they can still use their current EDO modules. Once again, it should be made clear to your customers that when they deal with high system speeds such as those of Pentium II, they will want to have the fastest RAM possible, ideally 10ns SDRAM or even faster for the higher bus speeds, as mentioned above. A new trend developing lately is to allow the user to check the current status of variousaspects of the motherboard. Nearly all of the boards tested use the LM78 chip to measure things such as the current motherboard temperature, CPU temperature, CPU voltages and fan speeds. Some even give the user the option of configuring alarms in case a fan should stop working, or a temperature value gets too high. These values can either be obtained through the CMOS, or with software written specifically for this task, commonly referred to as a LANdesk Manager. This is a great idea that is long overdue, and should make a lot of techies very content.

Millennium II card with 4MB of WRAM onboard, one 64MB DIMM module (10 ns) and a Pentium II 266MHz processor for the LX boards and a Pentium 233MHz processor for the TX boards. We tested the boards using three different benchmarking software: Sysinfo from Norton Utilities 3.0, Nbench 2.0 and BAPCo Sysmark32 v1.0. The popular Sysinfo program found in the Norton Utilities suite is used to measure the 'overall system performance' and is based mainly on the system's cache and memory throughput. Nbench performs anumber of tests to measure various parts of a system, though we focused primarily on its integer tests. The integerperformance testsuses a heap sort algorithm that constantly re-sorts a series of 1000 random numbers (integers). Because all 1000 integers can fit into the Ll cache of a CPU, it tests the processor speed under the best possible conditions. The result is the number of millions of operations performed in one second. BAPCo's Sysmark32 also contains a number of tests that measure different aspects of a system. We used the spreadsheet segment of the program, which performs automated calculations on a number of spreadsheets containing several thousand cells. This test is very CPU intensive and low on disk access, making it an ideal test. Two numbers are reported — one that measures the number of seconds it took the computer to run the automated scripts, and the second is a rating based on that number. In all of the benchmarks, the higher numbers representbetter scores,except for the spreadsheet running time test in t he Sysmark32 suite, which is measured in seconds. Here, the lower number represents the better score. It was interesting to note that all of the boards performed quite well, and were within a few percentage pointsof each other. Overall, the fastest Pentium II boards were the ASUS P2L97-DS followed by the Aopen AX6L. The fastest Pentium board was the QDI Titanium IB, followed closely by the ASUS TX97.

The Tests

Acknowledgements

We asked vendors to send us their latest motherboards based on the 440LX chipset for Pentium II, and 430TX for the Pentium boards. Some vendors sent us one of each, while others opted to send us just their new Pentium IIboards. To ensure the most accurate results, our tests were conducted using one Quantum 2.1GB hard drive, one Matrox

We wish to thank QDI for supplying us with the CPU and RAM samples required for this month's motherboard tests. We also want to thank STD Systems for supplying us with the Intel LX motherboard. Although the board was in its original seal, we were unable to power it on and therefore unable to obtain any benchmarks from it.

CA N ADIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER January 1998 hitpitwwwccwmag.corn

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Performance — Pentium II ASIIS P2E97-DS Aepen AX6L

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Jan. 98 Both of these boards offer excellent performance,support hardware monitoring, and have excell ent manuals. The ASUS P2L97-DS is a dual CPU board that offers bus speeds of up to 100MHz and has an onboard Adaptec AIC-7880P Ultra Wide controller, as well as Wake-On-LAN support. The Aopen AX6L offers bus speeds up to 83MHz, and offers one additional ISA slot when compared to the ASUS board.

Performance — Pentium MI Titanium IB ASIIS 7X97

Jan. 98 The QDI Titanium IB managed to outperform its competition, although the ASUS TX97 was a very close second. The QDI boardoffers severalunique features,such as hardware monitori ng, a bus speed of ,, 75MHz, and both AT and ATX power connectors. The ASUS TX97 does not offer bus speeds beyond 66MHz, although it does support hardware monitoring and has an excellent user manual.

Overall Features QDI Eegend IV Jan Thunder 2

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Jan. 98

The boards with the most unique features are the QDI Legend IV and the Tyan Thunder 2. The QDI Legend IVfeatures an onboard RAID port„and onboard 100Base-T port for i n stant h i gh-speed networking. Combine that with its SpeedEasy feature which allows you to set the system speed through the BIOS, and you' ve got yourself a clear winner. Tyan's latest offering is the Thunder 2. It offersan onboard dual'U ltra-SCSI controller — every system admin's dream, as well asan onboard OPL4 Yamaha sound system and Wake-On-L'AN support. Steve Halinda and Tiiii Bingham-tI'allis are Canadian Computer $%olesaler 's Lab Test

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A SIA S C A P E The joint venture, in which 40 per cent is owned by ACI and 60 per cent is owned by Upson, demonstrates Acer's "Global Brand Local Touch" corporate philosophy, says Stan Shih, chairman and CEO of The Acer Group in a press briefing conducted in Manila The amount invested by Acer was not disclosed. However, Shih said it is quite small compared to the US$500 million it is pouring into its Subic Bay manufacturing facility. ACI, based and publicly l isted in Singapore, is the marketing arm of The Acer Group, which is headquartered in Taipei Taiwan. Acer has grown into a global compa *by+Ã~e'wsbyteS"'= ny with revenues of US$5.9 billion in 1996 20 years after its founding by Shih. Upson, on Acer forms joint venture the other hand, has been the exclusive distrib utor of Acer computers in the Philippines with Upson international F ulfilling t h e prom i se it since 1992 and has been cited for its role in made at the start of 1997, m aking Acer the top PC brand in t h e Acer Computer I nter- Philippine market as attested by International national (ACI) has for- Data Corp. reports in 1994, 1995 and 1996 Ricardo Lee, president o f U p son malized a joint venture with Upson International International today assumes the post as chair Corp. — forming Acer man and CEO of Acer Computer Philippines Computer P h i l ippines Inc., while Upson's former executive vice Stan Shih Inc. (ACPI). president, Manuel Wong is president IN

Hitachi Ltd.announces NetPC-based computer Hitachi Ltd. has announced two new network computers based on Microsoft's NetPC sys tern. The machines, which will be sold with supporting server software, are based on two of Hitachi's space-saving personal computers The Flora 310 N e tPC f eatures a 133MHz Pentium processor with 32MB of m emory and a b u i l t -i n 1 2 .1-inch H i Addressing STN LCD panel. The Flora 330 NetPC is similar to the previous model but comes with no display. Both machines are equipped with a floppy disk drive and come with Microsoft's Windows 95 and Client Management Kit 1.5 Hitachi said a feature of the network computers is the ability to configure new machines within five minutes. It said that by reducing this time, from an average 30 min utes for personal computers, the total cost of ownership was less than PCs But while Hitachi may have reduced the total cost of ownership, the cost of purchase remains almost equal to a personal computer. Hitachi has no current plans to sell the machines outside of Japan

I I S I - O Y ER SSS I T • N S I N S T O C K

Thailand opens intellectual property court •

Thailand's Intellectual Property and International Trade Court is now officially in operation. It had been four-and-a-half years since the Justice Ministry proposed the establishment of the court to the cabinet on March 22, 1993, approved in principle May 4, 1993 As a "special court," differing from civil or criminal cases, the IP and International Trade has been set up under the Intellectual Property and International Trade Law to judge all cases involved with IP and international trade issues Consideration of the cases will be undertaken by the judges appointed by the judicial officers, as well as co-judges, who are IP and international trade experts, selected by the Judicial Committee, hold ing their positions for five-years The Court has the power to judge both civil and criminal cases involving intellectual property and international trade

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The Malaysian government is taking an increasingly proactive stand in driving home the message that no company is safe from the long arm of the law if they continue to flout copyright laws, said Business Software Alliance Z'tronic Computer Sdn Bhd, one of the largest retailers of soft w are and computer products in Penang, recently was fined afterplead ing guilty to infringing the copyright subsisting in several software programs, including AutoCAD Release 12, Lotus 1-2-3 and Microsoft Windows Version 3.1 In a separate incident, the Enforcement Division of the Ministry of Trade and Consumer Affairs recently raided the premises of J. E Consultants Sdn Bhd in Kuala Lumpur, the first such action taken against a mechanical and electrical engineering firm for suspected use of illegal software in that country. IL'CW

CA N A DIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER January 1998 Itttp//wwwccwmag.corn

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by Jeff Evans I get letters. Particularly painful are plaintive histories from very unsatisfied PC end- u sers, describing PCs that are 'dead in the box,' endless waits for tech support, slow or no warranty fulfillment, and serious wastes of time from non-service-oriented vendors as well as from non-functioning PCs. To be fair ,some of these problems stem from the very nature of P C t echnology, which has often been fragile, complicated, hard to learn and maintain, and sometimes just buggy or unworkable. As well, many end-users are poorly trained, and contribute to their own problems. Nothing can excuse poor service, however. As the '90s roll to a close, a lot of PC resellers are feeling the pinch of an increasingly mature, competitive market. Margins are often paper-thin. What used to be premium products are now commodities. How can a reseller keep existing customers, and attract new ones? Increase market share? Maintain margins? Upsell customers on extra features and options, and continue to sell to the customer throughout the life of the system sold? Increasingly, the answer to all these questions comes back to a very old concept: know your customers, and love them to death. The competitive nature of business today doesn*t mean that there is no margin to provide good service â&#x20AC;&#x201D; rather, understanding and meeting the needs of customers is increasingly important to succeed in the information technology market-place. 48

The Business Case For Quality There will always be a segment of the market that is extraordinarily price-sensitive, where the no-frills, 'best buy' product will be able to find buyers. Especially in the mass market retail chains, the pressure on price is terribly fierce, and this tends to spread even to more upscale VARs and system integrators. However,the more a customer needs a reliable information system for their business, the more foolish it is to buy strictly on price. The best customers are those who have a professional, businesslike approach to buying computing products and services. They are realistic enough, and experienced enough, to know that hardware price is only a tiny part of the total cost of ownership of a computing system. They know that their business can be immobilized when their mission-critical computer system is down, and they are sensible enough to prefer reliability and service, even at a somewhat higher price.

business world of the computer age requires "constant, instantaneous communication with and responsivenessto customers." This kind of real-time service can only be provided by organizations that have been deliberately created to sense, respond, and change to meet customer needs. Accordingto McKenna, computer technologyhas become embedded inevery aspect of business, and to succeed, vendors must use technology to conduct a continuous dialogue with customers. Methods of doing so include traditional marketing, advertising and merchandising techniques, but i ncreasingly involve using the Web, intranets, customer databases, and techniques such as data marts. Once the province of only the largest firms, these techniques are now available to almost any size of business, as the cost and complexity of the technology decreases. New forms of maintaining contact with customers are offered by future developments such as

"How can a small to medium-sized reseller afford a customer management system? The solution is not to simply spend, but to spend wisely." In a recent book, "Rea/ Time, Preparing interactive T V a n d v i d eoconferencing, for the Age of the Never Satisfied Customer" accordingto McKenna. McKenna offers an by c o nsultant/guru R e gi s M c K e nna optimistic view of the business potential of

(McGraw-Hill Ryerson, ISBN: 0-87584-794-3, $28.95), the author claims that "in the information age, all businesses will become service businesses." McKenna points to the successes, and more interestingly, the mistakes, of companies such as Intel, Wal-Mart, and Apple, and concludes that the 'Real-Time'

CA N A DIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER January 1998 http/twwwccwmag.cpm

resellers creatively employing the same computer technologies that you sell. In the future, successful companies will employ technologies that let customers serve themselves much of the time, and which will allow the company to have a virtual 'presence' at their customers' locations all the time. McKenna is

T HE not just presenting a private opinion. Firms such as FedEx attribute their success directly to a 'People-First Philosophy,' which includes both employee and customer satisfaction. The Harvard Business School Press published a r e cent book "N e t G a i n : Expanding Markets Through Virtual Communities," wh i ch e choes many o f McKenna's concepts.Net gain assumes that consumers are gettingmore savvy about buying on-line, and are becoming ever more demanding of quality and service. For larger firms such as Canadian multinational Bombardier, Windows NT has alreadyoffered a costeffective platform for total c u stomer m anagement software. Bombardier has c hosen Onyx Software Corp.'s C u s tomer C e n tr e pr o g r am (http: //www onyx.corn), which runs with Microsoft BackOffice, as a complete solution to promote effective marketing, sales a nd customer service. Onyx t o uts i t s Windows NT program as being designed for 'world-class,customer-focused companies' desiring to 'improve marketing effectiveness, shortensales cycles, improve customer service, and exceed customers' expectations by providing marketing, sales, service, and support teams with a single, comprehensive tool for managing, sharing, and viewing all customer information.' Customer management software is typically designed to allow servers or mainframe databases to connect with the I nternet, mobile computers, and even new mobile 'smart' phones and hand held PCs and electronic organizers.

involves direct contact with customers. • Finally, employing customer management technology is not a band-aid that can be pasted onto a fundamentally non-service oriented operation. In order to integrate electronic commerce, mobile and on-line salesforce automation, and service and support, the entire organization must be brought into the new age.

Where To Get Necessary Customer Information

I ND USTRY

data warehouses, data mart and data mining systems. This mass of customer data is used with increasing effectiveness for 'loyalty management,' focused marketing, advertising, direct sales, warranty fulfillment and technical support. Decisive T echnology (h t t p: //www. decisive.corn,or l-800-987-9995) offers a free trial copy of its Decisive Survey program to help with gathering and analyzing customer information. Environmental S y stems R e search Institute (ESRI, http: //www.esri.corn, (909) 307-3051) has recently announced its ArcView BusinessAnalyst, a software system foranalyzing markets, site prospecting, customer pro filing, time analysis and report generation. ICCW !

There are avariety of new products that offersources of information on actual and potential customers. One of t h e m ajor advantages of big companies with large IT departments is that they are leveraging their networked server and mainframe technology, which was once mainly used for transac- Jeff Evans is Associate Editor of Canadian tion, billing and inventory tasks, to accumu- Computer Wholesaler. He can be reached at late information on their customers, through jeff C tcpon. corn.

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Bang For The Buck But, how can a small t o m edium-sized resellerafford a customer management system? The solution is not to simply spend, but ct to spend wisely. According to a study by Deloitte and Touche (http:/lwww.dtcg-ca. ,~lc corn), firms lacking in an understanding of how to use technology appropriately can spend up to 10 times more than firms that buy smart. The bottom line is that, to be successful, no vendor will be able to afford the option of either not spending on customer management, or spending on the wrong system. Secretsto success? They are remarkably IJtei'common sense: • Keep it simple. Buy fewer, more proven customer management tools. ' %l qll6flg • Buy offthe shelf,ratherthan custom made. • Spend money on training, not disaster recovery and lawsuits. ASS Oi'ieSx • Don't automatically outsource: it's often .-= 'S145-1%+fI1 more expensive than learning to do a core Plg@04g78business task in-house, particularly when it

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M ARK E T I N G

C o I u m n..:

Building Customer Relationships A romance is more than sweet talk. Remember the key principles of making and keeping good working relationships as you interact with your potential clients. by Monta Kerr What you are about to read should not come as a great shock. If you' re still in business, you probably recognize this truth of all truths: the customer is at Q„fan/ the core of all marketing programs. But some people do get too caught up in the process of marketing and forget the ultimate goal. The fact is, you can send out dozens ofbrochures, or create the best-looking point-of-sale materials, or advertise as much as you want, but if it's not all focused on the customer, it won't d o any good. Your success or failure all comes down to that fundamental relationship. It's not as simple as it sounds. Think of a customer relationship as a marriage. It begins with a courtship, as you try to find out if you belong together. Bit by bit you discover whatyou can offereach other, and then decide if you should make a commitment. Long before the vows are made, there is a series of steps that lead to the altar — or to the closing of the deaL There are three main stages you have to go through to forge a strong relationship: • Meeting the potential mate. As the old saying goes, you never get a second chance to make afirst im pression. Perceptions formed in the early stages of the relationship are difficult to change. So begin by making sure you know what you want the customer to think of you — develop a set of goals and a marketing plan that ties in closely with your business plan. Make sure all the marketing materials you develop are geared toward achieving that

goal. Be consistent in your messaging — you • Keep the romance alive. Congratulations! don't want your intended to think you' re fick- You and yourcustomer have signed on the le. Most of this work must be done before you dotted line — you' ve made the sale and the even meet your customer. Planning and agreement has been sealed. Don't let it end preparation will make you ready for the day there. You can't stop wooing your cuswhen the customer walks through your doors, tomer, any more than you can stop romancor makes that phone call to your number. The ing your spouse after the wedding. If you plan, followed up with high-calibre materials, want to maintain a relationship — and, will give you what you need to attract your after all, a repeat customer is the best kind — you have to work at it. First of all, do customer in the first place. • Getting asked to the dance. Most likely you what you said you'd do — meet every sinwon't be the only reseller the customer is gle one of the terms of your deal. Then, considering. It's a when the project is finished, keep track of competitive world your customer. out there, and even Stay in touch. Send out regular notices a fter y o u h a v e of special promotions. Let your customer attracted the atten- know when the software you installed is tion of a potential being upgraded by the vendor. Send a greetcustomer, there' s ing card during the holiday season, just to no guarantee that say thank you. Find your own personal ways you are going to make a sale. of keeping the customer happy, and remindAt this point, you have to prove that you ing him or her of the exceptional services have what it takes to go the distance. Here' s you offer. where you let the customer look beyond the Like a romance, building customer relafacadeand see what you really have to offer. tionships takes time and effort. But it is one Do their needs match what you' re selling? of the most important things you can do. So Can you tailor your solution to meet the make sure your upfront information is interrequirements? One esting and focused; of the primary eleanswer al l the ll ments that comes questions the cusi n« p lay h« e i s tomer asks a nd your ability to lisprovide the best and effOrt." ten. It's important possible product; to really hear what and finally, light a the customer is telling you. Be prepared to be few candlesand pour some wine every now flexible and willing to try something newand then (metaphorically speaking, of sometimes the solution isn't obvious. That' s course), to keep the magic alive. IEW why you' re in business. Find an answer that will work for both of you. One other thing to Manta Kerr is a senior consultant with High keep in mind: "sell" yourself and make com- Road Communications, a public relations mitments — but never, ever make a promise agencyfor high-tech companies. She isbased unless you know you can keep it. You don' t in High Road's Toronto office and can be want to get a bad reputation, after all. reached at mker rishi ghrd.corn.

"Be consistent in your messaging — you don' t want your intended to think you' re fickle."

building customer re(atjonshj ps takeS time

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PC98 — WhereAre We Goin by A/an Zisman Once, IBM i n n ovated and everyone else copied. But those times are long gone. Now, in the chaos that's the computing industry; everybody' s got a plan, but nobody knows where we' re all going. There seems to be a lack of what IBM chairman and CEO Lou Gerstner referred to as "that vision thing." While no longer simply 'IBM-clones,' the vast majority of computers sold today run one or another version of Microsoft Windows on some kind of Intel (or clone) CPU. As a result, Microsoft and Intel, who together are sometimes referred to by industry pundits as 'Win Tel' have provided the closest thing to a platform as we' re going to find. So it should not be much of a surprise that they' ve stepped into the power vacuum to try and provide a vision. For the past couple of years, they' ve published specifications detailing what they expect of the next year's PCs. Together, last October, the two companies collaborated on a set of PC Design Guidelines, with an aim to help the industry "move in sync," as Intel's director of platform marketing, Dan Russell put it, in a recent1nfo Sbrld article. While Intel does not issue logos to manufacturers who meet the specifications (and Russell noted that there are "N o I ntel police" ), Microsoft continues to have a logo program forhardware and software designed to work with Windows. This will be used to help move product development in the directions set out in the PC98 guidelines. A PC98 machine (which for the first time includes notebooks as well as desktops) will feature at a minimum: • a 200MHz MMX Pentium or compatible processor (desktops), 166MHz (notebooks); • 32MB of RAM (desktops), 24 megs (notebooks); • 256KB of cache RAM; • Universal Serial Bus (USB), IEEE 1394 (Firewire), or PC-Card ports, with hotswapping capabilities. Notebooks require U SB, 32-bit CardBus, and Infrared ports, with IEEE 1394 on a docking station; 52

. • USB and IEEE 1394 device bays; and, • Year 2000 and beyond BIOS-level support. Notebooks wil l n e e d t o s u p port Advanced ConfigurationPower Interface (ACPI), for power management that can be better controlled by future operating systems — specifically Windows 98 and NT 5.0. Current Advanced Power Management (APM) needs to be set at the system BIOS level, permitting only minimal configuration by the operating system. The specifications recommend changes to speed up boot time, for example, an end to the power-on video memory test, and a minimized memory test, meant just to establish the sizeofthe system memory. Testsofparallel and serial ports, and floppy and hard drive tests at boot-up would also be eliminated, as part of a move towards eventually making PCs instant-on like a TV or stereo — what Microsoft has referred to as OnNow support. Machines designated as workstations have additional requirements, such as a minimum of 4MB of video RAM, and a separate L2 cache foreach CPU in multi-processor systems. These machines should also support ECC memory and 64-bit physical memory addressing. Mini-notebooks are also mentioned, as needing at least 16MB RAM, a Pentium 133 MMX CPU, and at least 640 by 480 video. Perhaps more consequential is the move to eliminate the venerable ISA bus. This 16bit expansion slot standard was first used on 1984's IBM AT, and has survived attempts to replace it with IBM's Microchannel, EISA, and VLB-Local Bus. Those alternatives are mostly memories, but the ISA bus continues on today's machines, along with PCI slots. The continued survival of legacy ISA components however, is the biggest reason that Plug and Play on today's machines so often more resembles Plug and Pray. Still, Microsoft and Intel don't think that manufacturers are quite ready yet to bite the bullet and completely eliminate the ISA bus. As a result, inclusion of the ISA bus is an option for 1998, but it's widely expected that support for this classic but outdated piece of technology will be removed from the PC99 specs. It's hoped that by then, higher performance USB and Firewire peripherals will be

CA N ADIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER January 1998 hrtpltwwwccwmag.corn

common, and that ISA devices will no longer be needed or wanted in new systems. As part of th e move to USB and Firewire, expect to see external device bays, so that devices that now are typically added only by removing the PC's case and fiddling inside, will simply be plugged into an external bay. Compaq showed off such a system at November's Comdex, with two bays in the front of the PC's case, which allowed fast and easy installation of DVD, CD-ROM, hard drives and more. Operating system-wide support for these proposed changes can be expected next year with the release of Windows 98 and NT 5.0. In the meantime, Windows 95B SR2.1 includes USB support, with device drivers being written by peripheral manufacturers. Six months after Intel introduced the Pentium-II, redesigning motherboards in the process, there's increasing evidence that the Pentium II's Slot-1 may not provide much of a performance increase over earlier system designs. Customers are noticing that higherpriced P-II systems seem to providing only a small performance gain over more affordable Pentium or clone Windows 95 systems. Similarly, impartial tests found a minimal fivepercentperformance increasecomparing top of the line 300MHz Pentium II systems to less expensive 266MHz systems. The result, for Intel, has been lower than expected sales of Pentium IIs, followed by price cuts. (Note: 233MHz and 266MHz PentiumIIscurrently offer a good price/performance ratio). Intel's response is to 'just wait for Slot 2' — the next generation where, presumably it will be done right. Slot 2, however, will be initially limited to workstations and servers. In addition, it's expected that in 1998, Intel will be phasing out current Socket 7 MMX Pentium CPUs in favor of a new Pentium II design lacking the current model's L2 cache RAM on the card. The result will be sold at a lower price, but offering lower performance. On the high end, expect to see 400MHz Pentium II models sometime around February. Wt Alan Zisman is a computer journalist and teacher,living in Vancouver. He can be reached at azisman@rogers. wave. ca.

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B USI N E S S B A S I C S

Should You BuY Qr Lease

Your Business Ve¹cleV by Douglas Gray At this t im e o f y e ar, many resellers consider getting a new vehicle for their businesses. The most common question asked is: "Is it m o re advantageous to lease or to buy a vehicle?" Revenue Canada has considered each option and has established rules to ensure that one option has little if a ny benefit over t h e other. The decision is therefore based on your situation and needs and cash flow circumstances. Whatever decision you make, make sure you thoroughly comparison shop and sleep on it before you make any final decision, sign documents and take the car away. You want to make a decision based on sound logic and not emotion or sales pitch by the car company. Compare thecost of each approach over the term you expect to own the vehicle. The lease contract sets out the contractual nature of the deal. Any representations that the sales rep makes to you that are not contained in the lease contract, you can't rely on. So make sure that any statements made to you to induce you to lease the vehicle are written into the contract.

Advantages And Disadvantages Of Buying Advantages: • You own the vehicle and therefore do not have anyrestrictions on use. • You are building up potential equity in the vehicle, for example, the value of the vehicle less the debt you have paid off. • You can use the vehicle as security to borrow money. • You can sell the vehicle and you keep the money, after any loans or paid off. If youareusing the caras a business vehicle, there are additional benefits: • Depreciation is deductible. For cars, it is 30 per cent a year on the declining balance. However, only a maximum of $25,000 (plus taxes) is accepted as the capital cost of the vehicle, no matter how much more you pay. 54

• Interest on money that you borrow for the car purchase is deductible, however, there is a maximum of $300 a month, no matter how much more than that you pay.

Disadvantages: If you are using the car as a business vehicle: • You cannot deduct the full cost immediately. Only the first $25,000 plus taxes may be capitalized and depreciated for tax purposes, and the car you want or need might cost more than that. • Only a maximum of $300/month for interest is accepted by Revenue Canada. You pay your own repairs and maintenance expenses. • Time and effort is required to sell the vehicle.

The Advantages And Disadvantages Of Leasing Advantages: • You can change to a new vehicle relatively easily. • There are more consistent and predictable cash flow requirements. •Ifyou areusing thecaras a businessvehicle: It frees up cash flow as monthly payments are generally less than loan payments when financingthe purchase of a car. • Lease payments are deductible, subject to limits set out by the Income Tax Act. At present, it is $650/month. Disadvantages: • You don't own the vehicle. • You are not building up equity in the vehicle. You are basically renting the vehicle for a certain time period. • There could be restrictions on your use of the vehicle, fo r e x ample, outside the province or country. • Lease costs are slightly higher than purchase costs. •Leasingexpenses can be subjectto increases. Costs could include financing, administration and other fees. • You are responsible for maintaining the vehicle, according to the maintenance schedule set out by the leasing company. This could cost you more money than if you had the freedom to dowhat you wanted, where

CA N ADIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER January 1998 httpttwwwccwmag.corn

and when you wanted, as in a buy situation. • There are many restrictions and limitations set out in the lease, that affect your use and enjoyment of the vehicle. • You could be paying more money for greater mileageuse,wear and tear and guarantee of residual value at the end of the use, or penalties if you want to terminate the lease early. •Ifyou are using the carforbusinesspurposes: Depreciation is not deductible on operating leases. For further information, you can pick up a freeconsumer bookleton vehicle leasing published by the Canadian Automobile Dealers Association and others. It is called: "Turning The Lights On Leasing." You can also purchase a Canadian buy versus lease softwareprogram that customizes the pros and cons in specific situations. One such pro-

gram is called: "The Car Calculator," published by Orangesoft. (1-800-647-8693 or http:/twww. carcalculator. corn). Also check with your provincial consumer servicesdepartment for brochures and any legislative lease protections for consumers that might be available. Finally, speak to your professional accountant about the tax implications in your specific situation. IIW Douglas Gray,LL.B. has had extensive experience as a lawyer specializing in small business.He is also a speaker and author of 15 b est-selling business books, as well a s investment software program. His books include Home Inc.: The Canadian HomeBased Business Guide, Th e C o mplete Canadian Small Business Guide (both by McGraw-Hill Ryerson) and Start and Run a P rofitable C o n sulting Bu s i ness a n d Marketing Your Product ( b oth by Sel fCounsel Press).

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idio simplemre for slowing sales by Graeme Bennett At a recent meeting of the Western Canada Computer Distributor Society, I asked some attendees how their sales were, compared to last year. The general consensus was gloomy — s ales were down about 10 per cent on average, reported more than one distributor. Those inclined toward gloomy predictions are now wondering whether this is the long-feared stall of the computer market dynamo that has gathered momentum nearly unabatedover the last four years.However, there are signs to the contrary, too. Market researcherDataquest, in a Dec. 1997 report, predicts that sales of personal computers will grow 10 per cent in the coming months as a result of the downward price pressure that now finds sales of inexpensive personal computers opening the market to more new users than ever before. Indeed, as manufacturers push toward the US$800 price-point for an entrylevel system, the presumed price advantage of network computers is in considerable doubt. Also, Statistics Canada recently found that Internet use doubled in Canada in the period froin 1996 to 1997. At this point, says StatsCan, over 25 per cent of the population is on-line. Some industry onlookers see this as an important factor that will determine the next period of economic growth. In a compelling essay entitled "Feasting on the Giant Peach" (a metaphorical reference to James and the Giant Peach, a children's book by Roald Dahl), George Gilder states that: "In every industrial transformation, businesses prosper by using the defining abundance of their era to alleviate the defining scarcity." Gilder defines the modern consumers' free time as the irreducible scarcity. For all this abusive waste of the most preciousresource,says Gilder,the remedy is the 'Net. Businesses must use its defining abundance — MIPS, bits and gigahertz — to redress the residual scarcity of time. In practical terms, this is the promise of the Internet — a new global economy based on bandwidth abundance.For more detail s and an index of communications-related articles by George Gilder, visit http: //www.seas.upenn. edu/-gaj I/g gindex. html. 56

Indeed, the notion of " l ooking six Naturally, there is no simple cure-all that months in the future" is a useful exercise for will jumpstart slow sales. However, there are a number of important developments that are those who must maintain a practical sense of marketability for their products and services poised to define how the next generation of technology buyers will purchase and use their It's no good to be too far ahead of the curve nor too far behind. 4t products. Most obviously, the transition now underway to the Pentium II, and LX motherG t Baem nee rentt hi e sSr enoEi iTdhofetor board architecture (and its successors) will ComrpPuter arpeafnd aor mecomrprutte e al- i define the bulk of new system purchases in H e cear n that be re ached at r gaeme@ cp.Hctae the near term. Because the software drii deronly lveathe i ses /isaoC tnomdePxR ac tm h s i ves the advantage isn't yet is will place, t h e nmo h t i etWnnil d d t w s eo Roadr map Afo early adopters are already on board, but the a dBney9o8 nd. n E ebehind. rtprNisT e: mass market is only about six months

Ivm the Im m it (waive 16~: Q1 Early adopters will einbrace LX motherboards, in preparation for Windows 98 and/or NT 5.0. Sales of Pentium II systems using the new motherboards and system components such as Ultra IDE drives, SDRAM and AGP graphics cards will improve as Q2 approaches As the 56K modem standard is ratified, sales of these products will reignite, but expectdilution from cablemodems and SDL services

Optimists that we ate, we expect the release of Windows 98 around the middle of the year, despite the U.S. Department of Justice's Dec. '97 injunction disallowing Microsoft from forcing manufacturers to bundle its Internet browser as part of their license of Windows 95 or its successors. Our interpretation of the wording of the injunction suggests that it is worded in such a way that Microsoft is almost certain to be able to win an appeal or at least work around the vaguely phrased requirements of compliance With or without Internet Explorer integration functions activated by default, Windows 98's feature set is likely to make it a big seller. We' ve been testing the Nov. 21 pre-release version (beta 3) of Windows 98 here atCCW, and it's shaping up very nicely, with com, pelling features that, range from automatic Windows updates via the Internet to its strong TV integration and integral support for scanners from Hewlett-Packard, Umax and other manu facturers. Some features,such asA CPI and USB, are certain to encourage new system pur chasesas NT 5.0 begins to emerge in near-finalform. ACPI power management functions forexample, require systems based on LX motherboards or their successors and, as many vendors are keenly aware, such motherboards require all-new cases and present a strong inducement for the user to invest in all-new Synchronous Dynamic RAM, as well. Other fea tures like DVD, Firewire and TV support, am likely to result in strong sales of the support ing multimedia hardware such as video cards offering hardware support of 3D acceleration via Direct3D and sound cards capable of delivering hardware support for DirectSound APIs

Q3 and Q4 The market for DVD — especially the recordable and rewriteable varieties that hold so much promise in the computer industry — must settle down from the chaotic state it is cur rently in, if PC-based DVD sales are to take off. For the record, I'm betting on the Sony/Philips-endorsed DVD+RW standard To help you make sense of current market conditions, I have a page of info on such volatile technologies such as DVD and PCS posted athttp: //tcp.ca/gsb/net/. The lesson in all of this is to be aware of the technologies that will drive the decisions that your customers will be facing during the coming months

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There is a severe shortage of Microsoft Certified Professionals (MCPs), so certification is a hot ticket today. In the second annual MCP Magazine survey, it was reported that the average MCSE earns US$70,700. That is a powerful incentive for you and your customers to become industry-certified. So, the question arises, which is the best route to take? Currently, thereare three major choices:use an approved self-study guide, work through computer-based courseware, or take a Microsoft-certified course. Each has their advantages, but one gaining favor is self-study due to the low cost. This trend clearly shows in the recent MCP survey — 91 per cent are using books as a preparation method with 98 per cent indicating some sort of self-study as a preparation method. Which books would you choose for yourself or your customers? What should you look for? The answers are surprisingly simple. Choose a Microsoft-approved guide, written by experienced experts who have proven writing ability. Within the guide itself, look for plenty of practice questions, and additional background material outside of the topic area plus exam simulations. In addition, look for timesaving tips, and real-world examples. New Riders MCSE Training Guide Windows 95, is an excellent network consultants' handbook/reference and tutorial. However, it doesn't stop there. It is also a superb study guide for Microsoft's "Implementing and Supporting Windows 95" MCSE exam. Microsoft exams test specific objectives that your customers can find on Microsoft is web-site. Here lies a challenge. The exams also include material outside the objectives to test the general background of the candidate. This book meets the challenge by including a considerable amount of additional material that will prove useful in the real world. The authors bring plenty of experience to the book. Rob Tidrow has written more than 20 books including seven on Windows 95. Joe Casad is former managing editor of Network Administrator Magazine. Michael Wolfe works for Chevron and holds both a Novell Master CNE and Microsoft MCSE. This experience is evident in the clear writing, and thorough coverage. The book contains extensive tips and explanatory notes that are very useful to novice and expert network consultants. What sets this book apart from others? There is a handy five-page pullout listing all the exam objectives and their location in the book. 68

Each chapter begins with test questions to help your customers determine the amount of study time they should spend. For example, Chapter One Planning and Installation, contains 10 exercises and 50 review questions. The CD is particularly useful with TestPrepNew Riders test engine that emulates the actual test, an electronic flash card system to help in the study process, an electronic version of the book and samples of major commercial test-prep engines. To protect your customers against rapid changes, the Web addresses point to the latest exam objectives and certification requirements. After finishing the book, your customers will understand how to configure and install Windows 95 client services in a NetWare environment, know the limitations of network client services, how to migrate from other operating systems, and perform Registry troubleshooting. They will feel comfortable with the Desktop, Taskbar, Start menu, configuring property sheets, designing and implementing profiles. In addition, they will know how to manage disk resources using system tools, configure and install drivers, resolve GPFs, and utilize the Device Manager to configure Plug and Play components. The book delves into the subject matter with twelve chapters and four appendices. The topics include: • Planning and Installation, • Architecture and Memory, • Customizing and Configuring Windows 95, • Editing User and System Profiles, • Networking and Interoperability, • Managing Disk Resources and Utilities, • Managing Printers, • Running Applications, • Mobile Services, • Microsoft Exchange, • Plug and Play, • Troubleshooting, • Appendix A: Overview of the Certification Process, • Appendix B: Study Tips, • Appendix C: What's on the CD-ROM, and • Appendix D: All About TestPrep. In summary, the book is an all-in-one, Microsoft-approved study tool that would be useful to your customers for exam preparation and as a real-world operating system reference. There are numerous realworld examples, and tips for working with Windows 95. I highly recommend this one-of-a-kind resource for all VARs, network administrators, installers, consultants, or students of networking. For those interested in Windows NT, I recommend New Riders, MCSE Training Guide, Windows NT Server 4. ISBN 1-56205-768-5. Ital Stephen Ibaraki, ISP, is a lecturer,writer,advisor and co-convenor for the BADM Computing Program at Capilano College, which has won a number of international, national and provincial awards. He is Novell NEAP and Microsoft AATP-certified and can be reached at sibaraki @capcolleg e. bc.ca.

CA N A DIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER January 1998 ht tpllwwwccwmag.corn

N EW -P„

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Sharp adds keyboardless Pen E-mail device Sharp has introduced a pen-based handheld E-maiVorganizer device with a suggested list of US$299.The new Sharp SE-500 is optimized to keep mobile professionals up to date with current E-mail and contact manager or Personal Information Management (PIM) data. E-mail and some PIM synchronization software is included with the base unit. Option selection and text en~ is done with a stylusoruser'sfingertouch,and an on-screen keyboard. The SE-500 has an integral 14.4 Kbps modem, an IrDA port for printing and file transfer, and a 240 by 159 back-lit screen. The SE-500 also comes with its own docking station. See http: /Iwwwsharp-usa.corn.

Seagate ships Crystal Info 6 (NB) — Seagate Software, a unit of Seagate Technology Inc., has announced that its Crystal Info 6 business intelligence software is now shipping. Crystal Info 6, formerly known by the code nameBlack Widow, incorporateshybrid on-line analytical processing (OLAP) and Channel Push technology. Matt Dion, Seagate Software's product strategist, said in a teleconference with reporters that Crystal Info is the first business intelligence product to provide both relational OLAP and multidimensional OLAP capabilities — a combination that research firm Gartner Group Inc. has dubbed Hybrid OLAP (HOLAP). (Speedware Corp. of T o ronto, has launched Media/MR, another H O LAP product.) A key new capability in Crystal Info 6 is its support of push technology, including standards being pushed by both Microsoft Corp. and Netscape Communications Corp., to make business intelligence information available via the Web or an intranet. Seagate Crystal Info 6 starts at US$299 per client licence. Reporting and query capability comes in an add-in module that costs another US$199 peruser.Another module contains the OLAP capability, for US$349 per user. Seehttp: I/www.seagatesoftware. corn.

PRODUCTS

Microsoft delivers Internet financial technology kit (NB) — Microsoft Corp. has announced p any to have a simple package for processing Microsoft Internet Finance Server Toolkit bi l l p aying, checking account transactions, (MIFST) for banks and financial institutions. t r ansfers of funds and other banking and broThe new toolkit provides companies with the k e rage data," said a Microsoft spokesperson. necessary technologies operating behind Web Different elements of MIFST address featurescustomers normally see and navi- data integrity and scalability concerns associgate. ated with building an on-line financial serWhile visiting a Web site of a bank, brov i c es site. The product requires Windows NT kerage house orother financial institution, Server 4.0 and Microsoft SQL Server 6.5 and customers see a graphical interface and envi- i n t eroperatesw ith al l e l ements of t h e ronment; they do no t see M I FST. Th e M ic r osoft BackOffice platform. US$9,999 product is a platform upon which a Security is backed by support for 128bank builds a navigable Web site. "MIFST is b i t encryption. a platform and toolkit which allows a comSeehttp: /Iwww. microsoft. corn.

CanTax adds CD-ROM tax tutor based multimedia Calgary's CanTax and the Jacks Institute, of season, with this product. "By taking a numWinnipeg, have launched an interactive, mul- ber of simple tax planning steps during the timedia version of year, you can see a sigThe Canadian Tax nificant effect on your Tutor on CD-ROM, tax return." ~ w,„ "+'4vA which features the Suggested r e t ail tax trainer Evelyn price for The Canadian Jacks. Tax Tutor is $49.95, and It c o m b ines that price includes the tax training and tax final filing version of planning, and Garry Can Tax 98. K alinski, chi e f A mong it s c u s operatingofficer of tomer b ase, C an Tax Can Tax, says the numbers about 7,500 tax company is looking preparation services and to expand both the more than 40,000 indiselling season and vidual taxpayers. See the tax p l anning http:/Iwww. can tax. corn.

NEC debuts full-keyboard MobilPro 700 handheld CE system In announcing a new, second-generation m o b il e professionals most often require Windows CE device with greatly enhanced I n t ernet and E-mail access, word processing functionality over its first offerings on the CE a n d P owerPoint functionality while away platform, NEC is answering user demands for f r o m their desks. The added functionality and improved handheld PCs using the Microsoft f e a tures of the MobilePro 700 bring out the CE operating system. The MobilePro 700 b e s t in Windows CE 2.0. This combination offers the first true 'touch-typing' keyboard in d e l ivers true mobility, unlike anything else in a handheld CE device, according to NEC t h e market." Computer Systems Division. With a weight Software includes MicroBurst Virtual of under 1.5 pounds, the MobilePro CE is C o u rier, for mobile cc:Mail or MS mail users, much more productive for data entry, featurS y m antec PCAnywhere, for remote access ing a 7.3-inch b a c k-lit touch-screen, a a n d s y nchronization, Puma Intellisync, for 33.6Kbps internal modem, an IrDA port for P e rsonal Information Manager (PIM) syneasy file transfer, color VGA output for busic h r onization, bSquare bFAX Professional, for ness presentations, voice recording capability, m o b ile faxing, CIC QuickNotes, an electronand a compact flash memory and Type II PC i c h a ndwriting notepad, and CompuServe Card (PCMCIA) slot for easy upgrading. The S p ryNet, for accessing CompuServe via the MobilePro offers up to 25 hours of battery life M o b i lePro. on two AA alkaline batteries, and is optiNEC says it is working on delivering a mized for Windows CE 2.0. color screen version. According to Gordon Neff, manager of The MobilePro 700 is available now, system products for NEC CSD Canada: "Our f o r a s t r eet price of a bout $999. See customer research has demonstratedthat http;/Iwww,necnow corn. http//wwwccwmagcom January 1998 C ANADIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER 5 9

N EW

PRO DUCT S

Brother adds MFC-7000FC

Digital Persona has U.are.U fingerprint recognition

Brother International has just released the MFC-7000FC multifunction device, a product that bundles color scanning, printing, and copying,faxing,colorfaxing,message centre, and video capture and print. The MFC7000FC is aimed at the SOHO market, where an all-in-one peripheral is needed for consumer, education or business imaging, communications and printing. The MFC-7000FC scans at up to 1,200 by 1,200 dpi (with interpolation), in either 24bit (16.7 million color palette) true color or eight-bit (256 shade) greyscale. It can make copies at reductions of up to 50 per cent, or enlargements up to 200 per cent, and print in color or black and white at up to 720 by 720 dpi resolution. The plain paper fax feature operates at up to 14.4Kbps, and has advanced features such as fax/telephone switch, Caller ID, distinctive ring detection, and simultaneous faxing/printing capability. The integrated Message Centre can store up to 50 minutes of digital messages in its mailbox, with full duplex speaker-phone option, fax forwarding and paging, remote fax retrieval. Contact http: //www.brother.corn or (514) 685-0600.

One of the latest entries into the field of corn- p r o blem of unauthorized access to a temputer 'biometrics' (computer technology that p o rarily unattended PC. The U.are.U system comes to market at gets information from measurement of human biological functions or characteristics) a t i me when fingerprint scanners seem to be rapidly proliferating. The is the U.are.U fingerprint initial leader in this categoidentification system from I. ry, the B i o Mouse f r om Redwood City, Calif.-based Digital Persona. Ottawa-based A m e rican The U.are.U product is Biometrics, established the low-cost fingerprint scana hardware device t h at W' n ing product category, and a .,„. > i a ttaches to a PC to allow ~ > -y ," competing product f rom users to gain access to cornr ./ Sony has been announced. p uter systems and d a t a , „'s. '-'; " ' Other biometric security through the use of their per. ' p," pt , qp. sonal fingerprints. U.are.U,"' r 4tg sy, ,tI systems, based on voice .,.itr' print, face recognition, and consists of a small finger- , ,', "~st print scanner that attaches tn ,~. ey e ball r e tinal s canning, ,g.'gg " a PC via a Universal Serial ',„. r ,;.:-, h ave not found a ready mar' Bus (USB) port, and softket, due to problems of cost ware which allows a user to input his or her a n d reliability. Digital Persona claims that the fingerprint asa 'password' to a secured PC. In U.are.U system setsitselfapartfrom the comaddition to the finger scanning feature, the p e t ition through its low cost (US$99), ease of U.are.U software also offers a security screen i n s tallation, intelligent recognition of poor saver, which blanks the screen after a period q u ality or rotated fingerprints, and unique of inactivity, and only allows information to s c reen saver feature. be displayed again if the user re-scans his or Conta c t ht tp: //www digi talpersona. corn her finger. This is aimed at dealing with the o r ( 650) 261-6070. *-

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g/PC

Protec WebShare Models offerspeedier access )g

SOFTWAREDISTRIBUTORS Business Productivity, Educational and Games.

Pointe-Claire, Que.-based Protec Microsystems Inc. has released two new upgradesto its popularWebShare product, a hardware device thatallows up to three PCs to share a single IP address and Internet account. According to Blanca Novoa, marketing manager for Protec, "Small organizations have embraced the WebShare concept because it beats the high cost of multiple Internet access, and now with this new release supporting higherspeed modems, users can be even more productive." The second new version of the product, which relies on a user supplied external modem, is especially suited to expanding capabilities through higher speedmodems. Prices forWebShare begin atUS$258. Protec has also unveiled a new small office networking solution named SOHOLink, which is claimed to be 'the all-in-one Network Hardware Suite for small offices and home offices.' SOHOLink is based on a compact Ethernet 10Base-T hub that can connect up to six PCs in a local network, sharing printer, fax/modem and Internet resources. The network can be expanded beyond five users by attaching the sixth port on the main hub to a second SOHOLink hub. Contacthtrp://wwwprotec.ca or 1-800-363-8156.

Tally introduces fast impact T6180 printer

1 $00-510 901 1 Monday to Friday 9AM to 8PM Eastern Time I I' I I

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Tally Printer Corp. is shipping the T6180, a printer which, Tally claims is the fastest line impact printer in the world. While the mainstream computer world has moved away from the once-popular impact printer format in favor of laser and ink-jet, there remains a sizable and lucrative market for impact printing in high- end, specialized applications. The Tally T6180 is capable of printing 1,800 lines per minute. It incorporates some ingenious new technology to achieve its higher performance, including a proprietary print controller which intelligently arranges pages into segments prior to printing, the ability to print text and graphics in one pass, paper jam reducing static connol, and real-time monitoring of hardware temperature and performance. The T6180 has a suggested retail price of $12,999. Contact http: //www.rally.earn or (425) 251-5524.

C A N ADIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER January 1998 hgtp//trwwt cwmag.corn

P EO P L E

Corel's VP joins Pictorius

Compaq Canada president resigns After just a half year on the job, Sue Miller has resigned as president and managing director of Compaq Canada Inc. In December, the Sue Miller company said Miller had resigned "to pursue other interests, effective immediately." Don Weatherson, vice-president, government and education sales, North America Division, Compaq Computer Corp., has been appointed acting president of C o mpaq Canada Inc. by Jim Schraith, vice-president and general manager, North A m erica Division, Compaq Computer Corp., until a permanentsuccessor is named.

Digital Sound names VP marketing (NB) — Digital Sound Corp. has appointed Pamela J. Thompson as vice-president of marketing. Thompson will be responsible for developing a worldwide market strategy and will manage product marketing, channel marketing, and communications programs. Thompson was eight years at Motorola Inc., where she was most recently the director of strategic businesses, responsible for developing and implementing wireless content "solutions" for paging carriers around the globe. Thompson was previously managing director for Motorola AirCommunications Ltd. She also held other senior management positions at Motorola, including vice-president and director of Asia Pacific wireless data network operations and manager of corporate strategy.

Halifax-based Web development tools vendor Pictorius Inc. has announced Mark Alberdingk Thijm — former vice-president of salesfor Corel Corp., has joined the company as vice-president, sales and marketing. During more than five years with Corel, he played a key role in building and directing Corel's salesforce in N orth America, Europe, Asia and the Pacific Rim, says Pictorius. "Pictorius has definitely positioned itself as a leader in the web development market, a market that is taking off worldwide as businesses discover the power of the Internet as a vehicle to publish information and deploy applications," said Alberdingk Thijm, in a statement. He joins a management team led by president and CEO Jesse Boudreau.

Stentor council gets chairman The Stentor Alliance Council of CEOs has a nnounced the a ppointment o f C o l i n Latham as chairman. He succeeds Brian Canfield, who stepped down as CEO of BC Tel ecom. L atham is p resident and CEO o f Maritime Tel & Tel and chairman of the board for The Island Telephone Company Ltd. and MT&T Mobility Inc. He is an engineer by training, and has gained extensive experience in business services, sales and marketing during his 29-year career. The Council of CEOs provides overall strategy direction for the Stentor Alliance in matters of national service development, policy, regulatory affairs, and technology. The members of the alliance are: BC TEL, Bell Canada, Island Tel, M anitoba Telecom Services, Maritime Tel & Tel, NBTel, NewTel Communications, Northwes Tel, Qutebec Tel, SaskTel and Telus. Latham is a member of the Association of Professional Engineers of Nova Scotia and a fellow of the Canadian Academy of Engineering. He also serves on the Boards of Directors for the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design, the Greater Halifax Partnership and FastLane Technologies Inc. iCCW I

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httpltwwwccwmag.ccm January 1998 CANADIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER 6 1

illital pCS Will Have One Million Canadian

Subscribers in '88, Says New Study Etobicoke,Ont.-based market research firm Evans Research Corp. says the PCS market will attract more than one million subscribers before the end of 1998, in a recent report called:The Emerging Markets: Personal Communications Services. ERC predicts the PCS market will soar as a direct result of the associated benefits of digital c e llular t e chnology, i n cluding: improved sound quality; enhanced security; and an increasingly low price. The phones also support call forwarding, call waiting, caller ID, conference calling, text messaging, higher throughput speeds with reliable connections and longer battery life. The research firm stressesincreased security as one of the most important features of PCS. While traditional cellular phone calls are fairly easy to listen in on, with PCS, digital networks transmit data in encrypted code, which changes throughout the call, which

R nacla l

reportedly makes it extremely difficult to scriber's phone. And more computing func breach security, says Evans. tions are being integrated, to support E-mail Evans says Bell Mobility (the largest fax and Web browsing. ICCW shareholder of the Mobility Canada consortium) and Rogers Cantel lead the Canadian C ontact E v a n s R e s e arc h C o r p . , a t PCS market. 41- 6) 62188. 14, ext236. By the end o f 1 9 97, Rogers Cantel Inc. was expected to service more than 80 per cent of the Canadian population. ERC estimated that Bell Mobility's potential coverage encompassed more than half the population of Ontario and Cellular phones 56 Quebec. ;:i,multiple phone lines 44 Evans noted that applical~ernet alccess 43 tions currently under developFax machines 42 ment include push-pull content Pagers 33 delivery to ease on-line transl3ata/i'ax' Il'.n..e..s:'j Ii~~~0itg~lti 26 + actions and allow information Copier 23 to be delivered to the sub-

% Ii iiIII-Illlililyliiif iilelrl Nh Ilia' i~slclslhwins i â&#x20AC;˘

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Please indicate which most closely reflects your view Customers are eagerly investigating cable modems, attract ed by the high potential speeds of the technology. Interest will be high in 1998 People are interested in cable technology for Internet access, but are mainly taking a wait-and-see approach Interest will be moderate in 1998 Customers are comfortable with the traditional telephone based Internet services, and are hesitant to invest in the cable modem alternative. Interest will stay relatively low in 1998

Last Issue, we asked: What impact is Electronic Commerce having on your revenues?

You said:

5pq

I attribute revenue increases directly to Electronic Commerce. I don't see any measurable effect on my business

3 s7s tLs revenues, due to Electronic Commerce.

Electronic Commerce, with the additional competition it fo 7s brings, is having a negative effect on my business.

This issue: Over the last year, cable companies like Rogers Cablesystems, and licensees of its Wave Internet service have been rolling out high-speed 'Net access via cable systems. By the end of the 1997, 110,000 North American customers were expected to be using cable modems to access the Internet, said one recent study.

Our question to you: How popular will cable modems be in 1998 with your computing customers?

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http://+rene.ccwmag.corn E-mail:ccwotcp.ca or send your responses, and comments, by fax, to

CA N A DIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER January 1998 ht rpitwwwccwmag.corn

(604} 608-2686

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AfFordable Pricing Am S I Ilta is proud to be a working partner with Allied Telesyn International. Allied Telesyn International Corp. is a worldwide provider of highly reliable, standards-based LAN connectivity components. Allied Telesyn is committed to providing the lowest cost of network ownership through competitive pricing, high reliability, a nd c o m p r e h ensive p r o d u c t s u p p o r t a n d se r v i c e . The company's product ofFerings include Ethernet adapter cards; network management software; intelligent Ethernet hubs, including stackable hubs and switches; Asynchronous Transfer Node (ATM) solutions; and Inedia products such as transceivers, fanouts, repeaters, and u n managed hubs. For More Information on Allied Telesyn Products Contact PrnDalta or Visit Allied Telesyn on the World Wi de We b @ www.alliedtelesyn.corn

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Sceptre's Soundx Notebooks Are: n

Rated ¹1 in PC Digest "The Sceptre Soundx 5500 Notebook is the fastest syste in the review... "Sceptre takes top honors with the Sceptre Soundx 5500, which leaves all the other notebooks in its tracks when running NSTL's gauntlet of performance benchmarks. This is a very fast desktop replacement with a 233-MHz Pentium® processor, a 13,3-inch XGA display, and a roomy 3GB hard disk drive for storing large multimedia files." NSTL PC Digest, September 1997

Best Buy - PC Portables "The Sceptre Soundx 4500 is

an impressive machine. • ." "Sceptre is selling this computer [166 MHz Pentiume processor with MMX™ Technology, 12.1-inch TFT SVGA display, 2.1 GB HDD] with 40 MB of RAM... for just under $3,400, which puts it well within the reach of many. This configuration...deserves our "B estBuy" rating for the value represented.'*

PC Portables, November 1997 In head to head comparisons against the likes of Compaq, Hewlett-Packard, Gateway 2000, Micron and Hitachi, to name a few, Sceptre's

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Soundx notebooks have proven themselves the best. Call now for a distributor near you or check out our web-site for more information.

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