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THE MONTHLY FOR RESELLERS

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@i MAY 1997 Vol.3

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Bigger, Faster and in Definite DEMAND!

No0r ina Com uter, No0r ina Distri utor.

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Aptiva joins the SnpercomFamily...

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Business Partner

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Supercom, your source for IBM PCproducts, phone call away. Ask about our Dealer is pleased to offer the entire family of IBM Aptiva Authorization program, the great Demo Personal Computers. program, EPPprogram and more.

Aptiva is one of the hottest personal computers We' re here to help you sell Aptiva. on the market, with brand name recognition that continues to grow. Customers will come to your store looking for Aptiva.

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At Supercom, we make it easy for you to sell Aptiva. We have the models you need, in stock, and ready to go. Need literature? Need Point of Purchase materials? We' rejust a simple

It gets even better. We' ve put together some great Introductory Specials. Already an Aptiva Dealer? Call your Supercom Sales Representative for more information.

Want to know more about Aptiva and how to become an Aptiva Dealer? Call for your FREE Aptiva Dealer Information Kit.

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Super Quality Computer Product Distributor

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Vancouver Toronto Montreal Nationwide

Tel:(604) Tel:(905) Tel:(514) Toll-Free

276-2677 415-1166 335-1166 Inquiries

Fa x : (6 0 4) 27 6-0807 Fa x : (9 0 5) 41 5-1 177 Fa x : (5 1 4) 335-9326 1-8 0 0-9 49 -45 67

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Samsung s lineup of hard disk "space" vehicles provides the optimum capacities for today s storage requirements.

Designed to give a boost to any PC, they II fly on virtually any operating system, including MS-DOS, OSi2 and

Microsoft Windows.

These drives are high on performance, offering fast ATA support and full compatibility with the required data transfer rates for PCI Buses.

They' re also high on reliability, with a three year worry-free

Model Number WNRQ1601A Form Factor 3.5 inches Capacity (formatted) 1.61 GB Buffer Size 128 KB Average Seek Time 11 ms Data ltansfer Rate 16.6 MB/sec

WNN12730A 3.5 inches 1.27 GB

128 KB 10 ms 16.6 MB/sec

128 KB 10 ms 16.6 MB/sec

Toronto Office 168 Konrad Cres.

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warranty riding behind them.

To find out how Samsung drives can meetthe needs of your space missions, just give us a call at EMPAC. We II help dnve up your sales.

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Montreal Office 3385 R ue Griffith St. Laurent, PQ

H4T 1W5 Ph: 5 14 - 3 45-900 0 Fx: 5 14 - 3 45-855 1

Vancouver Office 186-4611 Viking Way Richmond, B.C. V6V 2K9 Pil : 6 0 4 - 821-0177 Fx : 6 04 - 8 21-0277

All companies logos and /or trademarks are registered trademarks of their respective companies.

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WHY NOT D EAL W IT H T H E B I GGEST)

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Buying parts the usual way> No-name brands of no known origin. No assurances of reliability or compatibility. No support. That's no way to build a computer. Much less a business. Switch to Acer components. Every Acer product meets the toughest quality standards in the industry. And that includes just about every kind of component your system needs. From monitors and keyboards to motherboards, sound cards, chassis, and CD-ROMS, AcerOpen has it all! And you' ll rest easy knowing every Acer component works together. It's proven everyday. As a matter of fact. Acer built the world's fifth largest PC company around these parts. At Comtronic, we' re your one-stop Acer

source. Our warehouses arepacked to the ceiling with Acer quality products. And all at prices that figure to leave you plenty of margin.

Call Comtronic, Canada's largest AcerOpen Distributor, now for quality and quality that adds up.

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Call 1-800-297-5505 Today For An Authorized Comtronic Distributor Near You! Toronto 905-479-8336

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E DIT O R ' S D E S K

PC Graphics:Notjust Pretty Pictures Think about this intriguing phenomenon: Kids across the county are regularly holed up in their , basements f o r countless hours; toiling in front of their computer screens until the wee hours of the morning. They' re rendering large graphics files, manipulating images, doing raytracing, drawing, experimenting with fills, light sources, reflection.

If you ask them: "Why?," (believe me, I have), they' ll shrug, and say: "For fun."

Of course, it's not just the kids who are getting their kicks from experimenting with and pushing the limits on computer graphics.As resellersofhardware, graphics software, hard drives and RAM — you can no doubt attest to this craze. As a hobby, it unquestionably has merits. "It keeps them off the streets," shrugged Kai Krause, graphics guru, plus cofounder, and science and design officer for MetaTools Inc. Yet, beyond the entertainment value; these people who are really getting their minds around these digital graphics are preparing for the new reality, as advances in graphics and perhaps even more criticalprocessing power, drive and change not only the interfaces we' ll work with; but the capabilities of computing.

Krause was on hand for the recent Intel Platforms for Visual Computing briefing day in San Jose, Calif. (Please see "Intel Makes 'Visual Computing' Push," page 16.) Industry players showed off the latest in computer graphics, 3D, video capabilities; and discussed the potential impacts on such sectors as entertainment, medicine, retailing and business.

3D Photos One of the most telling demonstrations came perhaps from MetaTools. The company invited Craig Barrett, executive vicepresident and COO of Intel to take a seat in front of a camera-like device. He obliged.

A moment later, his visage appeared on the overhead computer screen. The audience nodded tolerantly. Digital cameras are certainly a growing market; but not exactly gasp-wrenching material.

But that was yet to come. The demonstrator clicked on the photo of Barrett, and then rotated the 3D image of his head. And there was the audience gasp!

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T he t e c hnology c o m e s fro m MetaTools' partner RTG Technology. The "camera" was an RTG 3D scanner. The company claims:"scanning a human face results in a model of approximately 10,000 triangles, complete with a super high-quality texture map, in 0.3 seconds on either a PC or SGI platform; the output model is optimally triangulated and ready for editing. Large objects can be scanned in parts and then the triangle-based data 'glued' together as a single 3D image." For more on the technology, and to view some 3D photos, check out: http: //www.metatools. corn/rtgeom/.

Think of the implication for on-line catalogs. Imagine, not just seeing a photo of your potential purchase — what if you could turn it around, examine it from every angle; open it and manipulate it?

The future is graphical; and it's not just window dressings — it's a meaningful evotg/ii lution of computing.

Good News Graphics For resellers, it's only good news. The processors are getting faster,the computers are everincreasingly powerful; driving and accommodating these new scenarios in an intriguing chicken-and-egg fashion. Networking capabilities will definitely have to speed up. The need for high-quality printing will only see increasing growth. (Please see: "Preparing For The Printer Market In I997," page 26.)

Memory and storage requirements are already exploding and as your users look for more capability to handle the massive files that are being created; expect this to only accelerate.Be sure to check out CCW's special Lab Test report this issue on hard drives, on page 38. And check out "The Recordable CD Yields Opportunity," page 36.

Meanwhile, remember many of those kids who come into your stores to pick up an extra 16MB of RAM, may be doing very significant work for major corporations in just a short while.

And if you have someone toiling away at computer creations late at night in YOUR basement — well, be sure to leave a light on. Elfgl Grace Casselman Editor

C A N ADIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER May 1997 /i rtp/twwwccwmag.corn

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' Wh'o1esalei Publisher Douglas Alder Associate Publishers Judy Prange

Hnri Singh Khnlsa Editor Grace Casselman (gracec Cmnetcom.ca) Associate Editor Jeff Evans (jeff@tcpon.corn) Contributing Writers Graeme Benneit Tim Bingham-Wnllis Jazz Bhooi Hugh Black Gary Davies Douglas Gray Ralpl&gyatt

Thomas Ktem Pau) Limn Stele Halirtda ' Stephen Ibnrnki p Dnv@Tanaka

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KarisAfartwig Megan Johnston Key Account M t) Tino Wong uieger(Eee (tinol tcpon.corn) Key Account Manager (West) Jamie Leighion (jamie@tcp.ca) Account Managers Marsha Miller (marsha@tcpon.corn) Frank Houston

(frank@tcpon.cd)m), Controller Christine McPhie $/ Accounting Fnridn Aini Circulation Farida Aini ~ Esther Purr'vodn Founders Kent+ in Chen.g Li ~ g

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L ET T E R S

TO TH E E DIT OR

Is Windows CE Ready For Banking With IE? i'

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I read your Editor's Desk article regarding Windows CE. I was wondering if the IE version in WinCE has the low-level security in it?

This would help if people wanted to bank on-line.

Also, do you know when Philips Velol is coming out to the public?

Myles Lu Electrical technician AMOX Engineering Inc., Burnaby, BC mylesville@geocities.corn

Editor'sN ote: Windows CE 1.1 has added support forSecureSocketsLayer (SSL 2 and SSL 3), and PrivateCommunications Technology (PCT). Users of Version 1.0 can download an upgrade from: http:/lwww.microsoft.comlwindowscelpiel There are a variety of featuresthat can be found in the fullfledged desktop version of Internet Explorer, but not on the handheld. They include support for: scripting languages such as JavaScript, JScript, and Visual BasicScripting; animated objects such as GIF, AVI, MPEG, and MOV (QuickTime) objects; MIDI, AU, and AIFF sound files; ActiveX controls and cookies.

For a full list, see: http: /lwww.microsoft.comlwindowsceldeveloperldataldesignerlhtmLhtm and http: /lwww.m cles/q161/3/19.htm. icr osoft.comlkblarti However, as Bill Gates himself says, this isjust Version One of the Windows CE handhelds, and we should expect to see significantimprovements in subsequent releases.

According to Philip's Web site — http:/lwww.velol.corn, the Velo has just started to ship.

Hewlett-Packard's bigger-screen 320LX should also start shipping this summer. Iti c

Vancouver VAR Seeks

Sourcing Partners I have recently started up a VAR business, a small-time PC system reseller. I would like to be pointed in the right direcnon for sourcing software (including O Ss, sui tes,apps and games) as w ellas a good PC hardware source or sources. I do not intend to resell assembled systems, but to piece them together from the case up.

Any assistance you could offer in helping me to create a competitive, successful VAR business would be appreciated.

Robert )V Virtue President Virtue Engineering Solutions Vancouver Robert Virtue@mindIink.net

(604) 253-6315 I

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Pe welcome your letters on industry issues and concerns, and your comments on our magazine.

8e reserve the right to edit your contributions for length and clarity.

Please write to The Editor, via E-mail at ccw@tcp.ca, or fax: (604) 608-2686.

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CA N A DIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER May 1997 tt rtpvwwwccwmag.cpm

I NDU S T RY F L A S H

Intel demonstrates P entium II in N e t P C

Nevv standard supports critical Java applications Despite all the hoopla about the potential of the Java programming language to re-define the computer software market, precious little in the way of commercial Java applications has made it into this market so far.

However, the appearance of real, shrinkwrapped Java applicat ions may have been brought a step closer due as some major vendors are defining a standard for development of key business software using the Java language.

On April 4, IBM, Oracle and Tandem announced an alliance designed to specify a new Javalanguage extension,named JSQL, to help create business critical Java database applications.

According to Jon Kannegaard, vice-president of software products of the JavaSoft division of Sun Microsystems, "JSQL will help bring Java to the enterprise by creating Java database applications that are written entirelyin Java. Oracle, IBM and Tandem working together to drive this specification shows continued innovation and momentum for Java in the enterprise."

One of the key building blocks for successful use of Java applications is the ability to write Java applications that can easily gain access to relational databases.

A draft version of the JSQL specification i s now a v ailable fo r d o w nload f r o m http: //www.splash. javasoft.corn/databases.

(NB) — Andy Grove, chief executive officer at Intel Corp. recently demonstrated the next generation of Pentium microprocessors, Pentium II, in a networked computer, called NetPC. "The migration from the world of the 486 microprocessorto the Pentium microprocessor was a major progression for the world of computing," began Manny Vara, spokesperson for InteL "After the Pentium came the Pentium Pro. Now, we see Pentium II as the next major progression in microprocessors. It will deliver a level of performance which will astound Ant(yOlnye Intel CEO the industry."

Vara also said, "There is a lot of talk about which microprocessor has the most speed. We can alltalk about 200, 266 and 400MHz processors, but performance is what counts and performance comes from more than just clock speed." His comments focus on Pentium II which, according to Intel, represents anentirelynew form ofmicroprocessor.

Pentium II does not have pins similar to its predecessors. It also does not have the standard ceramic cartridge. Pentium II has a plastic and metal cartridge called "Single Edge Contact." Instead of the multi-pin connection to a motherboard, Pentium II fits into a slot, called Slot I, similar to a PCI slot.

"As we move forward into an era where tens of millions of people will be buying computers, Intel has to have a microprocessor which can be produced dependably and rapidly in high volume," added Vara. "Pentium II is the design which makes that possible."

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Please write: The Editor; CanadianComputerWholesaler CanadianComputerWholesalerwelcomesyour opinions408- 99 Atlantic Ave., Toronto, Ontario M6K 3J8 on current issues in the market, plus your feedbackon Fax: (416) 588-8574 E-mail:ccwetcp.ca our publication.

Editor: GraceCasse(man Call: (403) 262-7890 Fax: (403) 262-7892 E-mail: gracec@netcom.ca

We welcomeyour ideas regarding news and feature topics forCanadian Computer Wholesaler. Associate Editor: Jeff Evans Feel free to contact the editors directly with your Call: (416) 535-8404 suggestions.

Fax: (416) 588-8574 E-mail: jeff@tcpon.corn

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(804) 279-0320 (t,i Tom e.gn . (906) 525-9 Trumpet Oiatributova

We'd like to hearyour feedbackand suggestions onour Test Labsreviews section.

Contact: Steve Halinda Call: (416) 535-8404 Fax: (416) 588-8574 E-mail:stevet0)tcpon.corn

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http//wwwccwmag.corn May 1997 C ANADIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER 9

I NDU S T RY F L A S H

DVO Consortium announces licensing plans (NB) — The 10 companies that make up the DVD Consortium, an exclusive club that only companies which hold DVD related patents can join, has announced the completion of licensing plans for the new system. It means that companies outside the 10 consortium members are now free to license and manufacture DVD-based technology.

Under the new plan, which is only an interim solution before full licensing is worked out, companies can get a licence for the DVD system and logo from Toshiba, which is acting as a representative for the consortium. Excluded from this licence are DVD patents, which will still have to be licensed from each patent-holder.

Licensing of the system will cover any device associated with DVD, including players, drives, other equipment and discs for both DVD-Video and DVD-ROM. Devices or discs that conform to the specifications will also be able to carry the DVD logo. Licensing is available through Toshiba DVD Business Promotion and Support, DVD Products Division, in Tokyo.

The DVD Consortium is made up of Hitachi Ltd., Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. Ltd., Mitsubishi Electric Corp., Philips Electronics NV, Pioneer Electronics Corp., Sony Corp., Thomson Multimedia, Time Warner Inc., Toshiba Corp. and Victor Co. of Japan Ltd. (JVC).

internet Explorer preview saw an on-line distribution surge

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One of t h e g reat questions for resellers is whether or not distribution and sale of software via the Internet will replace sales by traditional distributors, re sellers and VARs. On April 7, one of the largest software distribution services on the Internet, TUCOWS (The Ultimate Collection of Winsock Software) claimed to have distributed more than 500,000 copies of Microsoft Internet Explorer 4 Platform Preview Release in less than 48 hours.

TUCOWS has more than 150 affiliate sites around the world, according to TUCOWS founder Scott Swedorski, "All my mirror sites are E-mailing me like crazy. One server in Australia told me their (download) statistics went up over 9000 per cent.

More than 1,000,000 copies have been downloaded since Saturday when the software was first put online. It was difficult to determine exactlyhow many were downloaded during the first 24 hours due to technical difficulties, but we believed that this was one of the busiest days of downloads in our history."

There has been great interest in IE (Internet Explorer) 4.0, due to its discussed features, which will allow it to integrate more closely with the Windows 95 desktop. IE 4.0 is widely expected to offer a large, well integrated suite of tools ranging from E-

CA N A DIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER May 1997 ht tp/twwwccwmag.corn

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mail to Web authoring, broadcasting, and conferencing. It's also supposed to support off-line reading of Web data and to offer automatic updating notifications.

To date, downloading demo versions of software over the Web has been an effective marketing tool for some software publishers, though relatively few full versions of software title are offered, mainly due to the slow speed of most Internet connections. Software publishers who get the best response to offers of preview versions of their software tend to be companies with 'hot,' welladvertised, popular software. Games software such as "Doom" and "Quake," Web browser software such as Netscape Navigator and Microsoft Internet Explorer, and business productivity software such as Corel's Java office suitebeta,have generated thousands of downloads in short periods of time.

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Montreal's MEIreleases UniverSell for sales automation MEI, a Montreal firm that has achieved rapid growth internationally with its sales automation softwareformobile computer users,has announced the release of UniverSell,its nextgeneration of salesforce technology. "UniverSell was developed in response to three major trends affecting organizations today," according to MEI president Anthony Gentilcore. "Corporate investment in technology is growing in strategic importance; companies are becoming more global and sales representatives need to be more effective wherever they are; and management is required to achieve more results with fewer resources."

UniverSell has been engineered to allow users to employ the Internet, LANs or other connectivityoptions to synchronized data between mobile users and PC, serverorm ainframe based databases.

For more information, contact http: //www.universell.corn.

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lotus says: get your motor runnin: win a hog IBM Canada signs Supercom

for Aptiva home PCs IBM Canada has added Supercom as an authorized distributor of the Aptiva line of home computers.

Markham, Ont.-based Supercom joins Beamscope as an authorized Aptiva distributor.

"With the recent expansion of the Aptiva line to include three distinct product families, IBM felt the time was right to also expand the reseller base for Aptiva," said Gary Isaacs, general manager, consumer channels, for IBM Canada, in a statement.

In an effort to rev up sales, Lotus Canada has initiated a SmartSuite 97 sales promotion that that is aimed at appealing to the 'Wild One' lurking inside that enterprise or SOHO software buyer's mild mannered exterior.

Unfil May 31, Lotus Canada states, any qualified entrant in the Lotus "Win A New Way To Work: SmartSuite 97 Sweepstakes" promotion has a chance to win a Harley-Davidson XLH Sportster 883 â&#x20AC;˘ 97 Hugger motorcycle.

Lorna Rosenstein, general manager or Lotus Development Canada showed off both her flagship software title and the Harley for the official launch of the promotion on April first.

Entry forms and contest details are available at a wide range of participating retailers, such as Future Shop, PC Home Computing, Computer City, Business Depot/Staples, Doppler, London Drugs and Office Depot. The promotion is not being run in Quebec.

For more information, contact http: //www.lotus.corn/canada.

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Former Canadian executives of Bell k. Howell Ltd. have acquired that company's Document Management Division for an undisclosed amount.

The new company is called DocuCom Imaging Solutions Inc. Raymond Patterson is president and Martin Mollot is vice-president.

The Toronto-based company will continue to market and service Bell sic Howell's document management products under a distribution agreement with Bell k. Howell. The company will also support such suppliers as Minolta Corp., Microfilm Technology Corp. and Kodak Canada Ltd. DocuCom Imaging Solutions will employ the division's 85 employees and will assume responsibility for oifice facilities across Canada.

The company can be reached at (416) 746-1141.

Microsoft launches suitagainst reseller

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Microsoft Canada Inc. is taking an Ottawa-based reseller to court, citing piracy.

According to Michael Eisen, legal counsel for Microsoft Canada, the companycommenced an action in the FederalCourt ofCanada on M arch 24 against Compufacts Canada Inc.,which operates under the name Akran Systems, in Ottawa.

Microsoft is alleging that reseller sold 500 computers to the Ottawa Board of Education that were loaded with copies of MS-DOS 6.22. Eisen said the board didn't receive licences to MS-DOS with the computers; and eventually contacted Microsoft on the matter. Eisen said Microsoft is seeking an injunction to prevent Akran from infringing on Microsoft's patents; and is seeking damages.

A kranSystems'owner Raman Agarwal hassaid,in a statem ent:"In reality, the problem surrounding the Ottawa Board situation is not that of software piracy; rather it is purely a technical matter involving sale of an upgrade to the client for the best price advantage under their tight budget constraint."

A separate statement from the company called it "regretful" that Microsoft is attempting to "defame and prosecute a small business in the media without waiting for the due course in letting the judicial system take a decision based on facts." CCW

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Restructuring of the Mac maker leaves some technology by the wayside.

by Gary Davies

Gilbert F. Amelio apparently thinks his com- Apple Video Conferencing, Open Transport and position in February 1996, he said this would be a three-year transformation, and we' re only pany has lost a few battles, but is still a long Game Sprockets. way from losing the war. The chairman and More focus will instead be placed on "the at the end of year one," Jones says. "We feel CEO of Apple Computer Inc. last March delivery" of the company's next-generation confident we can steer the company into the pulled back from in-roads made into new mar- operating system, code-named Rhapsody, black by the end of this fiscal year."

Jones says. "When we articulated our strategy The discontinuation of several Mac kets and technologies, announcing that his company would return to its roots and focus on it was to move toward Java-based technology, products will certainly help in that effort. the markets that made it one of the most popu- which is becoming the industry standard."

Craig Bowman, owner of the Mac Classroom lar computer companies of the mid-'80s: conRhapsody is based on technology acquired in Calgary, says users won't miss much of sumer, education, publishing and new media. from Apple co-founder Steven Jobs. Amelio what was left on th e chopping block.

"Generally, most of the technology that was It was a move that not only resulted in a reportedly paid Jobs US$430 million for his complete restructuring of Apple's corporate NeXT Inc. software company and has made him eliminated, wasn't of good use.

'The one exception, though, is Open hierarchy, but also saw a number of popular, a special adviser to Apple. While much has been rumored about Rhapsody, users will have to wait Transport. I think that was a big mistake. But the and not so popular, technologies fall by the wayside. "We' vegone to a more functional until next year to try the new operating system. dumping of the remaining products was long organizational structure internally," says Peter "Our long-term strategy has always been overdue. I think it was a classic situation of a lot Jones, president (until last month) of Apple to focus on our operating system," Jones says. of marketing types at Apple working themselves Canada Inc. "And from a technology stand- "The Mac OS has been the difference for the into techie positions and being there far too long." company since 1984." point, we' re simply focusing on aspects that On the hardware side of things, Apple our customers are looking for — portability, Amelio's decision to concentrate more decidedto cease production of its Performa low-cost, Mac-like features." on the development of the Macintosh operat- line of products in favor of the Power The technological losses are unfortunate ing system is interesting in light of a recent- Macintosh brand. The company said it would in the ongoing war for the personal computer ly released report which showed the compa- help to eliminate confusion for customers trymarket, but Amelio says his company's top pri- ny's market share in the U.S. dealer channel ing todecide between Performa productsand orities must be "the rapid delivery of distinctive on the rise, Power Macintosh models, all of which have products for our loyal business, eduNew research from Computer Power PC microprocessors.

"There's been a lot of problems with the cation and home customers."

Intelligence, released a week prior The h uman l o sses w ere to Apple's announced restructuring Performa model," Bowman notes. "The origextremely harsh. Across the board, plans, indicated the Mac OS plat- inal 603 chip had some major problems, and 4,100 staff lost their jobs in the form was taking market share from there were some real duds out there. The restructuring, 11 of which were the x86 platform. Figures indicated 5300 was arealnightmare." employed at Apple Canada Inc., it's high time Apple realized it the Mac OS share rose to 11 per cent including the president Peter Jones. in January 1997 from just eight per as biting oIf ~ t h an it could chew. "Apple The majority of responsibilities usucent in Nov e r 1 996. has alway~ t h i s vision of itself as a grand pat8t Joiias "I t ' ght b e more impor: provider o.~ ally handled by Jones have now fallt o o ls.

Kardware,software, it en into the hands of functional managers wh o t a n t for Apple to 1 at d o m inant m e t didn't ma ""..'g think you' re starting to see a ' will report to their head-office counterparts. share in their impo markets, rath' an realization '.,that' was way too much of a "I'm of two minds on the changes," says w hat constitutes to ket s h are o r mandate — y c o m pl y — save for IBM." Michael O' Neil, senior vice-president of IDC O ' Neil says, noting ompany will like 'vebeen any realbenefactors of If the Canada.

"On one hand, you're betteroffhav- n e ver rise above 10 ' ' nt in the PC market. Apple's rec ' moves, it has been companies ing strong local management, but on the other The results mov mp u t eq 1 ~ 2 e like Motoro ch are shipping clone modhand, they' re still running their marketing out s e nior industry analys e T r emNJltt648trf- els at a rapi of the U.S." ment at the time, "For st t h e short run, the O' Neil Al o t arqla can't make enough But what has the majority of Apple users M a c OS market can b b l e even as Ap'pie' , e dema'tie oItt there. talking these days was the company's decision s t u mbles." 'tie sold lately," to discontinue development of no fewer than Trembley also creditedIIIdlotoroiag owman says, "w'e've sold 10 to 12 clones." Itttl] seven Apple products. The company announced i n t o the Mac clone mar et as aang strength' it would no longer invest in the OpenDoc object a n d growth to the platfo s—'jvo~ equal to Gary Davies is a Calgary-based journalist architecture, its Cyberdog browser, AIX Server 6 1 per cent over a two-m th period. who specializes in high technology and < operanng system, Mac OS Development Tools, "When Gilbert Ameli tzst took over hi busi ness reporting.

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Intel Makes Visual omyutinI' Push

by Grace Casselnian

Microprocessor giant announces strategies, partnerships to push the envelope on PC graphics we' re looking for more person hours in front Intel Corp. is one of the most profitable of the PC." corporations in the world, and that's unlikely However, content has a ways to go. to change any time soon, as long as that company turns out more and more powerful People are used to a certain quality of content microprocessors; and while the buying mar- from their TVs, "and they want no less on ket continues to clamour for increased pro- their personal computers." cessing capability. But just in case, Intel is AGP Supporters setting itself up as something of an evangeEight graphics chip companies, including list, promoting and encouraging emerging 3Dlabs, ATI, C i rrus L ogic, Evans & technologies and markets that will need all Sutherland, NVIDIA, S3 and Trident say they the processing power Intel is able to squeeze will ship Accelerated Graphics Port products out of its silicon.

Top on that list is something Intel is call- in 1997. Intel also announced development of a high-speed extension to the specification (to ing "visual computing," as the company seeksto push the acceptance of high perfor- be incorporated in Q4), called AGP 4X mode.

It will double the bandwidth of AGP to mance 3D, video and imaging on the desktop.

IGB/sec., and is targeted at high-end workPeter Christy, market analyst and presistations. d ent o f Mic r oDesign R esources, i n Sunnyvale, Calif., said Intel is searching to Avid Investment identify "what could people possibly want Intel announced a US$14.75 million investthat causes them to need processors more ment in Avid Technology Inc., a developer of powerful than 166MHz Pentiums? Intel is video and audio editing products. As part of the now moving into broad technology evange- agreement, Avid will develop digital content lism," he said. For example, highly graphics creation tools for Intel-based systems. This deal intensive and 3D markets will be able to gives Intel 6.75 per cent ownership in Avid. make use ofsuch technological advances as "William Miller, chairman and CEO of MMX. Intel is working to "rev up the indus- Avid said, in a statement: "This agreement try and create demand," he said. marks a significant milestone in Avid's drive Christy commented: "This is what Apple to bring powerful digital content creation was really good at until it ran out of money." solutions to the millions of potential users in Intel recently sponsored a special cus- corporations, government, academic institutomer/partner briefing day in San Jose, Calif., tions, small business and homes. Intel archicalled Intel Platforms for Visual Computing. tecture-based computers are the clear volume At that, Intel announced a series of leaders in these market segments." partnerships on the visual computing front. According to Christy, not Kodak Partnershsp .,w g~ Intel and Eastman Kodak Co. also only do those partnerships give Intel a chance to promote emerging marteamed up toadvance a number of industry specifications for conkets, they also allow pertinent developers to give important feedback as sumer PC imaging, including digital Intel develops its next round of cameras and PC-based editing, storBarrett:We " arereally processors. ing, communication and manipulattle for the "We really are in a battle for the tion. FlashPix (supporters include User'sattention." user's attention," said Craig Barrett, K odak, H e wlett-Packard, L i v e executive vice-president and COO at Intel.

Picture, Microsoft) will leverage MMX to While more PCs will be sold this year than speed image manipulation and processing. television sets, people still spend twice as Future Kodak ImageMagic retail stations much time in front of their TVs. "By 2005, will include support for Universal Serial Bus 16

CA N ADIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER May 1997 htrpJtwwwccwmag.corn

and the I n tel M i n i ature Card f o rmat.

Moreover, both Intel and Kodak will promote the Kodak Picture Network â&#x20AC;&#x201D; a set of digital services meant to supplement capabilities at the desktop.

Kodak says more than 17 billion photos are taken with conventional cameras yearly in the U.S., and quoting IDC figures, expect 15 million digital cameras will be sold annually by the year 2000.

"We' re not in the film business and we' re not in the digital imaging business; we' re in the business of pictures," said Carl Gustin, chief marketing officer and senior vice-president for Kodak. "We want to capture and print pictures; capture, manipulate and store them, and communicate them from Point A t o P oint B . M M X t e chnology, (miniature) flash memory and USB are very powerful contributions that Intel brings to the party.

"Intel and Kodak are one powerful alliance," said Gustin. "It can ultimately benefit camera and PC users in a way that will add up to more than one plus one equals two."

Kai Talks One ofIntel's guestspeakers was Kai Krause, co-founder, and science and design officerfor MetaTools Inc., of Carpinteria, Calif. He said, regarding graphics-intensive, visual computing, that it's "inevitable everyone, whether they want to or not, will be in this game."

But he said there's still a lot of work to be done on software interfaces. For example, he said when someone picks up a tool, for example, a paintbrush â&#x20AC;&#x201D; it should look and work like a real paintbrush, with shadows and realistic movement.

He citedthe interfaces on word processing packages, for example. "Someone needs to take at least one more go at those," said Krause. Ittwl Grace Casse!man is Editor of C anadian Computer Wholesalerand can be reached ar g racec@netcom.ca.

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by Grace Casselman

Compaq Computer Corp. president and CEO Eckhard Pfeiffer says he wants Compaq to be one of the world's top three computer companies by the turn of the century."Today,we 're the fifth largest computer company in the world," said Pfeiffer at the recent Innovate '97 Forum, in Houston.

He said Compaq has "both feet on the acceleratorto speed usto our year2000 goalof being one ofthe top three computer companies in the world."

cent. Looking at the entire market, that adds up to 1.815 million PC systems,of which IBM has 14.8per cent,and Compaq had 11.8per cent.

Bulat said Compaq has experienced major growth in the last few years. "They now have to mean business. They' re taking stock of where theywere, and where they're m oving towards."

The Internet

In April, Compaq demonstrated its Compaq Acceleration Server technology, whichpromises to speed up Internet access for corporate and home users. Users will install a browser plug-in and then designate a server (at an ISP, telco or a corporation) running the Compaq Acceleration technology Customer Delivery as the "proxy" for the downloading of Web pages. The server technology In late March, Compaq launched its Optimized Compaq isproposing is the ProLiant x86/NT server integrated with comCustomer Delivery Initiative. It includes a Channel pression hardware (containing at least 16 digital signal processors, up to 64) from Integrated Computing Engines and Internet software jointly Configuration Program to let authorized resellers developed by the two companies. build computers based on customer specifications, Accordingto Richard Guerra, manager of research and developeliminating the need for them to reconfigure productsbefore customer delivery.Ron Hulse, directorof ment for Compaq's Internet Solutions Division, in Houston, the demonchannel sales and development for Compaq Canada E c khsrd Pheiffer: stration is part of Compaq's "Internet strategy to begin to address Internet infrastructure players." He explained the compression hardware Inc., said the program will be put into place over the aiming for TopThree. coming weeks and months. "We' re evolving the distribution channel to parses the KDvK and looks for images. It takes GIFFs or JPEGs back stay more competitive in the market-place." to their native format, and produces the equivalent of a bitmap that is Compaq will also be working to offer Build-To-Order capabilities transferred via a "wavelet," which is then reconstructed by the plug-in at to Canadian resellers, where products are actually built upon receipt of the user'sdesktop.Guerra said he's seen im agestransferup to 1,000 per a customerorder.The company saysthe model achieves costefficien- cent faster using this technology.

Guerra suggested the technology would likely appear later this year. cies by reducing resellers' needs for on-hand inventory — lessening costs associated with product obsolescence, price protection and invenRichard Morochove, industry analyst and president of Morochove tory returns. Compaq says the capability will be fully operational & Associates Inc. in Toronto, said Compaq's solution to speeding up the 'Net would have appeal because it worldwide by the second half of 1998.

A Configure-To-Order program out of the Houston manufacturing doesn't require anything special of site, "will allow the company to more efficiently deliver customized end-users. However, he said: "The one flaw in the marketing premise is productsto Canadian resellers and customers," says Compaq.

Roger Kay, senior analyst for Framingham, Mass.-based International most ISPs in Canada don't use Data Corp., said these services are aimed to compete with companies like Windows NT as a base."

Dell Computer Corp. But he commented: "It's hard to have your cake and In other news, Compaq has eat it too." And while channel assembly and build-to-order may be good teamed with NetCentric Corp., of initiafives, he said some people will question the quality of the assembly. Cambridge, Mass., to jointly develop However, he said the industry will have to wait and watch as Compaq rolls a metering specification for value-added services over the Internet. It out more details about the programs over the next few months. includes a protocol called Metered Services Information Exchange While Compaq may be growing the direct side of its business in the (MSIX) to let ISPs meter usage and charge for Internet services, such U.S., Compaq Canada sells exclusively through the channels, affirmed as telephony, fax, videoconferencing, content distribution and gaming.

Hulse. "There is no direct business in Canada." However, he said as security concerns over the Internet are further resolved, he expects to New Notebooks, Acquisition eventually see consideration givento increasing Compaq's direct sales, Compaq also announced its Armada 1500 line of "value-priced" notebook computers. Starting at $3,125, the notebooks include a 10X CDon a worldwide basis.

In 1996 i n C a nada, ROM drive, a floppy drive, hard drive and modem; plus an integrated AC ' II I I I according to George Bulat, adapter. Features and options include a 120MHz or 133MHz Pentium • IBM 14.8%-: • 0811 8< 'l" processor, 16MB EDO RAM expandable to 80MB, a 11.3-inch passive manager, PC research at • Compaq 11,8% • Toa" i'- I4/ International Data C orp. matrix or 12.1-inch active matrix display, dual battery support with a ' O i.e NEC 4:;R e AROIN T-6;6! k/ !l!foc IO O"', (Canada) Ltd., Compaq had: choice of Lithium-Ion or Enhanced Smart Nickel Metal Hydride, two 36.5 Per cent of the PC server Type II (or one Type III) PC Card slot; and a touchpad pointing device. soume: International oet Coy. (Csnsds}Ltd And Compaq has recently announced a definitive agreement to market (13,000 units) followed by IBM with 14.4 per cent; 11.2 per cent of the total desktop acquire Norwood, Mass.-basedMicrocom Inc.,a m akerofrem oteaccess market (1.47 million units) — second to IBM which owns 14.2 per cent technologies and solutions, for US$280 million. Xk mf the market; and 11.6 per cent of the notebook market (306,000 Grace Casselman is Editor of Canadian Computer Wholesaler. Shecan units) — following Toshiba with 25.9 per cent and IBM with 17.6 per be reachedatgracec@netcom.ca.

18

CA N ADIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER May 1997 htrprtwwwccwmag.corn

NEW S

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"'ms)ittr) +tcr$Q'„,

Digital Is Back Qn Track With PC Business Meanwhile, Alpha/NT systems tour rolls across Canada, in transport truck.

by Grace Casselman

Businesshas been brisk atD igital Equipment u p in a 7 x 24 operation," he said. products. According to Glenn Bontje, marketDigital says 90 per cent of its PC busi- ing manager for enterprise servers with of Canada Ltd.'s Kanata, Ont.-based PC plant, which turns out as many as 3,000 PCs per day ness goes through reseller channels, and Digital's Systems Business Unit, based in — a significant production countby any stan- c l aims such clients as: the Quebec govern- Calgary, the Driving Force Tour will visit 74 dards. Indeed, those kinds of numbers easily m e nt, TransCanada Pipeline, Stentor, BCTel, North American cities over 20 weeks. The tour is in Montreal on May 28, Ottawa on qualify the company as the larger manufactur- M a n itobaTel and Nortel.

Bill Harris, Digital's enterprise mar- May 29 and 30, and Toronto on Iune 2 and 3. er ofpersonalcomputers in C anada.

The 500,000-square-foot Kanata facility ke t i ng manager, said that even for server At the Calgary stop, Bontje said: "The exports $1.6 billion worth of PCs annually. p r o ducts Digital turns to the channel as key message is Digital is providing leadership technology and leadership partnerships in NT And with more than 1,700 employees in that "experts that are already in the field. We learned that lesson with solutions. He said NT solutions on Alpha syscity, Digital is not only ~ ' - . 1 ~ '" ' I a foundingmember of the PC business." tems arereplacing mainframe servers,while Silicon Valley North, According to a sur- reducing costs for organizations.

A recent Deloitte and Touche report called t he c o mpany a l s o vey on servers released in F ebruary b y Eva n s "Technical Workstation Total Cost of Ownership claims to be the third largest employer in the Research Corp., Digital Study, A Cost Comparison of Microsoft Windows National Capital region, sold 4,000 Intel-based /)/T Workstation and Unix," said the average following the federal servers i n 1 996 in three-year total cost of ownership (TCO) for Canada, ranking itself technical workstations running Windows NT government and Nortel.

Another 500 employees after Compaq and IBM Workstation (Windows NTW) was US$63,000 Oigital's Kanata, Ont., manufacturing facilities staffa service and supand more or less tying versus US$104,000 for comparable Unix are ISO9002-certified. p ort centre i n H u l l , with NEC for Intel server m achines — a savings of39 percent.

Que., handling more than 50,000 calls per m a rket-share. However, many of those sales Philip Doublet, president and CEO of month, with a goal to answer 70 per cent of c a me from existing Digital customers moving Calgary-based systems integrator Chronologic Systems Inc., was in attendance at the Calgary phone calls within 20 seconds and to log or fr o m VAX-based to Intel-based solutions. route requests within three minutes. (There Meanwhile, in March, Digital expanded its stop of the Driving Force Tour. His company are a total of more than 2,800Digital employn o t ebook line with the addition of the KNote works to "leverage the productivity of the ees in Canada, in 38 locations.)

VP 500 series. The HiNote VP 560, 565 and knowledge worker, specializing in corporate But most impressive is thefactthe compa- 575 notebooks have 12.1messaging and mail, ny has returned to profitability, according to Jim i nch displays and incorpoInternet/intranet security, Nolan, general manager of Digital's Personal r ate a removable combinagroupware and d ata Computer Business Unit. Whilethe unit experi- t i o n CD - R OM/diskette warehousing. He said e'Osusrewe versir enced financial losses in Q4 1996 and Ql 1997, d r ive. (The bay supports the company is currently Digital's PC Business Unit turnedthataroundin a n o p t ional second batworking with Digital on its second quarter, and profits were also tery.) They come bundled a 3,500-seat implemenachievedin Q3 '97,which ended March 29. with W i n dows NT tation of Exchange running on an NT backbone.

(The company doesn't break out figures for its Workstation preloaded and Doublet said cusindividual divisions.) 'The turnaround has been preconfigured, and include dramatic," he said. 'The company is investing power managementand plug-and-play features tomershave a choice ofa variety ofhardware in good products, and is buildingforthefuture." for NT. Pricing starts at $5,795. platforms and operating systems. "Our role is to takeaway the pain from customers and There are definitely challenges however, according to Mario Leduc, manufacturing Digital Takes To The Road understand the range and complexity of the C product and business planning manager for Speaking of NT, Digital Equipment Corp. offerings." II'ZIN the Kanata plant. The company runs a build- and Microsoft Corp. have teamed up to take to-order manufacturing environment, and an 18-wheeler on the road to show off Grace Casselman is Editor o f Canadian runs each $5 million line on three shifts per Windows NT, Alpha servers and third-party Computer Wholesalerand can be reached at day. "If you lose capacity, you can't make it technologies that take advantage of those gracec I netcom. ca. frrtpf)rnwwccwmag.corn May 1997 C ANADIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER 1 9

EYE

O N T H E I NDU S T RY

Java phenomenon Hard To Ignore the

p r e eminent

object-oriented programming language for some years now. Java is itp oftenreferred to as a "C++-like" language — and often touted as a +4Aftk,, t8„ more refined one.

J ava programming i s compiled as bytecode files, and that's what contributes to its "write once, run anywhere" portability. Programming code is Like the warm brown beverage that jolts morn- usually compiled into platform-specific exeing veins to action in all parts of the world, Java cutable files, but the bytecode file isn't plat— the technology phenomenon, has seized the form specific.

Th e same bytecode can be used attention of the computer industry worldwide. across all platforms, from Unix workstations The dictionary defines a phenomenon as a to PCs to the coming thin-client network remarkable occurrence, and Java is that, if noth- computers. ing else. Java, like the word "computing" itself, What is specific to each platform is the refers to many things. It is a hardware platform, Java Virtual Machine, which executes the bytea programming language,a setof software code. SeparateVMs have to be created for components, applications, a corporate strategy, everyplatform inorderforJava to run there. a new architecture for the Internet and corporate Java programmerscan write stand-alone intranets — and perhaps even a new religion. Java applications or applets. The latter are usuIt's a perfect expression of Sun Microsystems' allyembedded within aWeb document, and are unofficial slogan "the network is the computer." executedby a Java-enabled browser. Applets There are 300,000 programmers writing were mostpeople's first exposure to Java, as Javacode today, according to Sun. A few comthe downloadable calculator and real-time panies are actually using internally-developed stock market ticker tape made their rounds as Java applications in critical business applications. the toys ofthe week amongst Web surfers.

M oreover, Java has the wholehearted supportof Corel Corp. was the first company to some of the industry's biggest players including announce a full-blown commercial applicafion IBM, Oracle, Netscape Communications, written in Java — the WordPerfect Office suite.

Novell, and Sun itself. Sun CEO Scott McNealy The company now has the official beta version boasts of how quickly this has transpiredof the suite available for downloading on its Web abouttwo years— and it's indeed an accomsite. I downloaded a pre-official beta version of plishment worth crowing about. the suite a week or so before the official beta was posted, and played with it for a bit. Only the WordPerfect and Quattro Pro modules were But What's The Big Deal?

When alchemy was fashionable, the main quests working, but I was surprised at how responsive were for the universal solvent and a way of turn- it was,because I'd heard reports some months ing dross into gold. Sun is looking to create gold back that it was dog slow. Some of the perforby proposing the universal programming solu- mance increase might be attributable to the VM, non. When Sun,Netscape, IBM and Novell which Sun is trying to make faster and faster. sponsored a multi-city Java World Tour 97 earliBut it's not about replicating the PC envier this year, the big theme was "write once, use ronment. While the Java version of Corel anywhere." The implications of that slogan were WordPerfect Suite is a significant project, Java apparent to the object-oriented programming isn't just another way of bringing applications world, which has long championed portable, to the PC — or extending the metaphor of the reusable software components. C++ has been PC as the only personal computing device, for

,+

20

CA N A DIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER May 1997 t i ipf/wwwccwmag.corn

by David Tanaka that matter. Nowhere was that message more clear than at the Sunsponsored JavaOne developers' confere nce, held i n S a n Francisco in early April.

JavaOne Conference There, Sun announced a number of initiatives that seek to take Java to every corner of the computing universe.

For example, Sun announced the PersonalJavaand EmbeddedJava Application Programming Interfaces.In a news release, Sun stated that these, along with a Java Card API announced last October, provide "a unified wayfor programmers to create applications that run on phones, pagers, hand-held computers, printers, copiers, industrial controllers and smart cards."

Among thetarget devices Sun sees for the PersonalJava API are TV set-top boxes and WebTV sets, smart phones and handheld computers. The EmbeddedJava API is for developers that want to use Java on displaylimited devices like pagers or fax machines.

The specifications for these will be finalized later this year.

Sun said it is also making Java accessible to non-programmers with the Java Studio, which it alsoannounced atJavaOne. Sun calls ita "Java for the rest of us" tool. Java Studio includes a graphical HTML authoring tool, a Visual Java assembly tool, and a set of 75 JavaBeans, which arereusable software components.

These include controls for building user interfaces, for viewing information, accessing data, and m u ltimedia components (image viewers and audio players). Sun says an early adopters' version of JavaStudio will be available for download in June, Ittlll Contacts: Corel: http: //www.corel.corn Sun Mlcrosystems: http: //www.sun.corn David Tanaka is a Vancouver-based journalist specializing in high technology, and is News Editor of The Computer Paper. He can be reached at david@tcp.ca.

T HE

I NDUSTRY

ave eens The technology business is full of examples of products and companies that apparently came out of nowhere,flourished, and thenjust as quickly have gone from being mightily impressive to abject failures.

How can resellers avoid tying their fortunes to a failure?

All resellers dream of getting in on the ground floor of the Next Big Thing â&#x20AC;&#x201D; that new technology market, product, craze, or gadget that is going to make megabucks. Get in early, while there is a good profit to be made and prime clients to be won, and get out early, from markets or product lines that are about to decline.

No reseller or distributor wants to be stuck with inventory that will have to be drastically discounted in order to be blown out.

So, how do you pick the winners and avoid being dragged down by the losers?

Commodore Commodore Business Machines, which was founded in Canada, grew from a little business equipment sales and repair shop on Davenport Rd. in Toronto, to a global personal computer giant that sold about 20 million computers â&#x20AC;&#x201D; and then collapsed in confusion in 1994. Commodore's greatest success was the Commodore 64, an inexpensive, versatile, and bythestandards ofthe early 1980s,easyto-use personal computer. "I Adore My 64" was the brilliant slogan on the lips of a whole generation of f i rst-time computer users.

Resellers who got on the C64 bandwagon early watched product fly off the shelves quickly and at good profit margins.

However, Commodore management, after a great start, began to believe its own PR, became arrogant, and lost sight of longterm business realities, Commodore alienated its dealer channels by forcing resellers to take shipments o f unwa n ted, u n p opular Commodore products if they wanted to get allocation of the scarce, highly prized C64s.

Commodore counted on the fact that the loyalty it had earned from resellers and endusers in the early years would offset its poor practices later on. And, for a long time, memories of the good times and the good profits kept Commodore's resellers on-side. As one of Commodore's top Canadian dealers put it when describing what it was like to deal with Commodore, "We always knew there was crap on the floor, we just tried not to step in it."

In the fall of 1993, however, with the

Commodore product line having become obsolete and overpriced, the company's creditors decided to stop extending credit to the company, and Commodore quickly found that it had alienated all its former friends. It had run out of time and money to re-engineer the company or even to continue to build computers. It then went into a death spiral that ended with l i quidation i n A p ri l 1 9 94.

Thousands of dealers, third-party developers and creditors, not to mention millions of endusers, were left holding the bag.

Blg Blue: From Behemoth To Bungler, To Behemoth IBM, which benefited from the widespread belief that "Nobody ever got fired for buying IBM," staggered in the late '80s and early '90s by not adapting to the rapidly changing computer market it had dominated for the previous 20 years. Like Commodore, IBM brass insulated themselves from customers and market realities. Perversely, technology leader IBM had hobbled some of its best new technologies (such as RISC workstations) for fear of competing with higher ticket 'big iron' computers. IBM had also tried to push products on the market that it didn't want (such as the PC Junior, and the proprietary Micro Channel architecture), and had developed a bad reputation among its resellers for

allowing its in-house sales force to scoop sales leads generated by its outside business partners. Unlike Commodore though, when IBM ran into its troubles it found that it still had lots of friends (in the form of committed governmentand business customers),a reputation for quality, and a depth of technological and human assets that gave it the means to get out of its troubles.

Under an exceptional new leader, Lou Gerstner, IBM reformed itself quickly, and though it will never have the same dominance it once enjoyed, is once again a healthy, major player. Dealers who stuck with IBM, in general, made a good choice.

Xerox First, Xerox Corp. innovated most of the key components needed for an intuitive easy to

by Jeff Evans

use personalcomputer: the graphical user interface, windows, icons and pointing devices.

Xerox senior management didn't understand this brilliant invention could have made Xerox the leader of a whole new personal computing industry. They were fixated on concentrating on a single-purpose, expensive, specialized corporate word processing system instead of m ass market, flexible PCs. Fortunately for the rest of the world, Xerox failed to patent its best ideas, and let Apple's Steve Jobs stroll through their lab to see and 'borrow' these concepts.

Apple Apple insisted on being the only company allowed to use its own wonderful MacOS technology. If you wanted to use the Apple operating system, you had to buy the hardware to run it on from Apple, and only from Apple. This left Apple fatally vulnerable to smarter, less narrow-minded competitors.

Microsoft's Bill Gates, was left free to learn from the Mac (Microsoft has generally been the biggest Mac software developer) and apply its lessons to the much bigger IBM- compatible PC market.

If Steve Jobs had had the foresight to think of the "Mac on PC!" idea and act on it, he might today be the world's richest man. As it is, Apple is doing a dance somewhere between the Commodore Death Spiral and The IBM Stumble. Apple is in very serious trouble, but it still retains a lot of customer loyalty, some decent products, and a reasonably strong dealer base.

The Next Blg Thing Have a real good look at yours partners' current products, their business practices and their R8rD directions and budgets. If you see fundamental disregard for sound business practices, and disregard for market demands, be preparedto cut your losses and quickly find alternative products to sell. ICCW i Jeff Evans is Associate Editor of Canadian Computer 8'holesaten based in Toronto. He can be reached atj eff@tcpon.com.

http//wwwccwmag.corn May 1997 C ANADIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER 2 1

D ES K T O P

V I D EO C O N F ER EN C I N G M A R K ET I'

NemoVieleocoafsaencinff Wil Seem,SaysSteely (NB) — Desktop videoconferencing will Some senior citizens' centres are grow sharply over the next four years, and i n stalling videoconferencing so seniors can the home market will account for the conduct videoconference visits with lion's share of that growth, according children and grandchildren over '' to a new study by International : long distances, Buckingham Data Corp. noted.

Businesses have been the In 2001, IDC expects ' first into desktop videoconferenc- ,,' 1 about 600,000 desktop video';,„ conferencing units to ship to ing, but even today almost as many , I, " home as business users are buying «~ e , , bus i ness customers, and some " -'-" = ' - = , : - - "' desktop videoconferencing:-'5.4 million to sell into the " e ' ',,$j~ " . gear, according to IDC's fig- ~j'4,,:.Ind home market. ures. Between now and „/ B ucki n g h a m , ~ r 7..'Ir, ,' Q — --=-- - - ~ - ' ~ 2001,the research firm said IDCgatheredits expects annual busi- p lf g hfllie pf ffeiktOp figures by talking to ness shipments t o • • • videoconferencing slightly more than dou- VlllIOCOllferellClllg Ulllto III1$97l vendors, not by smveying users, and so ble, but predicts home videoconferencing has little data about Home clddtumem shipments will increase the precise uses to more than 20-fold. which people are IDC's r e port, "Desktop Video- pu t t ing their videoconferencing gear. IDC said conferencing: Audio/Visual Collaboration des ktop videoconferencing is taking off Via the PC," says business customers will b ec a use the equipment is getting better and buy about268,000 desktop videoconferenc- cheaper — a consumer system can be had for ing units this year, while home customers U S $400 to US$500, Buckingham saidstandards efForts are making it easier for difwill buy about 250,000.

Edward Buckingham, an IDC analyst, f e rent vendors' equipment to work together, said the home sales could include some peo- and new video and graphics chips and comple who have desktop videoconferencing at p r ession techniques are boosting performance. home but use it mainly for business purposThe latest desktop videoconferencing es, but he said the equipment is also being p r oducts are going beyond point-to-point used to keep in touch with distant relatives c o n ferencing, into true multi-point, multiand for other non-business purposes. media videoconferencing, IDC said. "

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S H I P P I N G — F O B R i ch m o n d B . C . , C a n a d a

by Dan McLean A few wordsof advice for those considering a ramp up to super-quick 56Kbps high-speed modem technologies â&#x20AC;&#x201D; not so fast.

Making the move to this next generation of Internet connectivity is still a risky proposition and making a choice today could mean a biggerheadache tomorrow, if the 56Kbps modem technology you choose to support doesn'temerge as the industry standard.

Internet service providers are especially wary, since none want to be in a position of having to refurbish their wiring closets more than once, so they are apt to delay full and wide-scale implementation.

M any experts are advising resellers and consumers to wait for the dust to clear. "If you' re a large corporate user you probably should delay your decision to buy more modems until the standard is set," said Abner Germanow of International Data Corp. in Framingham, Mass. "If you' re an ISP, to go with a pre-standard technology [means making] sure it's software-upgradeable because you don't want to have to go into your wiring closet any more times than you have to."

Whether it's U.S. Robotics Corp.'s X2 or Rockwell Semiconductor Systems/Lucent Technologies/Motorola Inc.'s K56flex, take comfort in the fact that purchasing either won't mean buying a potentially useless technology. When a 56Kbps modem standard is finally hammered out, both will ultimately be made compatible by their respective makers, accordingto Germanow.

Both technologies work basically the same, employing a software-based modulation scheme, he said. There are slight differences in the software coding that currently makes X2 and K56flex non-compatible and each modem maker, "simply has to agree that the technologies will speak to one another.

K56flex is the more widely adopted of the two technologies among vendors, with support coming from the likes of A ST Computer, Compaq C o mputer C o rp.,

Hewlett-Packard Corp. and Toshiba Corp.

According to Rockwell, its K56flex will offer speeds up to 64Kbps, without requiring the installation of new phone lines. The company argues most central site modem manufacturers already use Rockwell chipsets and more than300 of them have already pledged their support for K56flex.

The more proprietary X2 technology from U.S. Robotics has the advantage of being first to market with available product.

X2 technology, introduced in early March, is a software download (US$99) for Courier modems and a chip upgrade (US$69) for Sportster modems.

Truth be told, Germanow said users can initially expect speeds in the 40Kbps range.

A number o f I S P s h ave already announced their support for the U.S. Robotics technology. According to A l a n W h ite, Canadian district manager for U.S. Robotics, that list c u rrently i n cludes Sympatico, Netcom Canada, AOL Canada, IStar and TotalNet. At press time the modem maker was also n e gotiating w i t h H o o k Up Communications. "We have a program for Internet service providers to help get them upgraded to X2 and to provide some co-marketing funds for them to help really push the fact that they have X2," White said.

White admitted user confusion abounds, but predicted those same users are willing to buy into the U.S. Robotics technology because of the company's huge installed base.

"Absolutely there is confusion in the marketplace now. There's not as much as there could be because we' re the only one shipping a (56Kbps modem) product today (at press time)," he said. "We dominate the marketplace here in Canada. For sales out of distribution for 28.8 and above desktop and internal modems, we controla 65 per cent marketshare here in Canada, and for PC Card modems, we control a 91 per cent marketshare. "Most people are jumping on the X2

24 CANADIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER May 1997

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bandwagon," White added. "Where the pressure really lies is with the service providers.

Because the service providers will sit back and say, 'Yeah,65 per cent ofmy [users]are using U.S. Robotics so I' ll have to support X2. But then I'm turning my back on the other 35 per cent.' So I think the pressure is really going to be on the service providers to support both standards."

Recently three o thers entered the 56Kbps product fray. Hayes Microcomputer offers an upgrade program for any vendor's modem to Hayes 56Kbps Accura modemsfor US$99. Bay Networks Inc. will provide a free 56Kbps technology upgrade for its BayDSP Integrated Digital Signal Processing modem in it s carrier-class 5399Remote Access Concentrator Module for the 5000 MSX Multi-Service Switch.

Most recently, an Etobicoke, Ont.-based Global Village Communication announced the availability in May of 56Kbps Macintosh modems which support both K56flex and X2 technology, called Teleport 56. The street priceforthese products is $289.

It is on the server side where Rockwell may have the edge. K56flex has the support of two giant chip makers and an approximately 70 per cent share of the installed server line base in North America.

Hayes andits partners are also members of theOpen56K forum, a group of vendors who have come together in an attempt to settle the 56Kbps standards issue. That group planned to hold its first meeting on April 23 in New York.

The T elecommunications I n dustry Association, the organization that will set the standards, has a timetable of June for a decision, but many, including Germanow expect it will b e sometime next year before a 56Kbps standard emerges. ICCW I Dan McLean is a Toronto-based journalist who specializes in high technology reporting.

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Chipset: Intel 430TX, optimized for MMX™ Technology Processor: Support Intel Pentium /MMX™ 75-200MHz, Cyrix 6x68 to P166+ Series, AMD K5/K6 Series.

Award PCI BIOS: Support LS-120 120MB ATAPI Floppy Disk Drive Symbios SCSI BIOS: Support 53C810/860 Ultra SCSI Cache: 512KB Write-Back, Pipelined Burst L2 Cache

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RAM: 4 xSIMM+ 2x DIMM. (Max 256MB)

PCI Bus Master: 2 x PCI Bus Master IDE, support LBA mode, PIO mode 3, 4 Ultra33 Synchronous DMA Mode

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LinkUp Technology, Inc. 722 Gordon Baker Road North York, Ontario M2H 3B4 • Voice: 416-499-4707 • Toll-Free: 1-888-218-4968 • Fax: 416-499-6103 • E-mail:sales@linkup.on.ca • Web: www.linkup. on.ca

WESTERN CANADA CNS Technologies 396 W. Broadway Vancouver, B.C. VSY 1PB • Voice: 604-876-5558 • Fax: 604-876-2255

EASTERN CANADA Lexton, Ltd. 765,ruejarry ouest,suite 201 Montreal, Quebec H3N 1G7 • Voice: 514-271-4150 • Toll-Free: 1-888-453-9866 • Fax: 514-271-0755

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PRINTERS remember thefirstfourprintersmy wife and I bought for our fledgling desktop publishing company, in 1985 and 1986. One was a tiny $700 Hewlett-Packard Think Jetan early monochrome ink-jet that printed out angular 'computerish' letters built up from a small number of dots, with about 70 dot per inch (dpi) resolution.

We also got a Canon PJ 1080A color ink-jet, with a list price of about $800, and offering 84 dpi resolution. We added a $60,000 Linotype PostScript imagesetter, to which we could hook up our MS-DOS PCs, Macs and Amigas to print out typeset text on film at up to 2,400 dpi. Shortly after that, we added an $8,000 300 dpi Apple LaserWriter as a proofing device for plain paper output.

In 1997, many of the features of those four early printers are available to the average computer user, combined on one desktop printer with higher quality and more flexibility, for a few hundred dollars. In particular, 'photo quality' ink-jet printing of both text and images far superior to anything on the market in 1985, at resolutions up to 1,400 dpi, is now available i n t h e r e tail m arket.

Meanwhile, fast 600 dpi monochrome printing via networks is a fixture in businesses and government agencies.Far from creating a 'paperlessoffice,' the new generation of printing technology is causing an increasing flood of locally generated documents, and creating a new, multi-billion dollar market for printing supplies for Canadian resellers.

According to an Evans Research study of the Canadian printer market, unit sales of printers, especially ink-jets, are up sharply, and ink-jet printer sales in Canada will continue to grow strongly for the next few years.

A ccording toEvans Research, ink-jet printer unit sales in Canada will jump from 478,000 in 1995 to 1,036,000 in 1997. At the same time, though, total dollar revenue on those sales will only increase marginally, from $254 million to $266 million. In other words, as sales soar, price-per-unit will plummet, and so will resefler margins. Profits from the ink-jet market will have to be wrung almost entirely from the supplies market, as resell ers offer ink and toner cartridges, paper and other add-on products to make a profit. This continued growth in ink-jet sales will come partly from new customers, and partly atthe expense of laserprinter sales, which are

expected to fall from the current 610,000 to 443,000.

The Razor Blade Industry Priceson some printer hardware has dropped to such a low level, according to Evans Research, that in many cases printers are regarded as'seed' products — the margins for manufacturers and resellers are minimal, but once thehardware has been sold, the opportunity for profit comes in the follow-on sales of toner or ink, paper, and other addons. This follows the model established a century ago in the shaving industry: safety razor holders were sold for next to nothing, and fortunes were then made s'elling the packs ofdisposable razor blades that were needed to enable the actual shaving to take place.

To anincreasing degree, the printermarket is seeing the same dynamics taking hold.

In 1996, dollar sales of ink-jet printer supplies exceeded dollar sales of ink-jet hardware for the first time. By 1999, supply sales are predicted to hit as much as $2 billion, well over twice the value of printer sales in that year. The profit opportunity for resellers, it would seem, is in the 'razor blades' — the consumables that make the solution work for the end-user.

Technology Drives The Race

The averageprinter,whether a $300 desktop ink-jet model, or a $10,000 network laser, is increasingly a user-friendly appliance that has amazingly sophisticated technology buried inside it. Printers do something that personal computers don' t: they manufacture a physical product rather than simply move electronic data around. Printers take in paper or othermedia, and then arrange patterns of toner particles, liquid ink droplets, molten wax, or colored vapors on the media as it passes through the printer. Especially in the case of color printing, the process involves manipulation of matter and energy at a molecular level, employing fundamental physical processes that were simply unavailable to human manipulation until recently. Up to several million microscopic droplets are precisely positioned every second in order to create a picture of a schoolkid's pet cat, or a pie chart for a business presentation. The big players in the printer market: HewlettPackard, Epson, Canon and Lexmark — are spending billions of dollars each year in research, which is the principle reason for the rapid evolution of the products we see on store shelves. The money required to stay on the leading edge and remain competitive also means that printer manufacturing is increasingly a game for the big boys. http//wwwccwmag.ccm Ma p 1 997 CANADIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER 27

P R I NTE R S

Winners And Losers

Ceneric Versui Brandnemne Supplies In:~ y m ays, 'for'&sellera-,the 'real' part of the printer inarket (the part that ' offers profit opportunities) lies in selling aupplies to printer users af'ter they have bought the planter hardware.

The question of whether printer owners should buy name-brand toner or inks or use generic manufacturers' products is a source of endless controversy. In the early days of non-name-brand supplies, there were instances of fly-by-night cartridge refillers who sold poor quality products, which performed poorly and could void the Imnter's warranty by â&#x20AC;&#x17E; causing damage to the printer. Most of the non-name-brand suppliers still in busitiess supply".good quality products, at prices so much btlow those of nmnebrand supplies that many printer owners are happy to use them. For example, Image Control Corp., a Scarborough, Ont,-based suppliers of remanufactured, second-sourced and generic supplies for lasers and ink-jets, claims to have more than 5,000 different products 'available. D.M. Agency of New Jersey sells a do-it-yourself refilling system, called the ReInk system, which employs bottles of ink with flexible tips for reloading ch es. Rt)fill kits are avklarble for a raiiges 6f printers, incslud" " ing Canon, Apple, HP and Tektronix.

In past years, sortie printer manufacturers gbt into heavy'-duty confhcts with consumers by threatening to void printer vparranties if they detected evidence of use of non-name-brand supplies in printers r eturned f o r se r v icing.

Nowadays,although printermanufacturers still don't hke finding strangers' cartridges in their printers when they come in forservice, they are more diplomatic about Iionoring warranties.

Representatives from HP and Canon pointed out that vast amounts of R&D money (over half a billion dollars per ',.

rox 4512 NeNIroik LaserPrinter.

28

Resellers have very little tolerance these days for getting stuck with obsolete products which have to be kicked out the door at sacri fice prices, and will move to new product lines that are selling. The result has been tough times for printer makers who falter in terms ofprice/performance.

In particular, the low-end laser printer m arket hassuffered from apparently irre sistible competition o f c o l o r i n k -jets Although there is still a business case to be made for a personal laser, particularly in a home office, consumers are in love with the current generation of color ink-jets, and that is where the bulk of the market currently lies QMS, a pioneering PostScript laser printermaker which has a we ll-earned repu tation for quality, took some serious hits when laserprinterprices dropped suddenly a few years ago, putting its monochrome laser printers at a disadvantage. When low-cost but high-quality color ink-jets challenged its excellent but pricey color thermal transfer printers, it suffered similar setbacks. The company was forced to concentrate on markets where it still had a convincing story to tell (especially in high-quality networked business solutions), and it had to revamp its technology and product offerings. It appears to have accomplished an admirable turn around, but it seems to be out of the personal laser market, once its mainstay When caught in a no-win situation, par ticularly in the cutthroat low end printer markets, other manufacturers have responded as QMS did, by moving to niche markets or to the corporate networked printer market where margins are still higher, and profes sional customers are looking for printing solutions and long term stability and service So, forexample, Lexmark exited the low-end personal laser printer market (though main taining its successful personal ink-jet line) and now concentrates on its Optra lasers and its MarkVision network printing software Thiscorporatefocus allows Lexmark tooffer professional document solutions for enterprises ranging from small offices to large cor porations. Similarly, companies such as Genicom and Tektronix have attempted to stake out claims on niches within the govern ment and corporate markets, offering high end document solutions.

The major retail printer makers in theCanadian market are a handful of g i an t c o m panies: H e w lett P ackard, E p son, C a no n a n d Lexmark. They have released a constant stream of new products in late 1996 and 1997, and Epson in particular seems to be

CA N A DIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER May 1997 ht tp//www.ccwmag.corn

surging in terms of retail marketshare. In the case of the retail ink-jet market, the number of printers sold is rising so fast there is some room for all the players to grow: the crunch may come in a few years when the market is saturated, and the surviving printer makers have to fight over a static or declining pie

Apple

Apple Color LaserWriter 12/660

These days it's easy for r esell e r s I who don' t handle Mac computers to f o r get that Apple even sells printers, but at one time it was a leading player in the laser print er market with its LaserWriter line, and it has also been a leader in color ink-jet products The LaserWriter offered great ease of use connectivity and PostScript compatibility, but it was often the most expensive product in its class. This made it a target for all other man ufacturers to base their designs on, and to aim to displace. The individual products are quite impressive. The Color StyleWriter 2200 is a nicely designed, compact, light, portable inkjet, ideal for students and PowerBook users T he Color LaserWriter 12/660 PS i s a sophisticated, leading-edge color laser, with plug-and-play networking support and ColorSync color matching technology, and the LaserWriter 12/640 is a fast, cross-plat form compatible device with excellent workgroup performance.After a brief period of success with LaserWriter sales into the MS DOS/Windows market, Apple's printer offerings have pretty much been confined to Mac companion sales â&#x20AC;&#x201D; a shrinking market which offersless revenue to finance new research and development Apple Color StyleWriter 2200

I

PRINTERS

Irether This Montreal-based branch of the Japanese multinational distributes a wide range of laser printers, faxes, multifunction (fax/printer/ copier) and special-purpose printing devices across the country. In lab tests, Brother's laser printershave scored high for price/performance, though l ik e a l l l a ser m akers, Brother'spersonal laser line has suffered from competition with low-cost ink-jets. The company has a wide enough product line, that it still has strong sales in the other printing product categories.

Canen Canon Canada is perhaps the invisible giant of the Canadian printer suppliers. Compared to the amount of attention Hewlett-Packard, Epson andLexmark have recently been given by the computer press, one might think that Canon is a smaller presence in the market.

The reverse is true. Canon, in addition to supplying huge numbers of fax machines, copiers and laser printers, is the number one vendor of ink-jets in Canada, according to the recent Evans Research survey. However, a great many of Canon's ink-jet products go into obscure parts of the business printer market, such as point-of-sale printers. Many of Canon'sprinters are also non-sexy (but still u s eful) b l a ck-and-white m odels.

However, with the recent release of the BJC4200 color ink-jet, Canon has a product that competes head-to-head with t h e l a test Hewlett-Packard, Epson and Lexmark models. With its optional photo cartridge, it produces excellent photo-quality output.

Epsen Epson was once the leader in dot-matrix printing, and when ink-jet printer and personal laser sales began to take off six or seven years ago, the company was perhaps too slow to concentrate on those other printing technologies. As a result, Epson saw its competitors leap ahead in market share. The company struck back with the Epson Stylus Color about three years ago, and that printer's 720 dpi, near photo-quality output, took the printer market by surprise. The original Color Stylus had one big drawback, which was a dependence on very expensive coated stock. Since t hen, however, Ep son h a s released new Stylus Color models that have continued to boost performance while offering excellent, cheap 'plain paper' output. With the release of its Epson Stylus Color 500 model, Epson Canada Ltd. began to

increase its marketshare rapidly in the retail ink-jet market, and has followed up that success with the release of three new Stylus Color models, th e b u dget-priced 400, midrange 600, and professional level 800 models of Stylus Color. Epson has upped the ante in personal ink-jet printing resolution with its Micro Piezo printing technology, which enables up to 1,440 dpi printing. The addictive eye candy that these color printers arecapable of creating has created something of a bonanzafor resellers of Epson printer supplies. According to market analysts, Epson is continuing to expand its market share rapidly in 1997.

' 'year, nl'the cas'e of HP) go into developing improved ink formulations, car-'.tridge;,nnd pritit:head, teclinoIogy, vrhile .' rion-name branrdf comp'anies have com'-' paratively little investment in research, " Qng6Ag ilnpdove~ @ iri 'Ioartci'dg8s ' are IntroduceiI without announcement ~,by many manufacturers, leading to a constant improvement in quality and — reducfion in yrice of @e naine brand, 'supplies. Nevertheleds,' for the pririe-' " sensitIve consumer, thdre is a consider!'-.'.='-able semptatr'on'-to 'save,a,i' of;Hl~ '~ 'by' goiiig the' n'o'-'dame. supply'route.' ' ' "'j '

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" .Somewhat less controversial is the prac,-;;:4i —ep:. 9f--.-hu~ -„third-yarty..p'aper sup;-" .plies. 1(dissishauga,Chit.-basal Essapac ' -,: supplies kits to create presentation fold-

Fujitsu

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Fujitsu Canada carries a number of mainly high-end, specialized dot-matrix and laser products, aimed at business solutions. The PrintPartner 10iV and 14AV Workgroup lasersare high performance printers intended for demanding office environments. The company formerly sold lower-end lasers, which it de-emphasized as the competition in that market became more intense.

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'- nments' from a wide variety of ink-J*et and laser printers. On the one hand, ' ' there I9.e lot td'be saidfor the reputa6re,','..j'.

-' for qiiahty of companies like HP rrr 'Canon.'On the ether hand, printer sirp" phes are expected to increase i'n sales 'to=.="about $2 billio7i in Canada by 1999 ' "That' s "a great"opportunity for 'reseliers, " ' but end-users can't be blamed if they '-.want;-to 'i@i~ the i r .petsoneI contii- -' bution to this inipressive statistic.

He+riett-Packard Hewlett-Packard (Canada) Ltd. is the giant of Canadian printer suppliers, in terms of both volume of sales and range of products. The printer line of HP is only one component of a larger technology company with revenues of more than US$35 billion per year. HP is a leader in networked high-volume laser printers, personal laser printers, multifunction devices, and ink-jet printers. HP tends to offer PostScript models of most of its laser printers, as well as nicely engineered networking options for its midrange and low-end lasers. It is a major innovator in printing technology, and sets the pace for the other major companies. HP has seen serious competition from Epson and Lexmark in the color ink-jet market, as both those companies have specifically targeted HP as the competitor to beat.

HP's sales, earnings and p r o fits increased substantially in the first quarter of 1997, with orders for HP LaserJets growing moderately, and orders for the HP LaserJet 6P showing good marketacceptance. Demand was high for both the new HP Color LaserJet, and sales of printer supplies.

HP claimed healthy growth i n i n k -jet sales, but margins on those products were s queezed by t h e ongoing drop in inkjet hardware prices.

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+pie'Criblde: ' http; //www.apple.corn,(905)477-5400 „ Ilrnrtr Spphiea Corp.: ..%trpb/www.birinycom, (407) 768-6766 : Brother Cenedei . http: //www.brother corn, 'I-800-361-6466 , 'Canon'Cenndehre.: ;: -http'//Mwrw.ccsi.canon.corn, «1127 or (905)795-1111 .1-800-2(13 ' QIINAge'eioy: =DilMir@nol.oom, {201)783-7164 .Kpsen.@lnerhL ;,p@p'f/www.epson.corn, 1-800-463-7766 Ensepen: ,http://www.essapec.corn,(905)275-0556 -:.".-Aj|@n;~d(r'hr'd; '",. -' =.- ' ';,:,'-::;-.: ';,;;:: ~. 'htfp://wwwfopi corn, 1-800-263-8716 ' Hewlett-Pechenk .Jittpi//wrrvr.hp,,oom,,"'-:;,— ' ~'f400'-38778867,506)' 206;4725 linage Cerrtrok , http: //www.image-control,corn, (4|6) 694-7509 4ixinerh Cenethl".-' :4ittp://wwwdexrriark.corn, I-800-%8:5835 ":=.: — ;:,. ':. Ohideta:http//www.okidata.corn,(905) 238-4260 ;j'@NS.~ A ; http;//writvr,qms.coin, ' . 1-800-268-,0343,(905) 206-6848 ;4ervioeworhe/Rrnren: http: //wW'w.servioeworks.onm, '." (604) 273-4453,1905j712-2000 or (514} 844-4044 , "- Teldro~»Itttpj/www tet corn,p «' =,-,. l- ~, ',(„: , l:.-'~~„ -...7-800'-836-6.100 '. t...

Xerox: http: //www.xerox.corn, 1-600-275-%76 :

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http//wwwccwmag.corn Map 1997 C ANADIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER 2 9

P RI N T E R S HP continued to be a technology leader with the introduction of its OfficeJet Pro 1150c, a color printer-copier-scanner which combined two of HP's leading technologies, color ink-jets and scanners. Its DeskJet 692C photo quality printer, aimed at the SOHO market with a street price under $500, is highly competitive with any other offerings by other manufacturers.

Lexmark Formerly a division of IBM, Lexmark was spun off as a separate company several years ago during IBM's time of troubles, and it has proven to be a success as an independent manufactureroutside of the embrace of Big Blue. Its core products are the Optra line of laser printers, MarkVision printer networking software, and Color Jetprinter personal inkjets. A very nice line of personal lasers was deleted nearly two years ago, due to the conviction that this product segment would be a poor prospect for success and profits, due to falling prices and competition from ink-jets in the SOHO market. Although Optra lasers areaimed mainly atnetworked business markets, the entry level models offer excellent performance atan attractive price, and have been seen in retail outlets aimed at SOHO customers.Lexmark recently unveiled three new Jetprinter models, the 2030, 2050, and 2070. These are aimed at the SOHO market, and likecomparable HP, Epson and Canon products, offer photorealistic print capability, and come bundled with good selections of software to provide a complete printing solution to the family or home office.

Okjdata Okidata, a division of OKI America Inc., is in many ways 'a traditional printer maker, which still offers a l ine of do t matrix printers (including it s n ew, h i g h p e rformance Microline 390/391 Turbo!), as well as inkjets, fax machines, and its new LED Page Printers.

Its LED printershave performance characteristics similar to lasers, although they use a different imaging technology. The 4W offersgood laser performance atan extremely low price, and the 16 N offers 16 ppm per minute printing for a $1,500 street price.

This company was quick to exploit the demand for high-quality PostScript l aser printers created by the advent of desktop publishing, initially on the Mac, and later on the M S-DOS/Windows PC p l atform. QM S poached a good deal of business from Apple's LaserWriter line,by offering comparable performance at a lower price. When its personal laser printers were undercut by the drop in 30

laserprices to $600 or less,QMS re-oriented its efforts to concentrate on the corporate printing solutions market. Among its current offerings are the CrownNet Print Utility for Windows, a variety of connectivity solutions such as the i-Data ida PrintServer, the QMS Image Server Print Systems and Developers Kit, and the CrownImage Imaging System.

Current p r i n ter products include the QMS 4 0 60 Print System, a high-speed (up to 4 0 p a g e pe r m inute) wo r k h orse, and t h e innovative QMS C olorScript 4 60 a nd 4 8 0 Dye Sublimation Color printers. The ColorScript printers use a fast RISC processor to produce photo-quality output up to wide tabloid size, with sophisticated color matching capabilities, including support for Apple ColorSync, Pantone, and CIE International Color Standards.

QMS makes a distinction between 'network' printing and 'workgroup' printing. For reasons of security, it is usually preferable to locate a printer close to the user's computer, and QMS supports low-cost, distributed 'serverless' setups as well as centralized network installations. Typically, QMS continues to supply extremely well-engineered, high performance printing solutions for professional users, with an emphasis on a thorough spectrum of connectivity options and compatibility with other manufacturers' current hardware and software.

Serviceworks/Raven Canadian vendor Serviceworks carriesthe Raven printer line in Canada, which consists of narrow and wide carriage dot-matrix printers (confined mainly to specialist applications such as printing on multipage forms) and a line of personal laser printers and a dye-sublimation color printer, the RC-1600. The Raven LS Series lasers are very nicely designed, fast, compact devices optimized for Microsoft Windows and Windows 95 output, at either 600 or 1,200 dpi class resolution. In lab tests, Raven's lasers have proven to be very economical, pleasant-to-use products.

Tektronix

applications. The Phaser line's high-powered processors allow for very fast color output: around aminute for even complex pages of color images printed out by the Phaser 450.

Xerox Unlike many other printer makers which are essentially distribution operations in Canada, Xerox has a state-ofthe-art R&D facility in Mississauga, Ont., which has developed some of the company's critical color laser tec h nology.

Rumors from wellplaced sources indicate that Xerox will have some m ajor product a nnouncements concerning color laser products in the next month, aimed at bringing that technology to a much wider market. In terms of existing products, Xerox's printer offerings should be viewed in terms of a 'document solutions' strategy that incorporates photocopiers, faxing, networking, document servers, scanning, optical character recognition (OCR) software, aswell as printers. Xerox has been a leader in multifunction devices, with its WorkCentre series of consumer multi function scanner/fax/pri nter/copier products gaining w ide acceptance over the lastcouple ofyears.

The Future Of The Market HP currently has an incredible dominance in the laser market, with 55 per cent share, compared to 11 per cent for Brother (mainly lowend lasers),and 10 per cent for Lexmark (mainly mid- to high-end, networked lasers.

HP will probably keep its dominant position in lasers, but it will be in a shrinking market.

In the ink-jet market, it seems likely that Canon'scurrent market share of 38 per cent will shrink, as the market expands and aggressive players like HP, Epson and Lexmark expand their sales. However, the growth in the printer market's unit sales will m ean more sales for all manufacturers with competitive new products. The question, however, is what profits will there be in this market?

The best suggestion to resellers is to get very,very good at merchandising and marketing your printer supplies line â&#x20AC;&#x201D; that' s where the real opportunity exists to ensure you only use black ink, not red, on your annual balance sheet. ttNI

Tektronix is a strong player in high-quality, high performance color printing, with its Phaser line of solid-ink printers. The Phaser 600 is a wide-format color printer, that can Je +Evans is Associate Editor o f Canadian handle paper up to 36 inches wide, for graph- Computer Wholsaler. He can be reached at ic arts, advertising, scientific and engineering j eII@tcpon. corn.

C A N ADIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER May 1997 ht tp/lwwwccwmag.corn

T HE A D V A N T A G E S AR E AS T O U N D I N G As an ISO-9002 certified manufacturer, we make it our business to provide only the finest components for our customers. Our commitment to quality is the foundation for our products, service and innovative computing solutions. This commitment has been rewarded with achievement awards, Circle Canada status for our NMSO offering, CSA and DOC certification and most importantly of all, loyal customers.

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The computer software entertainment business is turning out to be a source of significant revenues for some resellers. But as always, the key is understanding your customer.

by Paul Weinberg

Know your customer.

It's always the first rule of business, but the advice is especially valid in the fast-paced world of computer games retailing.

Customers are becoming more discriminating in their purchases of games software, which according to Jeremy Logan, product manager for the Toronto-based distributor Beamscope Canada Inc., has led vendors to release about a quarter of the titles they used to introduce.

He estimates that the Canadian games software market in 1996 comprises about six per cent of the U.S. market, which hovered at about US$2.5-billion.

And games retailers definitely need to know their market.

"Seventy-five per cent of the sales are in the first week. There are few perennial bestsellers. You can buy 50 titles and it is bit of a crapshoot because you could be sitting around with 49 of them on the shelf," says Bev Buckton, public relations manager for the Toronto-based Ingram Micro Inc. (Canada).

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Consider Mediascape The appearance of Mediascape, a games software store, amidst the traditional grunge on Yonge Street in downtown Toronto may be a sign that this little strip is finally seeing better days.

Owners Darren Keyes and Jon Walsh, two young men who also fit the demographic of much of their clientele, say that their location brings them cheek and jowl with the lucrative market of university age students, with the proximity of some major schools nearby: Ryerson and the University of Toronto, as well as the community colleges.

Both Walsh and Keyes (who are, incidentally, cousins) have earned university degrees.

So fartheir efforts are paying off.Mediascape isalready earning a small profit after a year-and-a-half in operation.

"Their only reason for success is that there is no FutureShop around in the downtown area competing with them," says one distributor, and it may be partially true.

But Keyes and Welsh also suggest they have connected with the gaming clientele in a manner that would be impossible for a larger retail enterprise. Both are ardent garnersthemselves — each spent 50 hours on Diablo, a role playing dungeon and dragons game from CUC/Davidson, when it came out in January — and they know at least 60 of their cus32

tomers on a first-name basis. In addition to selling games titles, several PCs havebeen stationed in the back of the store w here people fora fee can either play alone or compete in a networked environment.

Garners come from all walks of life, Keyes and Walsh report, from thetaxicabbie who comes by Mediascape every week forhis latestsoftware fix to the police officers who have a preference for combat simulators. Women are rarely seen in the store, even though some of the top writers of games software are female, says Walsh, who blames this oversight in the industry on the aggressive, competitive nature of most games. His partner Keyes chips in and suggests that "roaming around the street like a warrior is also a girl's fantasy" and that we will see more purchases by female customers.

Titles like "Warcraft Battlechest," "Screamer 2," "Tomb Raiders," and "Command & Conquer:Red Alert" are among the top sellers listed for March by Beamscope Canada a major PC games distributor.

What about the violence and mayhem depicted in some games?

Keyes shrugs and says: "It is pure entertainment, no different from watching X Files or NYPD Blue on television. It is like any form of art."

There are different games categories, which sometimes blend into each other — action/adventure, strategy, role playing and sports (including hockey) — and each one attracts its own separate clientele.

"Adventure games usually appeal to people who are not real garners, while strategy is more popular among hard-core garners," says Keyes.

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CA N A DIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER May 1997 ht tp//wwwccwmag.cpm

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G AM E S At the start a fairly solitary activity, games software is becoming increasing social, with the growth in popularity of on-line Internet gaming whereyou can play with hundreds of people anywhere in the world, "Sitting by yourself in a room killing computer enemies over and over again is not as exciting," says Keyes.

Walsh and Keyes have bigger plans beyond the single store, including possibly opening new outlets in the greater Toronto area or eventually getting into other aspects of the entertainment business.

"We don't want to be two 40-year-old guys still working in retail," mutters Walsh.

uYou can buy 50 titles and it is bit of a crapshoot because you could be sitting around with49 of them on the shelf."

— Bev Buckton Keyes who has a masters degree in physics, jokes about how he "decided to go into business rather than make weapons."

On the market in general, he commented: "Retailers do appreciate the value of the games market, but they don't know how to run it.

I think most of them have gotten into the games market a little bit at some point and then backed out."

Video games vendors treat their retailers a lot better than what the computer industry metes out, according to Pritchard. Greater control is exercised on the pricing of games titles, compared to the PC industry "where products are overdistributed and competition is solely on

price," he says.

In contrast, video games retailers are given something extra to differentiate themselves from their competitors in areas like market positioning. The same games product may differ from store to store for instance.

Computer games start out being sold at somewhere between $55 to $70 in the retail channel, but eventually drop as low as $19, as inter est fades. One exception is the popular Diablo, where pricing is being kept up, explains Keyes. There is the additional used games market where garners will become bored and sell off their old titles, which can be resold at a reasonable amount, he adds.

Whether games software has helped create the demand for Pentium PCs is open to debate within the industry. It is safe to say that the sophis ticated titles put a lot of demand on the hardware and software.

Jason MacIsaac, editor of the on-line magazine, Gamesmania (jason@ifront.corn) suggests a user needs at least a Pentium 90 to ben efit from the pleasure of playing them. He is critical of games vendors that insist on more computing technology than what the customer already has available. "Many games developers are lazy and (won' t) streamline the code." ICCW J

The Market Logan made reference to one large retailer in Canada that turned to Beamscope for help on displaying the games titles in its various outlets. '"'lt wasn't properly merchandising the product. No uniform design and the shelving was poor," recalls Logan.

Nevertheless, adds Logan, a small independent operation like Mediascape has a major advantage over the large chains when its comes to games software. It can get a new title from a distributor onto a shelf, one to two days faster than a chain which has to take extra time shipping copies to all its outlet stores across the country. That is pretty importantissue, he explains, because hard-core garners want the new titles as soon as possible and they are willing to pay extra for that opportunity. 'The first store that has a new game will get the initial sale even if it is five dollars more," says Logan.

Paul Weinberg is a Toronto-based journalist, specializing in high technology reporting and business. He can be reached at corn. pwei nbg@ i n terlog.

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Gaming Today Keyes recall s creating games software when he was 13 and most such efforts involved "two or three guys."

Now game developmentisan enormously expensive endeavor, with games titles starting at $3-million in terms of development costs, with 40 people doing the programming over a two-year period. He adds that Hollywood has climbed on board with the introduction of games versions of popular movies featuring actors like Christopher Walken and Bruce Willis.

Adds Walsh: "You really have to know the products well ahead of time. Stay in touch with what is happening on the Internet [where versions of titles are featured]. Read the gaming magazines. You know there are certain games that are going to be big. Most retailers don' t have the time to invest when [games] is only part of their revenue. For us it is a major portion of our revenue."

Gaming is a subculture, Walsh reports, where garners like to come into a store and personally check out hot titles with a knowledgeable staff.

But if there is one sector where customer service unfortunately rates quite low, it is the PC retailers, says consultant Bob Pritchard, president of the Markham, Ont.-based R.J. Pritchard A Associates.

"Games software carries attributes of both a computer and a consumer electronics product, adds Pritchard, which he says causes a lot of headachesforretailers.

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May 1997 CANADIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER 33

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C L I E N T / S E R V E R C O M P U T IN G

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Mew W a v e nf Client/ Sea vsv H its M a r k e t

by Paul Lima Although the transition to client/server has not always gone smoothly, it is almost impossible to find a large-or medium-sized business that has not migrated in whole or in part to PC-based network computing. Even small companies with fewer than a dozen employees are networking operations, and running applications and peripherals off servers.

And while there have been bumps on the transition road, the next generation of client/server — intranets and virtual computing — is already upon us.

Corporate use of intranets is skyrocketing, according to a Creative Networks Inc.survey of 52 American companies. While the mean number of intranet users at the companies was 5,905 in late 1996, that number is expected to more than double this year.

Companies are using the intranets primarily to share information

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among employees and collaborate on projects.

Skip McGaughey, worldwide market manager, VisualAge, IBM Corp., describes the virtual corporation as "an exciting new type of organization where responsibility-based people act to solve particular problems with almost a disregard for organizational boundaries."

Fuelled by the Internet and intranets, virtual corporations will transcend departmental, company and geographic boundaries. "People down the hall will have a closer affinity to people across the continent that what they have with people next to them," he says.

With increased connectivity, customers are becoming data entry clerks for the organization, says Judith Hurwitz, founder, president and CEO of Hurwitz Group Inc. She cites as an example, Federal Express customers who can log on to the FedEx tracking system and look up the whereaboutsof theirpackages. "Systems areas much an issue for the customer as they are for the internal business unit. Customers and suppliers are, in a sense, part of your virtual corporation."

A short while ago, most of Hurwitz's customers provided data to their clients via hard copy reports. But now she says clients want to go on-line to look at information, to assess its quality, and undertake the analysis process in real time.

Industry experts agree that expanding client/server computing beyond theenterprize can be beneficialto corporations and customers alike, but there is a dark side to moving too hastily and not planning for change. "You keep hearing client/server is a lot cheaper, it's faster.

And the reality is it isn't necessarily so," says Sheila Bednar, vicepresident of worldwide best practices, Platinum Solutions Inc. Instead i of asking 'how does this fit into our overall cycle and infrastructure in handling our business?,' corporations have had a tendency to take an isolated viewpoint when upgrading IT applications, says Bednar.

So just how bumpy is the road to client/server computing? That road includes the development of related application projects, so fasten your seat belts. According a report released by the Standish Group, headquartered in Cape Cod, Mass., the road is littered with over-budget, under-achieving projects.

While American corporations and governments spent US$250 billion on information technology (IT) projects last year, the Standish Group report estimated US$140 billion was lost due to project cancellations, delays and cost overruns. A staggering 31.1 per cent of projects were cancelled and 52.7 per cent ofthe projects cost 189 per cent of their original estimates.

The cost of these failures and overruns are just the tip of the

C A N ADIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER May 1997 ht tp/wwwccwmag.corn

C L I E N T /S E R V E R

C O M P U T IN G

proverbial iceberg: lost opportunity costs are not measurable but could easily be in the trillions of dollars.

On the success side, only 16.2 per cent of the projects are com- ;,"„~fic~ 6 ''4„-Assbcjfttg',ll + tibbs;./gal'jutd-ttun'oJieiits: as, "tha."."

I ~ft + r,y p@@~cg~"' <he'".'~'.,96J),.".~-' +bitt,'," <qf';, t1'te.''-;," b,",~ pleted on-time and on-budget. In the larger companies, the news is 4i~ g @ I s 3 & 0n ';~116:~ worse: only nine per cent of projects come in on-time and on-budget. ~c 00IIxitrgfoB+; ~f;Ii1rII6'% ':;SISIS.;,4i'eSeIVSS;-'"8'q@.:litt(a'.ij'CB'ptttiJtj' lf'OWC Ir,'ceail';~,,'gatvagj'y,' And, evenwhen these projects are completed, many are no more than i84'..„54ys, $1-' ' @ sf"talitp p,pa .I -~4/:„ + o(,liq. to 'Atb; mitto. how. )x eg,' a mere shadow of their original specification requirements.

"We can no longer imitate the three monkeys — hear no fail- ,;:.+~ge0%%4-If',.';,'g4~ =." ures, see no failures, speak no failures," concludes the Standish ;„",beji65Ofh6 e'if' Sad~, .efin:~rk yqQ actIrauttCVb- "'80WeVai he' "at; jpvjng'f' I ...i ,','.%>6w. ily.l:sva' p u rl'tta' .".g$t' c ttrrn i s.out tbe.c/i'ortts qan't "qt c Group report.

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Resellers To The Rescue That begs two questions: How can resellers best serve their clients to ensure the transition to client/server, or beyond, goes smoothly? How can companies ensure they are getting value from resellers.

When contemplating a move to client/server and beyond, a key issue is change management. Companies have to determine how to incorporate IT into existing change management process "from problem resolution to monitoring software version control, software migration and testing, all the way up to distribution," says Bednar.

If corporations want their connectivity investment to pay dividends, industry experts suggest they should define corporate objectives, determine how information technology with help achieve those objectives, and then shop around for the products and services that will best fulfil the IT requirements needed to meet defined objectives.

When investing in new technology, planning for the future is crucial, says Hurwitz.

Companies should build flexible, adaptable, componentized, modular systems so they can make present systems more suitable for future expansion while meeting cur— Skip McGaughey rent needs.

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Client/Server Will Survive John Dodge ofPC Week describes intranets as "client/server done right." He says intranets are not different from client/server but are simply new client and server types.

Hurwitz concurs. She says client/server "as a discipline" is changing for the better. Because of increased flexibility, in some cases clients are servers and servers are clients, especially on the Internet or when using corporate intranets.

Intranets are the natural evolution of client/server, the experts agree. And this evolution is helping companies overcome the limitations of platform-specific and proprietary client/server environments.

But beneath the changes, the distributed client/server and object-based architecture will prevail.

As inevitable as the move to a world of transparent global communications may be, the experts warn it can still be a painful move for companies that leap before they plan. The transition for corporations can be eased by defining IT needs, and by working with resellers who have a proven track record in implementing client-server projects, ontime and within budgets. CCW ~

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http/wwwccwmag.ccm May 1997 CANADIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER 35

C D- R s

The Recerdehle Cll Yields Oppertmnity

by Geof Wheelwright Recordable CD systems have been with us for a couple of years now — and have changed dramatically during that period (and all for the better).

Thishascreated unprecedented opportunities for resellers and dealers to create new solutions using CD-R technology.

CD recorders are now cheaper than ever, easier to use and a better option for a wider variety of potential customer solutions than many conventional back-up devices. With CD-R media typically selling for between $12 and $15 per blank CD — each with the ability to store up to 650MB — the cost per megabyte of this medium is very attractive when compared to more conventional tape back-up drives.

Perhaps even more important is that CDs are now a universal media, like floppy disks. Any user who has purchased a halfdecent PC over the past three years is likely to have a CD-ROM drive in that machineand is therefore capable of reading whatever a CD recorder records onto a CD. This makes it a much better medium for passing large amounts of data between users, because the person who makes the CD can be confident that there will be large numbers of people who will be able to read that CD on their PC. All of these issues make CD-R systems a perfect vehicle for resellers and dealers to use in creating new and innovative solutions for their customers.

Here are just a few examples of how CD-R technology is, or might be, used.

Backing Up The Company When most small- or medium-sized companies have wanted to back up the data on their PCs — whetherstand-alone oron anetwork— they have typically turned to tape drives as a way of doing it. Tape drives have commonly been cheaper than their optical counterparts and been the "workhorses" of the data backup world. They have, however, failed to meet the standard of universality against which lowercapacity media (such as floppy disks) have been judged.

In cases where you didn't want others in the company to be able to get easy access to backed-up data, perhaps this was not a problem. But in many small- to medium-sized businesses, this kind of universality can have big advantages. It means, first and foremost, that backed-up data can be restored from virtually any PC with a CD-ROM. It means that your customers do not have to worry about 36

getting use of their backed-up data even if their CD-R system should be damaged.

Provided the CD back-up copies of the data are stored in a safe place, data can be restored without the cost of replacing or repairing the CD-R right away.

The latest trend in CD-R systems is to offer a parallel port option — such as HP's 6020i/ep — to allow back-ups to be made on virtually any system, including notebook computers.The fact that the CD recorder attaches to the parallel port also eliminates the need for users to have to get inside the PC, add SCSI adapter cards (with their sometimes nightmarish configuration problems) or set a whole load of jumper switches.

The wholething can be done in a few minutes and the user is up and running. This kind of back-up is also the perfect solution in the instance that the user has a few PCs in their company, but is not running a network — the parallel port CD recorder can simply be moved from machine to machine doing back up work.

The Enthusiast The secondbigmarket for CD recorders these days is the home enthusiast. Not only can such people more easily back up their data with CD-R drives, but they can also make their own music CDs. The CDs can either contain music they have created themselves or selected tracks copied from existing commercial CDs to create their "compilation CD" that can be played on any standard music CD player.

For The Sales Force Insurance agents, financial planners and other sales executives can be potentially huge customers for CD recorders. If a company has the ability to easily create CDs for its salespeople to use in customer presentations — either on their own notebook computers or on customer computers — then they can have a big advantage.

The advantage is quite simple — the data or application created for the sales force does not have to be installed by the company's IT department. It merely needs to sit on the CD and can be called on when needed. It might simply contain a set of large PowerPoint presentations, a couple of MPEG-2 video files that show the latest corporate promotional video, some huge amortization tables for loan calculations, actuarial tables for insurance or anything else that can make effective use of 650MB.

CA N A DIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER May 1997 ht tpitwwwccwmag.corn

Enterprising real estate agencies could even take their most recent database of homes for sale (perhaps including detailed digital photography) and make that available ona CD which sales forces could carry with them.

Some of these functions could be replicated by simply allowing the mobile sales force to have access by modem to an internal "intranet" where this data is stored. But standard modems speeds are not yet good enough tomake that an effective answer for quickly getting to large video files or huge presentations.

Some customersmay alsohave a need to create their own small-scale promotional CDs. This might arise in situations where it would be useful for them to create such items for a fe w major clients, but they would not require any mass duplication.

CDs produced on an in-house CD recorder would prove the perfect answer. In such circumstances, CDs could also be created on an "as-needed" basis, without the requirement to pay large duplication fees up-front for making CDs that you might not ever use.

A Cood Solution CD recordersoffer the chance for dealers, resellers — and their customers — to create a wide range of effective and creative solutions that meet the many data storage and flexibility challenges they face. The medium is universal, costs have come way down (meaning that you can now buy internal CD recorders from major manufacturersnow for well below $1,000) and speeds have improved (with 4X being the typical standard for midrange CD-R systems).

Inevitably there will be further evolution in the market, particularly as DVD (Digital Video Disc) technology starts to make an impact. Expect to see the first major wave of DVD recorders in 1998, with even higher capacities, a greater set of disc format capabilities and a whole new set of applications. But that, as they say, is a different story. CCW Geof Wheelwrightisa -Vancouver-based tech nology and business j. ournalistHe can be reached at geofwheelwright@msn.corn.

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transformation in the information goes beyond the benchmarks and provides a technology industry. Corporate and consumer common, everyday scenario. The test actually M-of @8:.I Ms now ~ r e e6mmuni- consisted of two parts. First, we generated a file eatlons capabiTify not only throughout but also (50MB in size), and copied it from one directobeyond their or~ on@ They look to com- ry on the drive to another and timed the process ou will have no doubt noticed a com- puting to shrink distance, collapse time and from start to finish. lower cost. The rush for companies to get wired This is a real-world test of a sequential read mandingneed has arisen forextremely reliable, high-performance, high- and provide informanon on-line requires infor- because the file we were copying was contiguquality storage solutions by desktop PCs; mation in digital form. Many companies are ous. Our second test consisted of copying two striving for a more paper oI5ce by publishing directories from one part of the drive to another. workstati ons,servers,disk arrays,mini-cominformation on internal Web sites.

These two directories were filled with 489 files puters and notebook systems.

Information that was traditionally stored Multimedia applications, the downloading and 89 other sub-directories, totaling 51.2MB. in analog forms is now being stored digitally of images, and on-line references arejusta few We chose this as the total size to demonstrate on hard drives. This transition has also examples of the way in which corporate and how copying 50MB using two very different consumer market are trotting. increasedthe demand for even larger and scenarios can turn out so differently. This test is faster data storage devices. an exampleof a random read/writ e task.

Computing today brings increasing lev- High CapacityStorage To our surprise, the Maxtor 85120 manels of performance and functionality to users. Never More Affordable aged to copy that entire directory tree in just Corporate entry-level systems and small Are your customerspurchasing Office 97?

32.35 seconds, whereas the average among the Have them check theirhard drive space! home/office have high expectations. These buy- otherdrives was closer to 80 seconds. A full Compelled to do so, hard drive manufactur- ers need greater functionality, high capacity defragmentationof each drive was performed eishave answered the need forhigh volume stor- storage, graphics and Internet access at the low- prior to these tests to give each drive the exact age of information with mammoth super fast hard est possible price, Whether its 500MB or 9GB, same testing conditions, and no third-party drives.

Five yearsago,a 100MB disk drive wasa an important issue still remains, keeping the cachingprograms were used.We used partition bigdeal.Today'sdrivesareGodzillasby comparcosts down. The average cost of purchasing a sizes of 1GB throughout the entire testing ison. Storage-hungry applications and operating I GB hard drive five years ago was about $1,500 process. All of the tests, with the exception of systems demand higher and higher capacity and compared totoday's street price of $300.

Sysinfo from the Norton Utilities v2.0 for disk drive manufacturers are shipping millions of Internet and network computing have become Windows 95, were performed under DOS 6.22. drives &om 2GB to 9GB and beyond. border-crossing technologies. The market for All tests were conducted on a Pentium 166MHz storage products is exploding. machine with512KB of Level 2 cache and Digitizing Trends 64MB of RAM. Each hard drive was configured Data is content — in all its forms. Tables, The Tests images, text, encyclopedias, audio/video are We used several well-known benchmark pro- for Mastermode on the primary channel.Each test was executed three times, with the final being digitized, archived and stored. Within grams to measure the performance of hard average being shown in the comparison chart. the pastdecade, there has been an explosion drives. Each of them, as can be expected, in the number and types of digital informagave different results for the various tests.

In Conclusion tion sources: business transactions, medical Measurementswere made on various methThis month, we' ve had the privilege of information, art, music and film are exam- ods of data transfer, such as sequential and putting the very latest drives to the test. ples. They' re all being digitized and stored. random. Each program provides a report on Indeed,much has happened in the world of The vision for the future includes: infor- some form of accesstime measurement, hard drivesduring the pastfew years.These mation in the form of "stores" that never close, although they don't always match the num- new drives boast superior specifications, and doctors that are always on duty, libraries and bers specified by the manufacturer. All-in-all, are constructed with extreme precision. universities at one's fingertips, global class- they each tell a tale of just how quickly a parThe new breed of mass storage drives rooms, and entertainment-on-demand. ticular drive can perform a given function. has enteredthe consumer market very draJust to make things interesting, we decid- matically, with competitive pricing to make Internet The Internet has a lot to do with the growth in ed to do a little test of our own — something significant storage all the more accessible to storage needs. The market is driving a dramatic quite simple, but also very useful because it just about everyone. »

Y

38

CA N A DIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER May 1997 ht rpzlwwwccwmag.corn

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T EST

Fu itsu MPA3035AT and MPA3052AT

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Suggested Retail Price: 3.5GB — $480; 5.25GB — $650

reliability," says Irving Frydman of Fujitsu

Street Price (approximate): $430 and $575 respectively.

Product Strengths: "Our strengths are in leading-edge design, incorporating advanced magneto-resistive (MR) read/write head and partial response/max imum l i k elihood (PRML) technologies. The end result is improved signal-to-noise ratios, less chance of data loss than with standard heads, and overall higher data reliability," said Frydman

Reseller Price (approximateJ: $390 and $520 respectively.

Marketing Support For Resellers: Toll-free tie-in to resellers.

National advertising.

Maintenance And Technical Relationship With Resellers: Three-year warranty on these drives.

Warranty includes parts and labor.

Toll-free technical support for resellers.

Dedicated technical BBS. Web site includes technical information.

Editors' Notes: Two of Fujitsu's latest creations are these new drives, with capac ities of 3.5GB (MPA3035AT) and 5.2GB (MPA3052AT). Both drives use the latest in technological advancements, offer great performance and are competitively priced. Both drives feature low access times of 10 ms, high spindle rates of 5,400 RPM, buffer Volume Discounts:None. sizes of 128KB and the new ATA-3 interface. As far as raw perDemo llnit Availability:None. formance goes, the larger 3052AT managed to achieve some very impressive results, making it a candidate for an Editors' Choice Market Orientation: "The Fujitsu hard drives are targeted towards PC builders/integra- award. Both drives have an MTBF rating of 500,000 hours and tors, looking for cost-competitive pricing, high quality, and high come with three-year warranties

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4GB, a spin rate of 5,200 RPM and an access time of 1 lms. It also has a larger-than-average 256KB buffer to help squeeze out every lastdrop ofperformance

Street Price: $493 Technical Support:Three-year warranty.

Web site, at http;//www.wdc.corn.

Editors' Notes: The drive cmmes with excellent documentation in the form of an Western Digital's AC34000L leaves little to be desired when it e asy to understand manual, as well as a full size poster with dia comes to both value and performance. The drive has a capacity of g r ams on how to install the drive

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anyone looking for a d rive with a capacity such as this Street Price: ST33240A — $427 and witha name they know Marketing Support For Resellers: well and can trust. This "Seagate's Web page offers many ways forresellers to obtain the drive has anaccess time informationthey need. We recommend the "Sales Partners" butrated at 12 ms, a buffer of ton for a listing of authorized distributors and sales offices," says 128KB and a spin rate Judy Plummer ofSeagate. of 4,500 RPM. Per HoIN Does Seagate Position This Product ln The Market? formance onthisdrive "The Medalist Pro 6450 is designed for either new high-end desk- was around average in top PCs or upgrades. It is perfect for the SOHO market. The comparison to the other Medalist 3240 is designed for both value-class desktop PCs and units tested upgrades. It too, is suitable for the SOHO market," said Plummer.

SuggestedRetailPrice: ST 36450A — $580

What Are The Products' Strengths?

The ST36450A is, in many ways, the ideal drive. It boasts a "The Medalist Pro 6450 offers performance and reliability. The storage capacity of 6.4GB and leaves nothing to be desired Medalist 3240 is certified for home/office environments. Both driwhen it comes to raw performance. The drive,although large in ves are multimedia-ready and are shipped with DiscWizard instalcapacity, uses a convenient 3.5-inch form factor. It has a spin lation/partitioning software." die rate of 5,400 RPM, an access time of 11 ms and the largest Editors' Notes: buffer of all the drives tested, a total of 512KB. With all this Seagate gave us two of their latest creations, the ST33240A plus the new ATA-3 interface for the fastest possible transfer and the ST36450A, with capacities of 3.2GB and 6.4GB, ratesand a MTBF rating of 500,000 hours, you have yourself a respectively. The 33240A is a 3.2GB drive, making it ideal for true performer.

40

CA N A DIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER May 1997 httpy/wwwccwmag.ccm

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TES T

IBM DAQA-33240 Suggested Retail Price: $521

Demo Ilnlt Availability And Restrictions: IBM has aloanerprogram.

Reseller Authorlrmtrout No authorization is necessary for reselling Options by IBM products.

What Is IBM's View DI Qe Mariret?

Mnrireting Support Co-op advertising.

Marketing funds.

Toll-free tie in to resellers.

Resellers are listed on the IBM Web site.

POP displays.

National advertising.

Maintenance AndTechnical Relationship With Resellerm Three-year warranty.

Limited warranty includes parts and labor.

The product adopts the on-site warranty of the IBM system it is installed in.

Resellers can offer service.

Toll-free technical support for resellers.

Dedicated technical BBS. Dealer-specific space on the Web site.

Web site includes technical information and drivers.

Volume DiscounterYes.

"IBM has been manufacturing storage devices for over 50 years, so we know a lot about storage. This knowledge has allowed IBM to develop a highly reliable family of hard drives for client systems andservers alike. The Deskstar family of hard disk drives offers excellent price-performance for IBM and IBM compatible ISA PCs," said IBM sources.

What Are IBM's Products'Strengths?

"Reliability — Magnetoresistive head technology allows IBM to build drives with increased real density, therefore fewer parts, '' Weoffer a high resulting in higher MTBF rates. Performance deliver up to sustained data rate. High capacity — IBM hard drives 15 per cent more disk space for data storage by putting the Data IDs in silicon rather than storing them on the hard drive," says IBM.

Editom'Noae: IBM's new DAQA-33240 is a 3.2GB capacity drive that would make a great addition to any system. The drive is capable of sustaining high transfer rates and had an impressively short average seek time of only 9.5 ms — the fastest in this survey. The 33240 uses thestandard ATA-2 interf ace, has a spindle rate of 5,400 RPM and a three-year warranty.

Quantum Fireball TM 3.8GB and Quantum Bi foot CY 6.4GB enough storage space for both today and tomorrow. Both driStreet Price: TM3840A — $478 ves managed to achieve reasonable test results based Editors' Notes: Quantum has two new drives available, each suited for different on their design specifienvironments. The models we tested this month were the Fireball c ations. I t' s a l s o TM3840A and the Bigfoot CY6480A. The Fireball 3840A is a worth noting that 3.8GB drive, making it attractive to anyone who's looking for t he 6480A i s something just a little larger than 3.1GB. It features a spindle rate of designed using a 4,500 RPM and a 10.5 ms average seek time. The Bigfoot 6480A 5.25-inch form factor, on the other hand, has a generous formatted capacity of 6.5GB, a whereas the 3840A uses the spindle rate of 3,600 RPM and an access time rated at under 14 ms. standard 3.5-i nch type. Standard This drive is ideal for anyone looking into buying something with warranty on these drives is three years.

Suggested Retail Price: CY6480A — $395

. '5 , -

Maxtor 83500A and 85120A • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • 1 • • • • • • • • • • • • •

List Price: $443 and $601 — respectively.

Iylarketing Support: Marketing support for resellers includes the Maxtor VAR Partner Program. This is open to VARs selected by distributors.

Technical Relationship With Resellers: Three-yearwarranty includes parts and labor.

Toll-free technical support.

Web site includes technical information.

A No Quibble Service policy.

Demo llnit Availability: The company periodically offers demos programs on select drives.

What Is Maxtor's View DI The Market?

The company says, of its 3.5GB and 5.1GB products: "Now, the most reliable EIDE drives are available with high performance and high capacity points."

42

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What AreThe Products' Strengths?

Maxtor cites the strengths of: "high reliability, high performance, a variety of capacity points and the No Quibble service policy."

Editors' Notes: Maxtor has developed a reputation over the past few years as being able to manufacture drives that deliver both performance and great value.

The two models we received for this month's evaluation were the 83500A and the 85120A, with capacities of 3,5GB and 5.1GB, respectively.

The 3.5GB drive offers good overall performance and is well-priced for a drive of its size. The larger 5.1GB model managed tosurprise us on a number of occasions, achieving some of the best results in the survey. Among the drives more appealing qualities are its larger 256KB onboard cacheand the use of the ATA-3 interface.

CA N A DIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER May t 997 hrtp77wwwccwmag.cpm

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The drive'sunique size of4GB is another plus.Ifyou feel ~t 3.1GB is not quite enough, and d,at a 5GB d ve or larger is this new model fmm Fujitsu is $650. Overall it's an excellent uoverkill, Western Digital designedthis dhi've withyou in mind ~ f for-." ' drive, and should defmitely be consideredfif you' reI looking . ' Once again, this drive obtained some of the best scores on our aunitwithplentyofstorageandexcellentperformance. benchmark suite. Using a large 256KB onboard buffer, a low access ,, The Seagate Medahst Idiot ST3645QA is one qf Scag'at@',f,',"s s ~-Of H- ms and a spindle rate of. 5 2k0g;RPM,.this drive will have cttrons; Tliis,6,4cGB drive aranaged to surp ris.'us latest crea :," heo ubhble shuffling your data from sector to sec'ter. It has an average in a number of ways. Pirst of all, all of that capacity ls,,' squeezed into a 3.5-inch fform ffactor. SSecond, d it achie hi ved d","' - ' street price of $493, giving it a mere12;3,cents per megabyte usage ost An excellent drive you won't met/tooverlook. EÃ some of the best restilts on our benchmarks in various' cat-.' egories. It has very high transfer rates and low access St eve Halinda, Tim Bingham-ylhllisand Jazz Bhooi are Canadian times, making it thedeflnite choice for someonelooking fdr Co m puter Wholesaler's Lab Test Editors. They can be reached ar pure raw performance The drive uses the ATA-3 interface,:: ' f4J6) 535-8404 =,,

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A S I AS CA P E

Fujitsu intros systems for mobile PC users at Comdex/Japan Fujitsu Ltd. used the recent Comdex/Japan modem, 7.2-inch liquid crystal display and a exhibition to show two new computers for s l ot for PCMCIA Type II cards. The second mobile users. The "Debut" is a new new product on display, which is asnotebook-style computer that fea- ~ ~ ~ ~ I~ @ y g ye t u nnamed, was a new personal tures a fully rotatable display and a f U I I Q U digital assistant (PDA) that has a space for a cellular telephone in the new PDA from the company integrates a cellular telephone into the case for c ase. The phone lies in a docking slot and is wireless use. enclosed within the unit so the user has, in The Debut 700 grams and is designed to effect, a PDA with built-in cellular telephone. slip easily into a case or bag, said a Fujitsu T h i s means all sorts of mobile data applicarepresentative at the show. It features a 486- t i ons can be run from the unit without the need equivalent processor, internal 28.8Kbps f o r a separate phone and connecting cable.

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from Newsbytes'

Police detain youths over Tamagocchi theft

Apple shuts down Singapore design centre

The craze over Bandai's Tamagocchi electronic pet has elevated the game into the same category as Nike "AirMax" sports shoes among Japanese youth. ;,8 Police reported the recent detaining of four high school boys for the theft of a Tamagocchi from a fellow student. The game, a small key-chain type, involves the raising of an electronic chicken from chick to old age. The chick reaches old age if given a good life and fed regularly. Owners must also play with and clean up after the chick if they want to prevent it dying.

Impossible to buy in shops, street prices of Tamagocchi have rocketed to 20 or 30 times the retail price of just under 2,000 yen (US$16.60).

The financial crisis at A pple f u r ther development of software Computer Inc. spilled over to f o r t h e Asian market formerly Singapore recently with the corn- c o nducted by the center. pany deciding topullthe ~ Teck Cheo ng, meanwhile, shutters down on its ~ said the l a y o ffs affected three design center and lay off 101 of its groups of employees, namely the 974 employees in the island state. m anufacturing, RAD and support Set up in 1993, the Apple d i visions. Apple, however, has Design Center-Singapore was d e cided to r etain its display involved in research and develop- design team, which will continue ment work on technologies such t o b e i n volved in the monitor as speech recognition and pen- m anufacturing operations. The based inputdevices forAsian lan- t eam will play an enhanced role guages. It also carried out work i n the company's partnership with relating to printed circuit board S T El ec t ronics Sys t ems layout, analog and digital circuits A s sembly, which last year was and design validation. granted the right to build highWith the closure of ADCS, end Apple-designed monitors. its director, Dr Louis Woo, is off Pete r Tan, managing director the payroll as well. "The closure of A pple Computer, Singapore, is the direct result of Apple's con- said: "The restructuring here is in solidation of R O D h a rdware l i n e with the recent moves by the design at the company's head- headquarterstoimplementamore quarters in Cupertino," Woo said streamlined organization to return in a matter-of-fact way. He said t h e company to sustainable profno decision had been made on i t ability."

Dell Computers targets Thailand market

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Dell Computers CEO Michael Dell visited Bangkok last week to shake up the competition in Thailand, Dell's newest market in the Asia Pacific region.

According to Peter Sykes, Thailand manager, the company has had a good start with sales to a number of multinational companies.

Dell sells direct in 11 countries in the region: Hong Kong, Macau, Japan, Singapore, Malaysia, Taiwan, Thailand, Korea, Brunei, Australia and New Zealand. All orders from the region are processed in its manufacturing facility in Penang, Malaysia.

According to Dataquest, Dell held 10th place for market share in the Asia-Pacific region in Q4 '96. Revenues in this region, including Japan, grew 60 per cent in that quarter, as compared to the same quarter in 1995. Sales in 1996 sales reached US$476 million.

Dell recently announced they would start manufacturing workstations, and should be available in Asia this summer, said Dawn Kleiman, Asia-Pacific director of corporate communications. KWI

CA N ADIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER May 1997 http//wwwccwmag.ccm

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

Choose Vouv Advisovs With Cave There are indisputable benefits to consulting the 'experts' in certain situations. However; whom you turn to for help can be critically important. Exert caution, when choosing your source of professional advice.

by Douglas Gray As a reseller, you have a lot of hats to wear, but you can only wear so many hats well.

You need to rely on objective and expert professional advice to compensateforareas thatare outsideyour comfort zone or knowledge. But how do you find the best advisors in the first place'? And if you already have advisors, how do you check to make sure that they are the right ones for your needs? A lot of business owners simply stay with the same people out of habit. This can be hazardous to your business health.

Because of the costs associated with hiring a lawyer, accountant, or financial planner, some people are inclined to try the do-it-yourself approach. This can be a short-sighted decision and detrimental to your interests. For instance, lack of professional tax and estate planning could result in a lot more tax being paid during your lifetime and on your death, than was otherw isenecessary.Ora person who signsa leaseor contract without having it reviewed beforehand by a lawyer may regret it for years to come.

The right mix of professional advisors will inspire confidence, enhance your peace of mind, reduce taxable income and protect your legal and financial health. The wrong selection will be costly in terms of time, money, and stress.

There is enough stressoperating a business. You don't need the extra aggravation.

Here are some benchmarks for evaluating your existing or potential future advisors.

Qualifications

Experience It is very important to take a look at the advisor's experience in the area in which you need assi stance. Such factorsas the degree of expertise, the number of years' experience as an advisor, and percentage of time spent practising in that area are critically important.

accountant or financial planner, if you don' t intuitively trust the advice as being solely in your best interests, never use that advisor again. You cannot risk the chance that advice is governed primarily by the financial selfinterest of the advisor, with your interests as a secondary consideration.

Compatible Personality

Comparison

If you are going to have an on-going relationship with the advisor, it is important that you feel comfortable with that relationship in terms of the degree of communication, the attitude, the approach,the candour,and commitment to meet your needs. A healthy respect and rapport will increase your comfort level when discussing your needs, and thereby enhance further understanding of the issues. If you don' t feel that there is the degree of good chemistry that you want, don't continue the relationship.

If you don't relate well to someone, it is only human nature to resist contacting them. That could compromise your best interests.

It is a good rule of thumb to see a minimum of threebusiness advisors before deciding which advisor is right for you. You need that qualitative comparison to know which one, if any, of the three, you want to rely on. Seeing how they each respond to your questions will be agood reference point.Th e more exacting you are in your selection criteria, the more likely it will be that a good match is made, and the more beneficial that advisor will be for you. Write down your questions before your meeting so you don't forget, and prioritize them in case you run out of time. The initial meeting with any advisor is usually free.

Ask in advance.

W hen going through the process ofselecting an advisor, you can get prospective names from friends who have a trusted advisor, from the Yellow Pages, and from professional associations in your province. For example, consult the LawyerReferralService operated by the Law Society or Bar Association, Institute of Chartered Accountants, Certified General Accountants Association an d C a nadian Association of Financial Planners (CAFP).

Contact CAFP at their national toll-free number of 1-800-346-2237. You will be sent a copy of the members in your province, with theirbackground, and whether they offer services in the fee-only, fee-plus-commission or commission-only format. You will a l so receive a booklet on selection criteria. IL'Ml

Objectivity This is an essential quality for a professional advisor. If advice is tainted in any way by bias or personal financial benefit, obviously it would be unreliable and self-serving. That is why you want to get a minimum of three opinions on your personal situation in terms of advice,before carefully deciding which professional to select.

Lawyers and professional accountants (CAs, CGAs) cannot obtain any direct or indirect collateral benefit from advising you, as it would be a conflict of interest. They also have professional liability insurance coverage in the eventthey give you bad advice.However,when dealing with a financial planner, it is a different situation. Some offer fee-only services and receive no other benefit from their advice, and confirm this in writing. Others obtain a fee as well as commissions from the products they recommend or sell to you. This could potentially influence the nature of their advice.

Ask a financial planner if they have professional liability insurance coverage and if not, why not. If they are covered, have that fact and the amount confirmed in writing.

Before you entrust an advisor with your affairs, you will want to know that he or she has the appropriate qualifications to do the job.This may include a lawyer's or accountant's professional degree, or if a financial planner, professional training accreditation and experience relative to their professed area of expertise. Lawyers have to be accredited to practice law, but anyone can call themselves an accountant or financial planner.

When selecting a professional accountant, look for a Chartered Accountant (CA) or Certified General Accountant (CGA) designation. A financial planner should have Certified Trust Financial Planner (CFP) o r r e gistered Trust is a vital trait in the person you select to Financial Planner (RFP) designation or both. advise you. Whether the person is a lawyer,

Douglas Gray, LL.B. has had extensive experience as a l a w yer s pecializing in small business.He is also a speaker and author of 15 best-selling business books, as well as an i n v estment software program. His books include The Complete C anadian Smal l B u s i ness G uid e a n d R aising M o ney ( b o t h p u b l i shed b y McGraw-Hill Ryerson), and Start and Run a Profitable C onsulting B u siness and Marketing Your Product (both published

by Self- Counsel Press).

hup//wwwccwmag.corn Map 1997 CANADIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER 51

M A R K ET

O U T LO O K

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T ech Stoekll Are Dew n But the future is still bright for the technology sector.

by Thomas Klein T he d o w n-trend t h a t started with technology s tocks at th e e n d o f January h a s ca r r ied through to the rest of the m arket with t h e D o w Jones and Toronto stock exchanges down between eight to 10 per cent. The technology sector followed the markets lower with many companies shares lower 10 to 40 per cent, or more.

It is important for investors and resellers to remain realistic. When the technology sector rallies to new highs — do not get overly optimistic, and when it falls sharply — all is not doom and gloom. The fact is that capital markets fluctuate for short-term reasons and it is far more important to look at the longer-term trends.

In the short term, the stock market is worried about rising U.S. interest rates, a stronger economy with signs of inflation due to increased wage pressure. It is important to note that with the strength in the U.S. economy, retail and corporate sales are looking very strong.

This may be negative for the market but it is great news for resellers. In fact CompUSA Inc. stated that sales for the third quarter ending in March rose 19 per cent to US$1.27 billion from US$1.07 a year earlier. It was interesting that corporatesales outpaced consumer sales.This was an encouraging sign and many retailers

a hedging strategy. In working with a financial advisor any company or individual can protect themselves from currency fluctuations.

Networking

There's been lots of news in the networking industry about mergers and consolidations. A merger between 3Com and U.S. Robotics spurred a complete review of the sector by Wall Street analysts. Uncertainty in the sector took its toll on Cisco Systems and the stock has fallen below US$50 afterpeaking above US$75.

Analysts are worried that competitors will chip away at Cisco's leading market share. To add insult to injury, a report surfaced that most ISPs will be delaying major equipment upgrades in order to improve their bottom line in the short term which caused the entire networking sector to sell off. It appears that investors are overreacting to any slowdown in the need for networking equipment. The sell-off has been over done and it appears to be a great opportunity for more e ssive investors to enter the market. For the a~ faint of heart, wait until you see pronounced positive momentum. In the long run stick with quality names and you will be rewarded.

For resellers, I think that the picture is much brighter than the stock market is portraying at the moment. Strong economic growth may not be good for the market because it raises inflation fears; however, it is very positive for the technol were coming off a disappointing previous quar- ogy industry because it increases demand. ter. This U.S. trend should spill over to the Hardware Canadianmarket in the months ahead.

A dramatic shift, is that IBM no longer sets the Another development in the market that tone for the entire technology sector. IBM is affectssome resell ers is the weakness of the still an important player in the market, but a Canadian dollar. The Canadian dollar has fall- downgrade in IBM does not move the sector en below 72 cents and appears to be headed like it did in the past. IBM was downgraded lower. For exports this is very positive from a Buy to a Hold By a number of analysts because it makes our products cheaper. last month and under ordinary circumstances However if you are importing foreign compo- most technology stocks would sell off in sym nents or products this will increase your costs. pathy, this has not happened of late.

Resellers that have significant exposure to the The market now looks at companies like Canadian dollar should look at implementing Intel and Microsoft for a better indication of

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the sector. Is this a sign that the technology sector will start trading with more understanding and less volatility? Don't count on it. but it is a small step in the right direction.

The big rumor on the street is that Larry Ellison of Oracle might be looking at taking over Apple. Apple's shares have rallied 11 per cent based on that speculation. Stay tuned for further developments.

Chips Intelstock price has weakened from a high of US$165 to the mid-US$130s amid concerns of increased competition from Advanced Micro and market jitters. I think that these fears have been exaggerated and that this price weakness is another buying opportunity.

Sales of computers with MMX microprocessors are stronger than expected.

Motorola's stock has been slumping lately but never count a quality player out. Just as some analysts were about to sing the blues, Motorola turns around and announces a US$3 billion cellular contract in Japan. The stock rallied, to close back up over $60. The lesson to be learnt for investors and resellers is that brand-name companies may have a year or quarter where they fallbehind or underperform but they always seem to rise to the top.

Software Microsoft was not hurt to the same degree as most of the other technology stocks even with the announced delay for the launch of Windows 97. Microsoft is a powerhouse but theremight be signs of a few areas of weakness. Java technology is gaining momentum and there seems to be concerns about ActiveX. Netscape is not buckling under pressure from Internet Explorer and the possible strengthening of Apple if it is taken over will all contribute to eroding Microsoft's upward momentum. I would watch Microsoft closely and wait for lower prices before investing.

Oracle has weathered the correction with relative strength. Watch for a bounce in the share price as analysts have come out with recent Buy ratings on the stock. Although Ellison has shown interest in Apple he has stated that he will not directly involve Oracle into the venture. IRW' Thomas Klein is an investment executive with ScotiaMcleod and can be reached at hrtp:/hvww. webhaven.corn/mone.y

B OO K

R EV I E W

ra in an e 'iiriii '

by Stephen Ibaraki

Are yourcustomers concerned about the high costof new computer pur~ and w ant..fo upgrade existing computer systems? Do you sell to "do-it-yourseII" consurnhrs? Vkll, look nd further. Upgrading and RepairingPCs isthe complete hardware reference and upgrade guide for resellers, consultants, and knowledgeable end-users.

This 1,433-page book includes sevea.comprehensive sections.

Numerous diagrams, charts, and tables illustrate major points and detail hard-to-find information. This is for people who want to upgrade, repair, maintain, and understand the technical intricacies of PC-compatible computer systems. The book covers the components found in the oldest eight-bit machines to the latest high-end 64-bit workstations. An enclosed CD-ROM disk contains WinStone 97 and WinBench 97, PC benchmark software from Ziff-Davis. Be forewarned! For full installation, your customers will need more than 278MB offreedisk space.

Included within the introduction are chapters covering PC history, overview of features and components. The tutorial on system teardown and inspection is excellent.

The chapter: "Primary System Components," follows with an extensive description of motherboards. The chapter on bus structures and IO cards illustrates ISA, EISA, MCA, PCI, VESA, and PCMCIA. "MicroprocessorTypes and Specifications" isvery extensive.The chapters on "Memory," and "The Power Supply," are informative and useful.

Part III, "input/Output Hardware," covers input devices, video, communications and networking, and sound hardware. Part IV,"Mass Storage Systems," thoroughly describes drive interfaces, disk drives, tape devices and other storage systems.

If end-users want to build the'r own syste~ — Part V, "Sy~te~ Assembly and Maintenance," illustrates all the essential issues.

Contained in Part VI, "Troubleshooting and Diagnostics," is a discussion ofdiagnostic software and error codes.

The three appendixes containing a technical reference, vendor list, and glossary, easily justify the book price. The sheer volume of information is outstanding. The technical reference includes everything but the kitchen sink, from extended ASCII keycodes and IRQ/DMA summaries to modem/printer control codes and hard disk installation specifications. The vendor list is especially useful with its addresses, telephone numbers, fax information, and Internet Web data.

Each listing also includes a description of the products and services the organization provides. This is particularly useful when researching computer gear.

If your customer wants a beginner's guide to computing, then this book is not recommended. But if your customer has computing experience and wants the most comprehensive and readable PC support reference available, then Upgrading and Repairing PCs, is the best.

Take notice: A customer looking for the newest and latest will not

find it in this book. Upgrading and Repairing PCs,reflects the market-place as of early- to mid-1996. For example, there is no in-depth discussion of Intel's MMX technology or AMD's K6 processors.

For the reseller, consultant, sophisticated end-user, or student, this book is a "must-have." I highly recommend it as a great addition to anyone's PC tool-kit. ICCWI Stephen Ibaraki, ISP, is a lecturer, writer and advisor; and also coconvenor for the BADM Computing Program at Capilano College. He is Novell/Microsoft-certified, and can be reached at sibaraki capcollege. bc. ca.

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httpviwww ccwmag.corn MBV 1997 C ANADIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER 5 3

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The US$500 price tag is important, but the total cost of ownership associated with this technology is a more important consideration that is often ignored by some proponents of Lite Clients. Some analysis indicates that if the costs of the network and server upgrades required to run a Lite Client are added in, some of the Lite Clients proposed m ay have ahigher cost per seat than effectively networked PCs. Industry efforts in support of the Lite Client should be focused on reducing not only the initial cost, but also the ongoing costs of administration, maintenance, training and support of the user.

Call it what you will, but Because the network and servers in the there is no denying that network would play a bigger role in the applithis technology is receiv- cations and content of the Lite Client, there is ing considerable atten- the potential to simplify the management of tion as a low-cost device the client desktop by putting strong managethat could p otentially ment tools at the server. This also provides connect to the Internet, flexibility by leveraging the Internet/intranet as a software distribution channel. providing new types of functionality to computer users.

These are indeed attractive concepts that The concept behind the Lite Clientwill be achieved both by evolving current PC what Compaq prefers to call it — relies on the products and by developing new paradigm Internet or browser technology as the focal products. That said, rather than viewing the point for software integration and leverages Lite Client as a single device, the Lite Client the network and servers in the network for should be seen as having the potential to content, processing and storage. evolve differently for different market segThe Lite Client has potential application ments, such as government, commercial and for both the public Internet and on an internal, consumer. Generally, it is conceivable that I nternet technology-based network o r the Lite Client concept could result in four intranet. At its core, the Lite Client is pro- categories of clients: posed to typically differ from the traditional Smart Terminal Devices —This is a termiPC in the following ways: there is no hard nal device with local intelligence and which drive; local storage is optional or is used for may also include a fair amount of built-in caching; there is no CD-ROM; there is very cache,but itaccesses the server; little R A M ; t h e b a si c p r ocessor h as Focused-Function PCs — This low-power 486, minimal memory, small disk, is designed minimum-level audio and video capability; the operating system does not support the to run an Internet browser on top of DOS, or existing base of Windows applications; and Windows, or potentially "Windows Lite;" street price is less than $1,000.

Internet-specific Devices — They' re designed for Internet use only. Both Oracle With those characteristics, there are some pitfalls. But there are also some poten- and Sun have proposed devices of this sort. tially attractive benefits, including improved These "new paradigm" deviceswould run a ease-of-use,reduced costs of ownership, and new operating system (such as Java and would likely run a new class of applications simplified management.

The industry-standard PC has clearly built for that operating system; and, become easier to use recently, but there is cer- Internet Enabled Mobile CompanionsThesemobile Lite Clients would embrace the tainly room for improvement. The Lite Client has the potential to represent a further step by standards of both the Internet and the PC. the industry to bring greater ease of use to the Mobile devices will take the shape of multiI cn. customer. ple form factors and beCanada dynamically config54

CA N A DIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER May 1997 ht tp/twwwccwmag.corn

ien

by Ralph Hyatt

urable from the PC connected to the Internet.

These devices may create new opportunities that will add to the overall PC market and are not replacements for the traditional PC. Thereare three specific types of users with needs that will determine the choice between eachof these devices and the traditional PC: Knowledge Worker — needs a wide variety of applications and requires flexibility and power. This user will stay with the traditional PC; ProductivityWorker — uses orcould use only a handful of general productivity applications. Many of these workers currently do not have PCs, so this represents a growth opportunity in the information processing market-place. Some portion of these users may be able to make the uansition from a traditional PC to a smart terminal device or Internet-specific device; Task-Specific Worker — Uses one or two specific specialized applications, such as a motor vehicle registration system. If this user has access to a computer, it is likely a terminalrunning offa large-scale mai nframe. This user will be able to migrate to a focused-function PC or a smart terminal device. This also would representa new market for PC technology.

When all of these users are travelling or are in situations that require a handheld device, frequent use of the Internet-enabled Mobile Companion as an adjunct to stationary devicesis probable. In these scenarios, there is little doubt that there is some potential for the Lite Client to increase ease-of-use, lower costs and simplify management.

That said, I believe a significant majority of traditional users will continue to favor a fully functional PC that allows them to create and savedocuments and drawings, manage databases and cruise the Internet. There is little doubt that smart terminals and focusedfunction PCs represent new opportunities for our industry and, most importantly, for our customers, but the full extent of this opportunity will not be realized for some time to come. ICCW I Ralph Hyatt is manager, product marketing, for Rich- mond Hill, a n t . b ased Compaq

MARKETING

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With the vast amount of information a v a ilable today on the World Wide Web, it's becoming a business necessity to create an on-line presence.

Consider the numbers. Of the 220 million people over the age of 16 in Canada and the United States, 23 per cent are usingthe Internet and 17 per cent are on the World Wide Web. A noteworthy 73 per cent of Web users spend some time searching for information about products and services.

And 5.6 million people — or 15 per centhave purchased on-line.

These statistics, from the Spring '97 release of the CommerceNet/Nielsen Media Demographic and Electronic Commerce Study, should be enough to put resellers on alert as to the need for an on-line presence.

That's particularly true because the numbers represent the consumer market; Internet use among the IT community is probably higher.

Therefore, it's important to evaluate some form of Web presence in order to cash in on potential business and to remain competitive.

The Promise Resellers with a Web site of their own have a unique opportunity to interact with customers, vendors and partners alike. Not only does a Web site make your business accessible 24-hours-a-day, seven-days-a-week, but it's also the perfect medium to provide customers with regular product updates and industry news, for example.

Customer Service A Web site is also a good place to help customers better understand how new technology fits into their line of business. A reseller that focuses on the healthcare industry, for instance, can post information about a new server announcement and explain to customers the benefits of applying the product to a health care environment. By taking information from the vendor and putting it into contextfor the user,a reseller can show the

value to his or her target audience and guide customers through their decision-making processes. If you' re wondering who your visitors are, ask them to sign in and then use the collected information to send E-mail newsletters to announce enticing site updates.

Provide valuable content and keep it fresh. This will encourage people to return to your site for information updates. If your content does not provide value to your target audience or is not up-to-date, it will never be an effect ive mode of communication.

In addition to being a communications vehicle, your Web site should also offer business value. Ideally, customers will be able to request product information, place orders and check inventory at their convenience. If your operation is not large enough to maintain extensive on-line customer service, at least provide an E-mail address and respond to queries promptly.

Build interactivity into your site. The Internet enables organizations to not only provide information, but also to receive feedback via forms, E-mail or on-line surveysremember, user insight is one of the best guides for content development. Provide hypertext links to other sites on the Internet including vendors, industry associations, trade publications and newsgroups.

Finally, register your site with Internet search engines such as AltaVista, Excite and Yahoo! to be sure your company receives the broadest exposure possible. And don't forget to list your URL on all collateral materialcorporate letterhead, business cards, brochures,advertising, annual reports and invitations — so customers become familiar with it.

You can make useof the Web beyond your own site. Leverage your relationship with vendors to make sure your company and contact information are listed on their sites.

For example,get yourself on a vendor's online list of resellers or have customers reference yourcompany on theirWeb sites.

Resellers also can use E-mail to communicate with customers. Brief and informative E-mail newsletters, sent to subscribers at reg-

ular intervals, are a good way to inform your audience about industry trends, product announcements, customer testimonials, management changes,service and support activity, pricing changes, vendor updates and new paitnerships.

For resellers with their own Web site, E-mail newsletters provide an ideal opportunity to drive traffic back to the site. ICCW I Hugh Black is a senior consultant in the t echnology communications practice a t Nationa/ Public Relations in Toronto. He is hblack®toronto.

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T ECH N O L O G Y

RememhvanceofThings Future Significant developments in computer memory will further speed the next-generation computers that will hit the market. Keep an eye out for the latest in upcoming RAM designs.

by Alan Zisman In columns past, we' ve A s a result, adding more RAM makes any itself(much of the performance increase of examined how new feac o m puter run faster and more efficiently. the new MMX CPUs comes from doubling t ures i n PC des i g n But while our computers sport everthe size of this on-board cache). Next, there' s promise to continue to fa s ter CPUs, the speed of the RAM hasn' t the so-called Level 2 cache on the motherprovide u s er s wi t h ke p tup. The original IBM PC featured an board — typically 256KB to 512KB of fast machines that will d o Int e l 8088 processor, running at a blazing but expensive SRAM (Static RAM, which more — not only making 4 . 7 7MHz, and came standard with between doesn't need to be constantly refreshed). computing faster, bu t 16 K B and 64KB of 200 nanosecond (nsec) Much of the power of the Pentium-Pro design easier. We' ve looked at Intel's new family of R A M . Your 200MHz Pentium processor is 40 comes from it including the Level 2 cache MMX processors, now available, and at ti m es faster,andabout400timesaspowerful right on the chip.

Universal Serial Bus, Firewire, and the a sthat original processor. And with 16MB or Accelerated Graphics Port — all somewhere m o r e RAM, it's got 1,000 times as much Newer And Faster RAM Designs in between promise and reality. memory. But that memory is probably run- Over thepast couple of years, old standard But none of these advances will work ni n g at 60 nsec — not even four times as fast DRAM was replaced with more efficient Fast without memory — the chips the computer a s that on the 1981 PC. Designers have had to Page Mode (FPM) RAM. That in turn was uses to remember what it' s build in a series of tricks to replaced with today's standard — Extended keep the processor and the Data Out (EDO) RAM. By letting the CPU just done and w ha t i t ' s about to do.

RAM working together. read and write at the same time as the refresh @gall ggeglggg o Many users still get concycle, this speeds up access and eliminates go ~ ~ ~ h fused between storageWait States wait states. But even EDO is reaching its limStandard DRAM (Dynamic theirhard drive, for example, its, as processors get faster and faster.

• p~MM RAM) needs to be refreshed and memory — the computReplacing EDO is Synchronous DRAM 'f — el e ctrically r echarged (SDRAM); because it can run in higher er's RAM. Perhaps that's • with its data. Designers add because both can be measpeed systems, it's poised to become the • Rp~ M 'wait s t ates' — periods new standard for 1997 and '98. But increassured in megabytes. The difwhere the CPU sits idle, ference is simple. Imagine es in processor speed that are already in the e UMA M ~ '.",",,",. wa i t ing for the DRAM to be works limit the potential of SDRAM much l ooking up a recipe in a cook- +",'" ~ ~ • NDRA m r efreshed. F aster R A M beyond that. book, and then trying to cook means fewer wait states. it. The cookbook is like your Coming right at us is RAMbus DRAM hard drive — information is in long-term stor(RDRAM). RAMbus is a hot company, with age. But in order to make dinner, you need to a recent, wildly successful stock offering, read the recipe, and remember it, at least long based on owning the next generation of enough to cook the meal. Your brain, in this RAM technology. Early versions of its RAM case, is acting like the computer's RAM, are available in high-end Silicon Graphics remembering just enough of the recipe to get workstations, and in $300 Nintendo-64 you from the cookbook to the stove. game machines, as well as on some PC And more RAM is always better. In our graphics cards. recipe example, more RAM would mean While more standard RAM communibeing able to remember several of the cookcates with the CPU in 16-bit or 32-bit pieces, book's instructions at once, instead of having RAMbus RAM uses a humble eight-bit interto go back and read each step, one at a time. face. It overcomes this seeming-limitation

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CA N A DIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER May 1997 tt ttpy/wwwccwmag.corn

T ECH N O L O G Y because the interface is extremely fast — currentlyat250MHz. Speeds of 600MHz have been demonstrated, with even faster versions on the horizon.

To make use of this super-fast memory design, motherboard companies will need to license the custom RAMbus Channel — the special chip set that allows the CPU to interact with the RAM. CPU giant Intel has thrown its support behind RAMbus, The two companies have announced plans to cooperate to design the next generation, being called nDRAM. They' re hoping to reach speeds up to 1.6GB/sec. by 1999, just in time for Intel's 64-bit P7 Merced processor.

Until that becomes reality, there are other shifts in how RAM is being sold. The 386 and many 486-generation computers typically used so-called 30-pin SIMMs. These were eight-bit pieces (ironically, like the futuristic RDRAM), and had to be added in pairs for 16-bit 386SX buses, and in sets of four for 32-bit 386DX and 486 systems.

Pentium systems, however, use a 64-bit memory bus. To use 30-pin SIMMs, users would have to install these eight at a time, an impractical arrangement. So virtually all such systems were built to use newer, 32-bit 72-pin SIMMs. These could be used singly in a 486, or in matched pairs on a Pentium.

New Pentium and PentiumPro motherboards have, however, adopted an idea from recent Macintosh designs, and now include slots for 64-bit DIMMs (dual in-line memory modules). A single DIMM can replace a pair of SIMMs — an advantage as users try andcram more and more memory into their case.

But that's not the only Mac design showing up on PCs in the near future.

Currently, PCs end up with RAM in several places. There's the main system RAM, of course. But there's also RAM on the video card — typically 2MB to 4MB worth. There may even be RAM on a wavetable sound card,for storing sound samples,cache RAM on a high-end disk controller, and other bits and pieces around the system. For several years, Macintoshes have been designed using a Unified Memory Architecture (UMA — a simpler design in which the main system RAM is shared around as needed.)

When RAM was expensive, this made sense. You might have 4MB of RAM on your video card, but only be using 1MB or so, depending on the number of colors and screen resolution — the rest of the video RAM would be going to waste. Implementing UMA could, as a result, lower system prices.

UMA, however, has been a mixed benefit. Performance of UMA systems has tended

to be lower than systems with dedicated graphics RAM; this is especially true when running at high video resolution and color depth, which requiresa large amount of RAM. Under UMA, this deprives the CPU access to a significant amount of RAM. As well, constantly deciding how to share the system RAM around is just one more task to dump onto the CPU. Operating systems have to be designed to support UMA. This support is not currently written into either Windows 95 or NT, but is expected to show up in future generations.

That's because the performance hit associated with UMA will become less of an issue in the future with more powerful CPUs accessing large pools of system RAM. As a result, expect to see this becoming a standard feature on low-to mid range systems over the next few years.

For now, make sure your systems support DIMMs; these will be needed to support the large amounts of RAM users will be requiring. EDO RAM is on the way out, SDRAM will be the standard by late 1997, through 1998. After that, look for the results of the Intel-RAMbus cooperation to take us through the turn of the century.

Avoid Unified Memory Architecture models for now — b u t e xpect this to become common on entry-level systems in a year or so.

Now if only I could get that RAM to actually make my dinner... Next monthmaking PCs simpler: the NetPC and the ZeroAdministration initiative. ttIII Alan Zisman is a computer journalist and teacher living in Vancouver. He can be reached ata zisman@cyberstore.ca.

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T HE

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InSearchOfThe Pvosumer

by Graeme Bennett

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As the personal computer matures, the logical, evolutionary step is the emergence of more sophisticated consumers.

They' re increasingly not first- or second-time buyers, but older and (hopefully) wiser, fifth- or sixth-time buyers.

These people need more sophisticated solutions than the hand-holding that beginners demand, and the seasoned consumer is less likely to window-shop and more likely to order via mail-order or telephone, or at least based on price point.

"Prosumer" is, of course, a term that emerged as professional-quality results sorte to become available at the high end of the consumer price points. It happened in stereos, it' s happening in digital video camcorders and editing decks and — surprise, surprise — it's happening with digital audio and video on computers.

The serious pros, those who scoff' at anything that costs less than about $50,000, will continue to point out the limitations of the prosumer-priced products, but the people willing to put up with a bit of cobbling together of bits and pieces, and the inevitable glitches that occur, make up a hungry market that is feeding on the true power-centre of Intel and Microsoft's 1998 plans: digital audio and video.

Big changeshave happened inthe camcorder and VCR market over the past few months. For one thing, DVD, despite its birth pains, is most definitely here. Another phenomenon is the way that digital video cameras are catching on. As soon as the prices approaches those of analog camcorders (and, with the first-generation JVC DV camcorder already discounted as low as US$1,295, this isn't far away), the old-wave consumer-class products will be toast.

Indeed, although Apple's newest PowerMacs rightfully put any of its 1996-era models to shame, it is the Mac clones from Motorola, Umax and Power Computing that are shaking up that market, much as Compaq and the second wave of PC clones stole the thunder from IBM in the late '80s. And, despite Apple's woes, the miniscule Mac market still manages to lead the way for the next generation of PC "innovation." Today's better Mac clones deliver exceptional AV performance thanks to a 60MHz bus, dual SCSI buses with AV drives, built-in DVD and/or Jaz drives and 300MHz or faster processors. The Mac has proven strong in multimedia, but the advent of high-performance PC digital video-capture and MPEG encoding cards at prosumer-friendly price points suggests that the Big Multimedia PC is coming on strong, too.

Prosumers are driven by performance and compatibility issues, not brand loyalty.

Microsoft and its hardware partners, for their part, have proclaimed the "PC98 spec," which, among other things, specifies a PCI-based PC design with a minimum 200MHz CPU, 32MB RAM, 2MB hard drive and the other trappings that reflect the enormous potential of hi-fi digital video and

CA N A DIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER May 1997 hnpllwwwccwmag.corn

audio to sell ever-faster PCs. PCs will evolve toward the dual independent bus architecture of Pentium II, and the Advanced Graphics Port design will give a needed boost to drive yet another stage of PC graphics evolution.

Part of the first wave of this "wise-buyer" trend is Joel Kocher, formerly a vice-president at Dell, and now the CEO of Power Computing.

Q uotedina recentMaeWeek, Kocher stated,"Itw as our belief [at Dell] that when customers evolved to the point of third-, fourth- and fifth- generation purchases, their criteria for makinga decision on a vendor change.Seeing,touching,feeling the computer just wasn't important enough anymore to pay the mark-ups associated with a traditional retail establishment."

Kocher maintains that mail order is not an effective distribution channel for the first-time buyer. "But," he notes, "the number of first-time buyers is shrinking hourly."

So, what are the buying patterns of the fourth- or fifthtime buyer? Increasingly, they are the technology advisors for a pool of users. Understanding and catering to the needs of these key influencers is a trend that has caught the attention of forward-thinking vendors both large and small.

These days, a growing number of progressive companies (and not just ones in the computer business) put experts on-line to demonstrate the vendor's expertise and knowledge and, for want of a better word, evangelize their specialties. (If you aren't familiar with the techniques of technology evangelism, the bookSelling the Dream by longtime Apple evangelist Guy Kawasaki is a good place to start.)

An increasingly popular strategy is to host (and keep up to date)a Frequently As ked Questions Web page.Yo u can ask for nothing more than to become the de facto standard for information on a product category that just happens to be your company's specialty. If you build it, the prosumers will come.

Following the appropriate newsgroups will tell you usually even before the official release, as beta-test reports filter in, what the caveats and solutions are. FAQs will usually list recommended system configurations. With a little luck, you' ll build and learn to deeply know a system based on the accumulated expertise of dozens of experts.

Remember,best-of-breed productschange like the wind.

Don't get so attached to a product line that you, too, end up as an also-ran.

The effective evangelist doesn't hang around in the newsgroup areas slamming the competition, nor do they act as a sales flack, but rather as a solution provider. And when your company's solunons target the prosumer, you can begin with a sale that grows into a long-term relationship. It% Graeme Bennett is Managing Editor at The Computer Paper, and is aformer computer reseller.Based in Vancouver,he can be reached at graeme®tcp.ca.

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Hewlett-Packard launches color multifunction device Hewlett-Packard (Canada) recently intro duced the HP OfficeJet Pro 1150C all-in-one printer-copier scanner. With a suggested list price of $1,646, the OfficeJet Pro 1150C is aimed at taking the multifunction device market from the world of black and white to 'no compromise' full color, according to HP. According to Linda Blakely, the OfficeJet product manager for HP Canada, "This is the Calgary's Image Club Graphics ideal small-business peripheral because it proreleases new CD-ROMs vides professional-quality color capabilities in Recentproduct releases from Calgary-based an easy-to-use, integrated design. Teamed with Image Club Graphics, a division of Adobe a PC, the device transforms a small oftice into Systems Inc., include the Urban Colors CD- a highly efficient workplace, with all the func ROM, "a collection of hand-illustrated art tionality of a larger corporation that captures life in the '90s and living in The 1150C's key components include an urban centers. Forty-five unique illustrations integral, high-quality color scanner, with up to present images from people and relation- 1,200 dpi (interpolated) 24-bit color scanning ships, to still-life and night-life," said the capability, or eight-bit greyscale scanning company.

The ink-jet printer component features high The Urban Colors title is the first in a speed black and white or color (up to 8 ppm CD-ROM series of prestige, 'custom' illustra- for black text, and 4 ppm for color text and tions for computer publishing professionals. graphics). The copying function, which uses The disk, available for Mac and Windows both the scanning and printing capabilities users is priced at $149.95. can copy color documents at speeds up to Visit http: //www.imageclub.corn. seven copies per minute for monochrome, and

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In what it claimed was "another major step to provide enterprise-class communications solutions," IBM has launched Communications Server for Windows NT, a multifunction gateway product which pro vides host and Internet access to Windows NT users. "IBM is responding to customer demands for more cost-effective, industrial strength communications solutions on Windows NT," said James Neiser, vice-president of marketing, IBM Networking Software "IBM is committed to providing customers with the most reliable flexible and scaleable communications solutions on all the platforms that suit their business needs Jocelyn Attal, IBM's worldwide executive and vice-president responsible for NT software solutions, said IBM's purpose is not to promote NT, but rather to meet the needs of customers who wish to use NT in their enterprises and still have access to the high-reliability technology that IBM provides for mission critical applications This new version of Communications Server opens up the enterprise for Windows NT users. Customers will be impressed with its easy installation, stability and cost-effective performance, accord ing to James Neiser, vice-president of marketing for IBM networking software IBM's announcement poses a challenge to Intel-based NT serv er vendors, and to Microsoft itself. The world's several thousand largest computing environments are largely based on 'big iron' corn puters such as S/390 or AS/400 models These computers run networks that handle many languages, such as AIX (a version of UNIX), OS/2, OS/390 and Novell NetWare Instead of the all-Windows approach that MS has promoted, IBM's vision is for a cosmopolitan computing environment, where Microsoft is merely one of many operating system players. For more information contact http: //www.software. ibm.corn. KW

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P EO P L E

Informix adds sales director

Gregory Myers appointed new Novell Canada GM Gregory Myers has been appointed vicepresidentand general manager of Novell Canada Ltd. He replaces Don Chapman, who has been promoted to vice-president, North American sales and field marketing for Novell Inc. Myers is well known in the Canadian I T industry, after 1 0 y e ars a t N E C Technologies Canada, including five years as vice-president of sales and marketing.

In a statement, Myers said: "I am delighted to join Novell Canada...I look forward to meeting and working with our channel partners and corporate customers to bring Novell's i ndustry-leading solutions to market."

Myers' responsibilities include: directing day-to-day operations of the company, expanding channel partnerships and promoting Novell's "Everything's Connected" vision of a networked world.

Chapman said, in a statement: "Greg has astrong track record in country management and sales leadership. His channel and marketing experience will be a great asset to Novell Canada."

3Com Canada announces

new general manager 3Com Canada Inc.has a new general manager — Patrick Guay. He replaces Gus Malezis,who according to the company, "assumes other growthoriented 3Com Canada responsibilities as district manager, based in Toronto."

G uay spend t h e past year as regional directorof network cons ulting i n the U .S .

Northwest and Canada.

Previously, as network consulting manager, he spent two years building 3Com's consulting business in Montreal, Ottawa and Edmonton. Before that, he was director of professional services in Ottawa, for Control Data Systems (Canada) Ltd.

Informix Software (Canada) Ltd. has named Dave Duncan as directorof sales.

He is responsible for managing the Canadiansalesteam, and developing a sales plan to increasemarket share for the database technology company.

P rior t o j oi n i n g Informix, Duncan spent i six yea r s a s d i rector, salesand marketing for a QeyeQrtooeo Mississauga, Ont.-based PC service organization, and held management positions with a variety of companies that specialize in technology, electronics and security.

IIRC Reelal Rmnanmo )IilashingtonConlact: Bill Munson Call: (905) 602-8510 E-mail:bmunson@itca.ca •

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Mark Dunlop, manager of B.C. for SDMS, has been promoted to general manager for the company.

SDMS, a vendor of POS hardware solutions, has offices i n R i chmond, B.C., Mississauga, Ont., and St. Laurent, Que.

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Doug Walker, president and CEO of Silicon Graphics Canada Ltd., has announced the appointment of J a mes C hristopher as National Director of Channels. Christopher will be responsible for the relationships and alliances with value-added dealers, systems i ntegrators, ISV s a n d VARs; as well as developing and e xpanding Silicon Graphics Canada's channel strategy.

Christopher joins the company from A p ple Canada where he was resPonsible for national JamesChristopher distributors and Ontario direct business resellers. Previous to his eight years at Apple, Christopher held various positions with Wang Canada.

SDMS has new GM

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Compaq Canada Inc.has appointed Jerry Gagatek as r e gion m anager, western region.

He will be responsible for the day-today sales and sales support activities of Compaq in western Canada, based out of Calgary.

Gagatek first joined the company as an account managerin 1987, and has held a number of positions with the company over that time.

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Cemliahr Fl Iaalmt Mississauga,Ont. Do you have an upcoming event you'd gite to see listed in CCyyaCalendars E-mail:ccvvetcp.ca

May 1997 CANADIAN COMPUTER WHOLESALER 61

T HE

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s oca ion oca ion oca ion There is a new retail concept being promoted in Richmond, B.C., called Computer W o rl d at Pacific Plaza.

I had seen this idea before when I visited the MA .. ' Golden Mall i n H o n g Kong, where an entire floor of a mall is devoted to computer-related businesses. The idea is to cluster a number of vendors under one roof to draw traffic. In this case, the developers are doing it by selling strata titles to the space, starting at about $90,000 for a unit. It got me thinking about the importance of location for resellers.

Whether a business is just starting out, expanding or relocating, finding the right location is one of their biggest expenses and biggest factors to success.

Proponents of the I nternet claim it doesn't matter where your business is, because you can sell millions of dollars of product from a Web site somewhere in cyberspace. While this is definitely a growing trend, many resellers in Canada still have to face the everyday fact that most of their business still comes in the front door. Even if their business is coming from a phone line, it is often motivated by how close they are to their customers.

Every major Canadian city has areas where computer resellers cluster together.

Toronto has College St. and Queen St. West as well as a b i g c l u ster i n M a rkham.

Vancouver has the Broadway corridor and Richmond between Jacombs Road and No. 5 Road. Calgary has 11th Ave., near the downtown and Macleod Trail near the Chinook Centre; Edmonton has a cluster around 40th Ave and 99th St.; Winnipeg has two major areas, near Portage Avenue and also St. Mary's Road; Ottawa has its Merivale Road area, Montreal's computer sector is scattered through the downtown core; and Halifax has a number of stores in the downtown core and at theBurnside Business Park.

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With The Competition There are obvious advantages to the clustering with other stores. You are often closer to 62

distribution. You can get better serviced by travelling sales representatives who can easily hit all the stores in one area. You benefit from the combined effects of all your competitors' advertising, or feed off of l arge retailers' ads. A non-computer example I noticed recently was a high-volume, heavily advertised national mattress store encircled by small competitors. Sleep Country Canada has a largead budget and they draw large numbers of buyers to their location. A small mattress shop competitor pops up beside their store, offering a different selection and discount prices. A futon store emerges beside both of them to get the consumers who decide against a r e gular mattress. In a n other instance, I saw a small computer store pop up beside an Ikea store to leverage off people' s awareness of this huge retailer and their regular pilgrimages to that store.

Resellers might want to consider locations near a Future Shop or Computer City store in order to leverage off their marketing, but differentiate themselves by offering products or services that the larger store does not, or using different price points.

On Your Own Going your own way has its advantages as well. By choosing a location in an under-serviced area, a reseller can more closely target the needs of a specific community. There are sometimes opportunities for a higher margin, if the community shows a reluctance to travel for deals. Some wealthier areas might have an aging population, which has more money and is less inclined to drive for a few dollars savings. Stores in small towns in Canada can often achieve much higher margins, as consumers have to go a long way to get the big city deals.

Research and Resources Here are some ideas for finding the best place to locate your business.

Talk to the people at your city planning department. Many cities have good statistics and information on future plans that will affect your future location. Statistics Canada is anotheruseful source for information on the types of people in an area. Compusearch

CA N A DIAN COMPUTER WHOI ESALER May 1997 ht tpltwwwccwmag.corn

by Douglas Alder

is another useful resource, although the information is not cheap. It provides comprehensive demographic reports on specific retail locations across Canada. Compare income, education level and age groups with your target market to find the best locations.

The Retail Council ofCanada has a Web site with some interesting material on it. The organization sells a number of books specific to retailing. One I noticed that looked good is called: Location, Location, Location by Ken Jones and Jim Simmons.

Cut Instincts One good technique to use is to stand on the street, where you plan to locate and count people or cars passing by. Walk the area.

Check out the other limitations of the area, such as zoning boundaries that will limit growth in the area, or things that stop the flow from an area like highways, or no left hand turn lanes. Does the location have good visible access for signs? Can customers walk or drive in easily? Check on parking availability. Is the access appealing? Look at the kinds of stores and types of people frequenting them. Can you imagine your business doing well in this area?

Rent and Availability In a perfect world, a reseller could chart an ideal location and then set up shop. In reality, the constraints are usually price and availability.

Until customers can beam into your store from anywhere on the planet, like they do on Star Trek, resellers are going to be in physical locations. In the meantime, choose your location well and then start working on your Internet presence. IttWI Computer World: (604) 640-3900 Retail Council of Canada: http: //ww w.retailcouncil.org Compusearch: http: //www.bpmsi.corn Statistics Canada: http: //www.statcan.ca Douglas Alder is Publisher of Canadian Computer Wholesaler. He can be reached at publi sher@tcp.ca.

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