Bent on dominating virtually every arena of personal computing, Microsoft has set its sights on desktop video, an exploding market that until recently was the near-exclusive domain of the Apple Macintosh. The projections of industry pundits are startling: within five years virtually all non-linear editing will be done on Windows NT. Systems such as Avid and Media 100, having cut their teeth and matured into powerful multi-media tools on the Mac OS, will have migrated to NT, following the lead of other top-flight DV packages such as D-Vision Online, In:sync Speed-Razor, 3D Studio MAX and Lightwave 3D.

If the experts are right, video producers and animators accustomed to working on Macs face tough choices:

• Thumb your nose at Bill and stick with Macintosh. Sure, Apple may go the way of the dodo and Atari, but someone else will make Macs and Mac OS software, right?

• Stay with Mac for graphic design, but dedicate a Pentium running NT for off-line editing and 3-D animation. Compatibility problems? That's what workarounds are for.

• Consign your beloved Mac to the ash heap of history and make the Wintel switch, helping to fulfill Gates' vision of cyber hegemony.

Based on industry research and conversations with in-house and independent video producers in both the PC and Mac worlds, this article explores the ramifications of this sea change in DV:

• why the migration to NT appears inevitable;
  
• the pros and cons of NT software packages such as D-Vision and Lightwave;
  
• and survival strategies for IICS members as they gear up for digital editing and high-end 3-D animation.