Hard Cider Index

Guest review by Robert L. Pritchett, 2-22-01

I hadn't intended to become a beta-tester for this unit, but it seems that when you deal with bleeding-edge technology, you have to take the lumps that go with it.

If I had some discretionary income, I'd probably invest some of it in Virtual Ink Corporation. Even though this version of Mimio for the Mac (1.02) is an obvious port from the Windows environment, it does seem to work well using the USB connection. If they went all USB end-to-end instead of having a USB to Serial converter, I think they'd be doing themselves a big favor since that seems to be the location that was giving me some grief when we set this up with my iMac (that's the engineer in me speaking). After searching online for the solution to my problem, I read in the 31-page Mimio User's Guide that I ought to look in the button-bar mimio Help under"tips, tricks and troubleshooting". While doing that, the 2.5 pound system seemed to correct/heal itself and the amber light finally stayed green on the"Capture Bar" so we could experiment with this neat product for a while. Later I was getting intermittant black screens on attempted cold-boot startups which disappeared once I disconnected the USB cable, so something was acting goofy every once in a while with the interface equipment. (My computer is a D-series iMac with 96 Meg RAM.) After diagnosing my situation through many startups, shutdowns, rebuilding the desktop and removing the mimio preference file again and again and getting some more software from Virtual Ink, I discovered that perhaps I had either a bad USB cable and/or a bad USB adapter. I was sent a new USB adapter kit and after dumping the mimio preference and warm-booting, the system hasn't hiccupped since. Ah, the joy of having good gear! Seems others have been getting damaged goods as the parts come from China to the USA. Could be high seas!

I highly recommend clicking on the QuickTime video presentation listed below as the"Online Demo" and reading the online testimonials before you go out and buy this product either online or from your local computer store. It's first class.

Perhaps adding to the sytem's confusion during setup is that we attached the 2-foot long Capture Bar vertically to the mirrored glass tiles (2' x 6') on my home-office wall. The brochures do state that this product will work on any smooth surface, but I thought perhaps the edges along the one-foot tiles may have been confusing the Capture Bar. I probably should have attached it to my 4' x 10' bay window instead. The default is a 4' x 6' area and the Bar scans the surface using ultrasonic positioning and infrared triangulation technologies to capture what is written using buzzing ergonomically-correct color-coded (red, green, blue, black) really high-tech marker pen holders (smartCaps™) shown below. Each marker pen head has 4 little purple electronic devices under the clear shell that just have to be transducers. They give the pens a space-station look.

The software that comes on a CD can change the width of the marker strokes on the virtual whiteboard screen on the Mac as well as changed from inches to millimeters. You can see the mic and the two infrared (IR) sensors under the control panel. The"foot" is really a cone so sound from the smartCaps™ can travel up to the mic after traversing the writing surface. The other end of the 2-foot Capture Bar has another mic also, but without the IR units. The Bar can be positioned either vertically or horizontally in the upper left corner of the writing surface depending on which direction you want as the"long" side of the writing surface. Notice I'm not calling it a"whiteboard".

The colored markers are the dry-erase kind that can be bought just about anywhere. The Capture Bar uses power from the Mac, so there is no need for"wall-warts" (power converters) to pack around. There is also a buzzing electronic eraser with two erasing surfaces (20mm and 100mm). That unit looks like a Death Star turret and cannon, but it works perfectly. The included batteries (size AA for the stylus and AAA for the eraser) are only on (buzzing) when the smartCaps™ or eraser surfaces are pushed against the writing surface. And the eraser comes with it's own holster. The buzzing sound is no big deal either. You really have to listen for it to hear it.

If you have an LCD projector to interface with your Mac, you can use one of the styli with a"dummy" marker as a mouse device (mimioMouse™) to control the screen on the Mac from the writing surface. Yep, the writing surface becomes a touchscreen.

The other "nifty feature of the software that comes in this package is that you can tag what you write and record everything. This allows us to use"VCR" buttons to"rewind" or"fast-forward" through a whiteboard movie presentation. This gets recorded so that later, others can look at the thought-process instead of just the cut&pasted end-results. Believe me, this is way cool! And since there is a virtual whiteboard on the screen, we can make changes "online" before distributing notes in JPEG, HTML, or even PICT formats. That might raise some ethical issues later on, but for now, just be aware it's possible.

This is most of the virtual whiteboard on the Mac screen. Notice the Capture Bar in the upper left corner of the white space (virtual whiteboard). The four menus (two to the left of the snapshot, one above the"screen" and the large one to the right) follow the Mac OS shrink-to-a-bar capability. The bottom row of icons are the VCR functions and the colored pens can be tapped with the curser to do drawing on the virtual whiteboard. Now all they need to do is make it so that it can do virtual-writing on the real whiteboard/writing surface!

When this first came out for the PC, I thought how great it would be for the Mac and this version meets/exceeds my expectations. Announced first at the MacWorld Expo in July 2000, it was released for general Mac consumption in late October, focussing on training/creative environments where Macs still rein and where folks aren't afraid of interacting.

If you're not into the"paperless office" mode just yet, printed versions of whiteboard presentations can also be printed through the Mac. This can be done for about 20 times less than what it costs for one of the electronic whiteboards - and you can take it with you instead of having to wheel the equipment from room to room - and without thermal printer hardcopy! Just be sure to bring along your portable or just bring along the CD instead with the Mimio gear. A separate package allows you to print directly from the Capture Bar to a printer for another $200 if you're really into that kind of thing.

Another system feature is that Mimio really tells you what is going on when you push buttons on the Capture Bar or in using the 4-function virtual calculator (Control Panel) pad you can lay against the writing surface assuming your speaker system is on. Calibration of that function was getting to be funny."Click top left corner. Click bottom right corner.Click ‘Okay'. (‘Okay' is the checkmark pad, lower left side of the see-through flexible-plastic sheet template) Location failure, Click top left corner....". It finally worked, and quite well once I got the replacement USB adapter. It never made me do the do-loop again. Just be aware that Mimio uses speaking capabilities. Now if we could tell it how to write...

The Virtual Control Panel Template on-screen. (Sorry about the font. My daughters have been having fun too with my iMac. Yours will perhaps look different, depending on which font you picked for your OS desktop.)

One of the other"gotchas" is that the stylus (smartCaps™) can't be more than 15 degrees off horizontal or the Capture Bar won't capture and you will see skips on the virtual whiteboard on the Mac. Since the sensors are line-of-sight, using a curved whiteboard probably isn't a good idea with this product either (no mirrored tiles need apply).

The Capture Bar has a couple of not-so-over-engineered suction cup units that appear to be able to hold forever on a clean surface. They even have pull-tabs to unsuck once the suckup levers are popped open. Why so much effort in making the suction cups work so well? Seems some folks have tried attaching the Capture Bar to less-than-optimal surfaces and gravity takes its toll on the USB adapter when the suction cups let go, since it hits the ground first. (At least that is what I was told.) Just grab the bar with one hand while trying to pop the Bar off the surface, okay? And I'm not speaking from experience

The Capture Bar folds into two one-foot sections like a stork's leg. The"Made in China" USB/Serial Converter was designed specifically for this device following the same color and form-factor as the Bar. A long-enough-to-reach A-B USB cable is also thoughtfully provided, but if an extension is needed another 16-foot extension can be bought from Virtual Ink's website.

Recommendations:
On a scale of 1-10 with 10 being best, I'd give this baby a 9. When it works, it works great! The software is solid. The Achilles heel as far as I'm concerned, is the USB converter/adapter. The guys helping me out were Robert Halpin and Matt Cushman. Hopefully after my review most of the bugs have been worked out for the Mac clientele for this product. I'd suggest they get those yellow bumper units like Fluke uses with their testers to protect the bottom end of the Capture Bar interface, otherwise I see the price going up for this system if existing folks aren't more careful with the product. (Spring-loaded bumpers using Pogo-stick technology probably would be too much of a temptation for salesmen to ride. ;^)

Mimio software version 1.5 for the Macintosh is due out this Spring. 1.5 will allow Mac users to export whiteboard information to QuickTime, as well as to iMovie, for streaming presentations over the Internet. It will be made available from the Mimio website once it is customer-ready. And when we move to OS X, this product won't be made obsolete...

"With FireWire and the revolutionary iMovie, which is standard on most every Mac, Apple has made video editing available to scores of students, teachers, and business people. With Virtual Ink's mimio, users can output whiteboard information to either a QuickTime file, or directly to iMovie, allowing home users, educators, or businesses to create compelling movies that combine video with whiteboard sessions. We're thrilled that Virtual Ink will also bring this innovative technology to Mac OS X."

- Clent Richardson, Apple's vice president of Worldwide Developer Relations

Product: Mimio
Company: Virtual Ink Corporation
MSRP: $599 PriceZone - Lowest price as of 2-22-01 ... $499 PriceZone - Check for current low price
Requirements: - G3 - Mac OS 8.6 or higher - 10MB RAM - 11MB disk space - USB port
Online Demos: Mimio Online Demo (8.6MB QuickTime movie) Mimio software 1.5 educational use demos