New Cineon, DPX QT Components at NAB '07...

Glue Tools has announced that v2.5 of its Cineon and DPX QuickTime Components will be released at NAB 2007. The new release will include Playback, 3D LUTs and full integration with Apple's Final Cut Studio. The company said that "on capable systems with high speed storage, the Cineon/DPX Components can achieve playback speeds," but that on slower machines, including laptops, the ability to “scrub” through a shot, is now possible. Regardless of the system’s performance, the Cineon/DPX Components enable any QuickTime application to have a Cineon or DPX frame flipper “built-in.” The components enable import and export of Cineon or DPX sequences into Final Cut Pro -- without any additional processing (as well as Motion, Adobe After Effects, Photoshop and Combustion).

Apple denies violating EU laws

Apple has denied claims that it breached European Union laws regarding the pricing of songs on its iTunes Store, following a 'statement of objections' that was sent to the Cupertino-based company as well as several unnamed major music labels -- which are believed to be the "big four" known as EMI Group, Warner Music Group, Universal Music Group, and Sony BMG. "We don't believe Apple did anything to violate EU law," Apple said. "We will continue to work with the EU to resolve this matter," the company added. The Financial Times reports that the big four record labels are understood to be included in the antitrust probe. The primary argument behind the probe centers around the fact that consumers are limited to purchasing music from the local iTunes site in their own country, which effectively limits consumer choice of where to buy tracks and what music is available at a given price, according to AFX.

New architectural releases for Mac...

Four new Mac-compatible architectural applications have been released, according to Architosh. The first two belong to Interstudio, which is shipping Domus.CAD 14, and DigiCAD 3D 8.5. The former allows architects to design interiors and exteriors in 3D, without the need for first creating 2D floorplans. Domus.CAD 14 adds linear fills and extended snap functions, as well as improved import/export capacity specifically addressing DWG, DXF and AutoCAD files. DigiCAD 3D is used in photogrammetry, with the update simplifying distortion correction via a user-created lens database. Domus.CAD is available as a rent-to-own application for $360; a similar plan is offered for DigiCAD 3D beginning at $160.

Apple offers refurb Mac Pros from $2,199

Apple is offering refurbished Mac Pro Quad Xeon workstations at discounted prices, as well as its entire line of Apple Cinema Displays. Reconditioned Mac Pros include the Quad 2.66GHz Intel Xeon system with two 2.66GHz dual core Xeon processors, 1GB of memory, a 250GB hard drive, and an NVIDIA GeForce 7300 GT graphics card (256MB) for $2,199; as well as its Quad 3.0GHz Intel Xeon model with two 3.0GHz Xeon processors, 2GB of memory, a 250GB hard drive, and an ATI Radeon X1900 XT graphics card (512MB) for $3,299. Apple's refurbished Cinema Displays currently include the 20-inch flat panel with 1680 x 1050 optimal resolution for $549, 23-inch flat panel with 1920 x 1200 optimal resolution for $749, and the 30-inch flat panel with 2560 x 1600 optimal resolution for $1,599. The Apple Store Canada is also offering the 23-inch Apple Cinema Display for CAD $899, but currently offers no other Apple-branded flat panel monitors or Mac Pro systems. [click here to access the Apple Store Canada]

US airlines to see in-flight Wi-Fi by 2008...

US airline passengers will soon have the option of wireless Internet in their cabins, thanks in part to developments by Colorado-based AirCell. The company says it has snapped up unused frequencies from the FCC that would let it create a Wi-Fi hotspot in airplane cabins, allowing notebooks as well as properly-equipped handhelds such as the iPhone to access the Internet mid-flight. While the service would block VoIP calls for courtesy reasons, speed would be roughly equivalent to what users can see on the ground, AirCell says.

Briefly: iPod Film Festival; BBC clips...

In brief: The Flux.tv iPod Film Festival is now online with all finalist short films available for free viewing, Feral Interactive has launched its LEGO Star Wars II mini site, and the BBC Motion gallery has announced a new royalty-free collection. Transcend is producing new flash drives for ExpressCard/34 slots with various storage capacities, and MacSpeech has announced its April road show dates for the state of Florida. The second year of Flux.tv's iPod Film Festival features movies that are all less than 10 minutes long, and enables viewers to participate in a new community section by leaving reviews of films, messages from the filmmakers, and blogs by the filmmakers. Films will remain available for download until June 28th, which also marks the end of judging for the festival.

Automatic Duck announces CS3 plug-in

Automatic Duck has announced the development of Pro Import AE 4.0, the next version of its plug-in for Adobe After Effects. The software imports sequences from Xpress and Final Cut Pro, seamlessly layering them with all their associated data, including audio tracks. The main addition to v4.0 is CS3 compatibility, but it will also be a Universal Binary, and support FCP multiclips. Numerous other additions include increased import options, and the display of Motion particles and replicators within After Effects. Automatic Duck will be displaying the new plug-in at the NAB 2007 expo, starting April 14th in Las Vegas; the final product will go on sale this summer for $500.

Apps: MapSpinner, PDFpen, Nano, iCalamus

• MapSpinner 1.0 ($15) is a Web authoring utility that offers an easy-to-use "what you see is what you get" means to edit HTML image maps without writing code. Users can save image maps created in MapSpinner directly as HTML documents, or paste them into existing HTML documents. The software also features a new map wizard, layout helpers, image zoom functionality, a browser preview, and more. [Download - 706KB]


• PDFpen 3.1.1 ($50) is a $25 upgrade to the PDF editing tool for Mac OS X. The latest release enables users to start editing quicker by remembering zoom level and page position of previously opened documents. PDFpenPro 3.1.1 was also released, which can create PDF forms in addition to all of the PDF editing functionality found in PDFpen. PDFpenPro 3.1.1 respects default font size preferences when creating form fields. [Download - 7.1MB]


• Nano 1.3 (free) enhances the open-source C++ framework for developing high-performance applications that run on Mac OS X systems. The latest revision includes substantial performance improvements, offering automatic copy-on-write behavior for CoreFoundation objects and tuning performance-critical classes such as NBitVector. The update also features more than 70 bug fixes and improvements. [Download - 5MB]


• BurnAgain DVD 1.1 ($25) signals a major upgrade to the software that supports using a DVD+RW, CDR, or CD+RW like a hard disk. BurnAgain DVD adds files to a disk several times without creating multiple volumes and without erasing files in a platform independent way, and preserves all HFS-specific attributes such as resource forks. Version 1.1 brings improved performance, as well as better handling of aliases and German localization. [Download - 1.3MB]


• Syncro SVN Client 2.3 ($60 with 1-year of maintenance) updates the Subversion client, allowing users to quickly discover what happened in a project or what a user worked on during a given period of time. Syncro SVN Client 2.3 also improves integration with bug tracking tools, and adds application global ignores for universioned resources displayed in the Working Copy view. [Download - 11.3MB]


• iCalamus 1.07 ($175) is publishing software for Mac OS X. iCalamus 1.07 comes with a new plug-in called Photographerbook that is usable for typesetting and purchasing photobooks in various versions directly in iCalamus. Further improvements include a Document Template Manager, the ability to use custom Exception Dictionaries for optimized hyphenation of texts, and the ability to enter RGB color values as percentage, integer, or hexadecimal values. [Download - 22.8MB]

Elgato readies USB H.264 encoding

TV tuner maker Elgato is today branching out into dedicated video encoders with the turbo.264 USB adapter. Similar to the ADS InstantVideo-To-Go, the Elgato device includes a dedicated video encoder that can dramatically accelerate the process of converting video to the more efficient H.264 format to assist slower computers or speed up larger projects, the company says. The turbo.264 was born with Macs in mind and includes Elgato's own Mac OS X software as well as a QuickTime plugin for converting footage for most any Mac program.

Shipments of the USB encoder are scheduled to begin in late April at a price of 99 Euros ($132). An official US launch date and price point are currently unavailable.

LapWorks' new Desktop Stand for notebooks...

LapWorks today unveiled its sleek Aluminum Desktop Stand, a desktop-only stand for Macs and PC notebooks. The portable Aluminum Desktop Stand elevates notebooks to improve screen viewing, enhance typing ergonomics, and cool the system by up to 23 percent, according to LapWorks. The stand features six easy-to-adjust elevated positions with the three lower positions designed to cool and improve ergonomics when using the laptop's own keyboard, while the three steeper inclines raise the screen closer to eye level to create an ergonomically-sound desktop workstation when using a separate keyboard. LapWorks' stand is constructed from heat-dissipating brushed-aluminum, and folds flat to 12 x 9.5 x 3/8-inches for easy storage in a computer bag. LapWorks is offering the Aluminum Desktop Stand for $60.

Piranesi 5 ships for Windows, coming to Mac

Informatix Software International today began shipping Piranesi 5 for Windows systems, and announced that it will release a Mac version this summer. Piranesi is a specialized 3D paint rendering system that enables users to start with a simple CAD model and quickly create photorealistic images, or soft "non-photorealistic" images with a hand-rendered look. The software features a new user interface, as well as numerous new feature and effects. Piranesi 5 also comes with 200 new royalty-free cutout images. The application features locks to 'lock on' to a particular portion of an image, cutouts for 2D raster images or 3D models, and the ability to paint in perspective using knowledge of the 3D geometry to continuously adjust the texture to honor the scene perspective. Piranesi 5 for Windows is priced at $750.

Age of Empires III demo released

MacSoft today released a demo version of its Age of Empires III game for Mac users. Age of Empires III is designed to offer gamers a taste of the real-time conquest in the latest chapter of Microsoft and Ensemble Studios' Age of Empires series. "Age of Empires III sets the bar for real-time strategy gaming, with amazing 3D graphics, Ageia PhysX technology, and an innovative Home City feature that lets players strengthen their economy, technology, and military. This demo allows Mac gamers to test out both the single-player campaign, Skirmish mode, and the persistent Home City feature." Players become one of eight European powers exploring, colonizing, and conquering the new world as they command rifled infantry to scatter soldiers and blast buildings with cannon fire, directing cavalry through plains while navigating naval fleets to hold strategic waterways. The game is priced at $50, and the demo is available via Macgamefiles.com requiring Mac OS X 10.3.9 or later.

FinanceToGo 1.3 adds setup assistant

Fastforward today released FinanceToGo 1.3, a free update to the personal finance manager for Mac OS X. FinanceToGo offers graphs, tracks shares, imports QIF files from Quicken, manages dozens of accounts, generates reports, and can track thousands of transactions simultaneously. The latest release adds a setup assistant to improve ease-of-use when setting up new documents with default categories and accounts. FinanceToGo 1.3 adds Unicode support, and adds an 'Export Transactions' option to the File menu. The software is priced at $45, and requires Mac OS X 10.3.9 or later. Fastforward today also announced that it is offering Koingo Software's Mac Pilot -- a utility that unlocks more than 300 UNIX features -- online for 25 percent off ($15).

SoftCare releases K4 Web Editor 2.1

SoftCare today released K4 Web Editor 2.1, an update to the Web-based publishing software that offers low-cost access to select users without the need to install and maintain software on offsite client machines. K4 Web Editor 2.1 includes new navigation tools that enable users to access an existing article in the current layout, and supports creating a completely new article or an article from a designed template. A simple query mode allows users to find articles without defining a query by searching for a file name, issue, section, or status. Additionally, users can create specific queries with the advanced query mode to accelerate a search for the articles in use. K4 Web Editor 2.1 is available in combination with the publishing system SoftCare K4, and is usable with K4 5.6 as well as 5.7 installations. Users with valid maintenance agreements for K4 Web Editor are eligible for a free upgrade.

Sony slips out iPod dock for Bravia line

Without fanfare, Sony has released its new Digital Media Port iPod Dock. The relatively rare concession to the iPod market links the Apple music player to the Digital Media Port of Sony's newer Bravia home theaters and receivers to both play and control its music or video through the larger system. Composite video output and the ability to charge an iPod are similarly built-in.

The dock is compatible with all fourth- and fifth-generation iPods as well as all iPod mini and nano models. Sony is taking pre-orders today and plans to ship the dock in May for $100, complementing its earlier IP001 iPod speakers.

Apple ranks last in Greenpeace report...

Environmental group Greenpeace International placed Apple last out of 14 companies in its list of major electronics manufacturers for environmental friendliness, reinforcing the organization's stance that Apple continues to use toxic chemicals in its manufacturing processes and that the Cupertino-based company has plenty of room to reform its recycling program for old or broken products. Apple has not stopped using several types of harmful chemicals in its manufacturing, according to Greenpeace spokeswoman Iza Kruszewska, and unlike many other companies has yet to set a timetable for phasing those chemicals out. Apple, however, rejects Greenpeace's ranking system, and said that its products are among the "greenest" on the market, according to the Associated Press.

MacGourmet 2.1 adds import, export options

Advenio today released MacGourmet 2.1 for Mac OS X, allowing Mac-using cooks to organize recipes, wine notes, and cooking notes via a friendly user interface. The latest release of MacGourmet adds numerous user-requested features, including many new import and export options. MacGourmet 2.1 exports to iPod notes, text, RTF, and Meal-Master formats. The update also imports RecipeML, alongside a variety of third-party application formats. A new "one step" importing service grabs recipes from popular websites, and users can open alternate recipe libraries at application launch. The upgrade is free for current registered MacGourmet users, and is available for $25 to new users. MacGourmet 2.1 requires Mac OS X 10.4 or later, as well as a .Mac account or a WebDav server for publishing.

Divine Fiat ships Sophisticate for Keynote...

Divine Fiat has released Sophisticate, its latest theme set for Apple’s Keynote presentation software. Sophisticate consists of two themes: Ebony Sophisticate and Ivory Sophisticate. Both themes provide you with instantly interesting compositions for presentations by "employing clean blocks of space in conjunction with see through panels. With 50 different master slide layouts, Sophisticate is the perfect theme set for any upscale presentation and is ideally suited for displaying art and photography." Sophisticate includes two styles of scaleable countdown timers -- QuickTime movies that sport transparent backgrounds for a seamless look when used with any Keynote Theme. In addition, it includes the company's original scalable button objects and a new set along with a suggested color palette. The Sophisticate collection can be purchased in standard format for $32 or in professional format for $52.

Lithium offers Xserve, AirPort monitoring...

LithiumCorp on Tuesday officially launched its new range of monitoring plug-ins to provide hardware and software monitoring for Xserve (G5 and Intel), Xserve RAID, Qlogic Fibre Channel Switches, AirPort wireless base stations (including the new 802.11n units) and Mac OS X Server. These new plug-ins extend LithiumCorp's network, server and appliance monitoring suite -- "Lithium" -- to provide advanced monitoring for Apple specific products. "Lithium now provides a real alternative for managers of Apple-centric server and storage deployments that need a monitoring system that can competently handle these specialized devices as well as providing solid SNMP monitoring support for all the rest of their network equipment," the company said.

Apple CEO touts DRM-free music, not video...

Despite the landmark agreement with EMI for DRM-free music, Apple may not be the same position to negotiate for video distribution without copyright protections. Based on comments at following the EMI announcement, Apple CEO Steve Jobs doesn not appear to be pushing for DRM-video, according to IDG News Service. During the teleconference, Jobs was asked about the potential of distributing video with copy protection technology: "Video is pretty different from music right now because the video industry does not distribute 90 percent of their content DRM free. Never has. So I think they are in a pretty different situation, and I wouldn't hold it to a parallel at all."