Mercurial Mind (10/22/98)
What goes on in the head of the world's most mercurial interim CEO? Heck, all kinds of stuff, as evidenced by Fortune magazine's recent interview with Steve Jobs. Others may not agree, but AtAT stands by our principle that any Jobs interview is a must-read for any Apple-watcher.

There's seemingly no end to the interesting little tidbits one can extract from the short interview. For instance, we weren't aware that Steve had attempted to have Apple buy the PalmPilot from 3Com. That sort of throws the whole Newton scenario into a slightly different light. And while we're fully aware of how people can overreact, it's more than a little disturbing to read that Steve received death threats for ending the clone business. There's even an explanation of that infamous sale of all of his Apple stock--except for one share. Call it a case of poor timing.

Certain aspects of the interview are a little worrisome to some of us--we don't mind, for instance, that Steve doesn't plan for Apple to expand into non-computer electronic appliances. We always thought that Amelio-era idea of having Apple-branded educational toys and cybercafés was just a little bit cheesy. And we're just dandy with his direction of focusing on making Apple primarily a consumer-oriented company, but we hope and pray that Steve doesn't forget about the professionals who have kept Apple alive. We love our iMac, and most of what we do to produce AtAT could definitely be done on it. But not the video capture, for instance... and we'd feel a little cramped putting AtAT together on a 15" display. And those real professionals out there who push pixels all day, or edit broadcast-quality video, rely on pro-level Macs for their livelihood. The iMac rocks, but we're more than overdue for a serious high-end Mac.

http://www.pathfinder.com/fortune/1998/981109/job.html

Into the Abyss (10/18/98)
So Mac OS 8.5 finally arrived on Saturday, and there was much rejoicing (yayyy). For the most part, people seem pleased with Apple's new system software release, which appears to be a solid upgrade with enough fun little features to justify the $99 retail price tag. For our part, we ventured bravely into unknown territory to secure a copy--namely, the newish CompUSA in Cambridge. We've never been great fans of CompUSA ("Your Dank, Spooky Warehouse Filled With Computer-Type Stuff!"), whose stores seem universally underlit and staffed with brusque and unknowledgable salespeople as a general rule. Not that we haven't found some great exceptions: in the past, we've encountered a few genuinely helpful and technically-savvy CompUSA employees, but we should have radio-tagged them as members of an endangered species, because their breed is few and far between. As for exceptions to the rule that CompUSA stores must be vast, yawning warehouses lit by a few ill-placed kerosene lanterns placed atop some dusty and teetering stacks of dot-matrix printers, we hadn't encountered one until Saturday...

Cambridge's CompUSA is actually mostly on the second floor of what is almost a small office-type building; upon entering the first-floor lobby, we were greeted with the sight of several customer service representatives sitting along the back wall, and an escalator up to the second floor, which was the main store area. Surprisingly enough, the atmosphere was almost pleasant, as the ceilings weren't six miles high and the lighting felt more appropriate for a department store than for, say, that giant government warehouse at the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark. Most CompUSA's we've visited somehow manage to make us feel claustrophobic despite the empty space overhead; this store, conversely, seemed more cozy than flat-out cramped. It was definitely a more pleasant shopping atmosphere than we had expected.

Some things really are constants in the CompUSA universe, though. All of the PowerBooks were either off completely, or stuck at the Password Protection screen, making them useless as demo models. There were several poor souls (ourselves included) wandering the aisles of the tiny Apple store-within-a-store, looking lost and vulnerable, with nary a salesperson to be found. (There were plenty wheeling and dealing fifteen feet away in the PC section, of course.) Even on Mac OS 8.5's intro day, there was nobody demonstrating the software--but it was after six by the time we got there, and we're sure we just missed the festivities. On the way out, we were eyed suspiciously by a security guard who checked our receipt before letting us leave. And while the atmosphere wasn't really appropriate for the presence of a giant stocking ladder blocking the Apple area, instead the Mac OS 8.5 boxes were on a shelf obscured by a big supporting pillar. But hey, it is a CompUSA, after all...

The "Other" iMac (10/19/98)
By now most of AtAT's faithful viewers are aware of the running gag known as "Apple products in CompUSA's Sunday circulars." It's harder to find Mac hardware in one of those than it is to find an actual peanut in a modern box of Cracker Jacks. But even wrong information is better than no info at all, as faithful viewer Kareem Kazkaz makes clear. He pointed out an "interesting" description of the iMac at CompUSA's website. The description has since been amended to list the standard specs we all know and love, but before it was changed apparently the particular iMac model described was listed as having a 350 MHz Pentium II processor. Holy hybrid, Batman!

Ah, but you probably thought the Pentium-powered iMac was just a humorous mistake, didn't you? Or did all those little alarm bells go off in your head warning you that there's more here than meets the eye? It's no secret that rumors about Motorola possibly cancelling further PowerPC development has some Apple watchers nervously waiting for the other shoe to drop, and while Motorola execs strongly deny that any such move is in the works, you should know by now never to take an exec's statement too seriously. Yes, it's a long shot, but if Motorola were to drop the PPC, that would leave IBM as the sole developer and supplier of every chip at the heart of every Apple product. A sketchy situation, at best; what if IBM were to duck out, too?

Nope, that Pentium-fueled iMac is the real deal, cooked up in Apple's secret underground labs as a "Plan B" in case the PowerPC goes kaput. It runs a souped-up version of the "Star Trek: The Next Generation" operating system, which appears to be Mac OS 8.5 rehosted on the x86 architecture. However, this "alternative" iMac was supposed to be kept under wraps, only to be unveiled if circumstances demanded it. Instead, somebody mixed up the work orders, and somehow specs for the secret iMac design (see, the "i" really stands for "iNtel") found their way into CompUSA's marketing department. Whoopsie! But black-suited Apple agents have "remedied" the problem, paying a little visit to CompUSA headquarters and "persuading" them to remove the Pentium II specs. Reports are filtering in that the two agents in question looked remarkably like Jesse "The Body" Ventura and game show host Alex Trebek, but hey, you can't believe everything you hear.

Jack Miller
jackm@infoXczar.com