Following through on October's promise to counter the Network Computer with a slimmed-down, centrally managed personal computer, Intel Corp. and Microsoft Corp. last week released the first draft of the NetPC reference specification, which contains guidelines for building Windows-based PCs designed to be less expensive and easier to manage than existing PCs.

If the specification, which was developed by Compaq Computer Corp., Dell Computer Corp. and Hewlett-Packard Co., meets industry approval, computers based on the design will be available as early as this summer, said Jesse Treger, NetPC platform marketing manager at Intel.

Although much of the attention surrounding "thin client" computers have focused on hardware, the most important feature of the NetPC specification calls for the installation of management software, Treger said. "One of the benefits of the NetPC is that you not only have a fully functional PC, you have this management capability as well."

Through built-in management features, businesses will be able to reduce the cost of owning personal computers by performing maintenance and upgrade tasks from a central station, Treger said. New centralized management features that will be available with the first NetPCs include remote troubleshooting and repair, configuration from a server and instant-on technology that will enable NetPCs to be turned on remotely in order to update software or perform maintenance. Additional capabilities will be added by software developers and Microsoft will incorporate management capabilities into future releases of Windows NT and Windows 95.

The NetPC, which was originally endorsed by about 100 companies from the PC industry, will support both Microsoft's Zero Maintenance Initiative and Intel's Wired for Management specification. WFM is a broader management specification designed to reduce the cost of maintaining PCs that can be applied to non-NetPC systems, Treger said. The least expensive of the NetPCs, which will be built around Intel's 133 megahertz Pentium processor, will start at slightly less than $1,000.

Source: Inter@ctive Week