Digital Innovations

Faster Older Computers
Are you talking to me, Willis? Newer Technology, Inc. (www.newertech.com) offers MAXPower G4/7448 Single and Dual Processor Upgrades starting at $399 for Power Macintosh G4 AGP Graphics/Sawtooth, Gigabit Ethernet, Digital Audio, or QuickSilver computers. If, like me, you don't know which model you have, they'll help you figure it out. MAXPower Processor Upgrades deliver up to 4.6 times faster performance during intensive CPU usage and in a real-world Photoshop test was faster than the latest 2.33GHz iMac Core 2 Duo system. The Upgrades utilize the latest generation Freescale 7448 processors and are fully compatible with existing hardware and software and require no operating system modifications. MAXPower Processor Upgrades can be installed in 10 minutes and offer a hassle-free solution to getting a huge performance boost in your G4, all without the expense of buying a new system then installing software and hardware upgrades to work with that new system.

Better Color Faster
PictoColor's (www.pictocolor.com) iCorrect EditLab ProApp 6.0 uses a simplified approach for color correcting and editing large volumes of digital photographs. Its ProcessQ displays thumbnails in a filmstrip at the bottom of the main working area where you can view, sort, and manage color corrections. You can correct and save images one at a time or as a group and apply the same corrections to multiple images. As you make your corrections, ProcessQ automatically assigns the settings to the image and applies the settings to the thumbnail when you advance to the next image. The final corrections are made to the images when saving them to their destination folder.

If multiple images require the same correction, you can correct a single image and apply the same settings to all of them using the program's Sync feature. You can also use the Save Job function to save a record of all the images in ProcessQ along with the color correction settings for each image. When you choose Resume Job, all images will be added back to ProcessQ and all of the tools will be set according to saved settings.

An Ounce Of Protection
Without getting into the whole Mac OS vs. Windows controversy, it's a fact that Windows computers are more prone to attack just because their popularity makes them an appealing target for the demented people who create viruses and spyware. My solution is to install the latest version of Norton SystemWorks (www.symantec.com) on my Compaq Presario. The Standard Edition of SystemWorks 2007 costs less than $70 and detects and removes viruses and spyware. It blocks worms and prevents virus-infected e-mails from spreading. SystemWorks 2007 automatically detects and fixes Windows problems, something that plagued my computer before I installed this latest version. It cleans up unwanted cookies, cache, and temporary files that slow your computer's performance and gives you control over Windows settings and all of the processes running on your system. You may not think you need some of the tools that are included in the package but when you have a problem, you'll be glad they're there.