FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
San Francisco, September 27, 1995 -- Sonic Solutions and Xinet, Inc. announced today the co-development of a high-speed file serving solution for the prepress and media production markets. MediaShare will combine the file transfer speeds of Sonic Solutions' MediaNet network with Xinet(R) K-AShare(R) AFP server software. This combination will allow Macintosh workstations to access files from Sun, Silicon Graphics and Hewlett-Packard servers at speeds roughly equal to local drive access.
Bottlenecks are one of the most pressing problems in professional graphics and multimedia production. Most Macintosh to UNIX connectivity solutions offer little speed improvement over standard AppleShare. This is due to limitations with both the AFP server protocols and various NFS implementations on the UNIX side. MediaNet uses an enhanced AppleTalk protocol to bypass the AFP bottlenecks, which will then read and write files directly through special hooks into the K-AShare server. The system is fully compatible with all of the standard Macintosh applications such as QuarkXPress, Photoshop and PageMaker.
"This combination of two technologies is critical for the prepress market," said Mark Packman, Director of Sales for Sonic Solutions. "Our customers deal with individual files as large as 250 megabytes. Many have resorted to physically shuttling drives between workstations but this "sneakernet" mode is inefficient. Now, our users can simply open files directly from the server, which makes an operator more productive and also makes it easier to track jobs in the facility."
The combination of MediaNet and K-AShare will provide raw data transfer rates of 3MB per second. As a result, typical operations will be 5 to 10 times faster than normal AppleShare; a 20MB Photoshop file will open in 12 to 15 seconds. These speed increases yield tremendous improvements in prepress workflow, where lack of network speed has resulted in operators wasting time locating and accessing files, instead of performing revenue-producing operations.
"Xinet provides an advanced network solution for prepress customers, including the release of our OPI server FullPress(TM)," said Dick Wrenn, Vice President of Marketing for Xinet. "Using a typical Macintosh on Ethernet, Xinet has observed transfer rates of 500 to 600 KB/second. MediaShare provides even faster file access for high-res images, dramatically increasing throughput from image acquisition to final output. We're excited about providing MediaShare to our prepress customers."
Based in Novato, California, Sonic Solutions is a leading supplier of tools for the professional "digital media workgroup," including the Sonic line of digital audio workstations, high-speed networking, and MPEG/Video CD premastering systems. Sonic Solutions' audio workstations are used by leading film and television post houses, record companies, and radio broadcasters around the world. MediaNet is used by leading multimedia facilities as well as graphics and prepress houses which work with high-resolution graphics and image files.
Xinet has been developing and marketing UNIX to Macintosh connectivity solutions since 1985. The company specializes in client/server solutions that allow Macintoshes and UNIX systems to work together efficiently and reliably. Xinet is a privately held company with offices in Berkeley, California and Santa Fe, New Mexico.
Xinet and K-AShare registered trademarks, and FullPress is a trademark of Xinet, Inc. MediaNet is a registered trademark of Sonic Solutions. All other trademarks and registered trademarks are properties of their respective owners. Copywrite 1995 Sonic Solutions.