Free Internet Tv Serial

with files from Jennifer M. O'Brien

Several PC companies have launched appliance-like Internet PCs for the enterprise market, but one may have an edge on the competition.

Compaq Computer Corp.'s entries into the field are called the iPaq and iPaq Legacy-Free. Ken Price, Compaq Canada Inc.'s manager of product marketing for the commercial PC group, says the devices fall somewhere between the typical desktop PC and a thin client.

"(It's) for customers who are willing to trade off some of the flexibility of the traditional PC architecture, but (who) don't want to give that local data storage," Price says.

The target audience, he says, is businesses that have examined the future upgrade requirements of their PCs and decided third-party functionality isn't part of it. He expects users of this kind of system to be a minority at first, but points to market research that says appliances should represent about 50 per cent of PC sales by about 2003.

Price says what makes systems like iPaq attractive to IS departments is they cost less -- both on initial price and management costs -- and they're easier to manage.

What Compaq has done, Price says, is eliminate ISA/PCI slots and, on the Legacy-Free version, serial and parallel ports. While the conventional means for expansion have been done away with, devices can still be added through the newer USB connectivity options.

The other significant difference is the multi-bay. Price says iPaq allows users to swap drives like available options on some laptop PCs. Users can simply pull out the floppy drive and insert a CD-ROM or DVD drive, or another hard drive.

"If you think about the ideal appliance, it's sort of like a TV set," Price says. "You take a TV out of the box, you plug it in, hook up the cable and Bob's your uncle -- you're done. And really the expectation of an iPaq should be measured against that kind of a thing."

Anne Bui, a consumer PC analyst with Framingham, Mass.-based IDC, says Compaq may have a jump on its competitors because of its earlier release date. Meanwhile, other PC makers are launching their legacy-free machines including Hewlett-Packard Co. (with its e-PC appliance-like desktop device), Dell Computer Corp. (with the release of the Webpc in the consumer market) and IBM's gear, which is part of the EON (edge of the network) line of systems. Rob Enderle, a senior analyst with Giga Information Group, says of all the players catering to this space, IBM and Compaq have been "more agressive in redefining the desktop market. "HP still seems to be following the other two."

COPYRIGHT 2000 Plesman Publications
COPYRIGHT 2000 Gale Group

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