InformationWeek

Software Delays Will Stall NetPCs

By Gregory Dalton , with Bob Francis , Mary Hayes and Karen M. Carrillo

f you're interested in buying NetPCs, the sealed-case thin clients that are expected to dominate this week's PC Expo in New York, be prepared to sink more money into your network to get the most out of them. And don't expect to be able to buy NetPCs before the end of the third quarter.

Though the NetPC specification is finished and systems are ready t o roll, the desktop platform is being held up by one key ingredient: software. Microsoft won't ship a key component, the Zero Administration Windows toolkit for Windows NT 4.0, until sometime in the third quarter.

Pricing for most of the units on display at PC Expo will start at less than $1,000 for a system with a 166-MHz Pentium processor but no monitor.Acer, Compaq, Dell, Digital, Gateway 2000, Hewlett-Packard, IBM, Packard Bell NEC, and Toshiba all plan to unveil NetPCs this week.

But Rod Franklin, service director of Entex Information Systems, an integrator in Rye Brook, N.Y., saysbuyers have to consider the costs of installing a network operations center to manage PCs, as well as the increased bandwidth necessary to handle the jump in network traffic. Down the road, Franklin adds, customers must plan for more redundancy in servers as applications are shifted to them.

A lack of supporting software has also held up Sun Microsystems. It hopes to cast a cloud over the NetPC party with the announ cement that there are now 15 "100% Pure Java" applications in development for its rival JavaStation network computer, scheduled to ship this fall.

Still, NetPCs have generated interest among many users. "The NetPC will reduce the overall cost of upgrades," says Richard Hausman, chief administrator at San Francisco law firm Sideman & Bancroft.

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