Long-time Mac peripheral and accessory maker Other World Computing made a number of new product announcements throughout the last week at CES.

He also noted that E3 offered a wealth of information for potential peripheral makers eager to see and literally size up next-generation game consoles from Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo.

"There are going to be a lot of measuring tools and spy cameras there," he said of some peripheral makers.

And under peripheral makers' arrangements with high-volume retailers, Zoom must grant a price cut on the stores' existing inventory every time it lowers the price of its product.

For this reason, some peripheral makers have begun selling limited external and internal Blu-ray drives to Mac users.

For now, the confusion over standards concerns computer and peripheral makers, software companies and the relatively few PC users who must plan far in advance.

They they would only have to charge the peripheral makers, who would gladly pay if they knew everyone had the ports available.

In their efforts to distinguish products that have increasingly become interchangeable, computer and peripheral makers are relying more on benchmark results, ostensibly objective measures of performance, such as processor speed.

The EISA system, also known as a data bus, is a proposed standard endorsed by 200 computer and peripheral makers.

However, the company apparently also has a third small, low-end, low-cost controller it expects to launch ahead of Cactus Ridge to spur Thunderbolt adoption among a wider range of peripheral makers.