Firewire Que Drive 12x and 16x

I recently sold my last SCSI Mac. I now only own USB and Firewire Macs. Instead of buying an expensive SCSI to Firewire adapter, I tought it was time to buy a Firewire drive. I wanted at least a 8x drive. Then I saw the Firewire Que Drive 12 x and 16 x. I did not know which one to choose. I tested them before buying one. Even if the 16x was speedier, I chose the 12 x, because it was really cheaper. And it burns discs very fast!

The Que drive comes with a carrying case, an installation manual, a universal power supply, a FireWire cable, three blank discs (mmm it is supposed to come only with a CDR and a CDRW but I got two CDR and a CDRW....I still don't know why...). Toast 4 from Roxio is also included. You should buy Toast 5 as soon as possible. You can install the drive in 2 minutes. You just have to plug it into your mac and install the software from the CD.

I launched Toast 5 as soon as I got it. It indicated that a Que Firewire Drive was connected and ready to burn. After inserting a CDR in the drive, I dragged a 600 meg folder on the Toast window and clicked on the "Burn" button. Less than 5 five minutes after, I had my CD!

This drive uses the BurnProof technology, which is said to stop the writing errors that occur when you burn a CD. This technology also allow you to burn a CD in the background. With one of those two drives and Toast 5, you will be able to burn a CD in less than 5 minutes, while surfing the Web.

There is another feature that you only notice in a quiet room : the drive makes no noise. It is a perfect companion for the Cube. Even when you burn a CD at full speed, you would barely notice that the drive works if there was no drive light. I won't miss my old SCSI CD burner with a fan!

This CDRW drive is the best one we have ever seen. The design is great. It is quite fast (5 minutes to burn a CD with the 12x drive!!!). And we did not have have any errors yet. And if you buy two drives and launch two copies of toast 5, you can burn two CDs at the same time!

I have yet to find why you should not buy that drive! It is affordable, fast, well designed and Burnproof. Go and buy it!

 

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Test of one of the first European Cubes, with a 17 inch Studio Display

 

• Pro: easy setup, beautiful design, fast, almost totally silent, completely digital
• Cons: induces Cube-lust and fear of theft as well as serious dependency If they were cars: Ferrari (the iMac being the family car and the G4 tower the twin-turbo Mercedes all-terrain vehicle, your average PC a souped-up hotrod Ð fast in the beginning, webbing instead of seats, no real steering wheel and doesnÕt get you anywhere)

After much agonised waiting it finally arrived: my 450 MHz Cube and 17" CRT Studio Display. In all, there were 17 days between order and delivery. Not bad; most of the time us Europeans have to wait for more than a month longer than Americans before we can lay our hands on AppleÕs latest.

Much to my chagrin, I could only play with the Cube for half an hour or so since I was to go away for a few days with my wife and two kids (am typing this on the iBook). Nevertheless, that was enough for a first assessment. I think itÕs worth five out of five mice, stars, penguins or what have you. LetÕs get to it.

Unpacking it

The Cube arrives in a medium-sized box containing the machine itself, the new keyboard and the new pro mouse. The latter two are in a Styrofoam enclosure with a cardboard cover. The enclosure doubles as top half of the enclosure of the Cube. Lots of wrapping and protective covers Ð environmentalists should not buy a Cube. Anyway Ð this machine is so beautiful. It looks like it came from some sci-fi movie. The first thing I noticed unpacking the Cube was its weight Ð it is heavier than its size would lead one to expect. The second was the size. ItÕs small. When unpacked, itÕs not as cubic as most pictures would suggest. ItÕs very slightly tapered towards the top, and has rounded corners. The enclosure is very clear and catches the light in an interesting way; it looks like it has some internal reflectivity, making it opaque or clear depending on the angle of incident light. The power supply is a pretty dull affair, in comparison. ItÕs about the size of an Imation Superdrive and probably meant to sit on the floor. IÕve put it on the far-left side of my desk, where it doesnÕt attract undue attention and has better cooling.

The monitor is wonderful. Easy to unpack, it weighs about 20 kilograms. Despite being a 17", itÕs not very deep. It has a truly flat tube. The design is beautiful. The front has an almost Aqua-like striped white-grey finish, the back is completely translucent. The translucency is just right Ð any more would render the effect useless and cheap (which is what happens when other manufacturers make translucent stuff). The pedestal is nice and allows for very supple tilting and swivelling. A single connector comes out of the bottom of the display (nice touch Ð no more cables sandwiched between walls and the monitor or dangling over the side of the table). There are two usb ports on the right side (like in the iMac DV series).

The speakers are a nice surprise as well. They look incredibly cool. The small amplifier doesnÕt spoil the looks, but the USB cables going from it to the speakers are a bit shortish. They donÕt have strain relief going into the speakers, which is something of a worry.

Keyboard and mouse Ð this is getting to be boring- are great looking as well. The keyboard is about the same size as an old ADB extended, the keys are somewhat farther apart from each other than in the iMac keyboard and the keyboard has a nice solid feel about it. In all, a vast improvement. The mouse looks like an oblong drop of water or gel. ItÕs a bit small but has a good feel to it and fits the hand nicely. It definitely looks better than the Microsoft Intellimouse does.

Setting it all up

Total no-brainer, as weÕve come to expect from Apple. The single ADC cable is a joy. More so because some good designer finally thought of losing the VGA-port type screws and came up with a simple snap-to-close construction. The connector can angle freely between zero and 90 degrees. The power connector is angled as well (45 degrees) so neither cable has any strain going into the Cube. Excellent. The USB ports in the monitor help to reduce clutter. Mouse plugs into the keyboard, the keyboard plugs into the monitor and the speakers do so as well. This leaves two free ports on the Cube itself. IÕve shelved my hub for the time being, since the two remaining ports are all I need at present (one printer and a CD-rewriter). I used to place my Ôputers to the left of the monitor, but the Cube sits on the right. I have a better view of it there when IÕm not sitting at the desk. It is simply too beautiful to hide. I put an Airport card and 256 M of extra RAM in the Cube. That was easy and fun. I got to do the "nuclear core" thing ;).

No howtoÕs needed. Starting up is fun, you just touch the spot marked with the "on" symbol and thatÕs it. When you touch it, it glows white. The front of the display has two buttons, one for power (right) and one for contrast (left). They also glow in white when operated. The power button on the display and the power spot on the Cube pulse white to lilac when the Cube sleeps. Almost organic, as if itÕs breathing.

The Cube is silent, very silent. You only hear the hard disk chugging softly every now and then. To hear it spinning you have to put your ear to the Cube. My iBook is noisy in comparison. Even the iMac DV SE I had half a year ago made more noise. The (almost) lack of sound is wonderful and a bit eerie. Pictures coming soon.

To work

Installing the OS (9.0.4, International English) takes less than ten minutes. Since I already have an Airport network running, I was connected after the install finished (I have a cable modem going into an Airport base station). The display is worth every penny. It is crisp, sharp, very bright and doesnÕt show any blurring towards the corners as so many other displays do. Even my wife, who is not normally prone to noticing such things, remarked as to the quality ("Wow, thatÕs sharp!"). The refresh is excellent, 99 Hz vertical at 1024x768 resolution. The one thing thatÕll probably cause trouble is that all controls except contrast are software. ThereÕs no software brightness control, the brightness being dependent upon calibration. Considering previous experiences with Xfree86 on the iMac, the image will likely be excessively bright in X and I will probably need xvidtune to get the display centred. The absence of other hardware controlsÕll probably be a problem as well. The keyboard has a nice solid feel to it and is Ðfor me- very good. The mouse is cool, too. Tracking is better than with the Microsoft Intellimouse. It has not as much trouble following fast movements so I bet my Quake III fragging will be better. The lack of buttons feels like the right thing. There being no second or third buttons or a mousewheel will be a pain when playing Unreal Tournament Ð no asmo combo or high rate minigun firing. Other than that I donÕt miss Õem. Of course, X likes lots of buttons as well so IÕll probably end up getting an Intellimouse anyway. The speakers sound surprisingly good given their size. It would be nice to have a subwoofer but overall sound quality is good. They took Rob Zombie without complaint. Of course, when using Linux youÕll need the usb-audio compiled in or as a module. DVD playback worked fine for me Ð I watched The Matrix without noticing the glitches or graininess mentioned in the various newsgroups. Some people have had problems with the power spot Ð it was supposed to be excessively sensitive to the presence of fingers nearby. I have not encountered these problems. The Cube does switch on when inverted and plugged in.

Conclusion

ItÕs a wee bit expensive, but IÕm very happy with the Cube. Together with the display, it is truly a work of art and by far the finest piece of hardware IÕve ever owned. That includes my NeXT Cube and G4 tower. The G4 Cube has a very NeXTish feel to it and is, I think, what NeXT would have come up with had it still been in business (though one may argue that Apple is NeXT now, in the intellectual sense). I donÕt think I will ever want any other computer on my desk, except for its successor that had better be cubic as well. I am now eagerly awaiting its portable brother. I wonder what it will be like. Linux should not be a problem. X will probably be a problem, unless you swap out the ADC card and use another monitor. Advice Go and buy a Cube but do not expect X to like the displays (yet). Unless you require PCI slots, of course.

Review written by Maurice van Steel

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Logitech Pilot Wheel Mouse and Logitech WheelMouse

The Logitech Pilot Wheel Mouse is one of the best mouse I've used. It has two programmable buttons and a scrolling wheel. This mouse has a ball (If you don't want one, but still want the scrolling wheel and two buttons, you can buy the Logitech WheelMouse).

The Pilot Wheel Mouse is a USB mouse that can be used with no driver at all. Just plug it in in your iMac, iBook, PowerBook or PowerMac, and it will work. However, if you want to program buttons, you'll need to install the "Mouseware" software. You can double-click with the wheel (yes the wheel..), single click with left button for instance, and use the contextual menus with the right button. Or you can assign specific keys to each button. The people who are hardcore gamers know what I'm talking about. If you use to play Quake or Unreal, this mouse is for you.

• Pros: More than one button, a scrolling wheel. Designed for both left-handed and right-handed people. A cheap mouse.
• Cons: The mouse has a ball