MacWorld Expo: Last round-up; Overview

Last round-up A few notable products sighted on the last day of the Expo (that we did not mention in last week's reports):

miro displays introduced the Radius Artica Display for the Mac. The 1600x1024 pixel flat panel display was impressively sharp. Its shape is also perfect for showing "wide-screen" movies. They were also previewing the iBug device for "professionally" calibrating the color of iMac displays.

Mactell's FirePower lineup was on hand, including the FireWire FireORB drive, due to ship by September.

Not a new product, but I finally took a look at Trexar's MacTuner, a program that let's you listen to hundreds of different radio stations from around the world. Very cool.

Similarly, I got my first look at Real Software's RealBasic 2.0. This is one slick visual-based programming language. It's even compatible with Visual Basic. It claims to be both powerful and easy-to-use. It had me convinced.

And, of course, Adobe was previewing InDesign, their high-end desktop publishing application.

Overview The New York Macworld Expo was a success; overall it was a much stronger Expo than last year's New York affair. While the debate will likely continue over whether the summer Expo is better off in New York or Boston, this year's Expo showed that New York is at least a viable choice - and may easily get better with each year. Wherever it is held, it doesn't compare in size to the January Expo in San Francisco and it likely never will; vendors are being stretched too thin with too many events to attend; many thus decide it is prudent to scale back their presence at the summer Expo or skip it altogether. None-the-less, there were more than enough buzz products on display. At the top of the list was, of course, Apple's iBook portable and the AirPort wireless communication device. While we reserve final judgment until after the products ship, it certainly appears that Apple will continue its hitting streak. [Check last week's reports for the many other promising newly announced products, from Outlook Express 5.0 to E-Picture.]

And with Macworld now behind us, we return to the world of Mac troubleshooting: