Welcome to the latest edition of Medicine Man. I am your virtual on-call Macdoctor.
To ask a question (sorry, no house calls), just pop by the Apple Wizards website at http://applewizards.net/ and click on any of the links for the "Special Area" — you should see "Medicine Man" as a choice. Drop us a line with your question. The website is open 24 hours a day, 8 days a week.
This won't hurt a bit... I promise!
 
OUCH! # 1
I use a stand-alone version of Navigator and Claris Emailer. I want to be able to click on mailto url's in Navigator and have it open Emailer with an new message containing the email address I clicked on. If you could cover this topic or maybe point me in the right direction as to where I might find the info I seek, I would be very grateful!!
- Paul Danbury
 
Super Cure #1
Ahh, the perennial Navigator/
Communicator problem. When Netscape
released a standalone version of its
browser, Navigator, it did so somewhat
carelessly. Since Navigator was originally
part of the all-in-one Internet suite
Communicator, it does not contain the
necessary code to link to external mail and
news clients. There is a way to trick it into
doing so, however. Go into "Preferences"
under the "Edit" menu in Navigator. You should see "Personal Info." Click on it. Now select "Use Internet Config." Assuming you have setup Internet Config (installed inside your Navigator folder) or the Internet control panel in Mac OS 8.5.x to use your email client, Navigator will use your email and news client. It'll even use Microsoft's Outlook Express if you desire!
If you use the behemoth Communicator and want to use your own email client, you have to use a seperate piece of software called Netscape PlusAlpha. Its easy-to-use interface will allow you to configure any protocol standard you wish.
Netscape PlusAlpha can be found at http://www.jetcity.com/~tomo/download/NetscapePlusAlpha/index_e.html .
 
Owwy! #2
Can I run the new Mac OS on my Performa 578? Should I buy the iMac and forget this thing? I want a computer that's a fully functional Web surfing machine but most plug-ins require more sophisticated and updated software to work properly. What should I do?
Band-Aid #2 
Hmm, a Performa 578 and Web
browsing? Not exactly the dream
machine of the Internet. If you want to experience the "full" web and all its multimedia enhancements, definitely go for the iMac. I have a Performa 630 and have tried to do some web browsing on it. Believe me, it is not fun! I had about three crashes in half an hour and the pages loaded very slowly. However, if you are not ready to make the investment in an iMac, check out the Low End Mac website at http://www.mactimes.com/lowend/ , which has some great tips on web browsing on older 68k Macs. I make sure to glance over the site at least once a week.
 
WAHHH!!! #3
I own an Apple PC Compatibility Card running at 166MHz. It seems to me that each day, it gets more and more useless. With Mac OS 8.5, I can't even network the thing. The serial port speed is extremely slow and I can't even get 32-bit drivers! I want my $999 investment to work, is there any chance of Apple actually giving these things the opportunity to live up to their potential?
- Chris Brownan
 
First-Aid #3
Yeah! A fellow PC Compatibility Card
owner! I, like you, own a 166MHz PC card
and paid good money for it. A few months
ago, Apple announced that it would no
longer develop software for these cards.
Version 1.6.4 would be the last. When the
news broke, the PC Card community was
outraged. One user, Mark Fonnemann
started a 32-bit driver campaign at
http://www2.bc.edu/~fonneman/apple.html.
About two months ago, after what seemed
like ages of silence, Apple announced that
it sold the PC Setup source code to Fraser
Valley Distributed Computing Systems, a
Canadian consulting company. This
company will develop version 2.0 of PC
Setup which will include 32 bit driver
support as well as support for long file
names. They are also soliciting for feature requests at http://www.fvdcs.bc.ca/contact.html (click "Report a bug in one of our products or request a new feature"). Some of the features I requested are faster serial port access and "picture-in-picture" functionality. If you have PC or DOS compatibility card in your Mac (or just want to help us out), go and make a request for any feature you would like!
 
ARGH!!! #4
I got my G3 right after the iMac came out and it doesn't have a USB port — Is it to my advantage to get an add-on port —- what are the disadvantages — Can I put it in myself?
- Walter Pitts
Splint #4
Apple's new Macs are beginning to make me reconsider my recommendations for the best PCI cards to buy. With the introduction of the new Power Mac Pro models and iMacs, USB is now a standard on the Macintosh platform and SCSI is the "old" technology. For those of us with non-USB Macs, my advice is to take a "wait and see" approach. As of this writing, there is no real advantage of USB peripherals over standard serial and SCSI peripherals besides hot plugging and daisy chaining (available with SCSI). When vendors stop offering SCSI and serial interfaces in their products, buy a USB card (they are around $50). Right now, there is no need to worry.
