A duality of release for R-Comp’s Titanium-based products

Owners of R-Comp‘s TiMachine computers and subscribers to their Titanium Support Scheme can now benefit from two updates from the company. The first of these is an update to the Dual Monitor software, and the second is the release of the latest Super Pack – an update to the software provided with the computer or as part of the Support Scheme.

The Dual Monitor software takes advantage of the Titanium motherboard’s two DVI outputs to either drive two separate screens or, with the right monitor, to offer a cunning means to achieve a display that exceeds the board’s maximum of 2,048 horizontal pixels on each output. The right monitor, in the latter case, is one that can itself go beyond 2,048 pixels, has two suitable inputs, and the ability to split the display so that the input from one is displayed on the left of the screen, and the input from the other displayed on the right.

With such a monitor and the Dual Monitor software, the Titanium-based computer can split a RISC OS desktop that’s wider than 2,048 pixels and output half to one of the computer’s DVI outputs, and half to the other. The result is then a seamless display, and its as if the system were just driving a single monitor at a very high resolution.

Version 5 of the software, with the assistance of Fred Graute, brings a handy short cut to the computer: An Adjust-click on the Display Manager icon on the icon bar now switches between single and dual-monitor operation – this makes it that much quicker and easier to disable the second screen for compatibility with full-screen software (such as games) when necessary.

Super Packs are what R-Comp calls the updates they provide in one fell swoop to the software they supply either on the main drive of the computers they supply, or as an image that can be downloaded by subscribers to their support schemes. The latest pack for Titanium-based systems is Super Pack 12a, which weighs in at over 350MB – zipped down to around 130MB.

According to R-Comp’s Andrew Rawnsley, SP12a – to give it its much easier to type handle – represents an extensive overhaul of the supplied software, which goes hand-in-hand with the latest operating system release. He explained that:

SP12a combines essential updates to many programs to ensure compatibility with RISC OS 5.24 onwards, whilst introducing new software and enhancements such as VFP (hardware floating point) acceleration of a number of programs including video playback. TiMachine users can, for example, enjoy smooth playback of aspect-correct widescreen video in common formats like MPEG2, MP4 (H.264/AVC) and so on.

As you might imagine with 350MB of updates, there’s a huge amount of content (from updates to Zap/StrongED to programming tools, printing, graphics software, sound/music, video and so on), plus updates to much of the custom R-Comp software too.

Users of the TiMachine computers, as well as subscribers to the Titanium Support Scheme, are able to download both SP12a and the latest Dual Monitor software by visiting the users’ download site – full details of this and how to log in should be included in the material provided as part of the original purchase.

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