The Digital Future

Looks Matter

While the personal computer industry has made great strides in function, form has largely been forsaken. Cabinets, monitors, keyboards, and mice are still beige and bland. We may be buying brand-new Ferraris, but for the most part, they still look like '85 Ford Escorts.

Some new systems--such as EMachines' EOne and high-end, all-in-one systems like NEC's Z1--exhibit cosmetic changes. But future concoctions may overhaul our perception of the PC by taking the machine out of the box. Intel, for instance, is touting the Ottoman PC, a high-concept home PC that packs a Pentium III system, a flip-up LCD, and a wireless keyboard into a funky footstool that's "inherently suitable next to any sofa or chair." Meanwhile, printer manufacturer Lexmark has partnered with the University of Kentucky College of Fine Arts to design a future office workspace. Among its stylish components: a see-through monitor, a folding wireless keyboard (which looks like a high-tech handbag) that you can tote around the office and use with any PC, a printer that sprays paper as well as ink from its cartridges, and a smart desk that senses your arrival and adjusts itself to your height.

Someday, these gizmos may become a reality. In the meantime, as long as computers continue to get smaller, faster, and more affordable, we shouldn't complain. By way of comparison, consider another highly popular market in which the goods have become steadily bigger, slower, and more expensive over the years: major-league baseball. Free-agent first basemen seldom, if ever, come with a warranty.

Display's the Thing

The near future of display technology can be summarized in three letters: LCD. Flat-panel LCD monitors have several advantages over CRTs: They're lighter, smaller, and capable of higher resolution. Unfortunately, for the next few years at least, LCDs will be prohibitively expensive for many users. Bob O'Donnell, research manager for PC displays with market research firm International Data Corporation, anticipates that 15-inch LCDs won't hit the $500 price point (down from the current $1000) until 2003. And they will still cost more than CRTs.

Nevertheless, flat panels are the future, and at least one company is looking to take them to the next level. Russ Wilcox is cofounder and vice president of EInk, a company that aims to produce flexible, paper-thin displays within five years. EInk's Immedia technology consists of liquid ink embedded in paper-thin plastic sheets. Microcapsules contain the ink, along with tiny white particles that respond to electrical impulses. A wireless antenna chip in the "paper" transforms radio waves into text and images.

Currently, EInk is field-testing display signs in Illinois and Massachusetts J.C. Penney stores. The signs--measuring 4 feet by 4 feet and made of foam core and plastic--receive an electric impulse that causes the text and images to change. The company also plans to create an electronic book within five years, with flexible, plastic "pages" that could display downloaded text and erase and reprint themselves. "[The book] would have hundreds of pages you can thumb through, in which all of the text can change," Wilcox says. Attach the book to your PC and it will download whatever you want to read.

IBM's Morris expects displays to evolve in another way: Instead of smaller, 2D displays, he envisions bigger, 3D images. "One obvious extension would be the projection display," he says. "You could project right onto the walls and live in a sea of data [that surrounds you]." Morris predicts 3D displays for games, entertainment, and even medicine (perhaps offering doctors much more comprehensive views of the body through 3D CAT scans and X rays, for example). Initially, such displays would be projected into glass or plastic cubes, but eventually they could stand on their own.