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Technology Stocks : C-Cube -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Rarebird who wrote (27506)	1/5/1998 9:30:00 AM
From: Stoctrash	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 50808

Sony and NextLevel Plan Strategic Alliance to Develop Digital TV Technologies PARK RIDGE, N.J., and CHICAGO, Jan. 5 /PRNewswire/ -- NextLevel Systems Inc. (NYSE: NLV - news) and Sony today announced that they plan to form a strategic alliance, subject to definitive agreements, to jointly develop digital TV technologies. The companies are discussing future generations of digital cable TV devices and high definition television (HDTV) products, as well as incorporating new features like Sony's Home Network architecture into NextLevel's advanced digital set-top boxes. Both companies are exploring a broader business relationship and Sony, when definitive agreements are reached, will purchase 7.5 million new shares of NextLevel common stock (approximately five percent of the current outstanding) at a price of $25.00 per share. Two weeks ago, NextLevel announced that most of the leading cable system operators intend to purchase at least 15 million set-top boxes, valued at more than $4.5 billion over the next three to five years. At that time, NextLevel Systems announced that it is changing its name back to General Instrument Corporation. It is expected that the company's ticker symbol on the New York Stock Exchange will be changed to GIC on or about February 2, 1998. ''General Instrument has long enjoyed a leading position in analog cable equipment, and we are the only equipment supplier with a complete digital cable solution in the marketplace today,'' said GI Chairman and CEO Edward D. Breen. ''We believe that Sony's expertise in digital consumer electronics and its strong retail brand complement General Instrument's strengths, and will certainly be significant assets for the development of the next-generation digital set-top based on GI's platform.'' ''As a world leader in digital consumer electronics and the technological convergence of audio, video, computing and communications, we are particularly enthusiastic about the impact that digital television will have on our convergence strategy,'' said Yukio Kubota, deputy president of Sony Corporation's newly formed Digital Network Solutions Company, which oversees digital network related businesses including hardware and software technologies and services for digital distribution platforms. ''In the U.S., cable television will play an important role in bringing digital television to the consumer,'' added Gary Myer, president of Digital Network Solutions of America, a unit of Sony Electronics in the U.S. ''Sony and General Instrument will play key roles in the future digital cable and satellite TV business, and in bringing to market exciting, new digital products that are both cable and satellite consumer friendly.'' General Instrument is a world leader in the cable/satellite TV business, providing both analog and digital systems that offer video, audio and high- speed Internet/data services over cable television and satellite networks. It is the only company mass-deploying digital cable set-tops in the North American market. To date, some 700,000 have been shipped, and more than 500 headends have been deployed, passing more than 24 million households. Sony is a global leader of audio, video, television and information technology products and electronic components. With its music, film and video game businesses, Sony is also one of the world's top entertainment companies. The company has 163,000 employees worldwide and its consolidated annual sales for fiscal 1996 exceeded $45 billion. SOURCE: NextLevel Systems Inc.; Sony

To: Rarebird who wrote (27506)	1/5/1998 10:37:00 AM
From: Ian deSouza	Respond to of 50808

Rarebird, I think srvhap asked the question to see what you choose to ignore - fundamentals! And if that is being guilty of being "emotionally attached to a stock" then convict me.

To: Rarebird who wrote (27506)	1/5/1998 1:06:00 PM
From: DiViT	Respond to of 50808

Cube inside... More than Movies Poor, Alfred 01/06/98 PC Magazine Page 066 (COPYRIGHT 1998 Ziff-Davis Publishing Company) Copyright 1998 Information Access Company. All rights reserved. The Creative PC- DVD Encore is an affordable step up from first-generation DVD players and upgrade kits. DVD upgrade kits are still a brand-new product category, but Creative Labs has already come back for an encore. The new Creative PC- DVD Encore sets new standards for both performance and cost, with a stunningly low street price of $380. One of this kit's key features is its second-generation DVD drive with an IDE interface. Unlike the early drives, this new model has a dual read-head mechanism, enabling it to read CD-R disks--a feature we tested with a variety of CD-R media. The drive's speed is rated at 2X for DVD -ROM use at 2.7-MBps transfer rates and up to 20X (3-MBps) for CD-ROM access. There's more to the Encore than just faster disk speed, however. The kit includes an MPEG-2 decoder card based on Creative Labs' new DynamicXtended Resolution technology (also called Dxr2). The card has features that improve image quality while making the CPU and other system components minimal requirements. It combines the two interlaced fields of a standard TV signal and creates a single image that has twice the resolution twice as often. All of this makes for a stable and smooth picture. The card eliminates the combing effects of rapidly moving items in the image and improves image quality through scaling and filtering. It also has digital sound output for Dolby Digital AC-3 5.1-channel surround sound. Even though the card relies on an analog overlay (as do most DVD upgrade kits), with a pass-through cable for your graphics adapter, the installation and configuration process is a snap. The software automatically adjusts the analog overlay settings. The resulting images were steady and clear, whether viewed in a window or at full-screen settings (using the recommended 800-by-600 resolution). Images sent as composite video to a TV monitor were excellent--clearly better than any broadcast, cable, or VHS image. The PC- DVD Encore kit will also enhance your PC's performance. Though it didn't quite measure up to its specifications, we recorded a 2.07-MBps transfer rate for DVD -ROM access and 1.57 million bytes per second on the WinBench CD-ROM Sequential Reads test (2KB records). The result is speedy access to data in either format. If you decided to wait when the first set of DVD kits appeared, your restraint has been rewarded. There's no need to wait any longer, however, as the Creative PC- DVD Encore outperforms dedicated DVD players at an irresistible price. Creative PC- DVD Encore.Street price: $380. Creative Labs Inc., Milpitas, CA; 800-998-5227, 408-428-6600; www.creativelabs.com.

To: Rarebird who wrote (27506)	1/5/1998 2:02:00 PM
From: srvhap	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 50808

<<Why would you ask me questions when the answers I would give you are exactly what you don't want to hear?>> The only thing I don't want to hear is something about how the chicken bones tell you Cube is going to 8. Well, actually, I guess I would like you to say something like that. At least that way everyone would know that your feelings about Cubes future are based on nothing more then pure conjecture. I am just trying to get an idea about the rational that different people on this thread use to base the bullish or bearish case. regards,