Apple

Perhaps the biggest "winner" at NABwas Apple, who without a doubt brought a certain buzz and excitement to an otherwise subdued event. Intel had tried to get some PR mileage out of making announcements about the Pentium 4 tied in with NAB, but frankly, it turned out to be hype that didn't translate into show floor buzz.

Apple's big announcement at NAB was their latest release of Final Cut Pro partnered with the latest real-time DV hardware from Pinnacle, Canopus and Matrox. Apple seems to have a killer combination. Real-time DV editing at prices starting under $5,000. An impressive showing, and by the swarms of folks mobbing the Apple booth it was evident that many people felt the same.

Aside from an impressive line up of hardware vendor support, Apple was also showing Final Cut Pro networked with storage area network (SAN) capabilities, thanks to their partnership with Transoft, Hewlett Packard's storage provider subsidiary.

According to Apple, there have been over 150 million downloads of QuickTime 4. In its first week of being available, Apple claimed QuickTime 5 had been downloaded 1.5 million times, a good indication it is being well received. QuickTime 5 was released for handling video, sound, animation, graphics, text, music, and immersive scenes. The latest version of QuickTime also supports MPEG-1 content, Flash 4, advanced digital video codecs, and DLS and SoundFonts for audio.

Apple has already amassed a very comprehensive line up of digital camera manufacturers that are integrating QuickTime technology into their products. More than 75 camera models playback content using QuickTime, of which 25 also capture short video clips in the QuickTime format. The company is going gangbusters with Final Cut Pro now that they have the hardware to back it up. Apple still manages to have a hold on its core audience in the media industry.