the MacGathering logoThe Regional Macintosh Gathering
Computer Expo for Southern California
Computer Expo & Seminars ~ May 14 -15, 2005
Pro Intensive Classes ~ May 13

MacGathering 2005 Exhibitors

MacGathering exhibits will be open both Saturday, May 14 & Sunday, May 15 from 10 - 6.
Admission to our Exhibit Hall (along with our free feature presentations) is $10 in advance or with an official coupon, or $20 at the door. Children 12 and under are free, up to 3 children per adult. Children under 15 must be accompanied by an adult unless otherwise pre-approved.

Every exhibitor will have chairs for you and will be there to sit down with you and address your particular needs and concerns. This is the best place to really get your questions answered! Learn whether you can work on Mac with someone else on Windows or vice versa. Learn whether a software will work for your business or do what you need it to do. Try the software, look through the book, preview the learning DVD.

Our seminars are staggered so, even if you're planning a full day of sessions, you'll have time to visit our exhibitors. Learn about an item in a session, then come right over to check it out. Learn about a product at the exhibits, then ask about it in a seminar.

Don't see a vendor you'd like us to have?

Here's who we have so far (and had time to post).
Of course, we've got more great vendors in the works.

   

Apple Computer — The Grove

The Apple store at The Grove is LA's flagship store, and you might not know this, but it's got an entire business staff. Come sit down with the store's business experts and learn how they can help your business.

Circus Ponies

Circus Ponies NoteBook helps you take notes, clip content, share information. Consider it your personal assistant.

Corel Painter

With its unparalleled painting ability, Painter is a popular choice for Hollywood creative professionals — and many others. Come learn all about its abilities. See what it can do for you. Learn how to get started with it. Get all of your questions answered. We'll have seats waiting for you and will be doing mini-classes throughout the weekend.

DriveSavers

[Description by Deb] When the worst happens to your computer and you need the data out of that mangled machine, DriveSavers is the place to turn. DriveSavers engineers take your drive apart, spin it in a clean room, locate your data and put it back together for you. That's no small feat. These guys really, really know hard drives. Actually, not just drives, but many types of storage media. Come visit with John Christopher to learn about the DriveSavers recovery process. He's the person to know if you ever need to recover your data from a damaged computer.

Wonder about the "care and feeding of your hard drive?" John regularly delivers this session at Macworld Expo. (Deb came up with it for MacFair LA; John created it.) Come learn all about it from John Christopher. Perhaps we'll set up some mini-sessions at the DriveSavers booth.

EazyDraw

EazyDraw is an affordable vector-based drawing application written in Cocoa, designed exclusively for Mac OS X. It's a drawing application for desktop publishing. It's an Illustration or drawing software application that offers vector-based graphics editing and creation capabilities for creating simple, non-photographic drawings, technical diagrams and illustrations such as logos, icons, buttons, and stylized art. Great for flow charts. Easy-to-use connectors, orthogonal paths, and an extensive selection of predefined shapes. Think MacDraw (ClarisDraw) on steroids. Drafting, DTP, Illustrations, Technical Drawings, Web Art, Organization Charts, Family Trees, House Plans, Math Curves.... It is useful for many creative projects including technical drawings, illustrations, icons, logos, and stylized text. Import from Claris Draw — full vector information including layers, paths, patterns, gradients, colors, text. Also imports MacDraw. A full palette of precise mathematical curves tools like sine waves, the bell-shaped probability curve, and many more. Check out our Math screen shot. Web designers. The OS X drawing application of choice for Engineers, Entrepreneurs, Artist, Hobbyist, and Educators. Favicon support coming soon.

Elgato

Elgato Systems creates award-winning products around the convergence of the Macintosh computer with home entertainment devices. Elgato’s products take advantage of the benefits of the Mac, allowing you to record, edit or share TV recordings, movies, photos, and music with the entertainment devices in your home.

Elgato brings you a diverse line of quality products. The highly acclaimed EyeTV series, the world leader in digital TV recording and High Definition TV for the Mac, EyeHome for playing Mac-based content across a home network, and EyeConnect for streaming Mac content to UPnP™ A/V digital media players in your home. EyeTV was recently awarded the US Macworld Magazine’s prestigious Eddy Award. Elgato products support the broadest range of global TV standards within the industry.

Elgato is at the forefront of positioning the Macintosh as the ultimate digital hub for your home entertainment.  

FileMaker Inc.

FileMaker Pro 7 is the easiest-to-use most customizable version of FileMaker that effortlessly manages even more of your information than ever before! FileMaker Pro 7 includes new and improved features that store or export more types of files, including pictures, movies, Word documents and Excel files; let you open multiple windows in a single database at the same time, and give you dramatically increased database capacity while consolidating all your tables into one file with the new relational model. And with its enhanced Web Publishing and advanced security features, you can extend richer solutions to the Web and know your valuable information is secure.

Final Draft

When your creative juices are flowing you want them to keep on going. Don't get hung up on formatting. The Final Draft family of products can handle that part for you — whether you're writing for screen or A/V. Final Draft is the number-one selling word processor specifically designed for writing movie scripts, television episodics and stage plays. It combines powerful word processing with professional script formatting in one self-contained, easy-to-use package. There is no need to learn about script formatting rules – Final Draft automatically paginates and formats your script to industry standards as you write.

Final Draft is also currently holding Big Break! their 6th Annual International Screenwriting Contest. Stop by and learn about it. You can enter through June 15th.

Fixamac Software

Having trouble printing in Mac OS X? Fixamac Software may have a solution. The ultimate in printing software diagnostics and repair for Mac OS X 10.1.2 through Mac OS X 10.3.x. Print Center Repair was the first product in the world designed exclusively for Mac OS X to combat printing issues at a software level. Need a solution for Panther? No problem. Printer Setup Repair is the evolution of the original design and is completely up to date with the latest technology.

Graphics Management Books: GM Books.com

GMBOOKS.com is the publishers of Mastering Nikon Compact Digital Cameras, Sony Cybershot, DSLR Nikon D-70 and the new Canon Digital Rebel 300D by best-selling author Peter Inova-a speaker at MAC Gathering.

Newest releases include, Digital Photography Tutor by Jerry Rabow, also a speaker at the gathering and Konica Minolta A1/A2/A200 by Gary Friedman. All of these eBooks were created on Macintosh computers. Visit our booth to meet Jerry Rabow and learn about his exciting and easy to use learning tools.

Founded in Los Angeles in 1985 by Anita and William Dorich, Graphics Management Press specializes in self-publishing of quality books.

Guitar Center

Are you curious about creating music on your Mac? Whether you're totally new to the concept, or you've been using Midi for years but need to update, or whatever your music-on-the-Mac level is, chance are the Guitar Center can help you out.

Consider our area on the show floor as your own personal midi school.

We invite you to come by and check out the possibilities of making music with your Mac.

iKlear

iKlear screen cleaner is a unique cleaner that safely cleans and replenishes your screen surface with a non-toxic, non-damaging, 3-step liquid polymer-based formula that lifts and dissolves contaminants and fingerprints from the surface of todays monitors and handheld devices, floating debris off the screen surface, leaving an anti-static coating that dramatically reduces surface friction, resists fingerprinting, and provides a renewable protective screen barrier.

iKlear product will be sold at special show prices so plan to stock up.

Intuit

Intuit is the most recognized name in financial management software for both Mac and Windows. From home bookkeeping to business they have you covered.

An addition to joining Intuit at their booth, you can learn about using their software for professional business accounting in a feature seminar. (Date and time soon to be posted.)

MacAlly

Mace Group/Macally Peripherals has designed and manufactured an innovative, premium line of computer Carrying Cases, Input devices, iPod Accessories, Multimedia devices and Mass Storage Solutions to suit your needs available in USB, Optical, Firewire, or Wireless configurations. Macally is devoted to bringing stylish comfort and performance to every Mac user.

They will be selling some low-priced refurbished and overstock items.

Deb's note: Most people mispronounce MacAlly's name so its significance gets lost. It's acutally Mac Ally, as in alliance; they are united with you in your Mac use.

MacSpeech

MacSpeech believes speech should be pervasive on the Macintosh and thus makes insanely great speech products for it. We provide products that help you control your Mac with your voice, speaking anywhere you normally type. We also feature quality headsets and other accessories to make life even easier.

MacSpeech employs software engineers previously responsible for the Macintosh’s first dictation software, PowerSecretary. Each of MacSpeech's senior engineers worked on that project for Articulate Systems; together they are considered the most experienced speech recognition engineers on the Mac. Our engineering team is rounded out by engineers who have worked on award-winning Macintosh products. Their collective experience includes some of the most extensive sound input experience on the Macintosh. Our development team has worked for Apple, Eastman Kodak, STF Technologies, Dragon Systems, and Wang, among others.

We teach computers how to listen! Come sit with us at our booth, see for yourself, and learn all about it.

MasterpieceBanner.com

Amazing quality banners for your event or business. (More description coming)

Micromat

Since 1989, Mac users have relied on Micromat for monitoring, diagnostic, troubleshooting, and repair utilities. Old-timers will remember Micromat's original monitoring and diagnostic utility, MacEKG™, which was used by NASA on Space Shuttle flight STS-51 to test the effects of microgravity on digital electronic equipment in space! That was the first time in history that NASA has performed such an experiment. Today, users look to TechTool Pro and Drive 10 to test and maintain their hard drive's health.

Microsoft — Mac Business Unit (MacBU) 

Stop by the Macintosh Business Unit booth to mingle with the people who build Office for Mac and Virtual PC. They are available to answer your questions and demonstrate how to get the most out of the latest MacBU products. You’ll also have the chance to roll-up your sleeves and take Office 2004 and Virtual PC for a test drive yourself!

Deb's note: If you're wondering how your program will perform in Windows XP on VPC, bring the installer with you. The guys may be able to install it so you can see for yourself.

The MacBU is a special sponsor of the Regional Macintosh Gathering.

MYOB

MYOB provides business financial managment software for both Mac and Windows. MYOB Certified Consultants, Nanci Lee and Debbie Koltun (winner of MYOB's Certified Consultant Of The Year Award and recipient of MYOB's first ever Certified Consultant Life Achievement Award) welcome your visit. Come sit down and learn what MYOB can do for you.

Other World Computing

Other World Computing has been providing quality hardware products and support to the Macintosh universe since 1988. The Illinois-based company operates the popular Macsales.com Web site, which features one of the largest online catalogs of computer enhancement products, including OWC’s own Mercury acceleration and FireWire product lines.

OWC representatives will be on hand to demonstrate some of the products available through OWC and answer your upgrade-related questions.

Peachpit

Peachpit is a long-time publisher of Mac-topic books. They were there for the Mac when many other publishers had given up. Now the Peachpit family includes a few other great imprints: the excelent New Riders, Adobe Press, Apple Certified, Macromedia Press, Lynda.com, TechTV, and even New Riders Games. Come by the booth, have a seat and browse through the books you think may help you.

Prosoft Engineering, Inc.

Prosoft Engineering, Inc. was established in 1985 and started out as an engineering services company doing contract work with many of Apple's key developers including Disney, Epson, HP, Intuit, Iomega, Microsoft, Sony, TDK and VST. Prosoft has licensed multiple technologies to Apple including disk utilities, plug-and-play drivers, CD burning software, drive setup, password protection and disk image mounting.

Prosoft's current line of networking and utility software products are engineered to empower users to effectively manage their data - including Netware Client for Mac OS X, Data Rescue, Data Recycler, Data Backup, Picture Rescue and Drive Genius.

RadTech

Founded in 1998, RadTech is an award-winning provider of digital solutions to the medical community. The company's large and growing client base also provides the perfect evaluation and testing environment for the development of practical and innovative hardware enhancements that improve the usefulness and lifespan of portable computers in the real world.

RadTech has been involved in creating Mac-based solutions for medicine and research for six years. We've been ruggedizing Macintosh notebooks for our demanding medical clients, and are now offering our solutions to the community at large. In the few short months since we began this venture, we've shipped thousands of our tools to PowerBook users the world over. At RadTech, we help your notebook computer withstand the rigors of your mobile digital life.

Software Cinema

Software Cinema brings you leading digital imaging experts who teach practical and proven Photoshop® techniques for Photography in vivid detail on CD or DVD and in our Training Camps around the U.S. and Canada.

Visit our booth to experience our CD and DVD training first-hand so you can know whether our training materials are the right fit for your learning needs. We'll have Jack Davis's How to Wow! Jack will be teaching two Wow! Photoshop classes on Saturday and will be at our booth before and after.

Wacom

Wacom pen tablets are the fastest, most comfortable way to work with your computer. They work great with all programs on a Mac or PC and over 100 software applications are specifically designed to be used with a Wacom pen. All Wacom tablets are built using Wacom's Penabled technology to give you the natural feel and superior performance of Wacom's patented cordless and battery-free tablet technology. Wacom's Penabled technology is the choice of all major Tablet PC manufacturers.

Come see the new Cintiq 21UX cordless, battery-free tablet on which you write directly on the screen! Also check out their Wacom Graphire Bluetooth Tablet, their Airbrush tablet, and the rest of their line. This is your opportunity to sit down at a computer and try the Wacom line for yourself.

 

Bloggers & Podcasters

Blogging and Podcasting are the two hottest methods for getting your message out to the public. Come by and meet some of the folks who are using these new mediums. Get ideas. Learn, etc.

 

Mac User Groups of So Cal

User groups offer exceptional benefits to members. As a Mac user, you can experience a feeling of connectedness by finding other Mac users in your community. Apple user groups are independent from Apple and run by volunteers. Joining is easy — just get in touch with a group near you.

The groups of the So Cal area will have info about their groups and perhaps a few members on hand to talk to you.

NOTE: If you run a group and would like to parti dcipate here, who you are.

Help Desk

During most of the Exhibit hours, we'll have a Help Desk open. Professional experts invite you to bring your questions, problems, and anything technical you might want to know!

  

Also...

World Without Borders will be on site, bringing the Mac Gathering to desktops around the world with its live chat. You can see them in action, right on the show floor.

This page was last updated May 2005.

Site & logo design by Deborah Shadovitz, all content copyright 2005 Deborah Shadovitz
Macintosh is a trademark of Apple Computer, Inc.
This is an independent event; it has not been authorized, sponsored, or otherwise approved by Apple Computer, Inc.