🚀 go-pugleaf

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A colleague at the office just handed me a copy of an article in
the business section of London's *Sunday Times* [17 January
1993]; I thought it would be worth typing, so here it is.

Some of what this guy says sounds ignorant and bogus, but there
are some good leads here...

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Turn your IBM PC into an Apple Mac

George Cole reports from the Consumer Electronics Show in Las
Vegas

MORE PEOPLE use IBM personal computers than buy Apple machines,
but most prefer the Apple Macintosh because it is easier to use.
Unfortunately, the two systems are not very compatible - discs
designed for or created on IBMs cannot be run on an Apple or
vice versa.  That is until now.

A device that enables almost any IBM PC or compatible to work
with an Apple Macintosh computer was one of the highlights of
the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas.

It is a circuit board, called the Dual Desktop, that plugs into
one of the slots inside an IBM computer.  Once the board is
installed, the user can switch between the IBM and Apple systems
simply by pressing two keys on the computer keyboard.

The added circuit board allows data to be transferred simply
between the Apple and IBM systems, and for both systems to be
operating at the same time, the user switching between them.

Until now, the only way to achieve any kind of compatibility
between Apple and IBM machines has been by software.  A number
of companies market programs that allow IBM computers to use
software designed for Apple machines, but the converted programs
often run more slowly.  And the American software giant
Microsoft has developed Windows software, which makes IBM
computers look and work like Apple machines [!!!! - bogus - REW]

"Apple software doesn't work with Windows," says Rainer
Poertner, president of Hydra Systems, the Californian company
that developed the Dual Desktop board.  "However, the Dual
Desktop literally puts an Apple Macintosh inside your PC and
gives you access to thousands of Apple software packages."

The Dual Desktop will cost 670 UK# in America but the price
should fall as sales take off.

The Las Vegas show also gave the public its first sight of the
Newton Personal Digital Assistant (PDA), developed by Apple
Computer and Sharp (Innovation, December 13, 1992).  This
powerful pocket computer uses intelligent software to recognise
handwriting and graphics.  The PDA can be used to store and sort
many types of information, such as telephone numbers, addresses,
appointments - even line diagrams.  Users will also be able to
send information from the PDA via a fax or radio link.

"The PDA will be a boon for business users who need to organise
their time and information," says Gaston Bastiaens,
vice-president of Apple's Personal Interactive Electronics
Division.  Apple plans to launch the PDA in American this
summer, priced at less than 700 UK#.

For the fanatical television watcher, Virtual Visions has
launched what it calls its Personal Projection TV system.  There
is no television set; instead, people watch large-screen
pictures on a pair of spectacles.

The spectacles can receive pictures from almost any source, such
as a television tuner, video recorder or computer games console,
and the image is displayed on a tiny liquid crystal display
screen, fitted into the thick frame of the glasses.  A mirror
that hangs in front of the glasses projects the image on to the
spectacle lenses fooling the brain into thinking that it is
watching a large image situated eight to 15 feet in front of the
viewer's eyes.

Known as Sport, the glasses will be sold with a portable
television tuner that can be hung from a belt.  The system will
cost under 600 UK#.  Picture quality is lower than that on
normal television sets but the benefit of mobility will outweigh
that disadvantage for many people.

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Russell Earl Whitaker                   whitaker@eternity.demon.co.uk
Communications Editor                       71750.2413@compuserve.com
EXTROPY: The Journal of Transhumanist Thought         AMiX: RWHITAKER
Board member, Extropy Institute (ExI)
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