Archive Magazine 1995/ARCHIVE95.iso/text/products/volume_05/issue_08

Text File | 1995-02-16 | 16KB | 293 lines

Å   A5000 CD-ROM offer Ö Acorn are offering to education (yes, education,
only, Iæm afraid) a öcomplete A5000 CD-ROM systemò for ú1799 +VAT. This
consists of an A5000 (not Learning Curve), 40M IDE, 4M ram (not 2M),
Acorn multisync monitor, Cumana CD-ROM drive and SCSI interface, a pair
of mains powered stereo speakers, seven CD-ROM discs (Hutchinson
Encyclopedia, Revelation 2, Space Encyclopedia, Times and Sunday Times
Sampler, Illustrated Holy Bible, Illustrated Works of Shakespeare,
Sherlock Holmes), PC Emulator 1.8, !CD Player to play audio CDs, Cumana
SCSI utilities, ChangeFSI, three CD caddies, mouse mat, Access to Cumana
CD-ROM hotline, ú25-off voucher for a yearæs subscription to NERIS, ú30
voucher for a yearæs subscription to The Times and Sunday Times CD
(RISC-OS version). This package will be available through Archive. (An
A3000 upgrade version to add on to an existing A3000 is said to be
öavailable 1 Julyò and will be ú599 +VAT.)
5.8
I have been down to Acorn to look at this system and it looks very
exciting, especially when you compare it to the offerings for Mac, PC
and Nimbus, etc. It seems to be another area, like DTP, where Acorn
could shine because of the high power/price ratio of the A5000. We
really need someone to write something for Archive about it. The trouble
is that, unlike DTP, I make no claim to be an expert on it. Any offers?
Ed.
5.8
Å   Archimedes Open Day Ö The University of Sussex is having an Open Day
on 2nd July to demonstrate the use of the Archimedes in the teaching of
Mathematics and Statistics. Contact Dr D.R.Robinson on 0273Ö606755 for
details.
5.8
Å   Base5 programs Ö There are now two more programs to add to the Base5
database management system. They are AdMaths which is an advanced
mathematics and statistics package and Mailmerge which is a flexible
mailmerge system allowing the merging of information from different
databases. The prices are ú25 and ú10 respectively but there is no VAT
payable on them. (Base5 itself costs ú69.)
5.8
Å   Cheap A540æs Ö We can still get hold of a few of the cheap (but brand
new) A540æs that we mentioned last month. They will be ú1925 inc VAT and
carriage each. (Beebug still have three available, they tell me, at
ú1875 Ö yer pays yer money...) We also have a couple of ex-demonstration
A540æs. These have been reconditioned and have a full 12 monthsæ
warranty. These cost ú1725 inclusive.
5.8
Å   Chameleon upgrade Ö 4mation have produced a new version of Chameleon
which has ölots of new features including fountain fillsò. The new price
is ú37.50 +VAT (or ú41 through Archive) and the old program is no longer
available. The upgrade from the old version is ú12.50 +VAT but is only
available direct from 4mation.
5.8
Å   ClearView Ö A new hypertext application is available from DEC_dATA. It
allows you to display, search, cross-reference and print text files. The
application costs only ú10. There are two ClearView files available Ö
Columbusæ First Voyage (ú6.95) aimed at primary and lower secondary and
Scientists and Inventors (ú8.95) which contains the biographies of over
300 scientists and inventors. There is also a version of ClearView that
allows you to compile your own files. This costs ú50 from DEC_dATA.
5.8
Å   Clipart Ö Primary Education Services are producing large amounts of
clip art on a whole range of subjects aimed especially at primary
education but useful for anyone interested in the particular subject.
The discs are ú5 each (+ VAT) or ú4.50 each if you order 4 or more discs
at once. Add ú1.50 for postage and packing. The subjects currently
available are as follows (most are single discs but those which are two-
disc sets are marked with a super-scripted 2): Pets, Farm Animals,
Wildcats, Birds of Prey, Pond Life2, The Body, The Circulatory System,
The Human Skeleton, Man in Space, Leicestershire2, Sikhism, Mecca and
Medina, Diwali, Chinese New Year, Christmas, The Romans, The Vikings and
The Greeks.
5.8
Å   Colour scanning and printing Ö BirdTech are offering services of
colour scanning using a Sharp JX100, laser printing using a Laser Direct
600 d.p.i. and colour printing using a Deskjet 500C.
5.8
(The leaflet that BirdTech sent us was very impressive Ö it was in
colour but it was crystal clear, laser quality. The technique used is
simple but very effective. The coloured parts Ö a big bold title and a
logo Ö were printed on the DJ500C and the main text was printed
separately on the laser printer. The overall effect made you think it
was done on a colour laser printer. It wasnæt until you looked carefully
at the colour parts that you realised they were not such high quality as
the main text.)
5.8
Å   Datapower Ö SterrySoft has produced a new database for schools use.
Its capacity is 960 records with up to 24 fields. It uses a 24 field by
24 record spreadsheet type display and has a range of editing and
reporting facilities. The cost is ú29.95 (no VAT).
5.8
Å   Desktop Thesaurus Ö Risc Developments have produced a desktop
thesaurus which is fully RISC-OS compliant. You can type in the word you
want to check or you can ösaveò it from an editor or DTP package into
the thesaurus window and it will offer you various alternatives. ú19
+VAT from Risc Developments.
5.8
Å   Diction is a RISC-OS compliant dictionary program from New Era
Software. It has a 6,000+ word dictionary and costs ú15 (no VAT) from
New Era. This price includes a site licence.
5.8
Å   Dictionaries for German, French and Spanish Ö New Era Software have
produced fully defined G.C.S.E. dictionaries in three European langu
ages. These are RISC-OS compliant programs and costing ú25 each (no VAT)
from New Era. This price includes a site licence.
5.8
Å   Digitising tablet Ö Techsoft have just produced a new digitising
tablet with a 12ö ╫ 12ò active area. It comes with both a stylus for
freehand work and a puck-type pointer with cross-hairs for accurate
work. The software is a sophisticated mouse emulation program so that
the tablet can be used with any applications software. The price is ú175
+VAT.
5.8
Å   Eizo F550i Ö Eizo UK have just produced another new monitor that looks
as if it might be a replacement for the now discontinued 9070. It is the
F550i. The basic facts are: 17ö, 0╖28mm dot pitch, flat screen (but not
Trinitron), microprocessor controlled, Archive price ú890 inc VAT &
carriage. It will need a VIDC enhancer (ú28) if used with A300/400/3000
computers or an enhancer modes disc (ú5) if used with A540 or A5000. I
am using one at the moment and am extremely pleased with it, especially
the microprocessor control which makes it much easier to use when
changing from mode to mode. Once set up in the different modes that you
use, there is no need to make any adjustments to the size, position or
shape of the display. The display is so clear that I can display the
whole of the double page spread of this magazine and still see the words
clearly enough to edit the text Ö well, not clearly enough to want to do
a lot of editing at that magnification, but it is possible which it
certainly wasnæt on the 9060 or the 9070.
5.8
We also stock the Eizo T560i which is 17ö but 0.25 mm dot pitch and uses
a Trinitron tube. The membersæ price is ú1240. Putting the two side by
side, it seems to have exactly the same resolution as the F550i but the
T560iæs colours are much more saturated and there is a much greater
range of brightness available.
5.8
Å   Floptical drives Ö Morley Electronics are the first company (to the
best of our knowledge) to implement the new floptical drives on the
Archimedes. These are very high density (20M) floppy drives that use
optical techniques to give accurate enough tracking to achieve the high
packing density. The same drives will also read, write and format 720k
and 1.44M floppy discs. This is an advantage to non-A5000 owners as it
adds 1.44M to the list of disc formats they can read. Morley are working
on the suppliers of the flopticals in order to get information that will
allow them to write software to read and write all the Acorn formats.
The flopticals could then be used as a replacement for a standard floppy
drive.
5.8
The drives are available now and sell at Archive prices of ú625 for the
external drive, ú475 for the internal (which can also be fitted by a
dealer or a competent DIYer into an A5000 as a second drive), ú685 for
an external drive plus a podule and ú570 for an internal drive plus a
podule. Each drive comes with one floptical disc. Extra discs cost ú35
each or ú165 for a set of 5. These are SCSI devices, so IDE owners will
need to buy a separate SCSI podule.
5.8
Owners of existing Morley SCSI podules need a software update which can
be obtained from Morley for ú10 +VAT. Owners of other SCSI podules will
have to replace their card with a Morley one because you cannot have two
SCSI podules in a computer at once and none of the other podules, as
yet, will support the flopticals. (We have asked Oak Solutions about the
situation but have not, as yet, had any response. Lindis UK say that
they do not, currently, have any plans to write suitable software so
that they can be run from their SCSI interfaces. Acorn are, I would
guess, unlikely to extend their SCSI software to include flopticals.) We
hope to have a floptical drive for testing purposes in the next few
days, so we will give further reports next month.
5.8
Å   G-Draft Ö is a 2D CAD program which can output to HPGL plotters or dot
matrix printers via files in Draw format that are passed to the RISC-OS
printer driver. It is fully RISC-OS compliant and offers a range of
features including automatic dimensioning, 8 layer drawings, HPGL input,
symbols can be input from or output to disk libraries, etc. The price is
ú80 excluding VAT but including postage from G-Soft in Germany.
5.8
Å   Graphics & font packs Ö Logan Interactive have produced a series of
fonts and graphics packs: Bullets (highlighting symbols) ú8.95, Liner
(family of 4 fonts) ú24.95, Sunshine (decorative font) ú8.95, Railway
mapping symbols (2 fonts + graphics) ú24.95, Transport 1 (transport
pictograms Ö 1 font + graphics) ú16.95 and Transport 2 (route diagram
symbols Ö 1 font + graphics) ú16.95. Here is a sample of Transport 1: a
f  g  h  m  y .
5.8
Å   Inkjet refills and cheap inkjet cartridges are available from a
company called HCS (not HCCS of Acorn fame) on 0800Ö252Ö252.
5.8
Å   Interacter 1.60 Ö The Fortran user interface/graphic subroutine
library, Interacter is available from Interactive Software Services. It
is a subroutine library which allows menus, forms, text windows and high
resolution graphics to be added to Fortran software in a system
independent manner. It is available for RISC-OS, RISC-iX, DOS, DEC VAX/
VMS, PRIMOS and various other Unix systems. The RISC-iX version costs
ú950 +VAT for a two-developer licence (or ú570 +VAT for education). A
single user RISC-OS licence costs ú195 +VAT (ú146.25 +VAT for
education).
5.8
Å   MicroDrive World Edition Ö Cambridge International Software have
produced a version of their well-established 3D golf simulator with
seven courses covering English parkland, Spanish riviera, US lakeside,
US pine forest, Caribbean, Scottish links and Portuguese coastal. ú29.95
from CIS or ú27 through Archive.
5.8
Å   National Curriculum Planner and Database Ö New Era Software have
produced a database and a planner for those having to plough their way
through the administration involved with the National Curriculum.
NCPlanner is aimed at the task of recording National Curriculum
assessments and NCBase is used to generate progress charts. The two
programs together cost ú25 or ú40 inclusive of site licence and
automatic upgrades.
5.8
Å   PinPoint upgrade Ö Longman Logotron have issued an upgrade to their
PinPoint database. The extra facilities, including horizontal bar and
line charts and extra options for many of the existing features, is free
of charge to existing owners. All registered users of PinPoint should
have received their free upgrades by the end of April.
5.8
Å   Precision is a RISC-OS compliant reading program produced by New Era
Software and aimed at special needs students. It has facilities for
learning, testing and recording and uses a limited number of selected
words. You can also include pictures if you wish and it costs ú20 (no
VAT) from New Era including a site licence.
5.8
Å   PrimeArt upgrade Ö PrimeArt from Minerva will now work in mode 21 and
has new features including support for concept keyboards, sticky menus
and brush latching. The upgrade costs ú10 +VAT from Minerva. The
PrimeArt package is ú79.95 +VAT or ú87 through Archive including a
primary or special needs site licence.
5.8
Å   PrimeArt display kit Ö Minerva now produce a program to allow you to
create a rolling demo of PrimeArt pictures just by dropping the files
into a directory. The price is ú12 +VAT from Minerva.
5.8
Å   Science control software and hardware Ö SterrySoft produces a control
box (ú19.95) and three applications packages (ú9.95 each). The control
box connects up to an analogue port (not standard on Archimedes but
available as an add-on podule) and provides inputs that can be used for
temperature sensors, pendulum recording and car-on-ramp type
experiments.
5.8
Å   !SFXM Ö This is Cambridge International Softwareæs new sound effects
maker. In software, you combine oscillators, noise generators, envelope
generators, pulse generators, low-pass and high-pass filters, multi
pliers, sample and hold, variable delays, echo and reverb, etc to create
interesting new sounds. Apart from the fun aspect and applications where
sound effects are needed, I can see this being used in education as a
way of investigating the effects of some of the fundamental components
such as filters, delays, etc. The price is ú39.95 from CIS or ú37 from
Archive.
5.8
Å   Supermarket is a RISC-OS compliant program produced by New Era
Software and aimed at special needs students. It is a simple simulation
of a supermarket and comes in five different languages under the names
Supermarket, Archfarchnad, Supermarkt, SupermarchΘ and Supermercado. The
programs are ú10 each from New Era (no VAT) including a site licence but
if you buy more than one at a time, the first one costs ú10 and extra
languages are then ú8 each.
5.8
Å   Swiv Ö Krisalis have ported their Atari/Amiga etc game, Swiv, onto the
Archimedes. Fly a helicopter gunship or drive an armoured jeep and...
...well, blow everybody up, I suppose! The cost is ú25.95 or ú24 through
Archive.
5.8
Å   Tapestry software Ö SterrySoft has produced a program that will allow
you to design tapestry on a 50 ╫ 40 grid in 8 colours with two styles of
stitch. Designs can be saved for later use and colour printed. The cost
is ú9.95 (no VAT).
5.8
Å   Virus watch Ö Pineapple Software have introduced a new service for all
Archimedes owners to combat the growing threat of viruses. The service
will operate as follows:
5.8
1)ááOn payment of a small annual registration fee (ú24 + VAT), customers
will receive a disc containing details of all known Archimedes viruses
together with software developed under licence from Acorn Computers
Limited, which will render all of the known viruses ineffective. Further
discs will be sent out to customers during the year as more viruses
become known and, in the case of any particularly damaging virus, an
immediate innoculation disc will be sent to all customers.
5.8
2)ááPineapple will act as a central point for collecting information
about new viruses. Any Archimedes users who suspect they have suffered
the effects of a new virus (i.e. one that is not cured by Pineappleæs
latest release of software) should send full details to Pineapple.
5.8
3)ááIn extreme circumstances (if all else fails!), they will offer an
Éon siteæ cure to customers, although the cost of this will have to be
arranged on an  individual basis.
5.8
Pineapple would like to stress that they are not trying to make a profit
out of the warped pleasure that some people seem to get from creating
these viruses Ö hence the charge which, it is estimated, will just about
cover the running of the service.
5.8
Unfortunately, judging from the experiences of PC users, viruses are
here to stay but Pineapple think they may at least be able to help
control the problem even though it is unlikely that it can ever be
completely eliminated.
5.8