What it is

   How it works

   Why it's better

   How it's used

   Who would use it
      Calling Michael Dell
      Calling Steve Jobs
   Who will win
   Why it's timely
   Green credentials
   How much would it cost
   Frequently Asked Questions
   Give me the details
   And there's more
   Patents pending
   To learn more

Retail
Kumar and Francesca descend under the plaza of the GM building into the 24/7 world of Apple magic.  Quickly, they are seduced by the must-have MacBook Pro, with its 17” LED-backlit display and 8 hour battery ensconced in a svelte, aluminum unibody enclosure.  Kumar, an alpha geek, eschews iWeb, and Dreamweaver to buy Textmate, Subversion, xScope, CSSEdit, Transmit, Xyle Scope, Linotype FontExplorer X, and Infinite Sushi ecto.  Francesca, an independent filmmaker and composer, gets Final Cut Studio 2 and Sibelius 5.  Five minutes after they enter their credit cards, two notebooks are delivered to the front of the store, identical but for their unique software loads, preinstalled. Exhilarated but exhausted by their intense shopping therapy, they happily duck around the corner to the Rouge Tomate.  Savoring their pistachio crepes, they bask contentedly in the amazing creativity that their purchases portend.  

Virtual PC

Dave works as an itinerant management consultant for McKinsey.  His motto is It’s easy to do.  He has a mild mien and CEOs hang on his every word.  Dawn each Monday morning, he goes through a security line to separately x-ray and then boot up his laptop, to satisfy a vigilant Homeland Security that he is not a terrorist.  Late Thursday evening, when he flies home, he goes through the same demeaning drill.  Dave is ecstatic when his old client Seagate partners with Citrix, and brings to market Freedom™, a virtual PC.  Dave rushes off to Best Buy to snag the sleek, titanium-shelled unit, packing a shockproof, 500GB, 7200rpm, USB 2.0 hard drive.  Its pocket-sized, four ounce heft makes his ultralight Voodoo Envy 133 feel like a boat anchor.  He buys Windows 7, Firefox 3, MS Office, Lotus Notes, Oracle Financial Analytics and Business Intelligence Suite, Primavera Project Planner, Adobe Acrobat 9, SmartDraw, Norton GoBack, and Mathematica 7 preinstalled from a selection of 1500 immediately available, preinstalled programs.  Now, he sails through airport check-in procedures, leaves his shoulder bag at home, stopped going to his chiropractor, and happily watches in-flight movies.  At work, he hotdesks at any available PC, at whatever client he finds himself.  All his applications, personal or confidential data, cookies, favorites, and browsing history stay on his drive, leaving no residue on a hosting PC. Best of all, desktop PCs are so much faster than any Centrino-powered notebook, that his programs execute effortlessly.

Personal Media Players
Sam is dating Rita.  He wants to give her a music mix that concisely expresses his feelings about their relationship.  He logs into the Apple iTunes web site and creates a 40 tune playlist.  When he finishes, he buys the songs as part of a happening, gift-wrapped, fuchsia 50 GB iPod mini that he gives to Rita over crème brûlée on their next dinner date.  That night, Sam gets very lucky.

Corporate IT

Gertrude manages internal IT audit for Amalgamated Widget.  With 15 million desktops deployed, AW is Hewlett-Packard’s largest global customer.  Gertrude must replace the notebook computer she lost at the Tulsa airport TGI Friday’s.  She logs into the HP web page on her company’s Intranet and enters her employee number.  HP receives a message with her job grade, department, and responsibilities and immediately overnights out to her a new Ethernet and Wi-Fi enabled Pavilion laptop, preloaded with the entire AW standard software configuration, the specific internally-developed, proprietary AW auditing software suite her department uses, as well as the PeopleSoft software suite she needs as a manager.  The order is priced according to the master AW purchase agreement and then automatically billed to her department.

Home Computing

Bill is tired of figuring out his income taxes by hand and wants to file them electronically.  He has a computer he can use at work, but doesn’t want to bring into the office his sensitive financial files.   He logs into the Dell web site and sees that they sell TurboTax for $15.  He’s happy because it costs twice that at the Intuit web site and the best price he could find on Google Product Search was five dollars more.  He decides he only needs a simple office suite, so he picks StarOffice 7 Office Suite for $20, figuring a $250 savings over Microsoft Office.  He realizes that he would like to research his family’s history.   Dell offers a choice of thirteen products.  After reading the accompanying reviews, he chooses Legacy, the cheapest at $15.  Feeling good, he splurges and buys a $200 copy of Adobe Illustrator ($500 list) for his artistic daughter to use.  He has the software preloaded onto a Dell Dimension 2900 priced at $500 with free 15” flat panel monitor, free inkjet printer, and free two-day shipping.  As he reviews his order, he realizes that his savings on software paid for the entire computer.  Dell is happy because offering the software drove a $750 sale, added a half to the selling price and doubled their profit margin.

Media Servers
Rick is putting the finishing touches on his new 11,500 square foot colonial in McMansion, Virginia.  His interior decorator suggests a central video server that would make his entire video collection instantly accessible from any room in his house.   He installs a Kaleidescape Server with 45 terabytes of RAID storage, with capacity of over 15,000 DVDs.  He buys it loaded with the 71 MGM musicals made from 1929 through 1941, the seven Preston Sturges movies made at Paramount, and the twelve Garry Marshall movies that include Hector Elizondo in the cast.  While spending a fortune on his video system, Rick saves 45 precious hours importing individual DVDs into his system.