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Upgrades: Do you have what it takes?

By Joseph Harris, Jr., Mary A. Griffin, and John Mulhern III

In recent months Apple and Microsoft released several major upgrades for the Macintosh. Apple introduced System 7.5 and Microsoft introduced Word 6.0 and Excel 5.0. These upgrades, though full of added features, are not for everyone.

System 7.5

Apple's newest version of the Macintosh operating system, System 7.5, contains a powerful new feature called Apple Guide, as well as welcome enhancements to Drag and Drop, Find File, and QuickTime. Apple Guide is a vast improvement on System 7's Balloon Help. Instead of merely commenting on or explaining system features, Apple Guide can actually demonstrate how to use them. Drag and Drop, an enhancement of the Mac's traditional cut-and-paste technology, now lets you use the mouse to "drag" pictures, sounds, and text from one System 7.5-savvy program and "drop" them into another - making many editing tasks a snap. It's also a lot easier to find buried files using the new version of Find File, which lets you search using such file attributes as size, kind, label, date created, date modified, creator, and version. The new version of QuickTime 2.0 (Apple's video-display extension) offers speed and compression enhancements, as well as MIDI support for electronic musical instruments. In addition, System 7.5 includes an improved version of the AppleScript scripting language, hierarchical menus, and several shareware-based enhancements - including a useful date and time display on the menu bar.

System 7.5 provides QuickDraw GX and PowerTalk as optional additions for your System Folder. Beware: You'll need additional hard-disk space and extra RAM above the minimums listed in the chart if you choose to install them. QuickDraw GX integrates many of the advanced typographic features used in desktop publishing directly into the Macintosh system (such as ligatures, swashes, and fractions), supports international text formats, and contains improved printing and document controls. PowerTalk provides a universal desktop mailbox for all incoming and outgoing e-mail and allows the creation of digital signatures. Since neither QuickDraw GX nor PowerTalk is, as yet, extensively supported by third party manufacturers, there seems to be no reason for most users to install them at this time.

As always, new features require an increased level of memory and greater processor performance. System 7.5 is not for every Macintosh - at minimum, you need a 25 MHz, 68030 processor; 8 Mbytes of RAM; and 3 to 10 additional Mbytes of hard-disk space (PowerMacs need 16 Mbytes of RAM and 5 to 20 additional Mbytes storage) to take full advantage of the new system software.

Microsoft Word 6.0

Microsoft Word 6.0 has a plethora of new features which should satisfy users ranging from those looking for ease-of-use to those hungry for power and control over complex, interactive documents. Features such as Document Wizards - plain language explanations of tasks that actually guide you through the steps necessary to perform a complex task such as a mail merge - and ToolTips, which explains the function of a button in a Tool Bar as you point to it, help novice users perform advanced tasks without a lot of agonizing toil. The interface is generally well designed and fairly intuitive to use. Enhanced use of Drag and Drop makes many editing tasks work exactly the way you think they should (e.g., select some text and drag it to a new location, instead of cutting and pasting). Advanced features such as the WordBasic macro language and full support for AppleScript, in combination with fully customizable Tool Bars and menus, give the power user nearly absolute control over the way Word 6.0 looks and works.

All of this ease-of-use and power, however, exacts a price. Word 6.0 is noticeably slower than 5.1 and has huge resource requirements that dampen its performance and make it impractical for the large number of people with older, slower machines or with limited memory and hard disk space. It takes longer to start up, scroll, search for text, perform word counts, spell check, and save documents. These are common tasks that add up to increasing the time it takes to edit a document. Speed is particularly lacking on a 68030-based machine such as a Macintosh IIci. The hefty resource requirements include: System 7 or above (System 7.1 or above on a Power Macintosh), minimum of 8 Mbytes of RAM, and between 5 and 24 Mbytes of hard disk space (10 Mbytes is typical). The 128K, 512K, Plus, SE, Classic, and PowerBook 100 Macintosh models will not work at all with Word 6.0. From a performance standpoint, Word 6.0 is really only practical on a 68040 or Power Macintosh.

Microsoft Excel 5.0

Excel 5.0 offers an array of powerful new features aimed at making the software easier to use. These features include a new default file structure, direct cell editing, Visual Basic, and a set of Tips and Wizards. The most obvious change is the new Workbook default file structure, a set of worksheets organized as a group, which helps you organize your data and also makes manipulating 3D worksheets easier. At last, it is no longer necessary to use the edit window in the formula bar just to enter data - new cell editing enhancements allow you to enter, edit, and format data directly in the cells. And, if you want to customize functions and dialog boxes or create macros, the new Visual Basic programming language offers many improvements over the old macro language. The handy new set of Tips and Wizards is similar to the set in Word 6.0. ToolTips, for example, a feature akin to Balloon Help but less obtrusive, is identical to Word's ToolTips. Excel's Function Wizard steps you through the process of selecting a function and assembling its arguments. The Text Wizard helps you import text files by converting data into the correct rows and columns. A new utility called the Tip Wizard (is it a Tip or a Wizard!) tracks your actions and displays context-sensitive hints about how you might work more efficiently.

Users considering whether to upgrade to Excel 5.0 need to weigh the benefits of powerful new features against the hefty system requirements needed to run the program at an acceptable speed. As with Word 6.0, these features cost plenty in terms of RAM and hard disk space: Excel 5.0 needs an 8-Mbyte 68040 Mac with 7 to 23 Mbytes of disk space or a 16-Mbyte PowerMac with 12 to 29 Mbytes of disk space to run comfortably. Although the manual says the minimum requirements are a 4 Mbyte 68020 Mac running System 7.0, Excel 5.0 runs agonizingly slowly on a 68030 or lower processor, and runs out of memory trying to print a small spreadsheet file. Even Microsoft states that you need to turn on virtual memory for PowerMacs with only 16 Mbytes RAM.

Sidebar: Late breaking news

Speed boosts for Word 6.0 and Excel 5.0 are due soon. Microsoft recently announced that they expect to ship maintenance releases for Word 6.0 and Excel 5.0 in the first quarter of 1995. The new releases, Word 6.0a and Excel 5.0a address complaints about application performance and will be free to current users of Word 6.0 and Excel 5.0

In addition, Microsoft has upgraded its processor recommendation for running Word 6.0. The newest packaging will appear with the label "/040 recommended."

                        Upgrades at a glance

   The charts below summarize CRC recommendations for minimum
   resource requirements. 

   PowerMac MINIMUMS

   Product      Processor       RAM (Mbytes)    Hard-disk space
   System 7.5   All PowerPC     16 MB           5-20 MB additional
   Word 6.0     All PowerPC     16 MB           12-35 MB
   Excel 5.0    All PowerPC     16 MB           12-29 MB

   Other Macintosh MINIMUMS

   Product      Processor       RAM (Mbytes)    Hard-disk space
   System 7.5   25 MHz 68030    8 MB            3-10 MB additional
   Word 6.0     68040           8 MB            5-24 MB
   Excel 5.0    68040           8 MB            7-23 MB

   Note:  The wide ranges noted for hard-disk space are due to
   installation options that allow you to choose a minimal, a 
   complete, or a custom installation.