Hi, everyone! I don't have anything extremely concrete to write about this month, so I'm going to hit a few random points; kind of a catchall column to wrap up a few things from previous months.

Random PowerBook Reflections
After a full month of practical use at college, I am still very impressed with my upgraded 1400. It is a workhorse, and has been the most reliable Mac I have used to date. I'm also rather attached to the campus T1 line I get to access the Internet with. No file is too large for me to download now!!!

An odd observation is that I seem to hit the Caps Lock key by accident quite often while I am typing. I'm not sure if this is an effect of the PowerBook's smaller keyboard or what, but I've never had that problem typing on any other keyboards. A minor annoyance at best, because the rest of my typing has been largely unaffected.

The only disadvantage I've run across with my 1400 is that it is built with a slow video subsystem. It's not a big deal, since I don't do any video editing, but if I don't have enough RAM available, or if the system is busy doing other things in the background, the frame rate drops considerably when I'm trying to watch South Park movies! :-)

Anyone who has a PowerBook and is even slightly concerned with theft (and when you're dealing with something as small and as expensive as a notebook computer, you should be!) should look into the Kensington MicroSaver security cable. It's an unobtrusive 6-foot steel cable that attaches to your PowerBook on one end and any immovable object on the other. I carry the key to unlock the cable on my keychain, and there is no way that my 1400 is going anywhere without using that key first. Best of all, the MicroSaver only costs about $35, which is a small price to pay for the security that it provides.

Control-Click Heaven
I have fallen in love with contextual menus. I don't know how I lived without them before. Anyone who has not picked up the freeware CMM plug-in FinderPop really should. This thing is invaluable. It provides easy file and application launching, as well as access to commonly-used folders and volumes. One of my favorite features is an "Empty Trash Now!" command, which empties the trash without the warning dialog box, and can do so from anywhere on the screen, instead of having to Control-Click the trash can to bring up that option. Very slick!

For those out there still using Apple's mice, FinderPop also gives the option of bringing up a contextual menu without holding down the Control key, based on how long the mouse button is held down. Another nice feature, but personally I couldn't live without my Kensington mouse.

The only problem I've run across with contextual menus? SimpleText doesn't support them.

Game Updates
Chris Dillman of Plaid World Software has released version 3.0 of his top-shelf shooter, Project Magellan, which Adam and I reviewed a couple months ago. Version 3.0 makes minor changes to the game, and also adds an "Arcade" mode feature, in which the power-up system and game play is more like a typical Nintendo-esque shooter. The update does away with the CD-ROM distribution method of the full version of the game, and allows registered users to download the full version over the Internet. The shareware fee has also been lowered from $29 to $20.

Project Magellan remains, in my opinion, the most gorgeous shooter out there, but it does take quite a bit of horsepower to run acceptably, unless you want to lower the graphic quality and frame rate. Users with less powerful Macs who want fun side-scrolling shooter action should try out Star Fight: Final 1.1 by A. Takano. The graphics are reminiscent of 8-bit arcade games, but the game is fun.

Finally...
I'll close this month with a confession. My new PowerBook has decreased my productivity in college. I know the Mac OS is easier to use, and thus should increase my productivity, etc, etc. The things is, keep in mind that my previous two Macs have been an original LC and a LC 575, neither of which packed very much horsepower. But with my 1400/250 G3, I can play the latest games, do all kinds of cool things with video and sound, and surf the web at lightning-fast speeds using every plug-in imaginable. When I use one of the campus Windows machines, I find myself wanting to type what I need to type and get away from the computer as quickly as possible, but when I use my 1400, it's just too much fun to play around with all the cool things I can do!

I'm sorry to have to debunk one of the best advantages we as Mac users have, but I've got to be honest. People say that Mac users are more efficient and more productive than their Windows-using counterparts, but in my case, the opposite has been true. As long as Apple keeps on making computers that are this easy to do all kinds of fun stuff with, I may never want to get any work done!

Not that that's a bad thing. :-)

Until next month, happy Mac-ing!

Mike Wallinga
mikew@mymac.com