Wireless '99 News (08-10Feb99, New Orleans, Louisiana, USA):

• Spyglass has announced a new "content delivery platform" called Spyglass Prism 2.2 that is ideal for handhelds and mobile phones.
• Glenayre Western Multiplex (GWM) has announced two new 4 x DS-3 microwave radios called the WM 6/180 and the WM 11/180 radios (6GHz or 11GHz licensed bands) that can offer up to 180Mbps of transmission capacity.
• Qualcomm is showing off their Palm OS savvy hybrid cellular phone called "pdQ".

Timex and Motorola have announced a new pager watch called "BeepwearPRO" (which is FLEX_Time and All-Day_INDIGLO savvy) that will be offered by Big Planet and SkyTel.

CTX International has announced a new ultraportable CTX EzNote M303 (US$1999, release date 01Mar99) that only weighs 3.6 pounds. The device comes with a 300MHz Pentium MMX processor, a 3.2GB UDMA hard drive, 32MB SDRAM (expandable to 96MB), 12.1" color TFT display, 24X CD-ROM (hot swappable with a 3.5" disk drive), and a 56Kbps (V.90) fax/data modem. The EzNote M304 will also be available for US$2099 with 96MB of DRAM and a 4GB UDMA hard drive.

The Global Technology Business published for February 1999 examines "The eBook revolution: Right around the corner" on page 39 written by Raga Rao. The article notes that all the major publishers, including the audio book publishers, are working on "electronic book related projects." The major electronic book companies include EveryBook, Glassbook, Librius, NuvoMedia, and SoftBook Press. A draft specification (based on HTML and supported by Microsoft) is current under review that would make electronic book file specifications compatible between all vendors.

Ericsson has announced a new snap-on wireless fax/data modem called the "DI 27" for their GSM 1900 savvy Ericsson 600 or 700 series mobile phones. The modem can communicate using IrDA with Windows 95/98 equipped laptops, and with handheld devices running Windows CE, Psion, and Palm OS. For more information call 1-800-ERICSSON.

-Steve Holden (sholden@pencomputing.com)