PC expo impressions

[Joshua Hosseinoff <hosseino@yu1.yu.edu>]

Huge crowd today at the PC expo.  I got a look at the new PowerPC 
thinkpad's.  The 850 model looks really cool the screen half of it has a 
rounded top for the video camera and microphone.  I felt underneath it 
and I was surprised that it wasn't searing hot like other thinkpads 
(perhaps the powerpc's don't get as hot as pentiums and 486's).
The model they had there had 800 on it so it looks like there was a last 
minute model # switch to 850.  The ones they had there were running 
either NT or AIX but not their Powerpc OS2 which is still in beta testing.

Now I have to dig out all the pamphlets and magazines I picked up.
Tomorrow I'll sit in at as many presentations as I can an enter all the 
raffles.  IBM's giving away one 701C per day.  I am amazed at how small 
those things actually are since I hadn't seen one yet.

I asked one of the reps there about the 28.8 DSP upgrade and he said any 
day now but that it would be a flash upgrade and would NOT need a 
hardware upgrade.  I also cleared up some confusion about the "lower" 
price on the CX model.  What they did is make the 800x600 screen and the 
mwave chip options so that the base price with a 640x480 screen and no mwave 
chip is lower.  
I also found out that memory manufacturers either have now or in the next 
couple of months will have 64MB IC dram's.  
I also found a company that sells batteries and car power adapters for 
thinkpad's including the older 700/720 and 350 models and even the l40sx.
I'll post the name and prices when I dig it out of my pile of papers.
Other than that no big innovations in PCMCIA, I did see one PCMCIA card 
with modem/fax and ethernet with both 10base2 and 10baseT.

Apparently there may be more product announcements from IBM tomorrow as 
well so stay tuned.

Josh Hosseinoff
hosseino@yu1.yu.edu