Small Suite Sweetened for Win95
by: James E. Powell
The first integrated software package for Windows 95 is out of the gate and--surprise--it's from Microsoft. Works for Windows 95 has been worked over. The beta we saw has a few new must-have features added, but the majority of the effort was focused on improving what was already there.
For example, when you create a letter with the Letter TaskWizard, you can choose from an available format and then type in a single entry or use a Works database for the mailing list. There are over 100 sample business and personal letters to choose from.
Works 95 is even more appealing if you get the version that includes Bookshelf 95. Adding Bookshelf 95 ups the price to $79.95 (through the end of the year, $99.95 thereafter), but it's still a good deal. Among its references, Bookshelf 95 includes a zip code database. For no apparent reason, however, Bookshelf is only available from Works 95's word processor.
Microsoft estimates about 65 percent of current Works users manage their small businesses with the program. To better serve them, Works 95 offers more predefined text, more layouts for reports, letters and faxes, and more useful help.
From its opening screen, Works 95's improvements are obvious. The new Task Launcher asks what category you want to work in--Correspondence, Business Management, Household Management, Employment or Common Tasks. These include letters, address book entries and creating letterheads. Click on a category and a TaskWizard starts. The wizards are arranged logically and are easy to find.
The word processor displays the font names in the drop-down list using the actual fonts. A new page layout view shows headers and footers on screen as they would appear in your document. You can also customize bullets, page and paragraph borders, and shading.
The Works 95 database has added a separate design view so you can't accidentally alter a screen form when entering data. The new ReportCreator uses a tabbed dialog box to offer Format, Group, Sort, Filter and Summary options. You can print only marked records or merge them with standard letters. The ReportCreator falls a little short. You can use a TaskWizard to quickly create a report, but editing the results is tricky. And you can associate only eight reports with a database.
Works' spreadsheet has some new features, too. Easy Calc walks you through any of 76 formulas. With only a little input, it made an intelligent guess about what I wanted to sum up and automatically created the =SUM formula. Autofill, which extends a series of entries across a range of cells, is also new. The spreadsheet's automatic formatting and charting functions have been improved, too.
Works 95's common address book can be used alone to store names and phone numbers or used in conjunction with mail merge. You can choose from several address book formats predefined for handling suppliers, clients, employees, or your personal or business contacts.
The program supports Windows 95 long filenames and OLE 2.0. With OLE, you can, for example, drag an Excel spreadsheet into your document and even edit it from within Works. Works 95 bears a strong familial resemblance to big brother Microsoft Office. The programs read each other's files, but don't share the same file format.
You'll need 6MB of RAM to run Works 95, but you'll be happier with the recommended 8MB. Works 95 treads lightly on your hard disk with a small footprint of only 20MB for the full package.
If the improved interface isn't enough to get you going, tap some of Works 95's other help options. There are quick tours that explain features using mini-movies and a task-oriented getting started guide. Right-button menus are everywhere.
With Works 95, the small improvements add up to a big winner.
--Info File--
Microsoft Works for Windows 95
Price: $54.95 (street); with Bookshelf 95, $79.95; $10 in-box rebate for upgrades
In Brief: The first integrated package for Windows 95 has plenty of help and default text, and samples to manage your home or business daily correspondence, spreadsheet and database needs.
Microsoft Corp.
800-426-9400, 206-882-8080
Image App Accelerates to 95
by: James E. Powell
Fasten your seat belts--Picture Publisher is going to take you on a 32-bit joyride through Windows 95.
Micrografx's popular professional image editor takes advantage of its new environment with significantly increased speed thanks to 32-bit code. Running on my 90MHz Pentium system with 16MB of RAM, the program was so fast that it was impossible for me to grab a screenshot of Image Task Manager in action. Picture Publisher is that fast.
Picture Publisher's Image Task Manager keeps its finger on the pulse of everything that's going on in the program. If you're modifying an image while loading another, the Image Task Manager shows you each task's progress. You can also use the Image Task Manager to suspend a task so another can finish--an especially handy feature when working with large, high-color images.
Picture Publisher makes good use of Windows 95 conventions, from right mouse pop-up menus and long filenames to custom toolboxes. The Infinite Undo command makes experimentation a pleasure instead of a threat. The program has tabbed dialog boxes, dock-able custom toolbars and tool tips that pop up when the cursor hovers over an icon. Click on a toolbar icon and a small group of icons for tasks in that category is displayed.
Just as with Windows 95 itself, you can right-click on an image to open its property sheet, which reports such facts as the filename and the color resolution. For advanced color work, there's support for color separations and the 32-bit Kodak Precision Color Management System. Micrografx has also added support for Corel's .CDR file format. The beta I tested didn't have JPEG, AVI and TWAIN support yet, nor was the Kodak system operational. But the Effects- Browser, which worked fine in the beta, lets you find and preview more than 45 special effects, from posterizing an image to changing its color threshold.
You can group your graphics into albums with thumbnails for each image. The album can accommodate a keyword or phrase that you can use as a search criterion. A multi-image clipboard, complete with browser, lets you store snippets of images so you can recall and use them quickly.
Picture Publisher has a full slate of image management features. Adjust contrast and brightness, rotate or flip images, crop sections and cut out parts of an image. Images can be converted to line art or gray scale and saved in different file formats. Mask image sections and arrange objects in layers and groups. The unique Object Layers feature works like a pasteup board, where you can create as many layers of single or grouped objects as you like. Layers--and the objects within them--can be moved easily.
The Command List tracks every command, adding each to an editable list. You can remove, reorder or modify any of the list's commands and turn it into the equivalent of a macro. This provides a degree of automation, so you make short work of repetitive tasks. You can also work with an image in low-resolution mode to save on redraw time. When you're happy with the results, use the saved command list to apply your modifications to the high-resolution version of the graphic.
Although not operational in the beta, Picture Publisher will accept plug-in effect filters such as HSC's Kai's Power Tools.
As a well-behaved Windows 95 app, Picture Publisher 95 supports OLE 2.0, so you can embed images into OLE-compliant applications. You could, for example, embed an image into a Microsoft Word document and then use OLE in-place editing to rework the image with Picture Publisher's tools.
Picture Publisher has a solid toolkit and exceptional ease of use. If speed's your thing, you'll want to park this app on your hard disk.
--Info File--
Picture Publisher for Windows 95
Price: $299.95 (street)
In Brief: Picture Publisher's Windows 95 edition is a slick graphics editing tool with speed to burn.
Micrografx
800-676-3110, 214-234-1769
Graphics Glasnost: Add-Ins OK
by: Lynn Ginsburg
With the debut of FreeHand 5.0, a high-end design package, Macromedia is ready to duke it out in the tough Windows graphics arena. The program is also the design component of a new suite that includes FreeHand, MacroModel, Fontographer and Fractal Design's Painter 3.0.
Macromedia has added some interesting new features to FreeHand, which it acquired as a result of the Aldus-Adobe merger. This version offers significant improvements with third-party plug-ins and special effects that are supported by a new open architecture. Drag-and-drop colors and styles, multicolored gradients, extreme magnification modes, enhanced text-handling capabilities and an enlarged pasteboard are among the new features.
But rather than playing a game of one-upmanship by packing in as many features as possible, Macromedia is attempting to distinguish FreeHand by simplifying common tasks. The changes and new features were designed to streamline the labor-intensive processes of graphics creation.
One of the best examples of the sleeker FreeHand 5.0 is the reduced number of steps required to accomplish modal tasks from on-screen palettes. For instance, I was able to apply styles to text and objects by dragging a style icon and dropping it onto the object, thereby reducing to one step a process that would normally require several. FreeHand has also added stylesheets for text, with the same drag-and-drop operation for instant text formatting. These may seem like minor changes, but if you count the times you re-spec an object's attributes or reformat type in a multipage document, the saved steps add up.
FreeHand's new open architecture now supports third-party plug-ins, called Xtras. The add-ons can be used to update the program or customize it with new tools for specialized needs. Six special effects plug-ins are included: spiral, smudge, 3-D rotation, fish-eye lens, arc and eyedropper. The plug-ins are displayed on screen in an easily accessible tool palette--unlike the Mac version of Adobe Illustrator 5.5, which nests the plug-ins within menus. FreeHand's implementation of plug-ins is very efficient. You use them as you would any of its standard tools, as compared to Illustrator 5.5, which requires you to enter values in a dialog box. Neither of FreeHand's biggest Windows competitors--Illustrator 4.03 and CorelDRAW--support third-party plug-ins at this time.
Version 5.0 also has improved text handling, with a spell checker, search and replace, and an optional text-edit window. I found these features especially useful when working with text in multipage layouts. The new 22- by 22-foot pasteboard also facilitates the production of multipage documents, as well as graphics with large print areas. FreeHand lets you focus in on your document in minute detail with magnification up to 25,600 percent. Also new are graduated and radial fills that can contain up to 64 colors, and a report generation feature that details the fonts, colors, embedded or linked objects, and other information pertinent to service bureau output.
FreeHand lacks CorelDRAW's flood of features and Illustrator's native PostScript compatibility. However, it does match most of these programs' key features and provides a unique approach to the graphics as well. FreeHand edges out its competitors with its streamlined interface and open architecture. The program focuses on making common graphics operations easier to execute, and leaves the gee-whiz features to outside developers.
With version 5.0, Macromedia has proved that FreeHand can continue to be a major player in the Windows graphics arena.
--Info File--
FreeHand 5.0
Price: $595; competitive upgrade, $149
In Brief: FreeHand 5.0 has solidified its position in the Windows graphics market with redesigned tools that simplify repetitive production tasks.
Macromedia
800-288-8108, 415-252-2000
Fast Color for Business
by: Michelle Tyrrell
If you yearn for color, but don't want to give up the speed and practicality of a black-and-white printer, Hewlett-Packard has solved your dilemma. HP's newest office ink jet printer, the HP DeskJet 1600CM, demonstrates again why Hewlett-Packard is the oft-imitated, seldom duplicated, leader of the pack in printer technology. The HP 1600CM churns out brilliant colors and true blacks posthaste, and it can switch among Ethernet, LocalTalk and Centronics interfaces. The $1,999 price tag should make it attractive to businesses and individuals who have put off buying a quality color printer for their office or workgroup.
Everyone gets a kick out of a new color printer, but I was surprised by the true-black images and text this one produced. With black text, this printer is swift enough for even the largest files. In Microsoft Word, I sent several text pages to the 1600CM, and it consistently printed 8 to 9 pages per minute. With Resolution Enhancement technology (REt), it turns out 600x600-dot-per- inch images that are crisp, clear and easy to read. And while it's still not really laser-quality, it should satisfy even the most discriminating users for most jobs.
When I switched to full color, the printing time increased dramatically, but the HP 1600CM was still fast enough to be practical. It produced a 300x300 dpi, full-color document from PageMaker in about 1.5 minutes in the Normal printing mode. Using the ColorSmart and print-quality options on the printer setup menu, I was able to tweak the color output by choosing from EconoFast, Normal and Presentation modes (a full-color document in Presentation mode printed at the rate of about a half-page per minute), and Automatic, Gray-scale or Manual color output. Using the Manual mode, the user can adjust the output for text, graphics or photos. And for the most beautiful color in presentations, I recommend the HP Premium Glossy Paper--the colors almost leap off the page.
The HP 1600CM is designed for individual and workgroup environments and comes equipped with Adobe PostScript Level 2 and Enhanced PCL 5 Color printer languages. It contains 35 Intellifont, 10 TrueType and 35 Adobe Type I scalable typefaces. It ships with 6MB of RAM, expandable to 70MB. The standard front-loading, 180-sheet paper tray is adequate, but an optional 500-sheet plain-paper-only tray is also available.
This printer is fully compatible with the HP LaserJet 4 Plus with the same PCL 5 printer language and fonts, the same memory SIMMs and the same HP JetDirect print servers. The included JetAdmin and JetPrint network- management tools provide networking capability for easily shared, cost- effective color output.
The HP DeskJet 1600CM weighs 25 lbs. and measures 11 by 20 by 17 inches. When I opened the box, I saw about eight pieces of documentation, including user guides and installation guides explaining setup procedures. I was prepared to be confused, but I was pleasantly surprised. When I realized that most of the material wasn't intended for me (it was printed in no fewer than 15 languages), I got to work and the setup was easy and uneventful.
I installed the four ink cartridges (cyan, magenta, yellow and black) and the software, and 15 minutes later it was running with nary a hitch.
The one blue button on the front of the unit is context-sensitive--push it to perform a self-test, to print data still in the printer's memory, to override manual feed, or to resume a print job after correcting a problem, such as a paper jam. And speaking of paper jams, the 1600CM seems to have precious few of those--I didn't run into that problem the whole time I tested it, even though I used envelopes, transparencies, labels and both glossy and plain paper in the paper tray and the manual-feed slot at the top of the unit.
With the 1600CM, Hewlett-Packard seems to have thought of everything. If you want color printing at a reasonable price, but require speed, compatibility and true blacks for monochrome printing, this printer can do whatever you need it to do--standalone or as a network printer.
--Info File--
Hewlett-Packard DeskJet 1600CM
Price: $1,999
In Brief: Brilliant color, superb text, forget-about-it reliability, heavyweight duty cycle: If you've waited to make the move to color, your wait is over.
Hewlett-Packard Co.
800-752-0900, 208-323-2551
Accounting's Artful Ledger
by: Joel T. Patz
There's a light at the end of the bookkeeping tunnel for small businesses. It's called QuickBooks Pro. SOHO-sized companies can get rid of those scraps of paper and bulging files and move into an organized, well-designed and attractive office, with some of the best help in town.
I tested a beta version of QuickBooks Pro, which builds on QuickBook's easy-to-use features by adding time tracking, estimating, job costing, accounting and payroll functions.
When you set up your business on QuickBooks Pro, you first define your company type: service, professional or product-oriented. Your choice determines the invoice style. To establish a chart of accounts, you choose the business type which most closely resembles yours from an extensive list of organizations. Any necessary adjustments can be made in the future. Check a few dialog boxes to establish if QB Pro should apply sales taxes, if purchase orders will be required, whether or not you'll use time tracking and the payroll module, and you're ready to go.
The major business functions are available via 12 icons on the toolbar. Two others--one for QCards, a step-by-step assistant, and the other for online help--round out QB Pro's toolbar. Drop-down menus and dialog boxes provide access to setups, lists, reports, graphs, preferences and the activities associated with configuring your business just as you want it.
To create an estimate, you specify the services or materials to be provided and the quantity or units involved. If the commodity is already in your item list, you can select it from a drop-down list and the cost and markups will be filled in. If it's a new item, you can easily add it to the list on the fly. Sales tax is calculated for the appropriate items. Before finalizing your estimate, you can include a customer message. When your prospects become customers, you can turn estimates into invoices with a mouse click.
The time employees spend on different jobs is entered on single-activity forms or on weekly time sheets. You enter the information once and it's automatically carried over to the appropriate accounting and payroll records. When preparing an invoice, the information can be retrieved. You can also modify the billable hours while retaining a permanent record of the actual time involved. In addition, there's a specific form for tracking all expenses and hours spent on a job so you won't forget to include them on an invoice.
The integrated payroll function will also make your life easier. Once an employee file is set up, information from time sheets is used to generate a paycheck. QB Pro handles hourly, salaried and on-commission employees; a wide variety of deductions; W-2 information and forms; and vacation and sick leave. You can preview all payroll information to verify the hours and make adjustments prior to individual or batch check printing.
Creating purchase orders and maintaining inventory is a snap. The integration of inventory with invoices, estimates and purchase orders ensures that you always know what you have on hand or on order. If you specify more items than you have in stock, the program's inventory manager lets you know about it.
You can customize QB Pro's estimate, invoice, purchase order and other business forms in minutes. It's possible to add or delete fields and columns or rename fields and titles. Parts of forms can be hidden so that while they're visible on screen they won't print.
QuickBooks Pro provides over 75 reports to keep you on top of things, and six graph types that highlight trends and relationships. From the graphs, you can drill down to the underlying transaction details. Reminder lists can be set to appear each time you enter the program, and the program will also let you know when to pay bills and print paychecks and invoices.
If you don't have a business now, QuickBooks Pro is a good reason to start one.
--Info File--
QuickBooks Pro
Price: $189 ($50 rebate for QuickBooks and Quicken users)
In Brief: QuickBooks Pro offers a neat all-in-one solution for time tracking, estimating, job costing, accounting and payroll.
Intuit
800-624-8742, 415-322-0573
Pricey Portable Packs Potential
by: John Perry
With a 75MHz--not a 90MHz--Pentium, the TravelMate seems a little pricey. But its smart design and enviable battery life make it worth a look.
The two lithium ion batteries kept me at work for more than five hours. Each battery has a three-light display. One shows the power level, and red lights on the deck and the battery packs flash when power levels become critical. The deck actually looks like something Dilbert would buy, with lights for every function imaginable. The power supply is designed to please: The sliding ejection switches worked flawlessly to eject either battery pack on the fly, and the adapter cord is slim--small enough to fit in the tiniest case.
The TravelMate's design places the PCMCIA slots--capable of holding two Type II cards and one Type III card--at the top of the deck so the cover can flip down without partially blocking the slot. (Type I cards will also fit.) My fingers, which are permanently scarred from trying to eject PCMCIA cards from laptops with ejection buttons in the slots themselves, loved the easy card-ejection switches on the TravelMate's deck.
The back panel cover, which operates by means of a spring-loaded button, is also nifty. One push of the button exposes EPP/ECP parallel (Enhanced Parallel Port/Enhanced Capabilities Port), 16550 serial and PCI expansion ports, as well as the external VGA adapter. The keyboard was middling--I neither hated it nor grew particularly fond of it. The pointing device is of the stick-point variety, nestled between the G, H and B keys. I found I had difficulty controlling the cursor with any degree of precision. Nonetheless, if you're the type who likes a stick point device, you'll probably like this one as well.
The TravelMate's software setup is a shortcoming. Game demos and overlapping DOS and Windows applications quickly eat up space on the 737MB hard drive. However, it's easy to make backup installation disks for the applications from a DOS-based utility and then delete the unwanted files. The TravelMate ships with Phoenix Card Manager, the TI power management system, TranXit and Windows for Workgroups 3.11. You'll be able to choose between Windows 3.11 and Windows 95 by the time you read this.
One annoyance is the Drop-n-Go application that places on-screen icons for various Windows applets on your desktop. These icons are always on top of whichever application you're using, and they don't offer much improved functionality over Program Manager.
The notebook weighs in at 6.7 pounds and measures 8.5 by 11 by 2.1 inches. The flimsy plastic covers' lack of durability is a problem. The floppy drive cover broke off in the drive and proved quite difficult to recover, while a hinge cover simply slid off in the bowels of my briefcase. The hinge cover was easy enough to replace, but the TravelMate is really ugly without it.
The TravelMate offers good performance: It clocked 80.6 Dhrystone MIPS and 16.0 Whetstone MFLOPS on our WINDOWS Magazine Wintune 2.0 benchmarks. Its video turned in an impressive 5.0Mpixels per second. The hard drive scored 5.5MB per second on the disk data-transfer-rate test.
The 10.4-inch Thin Film Transistor (TFT) active-matrix display and sound do not combine well for multimedia, each slightly lacking compared to TI's usual high standards.
Setup instructions are kept to a minimum, but you don't really need any. You do get a passport book containing all the warranty and dealer contact information you need, as well as a place to store important information about the TravelMate. All in all, the TravelMate 5000 is an excellent piece of equipment, but in these days of falling laptop prices it's not exactly a bargain, unless you consider buying the docking station, which transforms the TravelMate into a mini-tower--offering SCSI-2, MIDI game port and more.
--Info File--
Texas Instruments TravelMate 5000
Price: $4,699 (street)
In Brief: This unit is a tight package of good design with a dazzling display, powered by a Pentium. It is a little high priced, however.
Texas Instruments
800-848-3927,817-771-5856 (tech)
A Satellite to Moon Over
by: Jim Forbes
Life's getting easier for notebook computer users. New arrivals in the portable market are so well equipped that you only have to add a docking station to have a notebook that can serve double duty as a desktop PC and a mobile unit. Toshiba's new two- member notebook family--the Satellite Pro 400 Series--exemplifies state-of-the-art compact computing.
Both Satellite Pro 400 units use 75MHz Pentium processors and lithium ion batteries. They come with either a 10.4-inch color dual-scan display (the 400CS) or active-matrix screen (the 400CDT). They also have VL-Bus accelerated graphics with 1MB of video memory (capable of supporting 24-bit color displays), two PCMCIA slots and a 16-bit Sound Blaster-compatible stereo sound system.
The base dynamic RAM configuration is 8MB of EDO memory, and the standard hard disk is a hefty 810MB. The units measure 2.2 by 11.8 by 9 inches. The CDT tips the scales at a total travel weight of 7.3 pounds.
Toshiba uses an 82-key keyboard and an integrated AccuPoint pointing device. The AccuPoint's arc-shaped controls are located on the integrated palm rest--an arrangement I found comfortable and easy to use.
I tested a preproduction copy of the Satellite Pro 400CDT, which comes with the active-matrix color screen, an internal quad-speed CD-ROM drive and an external 3.5-inch disk drive. Toshiba's SelectBay feature lets you slide out the CD-ROM drive and replace it with the floppy disk drive.
The 400CDT performed impressively, and its video, audio and storage subsystems put it in the same league as many desktop multimedia computers. I liked the SelectBay storage module and the fact that these notebooks are as easy to set up in a hotel room as they are in the office.
The active-matrix screen is bright, and the accelerated graphics on this computer make it a joy to use. Function keys control brightness and other system attributes.
The sound controls on the front of the system case are convenient for volume adjustments during presentations. The sound system is based on the ESS chip set.
The 400CDT's lithium ion battery provided about two hours of service. Recharging takes about three hours with the system turned off, and five to eight hours when it's on. You don't have to carry an AC adapter with the 400CDT, because the adapter is built in. The notebook is kept cool by a small fan that kicks in when it senses excess heat around the system board or the Pentium processor. While it provides an extra measure of protection against heat-related damage, the fan will affect battery life.
In addition to its 176-pin interface for the optional port replicator, the 400CDT has parallel, serial, PS/2-style mouse and external monitor ports. There's also the IrDA-compatible infrared port, and jacks for line-in, a microphone and headphones. The PCMCIA slots will accommodate two Type II cards or a single Type III. The optional port replicator adds two more Type III PCMCIA slots.
I tested the notebook's performance using WINDOWS Magazine's Wintune 2.0 benchmarks. CPU performance was average for a 75MHz Pentium, clocking 80.3MIPS and 16.1MFLOPS. Its video and hard disk systems fared well, with excellent scores of 4.8 million pixels per second for video throughput and a 5.7MB per second data-transfer rate.
The 400CDT offers yeoman performance, versatility and solid construction, backed by Toshiba's limited three-year warranty.
--Info File--
Toshiba Satellite Pro 400CDT
Price: $4,899
In Brief: Toshiba's Satellite Pro 400CDT, with its 75MHz Pentium processor and array of desktop-like components, is an excellent multimedia PC for use at home or on the road.
Toshiba America Information Systems
800-334-3445, 714-583-3000
Practically Picture Perfect
by: Jeffrey Sloman
Sitting in front of a monitor all day can be hard work. A too-small monitor with an insufficient refresh rate is a prescription for a headache or irritated eyes. The ViewSonic 21PS can help you avoid eyestrain. Its 19.7-inch (viewable area diagonal dimension), invar-shadow-mask tube offers 0.25 dot pitch for a very clean image. The familiar problem of moire' (interference) patterns is a nonissue at all but the highest resolutions. The monitor is capable of a 1600x1280 maximum resolution at an impressive 160Hz refresh rate. Even at this resolution, the 21PS includes a control to reduce or eliminate moire' distortion.
The 21PS's tube is very flat--while not a flat-screen display, the curve is subtle. ViewSonic's antiglare coating is effective, greatly reducing annoying reflections while not interfering with a good, sharp focus. The company's "dynamic focus" system ensures it stays sharp under almost any combination of resolution, refresh rate or color temperature. A picture-tilt management system compensates for the Earth's magnetic field, making use of the entire tube possible. A complete range of geometry controls is provided as well.
The monitor provides two video inputs, the standard D connector (the cable is provided) and a set of BNC jacks. Both may be used, and selection is made through front-panel controls. The 21PS is Energy Star compliant, with three power-saving modes indicated by the front-panel power indicator changing from green to yellow. If radiation makes you nervous, you can rest easy thanks to low MPRII radiation levels from this big tube. Weighing in at 62 pounds, the 21PS hardly qualifies as lightweight, though compared to other large monitors it is pleasantly light. It can even be placed on a heavy-duty monitor arm to free up desk space.
All the monitor's controls are incorporated into four buttons on a panel that tilts out from below the tube. An on-screen menu lists the functions, which you select with up-and-down arrow keys. The other two buttons are labeled 1 and 2. These select options according to the key at the bottom of the on-screen menu. Pressing button 1 brings up the full menu, while button 2 brings up input selection directly. Operating the up- and down-arrow keys offers instant access to the contrast adjustment.
In addition to the expected contrast, brightness, horizontal position/size and vertical position/size controls, the 21PS allows complete picture geometry control from the front panel. This includes pincushion, trapezoid (keystone), parallelogram and rotation adjustments to ensure a square, perfectly bezel-aligned image. If you're a picture perfectionist, you'll be in love. If you're just a typical end user with a desire for a big, beautiful picture, the factory presets for most standard video signals will provide a nicely tuned image without any adjustment.
Color temperature is another very useful control lesser monitors lack. This control allows the user to define "white" in terms of degrees Kelvin. The monitor includes presets for 9300K and 6550K, while also providing a continuously variable setting for special cases. While this feature is one that electronic prepress color users will appreciate, you needn't understand exactly what it means to take advantage of it. Those with fluorescent lighting will find the 9300K setting much more pleasant, while 6550K will please users with incandescent lighting.
For professional digital-image users, a high-quality monitor like the 21PS is a necessity. Even ordinary spreadsheet and word processor power users could benefit, especially when you consider how much of your time is spent staring at a monitor. The 21PS is clearly an excellent choice for any serious Windows user.
--Info File--
ViewSonic 21PS
Price: $1,995
In Brief: It doesn't get much better than this. The ViewSonic 21PS provides a near-perfect image and a complete range of controls.
ViewSonic Corp.
800-888-8583, 909-869-7976